I want to begin this morning by saying that the Bible has a lot to tell us about the personality of sheep in comparison to people. Two good examples are Psalm 23 and Isaiah 53:6, which says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way.” Sheep are portrayed as being not too smart, having to rely on a shepherd to keep them from doing things to harm themselves; and they are total herd animals with no ability to think for themselves. They just go along with the crowd. Now, you rarely see the Bible refer to people as cattle, but cattle might be a much better comparison.
I grew up around cattle. I used to be quite comfortable with them; but then I learned that, like people, they will turn on you and you should never let your guard down. If you startle them, they will stampede through a fence to get away; and then when they realize that you’re not the boogey man, the whole herd will turn and come after you! Cattle can actually “catch each other’s feelings” in what’s called “emotional contagion,” and they can learn behavior from each other as well.(1) In people, we can see a similarity with cattle being demonstrated right now, as emotion is leading to rioting, and criminal behavior is being learned and repeated just about everywhere.
It’s been said that “a herd of cows is very much like a pack of wolves, with alpha animals and complex social dynamics.”(2) For example, “there is often one cow in the herd who is seen as the boss and who dictates behavior to the rest of the cows. Any cows that don’t follow the leader will become isolated from the herd.”(3) I’ve met people who are good at bossing others around, and pushing them to the side of they don’t conform. In fact, our entire society is getting to where those who don’t comply are being ostracized and cancelled.
“Cows have the ability to discriminate shapes, colors and individuals within the herd.”(4) I’ve noticed that cattle tend to stick with those of their own color. If there happens to be one white cow among a group of black ones, then the white cow is usually pushed aside. People tend to discriminate on the basis of color as well, and that’s one of the reasons why we’re seeing so much civil unrest in our nation. With people it’s called racism. I guess with cattle it should be called “breedism.” Right?
In the book of Amos we’re going to see some more bovine behavior demonstrated in the nation of Israel – a nation that had stubbornly strayed from the Lord – and if the people failed to repent, then they would be led away as cattle to the slaughter. So, we’re going to begin our passage by looking at the “cows of Bashan.”
The Cows of Bashan (vv. 1-3)
1 Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to your husbands, “Bring wine, let us drink!” 2 The Lord GOD has sworn by His holiness: “Behold, the days shall come upon you when He will take you away with fishhooks, and your posterity with fishhooks. 3 You will go out through broken walls, each one straight ahead of her, and you will be cast into Harmon,” says the LORD.
Here, we encounter a shocking use of words, as Amos referred to some women as “cows.” Some people will use this passage to argue that the Bible is sexist, but women are often viewed in a positive light in the Scripture. Allow me to refer to the New Testament, for example, where we see women holding vital roles of leadership in the early church. In Acts 18:24-26, Pricilla, along with her husband Aquila, “taught” Apollos. So, women were teachers. In Romans 16:1-2, the word “servant” used to describe Phoebe is diakonos, where we get the word “deacon.” So, we can infer that women are able to serve as deacons. In Philippians 4:2-3, Euodia and Syntyche, who are both women, were serving as missionaries; and in Luke 2:36-38, we even see Anna, who is described as a “prophetess.”
This passage in Amos has nothing to do with demeaning the female gender. In fact, in Psalm 22:12 and Ezekiel 39:18, we see negative references to the bulls of Bashan, which are talking about sinful men. Amos was addressing one particular group of women, and calling them out for their sin. The expression “cows of Bashan” is a symbol for some manipulative and abusive Israelite women; and Amos implied that these women were the trendsetters and leaders in Israelite society.(5) They were “the wives of the wealthy [male] leaders of the land, [men] who had gotten rich by ruthlessly and illegally robbing others. These ‘society women’ lounged around all day, drinking wine and telling their husbands what to do.”(6)
So, “why did Amos, the farmer, use this [particular] image?” Warren Wiersbe says that it was “not because these women were overweight and looked like cows, but because by their sins they were fattening themselves up for the coming slaughter. Both they and their husbands were living in luxury, while the poor of the land were suffering, because these same men had exploited them and robbed them of money and land.”(7) But much of the exploitation committed by the men was prompted by their wives, as the wives worked through their husbands.
The cows of Bashan wielded a great deal of power by influencing the policies and practices of the public offices held by men. We see an example of this kind of influence in 1 Kings 21:1-16. We read where king Ahab wanted the vineyard of Naboth, but Naboth refused to give it to him, and so he went home depressed. When his wife, Jezebel, saw how sad he was, she wrote letters in Ahab’s name, and sealed them with Ahab’s signet to have Naboth summoned and accused by false witnesses as having blasphemed God; for which he was stoned to death. Ahab then went in and took possession of Naboth’s vineyard.
This kind of corruption is known as the Jezebel spirit, which is said to be prevalent in the last days. In Revelation 2:20, Jesus declared to the church of Thyatira, “I have a few things against you, because you allow that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce My servants to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols,” and He went on to say of those who followed her ways as having “known the depths of Satan” (Revelation 3:24). In the Old Testament, as soon as Ahab married Jezebel, he began to serve and worship the false god known as Baal. Jezebel led people to commit sexual immorality and to offer their food to idols.
One part of the Jezebel spirit is women rising to positions of power and leading the charge in immoral practices and policies. In his commentary on Amos, John Ritenbaugh says, “In the United States, women have traditionally been the guardians of moral standards. In general, women have had high standards, while many men have held double standards. Amos, however, shows that the women of his day had slipped so far that they were leading the pack in immorality. And in America, the same is true. Women are becoming just as immoral as men . . . and when they begin to [act like these men], a nation is on its way down very rapidly.”(8)
Another part of the Jezebel spirit has to do with adulterating ourselves spiritually with the ways of the world – as the people of God and as a nation. In Revelation 2:22, Jesus said of the church of Thyatira, “Indeed I will cast her into a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of their deeds.” The adultery Jesus mentioned was spiritual adultery; straying from their one true love (like the church of Ephesus had done back in verse 4) to join themselves to the false gods and Baals of this world such as money, power and influence.
Revelation 2:20 in the NIV says, “You tolerate that woman Jezebel.” The church of Thyatira “tolerated” Jezebel’s doctrine. In contrast, Ephesus was commended, back in Revelation 2:2, for not tolerating wicked people. Thyatira was criticized for allowing sinful heresies to come into the body of Christ. In a word, the Jezebel spirit is “tolerant.” In an article I read on how the church becomes tolerant, here are some points made from looking at the church of Thyatira. The tolerant church 1.) has a desire to fit in with the culture, 2.) fails to rightly define sin, 3.) forsakes absolute truth for relativism, and 4.) fails to take a stand for truth.(9) We’re seeing all these things in the church of America today, and it indicates that we are in the same condition as Israel during Amos’ time.
So, what will happen to the cows of Bashan? Well, “what do farmers eventually do with cattle that have been fattened up? They lead them away to be killed and butchered. Amos described what would happen when the Assyrians invaded Israel, how they would capture these women and treat them like cattle. The Assyrian practice was to put hooks in the noses or lower lips of their prisoners, attach ropes, and lead them away like animals, either to captivity or to death. This is what the enemy would do to the wealthy matrons Amos was addressing in his message.”(10)
Verse 3 says the cows of Bashan will be “cast into Harmon.” But the King James Version says, “Ye shall cast them into the palace.” The word translated as “palace” was the Hebrew word harmown. The King James Version changed the first letter of the word to a common Hebrew noun for royal fortresses. However, the original word Harmon is meant to be a proper place name. The problem is that no one knows where Harmon is located. But what we do know is that many people were taken away captive by the Assyrians, so the term Harmon represents being uprooted and carried away.
I must point out that the Hebrew word harmown sounds similar to the Hebrew word hamown, which means “tumult” and “confusion,”(11) and the prophets often made use of word-plays to get their message across; so, Amos could have been saying that they would be hurled into confusion.(12)
Hypocrisy in Their Worship (vv. 4-5)
4 “Come to Bethel and transgress, at Gilgal multiply transgression; bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days. 5 Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, proclaim and announce the freewill offerings; for this you love, you children of Israel!” says the Lord GOD.
“The prophet used holy irony [here] when he spoke these words, for he later instructed them to do just the opposite. It’s as though a pastor today said to his congregation, ‘Sure, go ahead and attend church, but by attending, you’re only sinning more. Go and visit the . . . Bible conferences, but by doing so, you will be transgressing more. Your heart isn’t serious about knowing God or doing His will. It’s all just playacting; it’s the popular thing to do, so you [should just go right ahead and] do it.”(13)
“Bethel was a very special place to the Jewish people because of its associations with Abraham and Jacob. At one time, the ark was kept at Bethel, but in Amos’s day it was the site of ‘the king’s chapel’ where Amaziah, the priest, served. Gilgal was also important to Israel, because that’s where Joshua and the people camped when they first entered the Promised Land. Gilgal is also where Saul was made king of Israel. Unfortunately, both of these places had become shrines, where the people worshipped pagan gods while claiming to worship the Lord.”(14)
“On the surface, it looked as if Israel was experiencing a religious revival. Crowds of people were flocking to the ‘holy places,’ bringing their sacrifices and tithes, and even singing songs of praise to the Lord. They offered sacrifices more frequently than the law required as if to prove how spiritual they were. But their gifts and [their] songs didn’t impress the Lord, for He saw what was in their hearts; and the sin in their hearts made their sacrifices unacceptable.”(15)
In Amos 5:21-24, we read where the Lord said, “I hate, I despise your feast days, and I do not savor your sacred assemblies. Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings, I will not accept them, nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings. Take away from Me the noise of your songs, for I will not hear the melody of your stringed instruments. But let justice run down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.” Justice, in the form of God’s judgement, is what would take place if the people failed to repent of their hypocrisy and idolatry.
Harbingers Warning to Repent (vv. 6-11)
6 “Also I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities. And lack of bread in all your places; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD. 7 “I also withheld rain from you, when there were still three months to the harvest. I made it rain on one city, I withheld rain from another city. One part was rained upon, and where it did not rain the part withered. 8 So two or three cities wandered to another city to drink water, but they were not satisfied; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD. 9 “I blasted you with blight and mildew. When your gardens increased, your vineyards, your fig trees, and your olive trees, the locust devoured them; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD. 10 “I sent among you a plague after the manner of Egypt; your young men I killed with a sword, along with your captive horses; I made the stench of your camps come up into your nostrils; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD. 11 “I overthrew some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were like a firebrand plucked from the burning; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the LORD.
In verse 6, “cleanness of teeth” had nothing to do with shiny, healthy teeth; but rather, it meant that at some point the people had no food to eat. This language represents how the Lord sent a famine at some time in their history. An article in The Guardian headlines, “Corona Virus Pandemic Will Cause Famine of Biblical Proportions,” and states that “more than 30 countries in the developing world could experience widespread famine.”(16) Now, that might not happen here in the U.S., but even if it did, our response would probably be like that of the Israelites: they did not return to the Lord. I mean, if 9-11 didn’t bring our nation to its knees, then a famine probably wouldn’t either.
Verses 7-8 speak of a severe lack of rain. You’ve no doubt experienced a drought before. We actually had one here in central Kentucky just last summer where it didn’t rain for over two months, and everything withered and turned brown. But during that drought, there were places where it would break out and rain, while we stood watching the clouds from a distance; and I heard some people ask if we had done something wrong spiritually. But then we have the nerve to say that it’s just a coincidence when the rain falls in one place and not another. And maybe that’s true on a small scale, but not with what God described here; how He made it rain on one city, but not another. Sometimes the Lord is the one who sends a drought on account of sin. So, what was our reaction last summer after enduring a drought? Well, it was probably like that of the Israelites: they did not return to the Lord.
Verse 9 speaks of blight and mildew. In Amos 5:11, we read, “Though you have built houses of hewn stone, yet you shall not dwell in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink wine from them.” The privileged upper class were taking their ill-gotten gains and spending it on luxurious houses and large vineyards, but the Lord said that He sent blight and mildew on their vineyards and crops. Mildew got into my garden toward the end of the summer, and the plants withered and the melons rotted, so I know firsthand what mold can do. If that were to happened to a farmer today and ruin their entire crop, what would be their likely response? Well, they would probably get ahold of the USDA for financial relief. No need to depend on the Lord when Uncle Sam is there to bail us out! So, at some point, God sent blight and mildew on their vineyards, and even locusts; but they did not return to the Lord.
Take a look at verse 10. I think by now we’re all familiar with the plague, because that’s what the Corona Virus is. Right now, were approaching 1,125,000 deaths worldwide from Covid-19, and 220,000 in the United States. We can point the finger and blame China or try to hold President Trump responsible; or perhaps, we can take a hard look at ourselves and ask if we have lived so contrary to the ways of God that He has allowed this to happen; not only to us, but the entire world. “One of God’s promises was that His people would not experience the dreadful diseases they saw in Egypt if they were faithful to obey His law;(17) but if they rebelled against Him, they would suffer all the diseases of Egypt.(18) So, apparently the Lord had at some point allowed a plague to come upon His people; and what was their response? They did not return to the Lord.
We also see the mention of how they were defeated in war. The last one hundred years in our country seems like nothing but a string of meaningless and endless wars. I’m not sure we’ve even seen a lot of what you would call victories; you just see a lot of coffins being unloaded from military planes. And it shouldn’t be surprising, being that a lot of these wars are driven by corrupt politicians who fit the bill of those whom Amos described. So, the Israelites suffered such a large defeat that the dead bodies in the camps were not even given a decent burial, but they instead lay there and rotted; and even after this, the people did not return to the Lord.
In verse 11, we read how God overthrew some of the people, comparing it to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Perhaps what brought about this calamity was that the people were taking part in the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah. So, what were those sins? Jude 1, verses 5 and 7, says, “But I want to remind you . . . that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe . . . as Sodom and Gomorrah . . . having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.”
So, the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah were sexual immorality and going after strange flesh. Where the Jezebel spirit is present, sexual immorality is too. 1 Kings 16:31 says of King Ahab that “he took to wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal, and worshipped him.” The website Bibletools.org says this: “Amos 2:7 describes a deliberate act of ritual prostitution in a pagan temple: ‘A man and his father go in to the same girl, to defile My holy name.’ What was the rationale behind this perverse, immoral act?” It stemmed from Baal worship. “Since Baal was, like almost all ancient deities, a fertility god, the human act of intercourse demonstrated that they wanted Baal to prosper them. But what was its real effect on the participants and the nation? Ritual prostitution only served to erode the family, eventually leading to the destruction of the nation.”(19)
Romans 1:26-27 gives us an idea of what going after strange flesh is, for we read that “God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise, also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.” So, at some point God sent some kind of calamity on the people; and “the image of a [firebrand or] stick pulled out of the fire suggests that the Lord intervened and saved them at the last minute. They had been burned but not consumed . . . [and so] their ingratitude and hardness of heart was even more wicked,”(20) and they did not return to the Lord.
Get Ready for Judgment (vv. 12-13)
12 “Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel; because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!” 13 For behold, He who forms mountains, and creates the wind, who declares to man what his thought is, and makes the morning darkness, who treads the high places of the earth – the LORD God of hosts is His name.
Often when I’m driving down the road, I see signs that say, “Prepare to meet thy God.” Well, here’s where that statement comes from. “Israel had experienced famine, drought, blight, plagues, wars, and devastating catastrophes as God had tried to speak to His people and bring them to repentance. No matter what discipline He sent, they would not return to Him. [So], what more could He do? [Well], He could come Himself and deal with them! “Prepare to meet [your] God, O Israel!” (v. 12) was not a call to repentance, but an announcement that it was too late to repent. The Lord of Hosts (armies) Himself would come with the Assyrian hordes and take the people away like cattle being led to the slaughter (v. 2).”(21) In Amos 5:17, the Lord declared, “There will be wailing in all the vineyards, for I will pass through your midst, says the LORD” (NIV).
Time of Reflection
Warren Wiersbe says of verse 13, “Amos ended his message with a doxology of praise to the Lord. When a servant of God praises the Lord in the face of impending calamity, it shows he’s a person of great faith. In this doxology, he reminds us that our God is the Creator who can do anything, including making the earth out of nothing. He can turn dawn into darkness; He can tread upon the mountains, and nobody can hinder Him. He is also the omniscient God who knows what we are thinking. Thus, there’s nothing we can hide from Him. He is the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of heaven and earth! But are God’s people any more prepared today?”(22) You know, that’s a good question.
So, I want to close this morning by asking you, “Are you prepared to meet God?” Hebrews 12:23 calls the Lord “God the Judge of all,” and we read in 1 Peter 4:5 that all people “will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” If you want to be ready to meet God on the Day of Judgement, then you need to do what Israel failed to do, which is return unto Him. Returning unto God is called “repentance.” It is “doing a 180” from the course that you are presently on, being determined not to go that way again, and then heading straight into the arms of Christ.
Acts 3:19 declares, “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” Romans 10:9-10 tells us how to be saved from our sins when godly sorrow leads us to repentance: “If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”
NOTES
(1) Christina M. Colvin, Kristin Allen, Lori Marino, “Thinking Cows: A Review of Cognition, Emotion, and the Social Loves of Domestic Cows,” Farm Sanctuary: https://www.farmsanctuary.org/content/uploads/2017/10/TSP_COWS_WhitePaper_vF_web-v2.pdf (Accessed October 20, 2020).
(2) “The Hidden Lives of Cows,” PETA: https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming/cows/hidden-lives-cows/ (Accessed October 20, 2020).
(3) “10 Things to Love About Cows,” OneGreenPlanet: https://www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/things-to-love-about-cows/ (Accessed October 20, 2020).
(4) Colvin, Allen, Marino.
(5) John W. Ritenbaugh, Prepare to Meet Your God: The Book of Amos, Part 1 (1995).
(6) Warren Wiersbe, “The Complete Old Testament in One Volume,” The Wiersbe Bible Commentary (Colorado Springs: David C. Cook, 2007), p. 1423.
(7) Ibid., p. 1423.
(8) Ritenbaugh.
(9) Pilgrim Benham, “The Five Ways a Church Becomes Tolerant: The Church of Thyatira,” calvarychapel.com: https://calvarychapel.com/posts/five-ways-a-church-becomes-tolerant-the-church-of-thyatira (Accessed October 19, 2020).
(10) Wiersbe, p. 1423.
(11) Blue Letter Bible.
(12) There is a location that contains the Hebrew word hamown, the word for “confusion,” which is the valley of Hamon Gog, mentioned in Ezekiel 39:11. This was “the name given to a valley of graves; ravine or glen, now known as ‘the ravine of the passengers,’ located on the east side of the Dead Sea.” Ezekiel describes it as “the valley of those who pass by east of the sea” and says that “it will obstruct travelers, because there they will bury Gog and all his multitude” (Ezekiel 39:11). Now, Ezekiel prophesied a few hundred years after Amos, so Harmon cannot be associated with Hamon Gog; but on a prophetic level, this speaks to us of how those who depart from the Lord will be led into confusion and ultimately death.
(13) Wiersbe, p. 1423.
(14) Ibid., p. 1423.
(15) Ibid., p. 1423.
(16) “Corona Virus Pandemic Will Cause Famine of Biblical Proportions,” The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/apr/21/coronavirus-pandemic-will-cause-famine-of-biblical-proportions (Accessed October 19, 2020).
(17) Exodus 15:26.
(18) Wiersbe, p. 1424; Leviticus 26:23–26; Deuteronomy 28:21–22, 27–29, 35, 59–62).
(19) “What the Bible Says about Temple Prostitutes,” Bibletools.org: https://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/cgg/ID/7112/Temple-Prostitutes.htm
(20) Wiersbe, p. 1425.
(21) Ibid., p. 1425.
(22) Ibid., p. 1425.
