Armenia in comments -- Book: Amos (tAmos) Ամոս
Searched terms: amalek
tAmos 1:11 Edom - God had impressed on Israel its relation of brotherhood to Edom. Moses expressed it to Edom himself , and, after the suspicious refusal of Edom to allow Israel to march on the highway through his territory, he speaks as kindly of him, as before; "And when we passed by from our brethren, the children of Esau" Deu 2:8. It was the unkindness of worldly politics, and was forgiven. The religious love of the Egyptian and the Edomite was, on distinct grounds, made part of the law. "Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite, for he is thy brother: thou shalt not abhor an Egyptian; because thou wast a stranger in his land" Deu 23:7. The grandchild of an Egyptian or of an Edomite was religiously to become as an Israelite Deu 23:8. Not a foot of Edomite territory was Israel to appropriate, however provoked. It was God's gift to Edom, as much as Canaan to Israel. "They shall be afraid of you, and ye shall take exceeding heed to yourselves. Quarrel not with them, for I will give you, of their land, no, not so much as the treading of the sole of the foot, for I have given Mount Seir unto Esau for a possession" Deu 2:4-5.
From this time until that of Saul, there is no mention of Edom; only that the Maonites and the Amalekites, who oppressed Israel Jdg 6:3; Jdg 10:12, were kindred tribes with Edom. The increasing strength of Israel in the early days of Saul seems to have occasioned a conspiracy against him, such as Asaph afterward complains of; "They have said, come and let us cut them off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance. For they have consulted together with one consent, they are confederate against Thee; the tabernacles of Edom and the Ishmaelites; of Moab and the Hagarenes; Gebal and Ammon and Amalek; the Philistines with the inhabitants of Tyre; Assur also is joined with them; they have been an arm to the children of Lot" Psa 83:4-8. Such a combination began probably in the time of Saul. "He fought against all his enemies on every side; against Moab, and against the children of Ammon, and against the king of Edom, and against the Philistines" Sa1 14:47.
They were "his enemies," and that, round about, encircling Israel, as hunters did their prey. "Edom," on the south and southeast; "Moab" and "Ammon" on the east; the Syrians of "Zobah" on the north; the Philistines on the west enclosed him as in a net, and he repulsed them one by one. "Whichever why he turned, he worsted" them. It follows "he delivered Israel out of the hands of them that spoiled them" Sa1 14:48. The aggression was from Edom, and that in combination with old oppressors of Israel, not from Saul . The wars of Saul and of David were defensive wars. Israel was recovering from a state of depression, not oppressing. "The valley of salt" Sa2 8:13, where David defeated the Edomites, was also doubtless within the borders of Judah, since "the city of salt" was Jos 15:62; and the valley of salt was probably near the remarkable "mountain of salt," 5 56 miles long, near the end of the Dead Sea , which, as being Canaanite, belonged to Israel. It was also far north of Kadesh, which was "the utmost boundary" of Edom Num 20:16.
From that Psalm too of mingled thanksgiving and prayer which David composed after the victory, "in the valley of salt" (Psa 60:1-12 title), it appears that, even after that victory, David's army had not yet entered Edom. "Who will bring me into the strong city? who will lead me into Edom?" Psa 60:9. That same Psalm speaks of grievous suffering before, "in" which God had "cast" them "off" and "scattered" them; "made the earth tremble and cleft it;" so that "it reeled" Psa 60:1-3, Psa 60:10. Joab too had "returned" from the war in the north against the Syrians of Mesopotamia, to meet the Edomites. Whether in alliance with the Syrians, or taking advantage of the absence of the main army there, the Edomites had inflicted some heavy blow on Israel; a battle in which Abishai killed 18,000 men Ch1 18:12 had been indecisive. The Edomites were relpalsed by the rapid counter-march of Joab. The victory, according to the Psalm, was still incomplete Ch1 18:1, Ch1 18:5, Ch1 18:9-12. David put "garrisons in Edom" Sa2 8:14, to restrain them from further outbreaks. Joab avenged the wrong of the Edomites, conformably to his character Kg1 11:16; but the fact that "the captain of the host" had "to go up to bury the slain" (Kg1 11:15. It should be rendered, not, after he had slain, but, and he killed, etc.), shows the extent of the deadly blow, which he so fearfully avenged.
The store set by the king of Egypt on Hadad, the Edomite prince who fled to him Kg1 11:14-20, shows how gladly Egypt employed Edom as an enemy to Israel. It has been said that he rebelled and failed . Else it remained under a dependent king appointed by Judah, for 1 12 century (Kg1 22:47; Kg2 3:9 ff). One attempt against Judah is recorded Ch2 20:10, when those of Mount Seir combined with Moab and Ammon against Jehoshaphat after his defeat at Ramoth-gilead. They had penetrated beyond Engedi Ch2 20:2, Ch2 20:16, Ch2 20:20, on the road which Arab marauders take now , toward the wilderness of Tekoa, when God set them against one another, and they fell by each other's hands Ch2 20:22-24. But Jehoshaphat's prayer at this time evinces that Israel's had been a defensive warfare. Otherwise, he could not have appealed to God, "the children of Ammon and Moab and mount Seir, whom Thou wouldest not let Israel invade when they came out of the land of Egypt, but they turned from them, and destroyed them not, behold, they reward us, to come to cast us out of Thy possession, which Thou hast given us to inherit" Ch2 20:10-11.
Judah held Edom by aid of garrisons, as a wild beast is held in a cage, that they might not injure them, but had taken no land from them, nor expelled them. Edom sought to cast Israel out of God's land. Revolts cannot be without bloodshed; and so it is perhaps the more probable, that the words of Joel, "for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land" Joe 3:19, relate to a massacre of the Jews, when Esau revolted from Jehoram Kg2 8:20-22. We have seen, in the Indian Massacres, how every living being of the ruling power may, on such occasions, be sought out for destruction. Edom gained its independence, and Jehoram, who sought to recover his authority, escaped with his life by cutting through the Edomite army by night Kg2 8:21. Yet in Amaziha's time they were still on the offensive, since the battle wherein he defeated them, was again "in the valley of salt" Kg2 14:7; Ch2 25:11, Ch2 25:14.
Azariah, in whose reign Amos prophesied, regained Elath from them, the port for the Indian trade Ch2 26:2. Of the origin of that war, we know nothing; only the brief words as to the Edomite invasion against Ahaz, "and yet again had the Edomites come, and smitten in Judah, and carried captive a captivity" Ch2 28:17, attest previous and, it may be, habitual invasions. For no one such invasion had been named. It may probably mean, "they did yet again, what they had been in the habit of doing." But in matter of history, the prophets, in declaring the grounds of God's judgments, supply much which it was not the object of the historical books to relate. "They" are histories of God's dealings with His people, His chastisements of them or of His sinful instruments in chastising them. Rarely, except when His supremacy was directly challenged, do they record the ground of the chastisements of pagan nations. Hence, to those who look on the surface only, the wars of the neighboring nations against Israel look but like the alternations of peace and war, victory and defeat, in modern times. The prophets draw up the veil, and show us the secret grounds of man's misdeeds and God's judgments.
Because he did pursue his brother - The characteristic sin of Edom, and its punishment are one main subject of the prophecy of Obadiah, inveterate malice contrary to the law of kindred. Eleven hundred years had passed since the birth of their forefathers, Jacob and Esan. But, with God, eleven hundred years had not worn out kindred. He who willed to knit together all creation, human beings and angels, in one in Christ Eph 1:10, and, as a means of union, "made of one blood all nations of people for to dwell on all the face of the earth" Act 17:26, used all sorts of ways to impress this idea of brotherhood. "We" forget relationship mostly in the third generation, often sooner; and we think it strange when a nation long retains the memories of those relationships . God, in His law, stamped on His people's minds those wider meanings. To slay a man was to slay a "brother" Gen 9:5.
Even the outcast Canaan was a brother Gen 9:25 to Shem and Ham. Lot speaks to the men of Sodom amidst their iniquities, "my brethren" Gen 19:7; Jacob so salutes those unknown to him Gen 29:4. The descendants of Ishmael and Isaac were to be brethren; so were those of Esau and Jacob Gen 16:12; Gen 25:18. The brotherhood of blood was not to wear out, and there was to be a brotherhood of love also Gen 27:29, Gen 27:37. Every Israelite was a brother ; each tribe was a brother to every other Deu 10:9; Deu 18:2; Jdg 20:23, Jdg 20:28; the force of the appeal was remembered, even when passion ran high Sa2 2:26. It enters habitually into the divine legislation. "Thou shall open thy hand wide unto thy brother Deu 15:11; if thy brother, a" Hebrew, sell himself to thee Deu 15:12; thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray and hide thyself from them Deu 22:1-4; if thy brother be waxen poor, then shalt thou relieve him, though a stranger and a sojourner, that he may live with thee" (Lev 25:35-39; add Lev 19:17; Deu 24:7, Deu 24:10, Deu 24:14).
In that same law, Edom's relationship as a brother was acknowledged. It was an abiding law that Israel was not to take land, nor to refuse to admit him into the congregation of the Lord. Edom too remembered the relation, but to hate him. The nations around Israel seem to have been little at war with one another, bound together by common hatred against God's people. Of their wars indeed we should not hear, for they had no religious interest. They would be but the natural results of the passions of unregenerate nature. Feuds there doubtless were and forays, but no attempts at permanent conquest or subdual. Their towns remain in their own possession . Tyre does not invade Philistia; nor Philistia, Tyre or Edom. But all combine against Israel. The words, "did pursue his brother with the sword," express more than is mentioned in the historical books.
To "pursue" is more than to fight. They followed after, in order to destroy a remnant, "and cast off all pity:" literally, and more strongly, "corrupted his compassions, tendernesses." Edom did violence to his natural feelings, as Ezekiel, using the same word, says of Tyre, "corrupting Eze 28:17 his wisdom," that is, perverting it from the end for which God gave it, and so destroying it. Edom "steeled himself," as we say, against his better feelings," his better nature," "deadened" them. But so they do not live again. Man is not master of the life and death of his feelings, anymore than of his natural existence. He can destroy; he cannot re-create. And he does, so far, "corrupt," decay, do to death, his own feelings, whenever, in any signal instance, he acts against them. Edom was not simply unfeeling. He destroyed all "his tender yearnings" over suffering, such as God has put into every human heart, until it destroys them. Ordinary anger is satisfied and slaked by its indulgence; malice is fomented and fed and invigorated by it. Edom ever, as occasion gratified his anger; "his anger did tear continually;" yet, though raging as some wild ravening animal, without control, "he kept his wrath for ever," not within bounds, but to let it loose anew. He retained it when he ought to have parted with it, and let it loose when he ought to have restrained it.
"What is best, when spoiled, becomes the worst," is proverbial truth. : "As no love wellnigh is more faithful than that of brothers, so no hatred, when it hath once begun, is more unjust, no odium fiercer. Equality stirs up and inflames the mind; the shame of giving way and the love of preeminence is the more inflamed, in that the memory of infancy and whatever else would seem to gender good will, when once they are turned aside from the right path, produce hatred and contempt." They were proverbial sayings of paganism, "fierce are the wars of brethren" , and "they who have loved exceedingly, they too hate exceedingly." : "The Antiochi, the Seleuci, the Gryphi, the Cyziceni, when they learned not to be all but brothers, but craved the purple and diadems, overwhelmed themselves and Asia too with many calamities." Amos 1:12 tAmos 1:13 Ammon - These who receive their existence under circumstances, in any way like those of the first forefathers of Moab and Ammon, are known to be under physical as well as intellectual and moral disadvantages. Apart from the worst horrors, on the one side reason was stupefied, on the other it was active in sin. He who imprinted His laws on nature, has annexed the penalty to the infraction of those laws. It is known also how, even under the Gospel, the main character of a nation remains unchanged. The basis of natural character, upon which grace has to act, remains, under certain limits, the same. Still more in the unchanging east. Slave-dealers know of certain hereditary good or evil qualities in non-Christian nations in whom they traffic. What marvel then that Ammon and Moab retained the stamp of their origin, in a sensual or passionate nature? Their choice of their idols grew out of this original character and aggravated it.
They chose them gods like themselves, and worsened themselves by copying these idols of their sinful nature. The chief god of the fierce Ammon was Milehem or Molech, the principle of destruction, who was appeased with sacrifices of living children, given to the fire to devour. Moab, beside its idol Chemosh, had the degrading worship of Baal Peor Num 25:1-3, reproductiveness the counterpart of destruction. And, so. in fierce or degrading rites, they worshiped the power which belongs to God, to create, or to destroy. Moab was the seducer of Israel at Shittim Num 25:1-3. Ammon, it has been noticed, showed at different times a special wanton ferocity . Such was the proposal of Nahash to the men of Jabesh-Gilead, when offering to surrender, "that I may thrust out all your right eyes and lay it for a reproach unto all Israel" Sa1 11:1-3.
Such was the insult to David's messengers of peace, and the hiring of the Syrians in an aggressive war against David Sa2 10:1-6. Such, again, was this war of extermination against the Gileadites. On Israel's side, the relation to Moab and Ammon had been altogether friendly. God recalled to Israel the memory of their common descent, and forbade them to war against either. He speaks of them by the name of kindness, "the children of Lot," the companion and friend of Abraham. "I will not give thee of their land for a possession, because I have given it unto the children of Lot for a possession" Deu 2:9, Deu 2:19. Akin by descent, their history had been alike. Each had driven out a giant tribe; Moab, the Emim; Ammon, the Zamzummim Deu 2:10-11, Deu 2:20-21. They had thus possessed themselves of the tract from the Arnon, not quite half way down the Dead Sea on its east side, to the Jabbok, about half-way between the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee . Both had been expelled by the Amorites, and had been driven, Moab, behind the Arnon, Ammon, behind the "strong border" Num 21:24 of the upper part of the Jabbok, what is now the Nahr Amman, "the river of Ammon," eastward.
The whole of what became the inheritance of the 2 12 tribes, was in the hands of the Amorites, and threatened very nearly their remaining possessions; since, at "Aroer that is before Rabbah" Jos 13:25, the Amorites were already over against the capital of Ammon; at the Arnon they were but 2 12 hours from Ar-Moab, the remaining capital of Moab. Israel then, in destroying the Amorites, had been at once avenging and rescuing Moab and Ammon; and it is so far a token of friendliness at this time, that, after the victory at Edrei, the great "iron bedstead" of Og was placed in "Rabbah of the children of Ammon" Deu 3:11. Envy, jealousy, and fear, united them to "hire Balaam to curse Israel" Deu 23:4, although the king of Moab was the chief actor in this Num. 22-24, as he was in the seduction of Israel to idoltary Num 25:1-3. Probably Moab was then, and continued to be, the more influential or the more powerful, since in their first invasion of Israel, the Ammonites came as the allies of Eglon king of Moab. "He gathered unto him the children of Ammon and Amalek Jdg 3:13. And" they "served Eglon." Yet Ammon's subsequent oppression must have been yet more grievous, since God reminds Israel of His delivering them from the Ammonites Jdg 10:11, not from Moab. There we find Ammon under a king, and in league with the Philistines Jdg 10:7, "crashing and crushing for 18 years all the children of Israel in Gilead." The Ammonites carried a wide invasion across the Jordan against Judah, Benjamin and Ephraim Jdg 10:9, until they were subdued by Jephthah. Moab is not named; but the king of Ammon claims as my land Jdg 11:13, the whole which Moab and Ammon had lost to the Amorites and they to Israel, "from Arnon unto Jabbok and unto Jordan" Jdg 11:13.
The range also of Jephthah's victories included probably all that same country from the Arnon to the neighborhood of Rabbah of Ammon . The Ammonites, subdued then, were again on the offensive in the fierce siege of Jabesh-Gilead and against Saul (see above the note at Amo 1:11). Yet it seems that they had already taken from Israel what they had lost to the Amorites, for Jabesh-Gilead was beyond the Jabbok ; and "Mizpeh of Moab," where David went to seek the king of Moab Sa1 22:3, was probably no other than the Ramoth-Mizpeh Jos 13:26 of Gad, the Mizpeh Jdg 11:29 from where Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites. With Hanan, king of Ammon, David sought to remain at peace, on account of some kindness, interested as it probably was, which his father Nahash had shown him, when persecuted by Saul Sa2 10:2.
It was only after repeated attempts to bring an overwhelming force of the Syriains against David, that Rabbah was besieged and taken, and that awful punishment inflicted. The severity of the punishment inflicted on Moab and Ammon, in that two-thirds of the fighting men of Moab were put to death Sa2 8:2, and fighting men of "the cities of Ammon" Sa2 12:31 were destroyed by a ghastly death, so different from David's treatment of the Philistines or the various Syrians, implies some extreme hostility on their part, from which there was no safety except in their destruction. Moab and Ammon were still united against Jehoshaphat 2 Chr. 20, and with Nebuchadnezzar against Jehoiakim Kg2 24:2, whom they had before sought to stir up against the king of Babylon Jer 27:3. Both profited for a time by the distresses of Israel, "magnifying" themselves "against her border" Zep 2:8, and taking possession of her cities after the 2 12 tribes has been carried away by Tiglath-pileser. Both united in insulting Judah, and (as it appears from Ezekiel Eze 25:2-8), out of jealousy against its religious distinction.
When some of the scattered Jews were reunited under Gedaliah, after the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, it was a king of Ammon, Baalis, who instigated Johanan to murder him Jer 40:11-14; Jer 41:10. When Jerusalem was to be rebuilt after the return from the captivity, Ammonites and Moabites Neh 2:10, Neh 2:19; Neh 4:1-3, "Sanballat the Horonite" (that is, out of Horonaim, which Moab had taken to itself Isa 15:5; Jer 48:3, Jer 48:5, Jer 48:34.) "and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite," were chief in the opposition to it. They helped on the persecution by Antiochus (1 Macc. 5:6). Their anti-religious character, which showed itself in the hatred of Israel and the hire of Balaam, was the ground of the exclusion of both from admission "into the congregation of the Lord forever" Deu 23:3. The seduction of Solomon by his Ammonite and Moabite wives illustrates the infectiousness of their idolatry. While he made private chapels "for all his strange wives, to burn incense and sacrifice to their gods" Kg1 11:8, the most stately idolatry was that of Chemosh and Molech, the abomination of Moab and Ammon . For Ashtoreth alone, besides these, did Solomon build high places in sight of the temple of God, on a lower part of the Mount of Olives Kg2 23:13.
They have ripped up the women with child in Gilead - Since Elisha prophesied that Hazael would be guilty of this same atrocity, and since Gilead was the scene of his chief atrocities , probably Syria and Ammon were, as of old, united against Israel in a war of extermination. It was a conspiracy to displace God's people from the land which He had given them, and themselves to replace them. The plan was effective; it was, Amos says, executed. They expelled and "inherited Gad" Jer 49:1. Gilead was desolated for the sins for which Hosea rebuked it; "blood had blood." It had been "tracked with blood" (see the note at Hos 6:8); now life was sought out for destruction, even in the mother's womb. But, in the end, Israel, whose extermination Ammon devised and in part effected, survived. Ammon perished and left no memorial.
That they might enlarge their border - It was a horror, then, exercised, not incidentally here and there, or upon a few, or in sudden stress of passion, but upon system and in cold blood. We have seen lately, in the massacres near Lebanon, where male children were murdered on system, how methodically such savageness goes to work. A massacre, here and there, would not have "enlarged their border." They must haw carried on these horrors then, throughout all the lands which they wished to possess, making place for themselves by annihilating Israel, that there might be none to rise up and thrust them from their conquests, and claim their old inheritance. Such was the fruit of habitually indulged covetousness. Yet who beforehand would have thought it possible? Amos 1:14