And he said what he
felt he must say with a noble freedom, with a true independence such as
the grace of God alone can give. Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, who was
worshipping (absurd as it may seem to us) God and the golden calf at the
same time in King Jeroboam's court, complained loudly, it would seem, of
Amos's plain speaking. How uncourteous to prophesy that Jeroboam should
die by the sword, and Israel be carried captive out of their own land!
Let him go home into his own land of Judah, and prophesy there; but not
prophesy at Bethel, for it was the king's chapel and the king's court.
Amos went, I presume, in fear of his life. But he left noble words
behind him. "I was no prophet," he said to Amaziah, "nor a prophet's
son, but a herdsman, and a gatherer of wild figs. And the Lord took me
as I followed the flock, and said, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel."
And then he turned on that smooth court-priest Amaziah, and pronounced
against him, in the name of the Lord, a curse too terrible to be repeated
here.
Now what was the secret of this inspired herdsman's strength? What
helped him to face priests, nobles, and kings? What did he believe?
What did he preach? He believed and preached the kingdom of God and His
righteousness; the simple but infinite difference between right and
wrong; and the certain doom of wrong, if wrong was persisted in.
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