Article October 21, 1939 Issue

Bible Notes

"Seek ye me, and ye shall live: but seek not Beth-el, nor enter into Gilgal, and pass not to Beer-sheba" (Amos 5:4, 5)—Beth-el, Gilgal, and Beer-sheba had long been three of the chief sanctuaries of Palestine, but we gather from a perusal of Amos' book that in his day the tendency, particularly among the people of northern Israel, was to make attendance at these holy places a substitute for inward holiness and true religion. In fact, he affirmed that the people came to Beth-el and Gilgal to "transgress" (Amos 4:4) rather than to worship there. It is of interest to compare Amos' stress upon the inwardness of true religion with the announcement of Christ Jesus to the effect that true worship was not to be confined within the limits of Jerusalem, the sacred city of the Jews, nor of Mount Gerizim, the sacred mountain of the Samaritans, for "the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth" (John 4:21–23).

"Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion" (Amos 5:8)—"The seven stars" was a name often applied in early English literature to the Pleiades, and the translators of our Common Version sometimes rendered the Hebrew word "kimah" as "the seven stars" (as here), though in Job 9:9 and Job 38:31, where that constellation is again mentioned with Orion, the rendering is "Pleiades" (ef. Driver: Joel and Amos, p. 179).

"Establish judgment in the gate" (Amos 5:15)—In the Old Testament period, the "gate" of the city was considered usually as the center of civil, business, and forensic activity. Thus we find Boaz going to the gate of the city when he was going through the legal procedure preparatory to his marriage with Ruth (Ruth 4:1); while Absalom "stood beside the way of the gate" that he might be in a position to see anyone who "come to the king for judgment" (cf. II Sam. 15:2). Smith renders: "Establish justice at the gate."