Amos 5:27 | |
27. Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the Lord, whose name is the God of hosts. | 27. Et migrare faciam vos ultra Damascum, dicit Jehova, Deus exercituum nomen ejus. |
Here the Prophet at last denounces exile on the Israelites as though he had said that God would not suffer them any longer to contaminate the Holy Land, which had been given them as an heritage, on the condition that they acknowledged him as the only true God. God had now, for a long time, borne with the Israelites though they had never ceased to pollute his land with superstitions. He comes now to cleanse it.
It follows,
Prayer.
Grant, Almighty God, that as thou seest us to be so prone to corrupt superstitions, and that we are with so much difficulty restrained by thy word, -- O grant, that we being confirmed by thy Spirit, may never turn aside either to the right hand or to the left, but be ever attentive to thee alone, and not worship thee presumptuously, nor pollute thy worship with our outward pomps, but call on thee with a sincere heart, and, recumbing on thy aid, flee to thee in all our necessities, and never abuse thy holy name, which thou hast designed to be engraven on us, but be conformed to the image of thy Son, that thou mayest be to us truly a Father, and that we may be thy children, in the name of the same Christ our Lord. Amen.
1 Here is another instance in which the meaning and not the words, is given by Stephen in Acts 7:43. In this instance, the Septuagint is the same with the Hebrew text, "beyond Damascus;" but Stephen says, "beyond Babylon." The same quarter is meant, though the name of the place is different.--Ed.
2 There seems to be a peculiar propriety in introducing this sentence. The Israelites became the worshippers of the hosts of heaven; then the Prophet says, that Jehovah is the God of Hosts. What folly, then, it was to worship the hosts of heaven, and to forsake the God of them!--Ed.