Глава 7

Am.7:1–3. Show me the Lord God, and behold the offspring of the morning spring, and behold a caterpillar, only Gog is king. And it shall come to pass, when the poisonous grass of the earth is finished, and he says: Lord, Lord, be merciful: who will raise up Jacob? as if he is small. Repent of this, Lord: this too will not happen, says the Lord. Seeing this terrible sight, I begged God, says the Prophet, to be merciful and stop the destruction; but He did not favor, probably due to the excessiveness of lawlessness. “The offspring of spring” he called the king of Assyria; and the “caterpillar” of the king of Babylon. The words: “Gog is one king” mean the multitude of the army. Just as Gog, the king of the Scythian nations, says the Prophet, will gather a great multitude against Jerusalem, so the Assyrians and Babylonians will come with a great army. And God gave their fruits to the springs and the caterpillars, as well as the mosses; for this was predicted above. Am.7:4. The Lord showed me to this place, and behold, the Lord God called me into the fires, and I devoured the vast depth, and devoured some of it. In a word: “straight” the Prophet means God’s truthful verdict; He calls enemies “fire”; “by the many deeps” - countless peoples enslaved by them; and “part” of Israel. For blessed Moses also said so: “And the portion of the Lord became His people Jacob” (Deut. 32:9). And seeing this, says the Prophet, I offered the same prayer to the Master; but he did not beg Him. Am.7:7–9. Show me the Lord and behold a man standing on the fence of Adamants, and in his hand there is an Adamant. And the Lord said to me: What do you see Amos? and reh: adamant. And the Lord said to me: Behold, I will make adamant among my people Israel, whom I will not apply to him, and the treasury of laughter will be consumed, and the demands of Israel will be empty, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboaml with weapons. I will strike them, says God, with a strong and hard blow, like adamant, surpassing all substance in hardness and strength. For not only will I no longer tolerate the wickedness that they dared to go unpunished, but along with them I will destroy the altars to idols, and I will stop their holidays, in a word, I will crush their entire kingdom, because I called the kingdom “the house of Jeroboamlim.” This prophecy came true, not under Jeroboam, but after him and after the other six kings. Am.7:10. And Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to King Jeroboam of Israel, saying, Amos shall commit debauchery against thee in the midst of the house of Israel; the earth shall not be able to bear up all his words. When this was said by the Prophet, the Bethel priest Amaziah, fearing that the people, brought into fear by God's threats and having resorted to repentance, would leave the service of idols, and through this he would lose the opportunity to gain benefit for himself, denounces the Prophet to the king, adding a lie to the true words. Am.7:11. This is why Amos says: “Jeroboam will die with weapons, and the captive people will be taken away from their land.” As what was said concerning the people and the kingdom was true; what was said about the king is an obvious lie. However, this did not in the least prompt Jeroboam to scold the Prophet; so did not convince Amaziah to remain alone. On the contrary, He advised the Prophet to retire, live in Judea and predict the future there; because Bethel was the inheritance of the kingdom of Israel. But Amos speaks freely about his type of life and reveals the grace given to him from above. For he says: Am.7:14. I was not the Prophet, the son of the prophet was below, but the shepherd was beh, and he was picking off his buttocks 2 Instead of: “picking the buttocks,” Aquila translated: “looking for wild fig trees,” and Theodotion: “cleansing the mulberry tree,” and Symmachus: “having wild fig trees.” This is a genus of trees in Palestine; Blessed Evangelist Luke also mentioned him, saying that blessed Zacchaeus “climbed on his buttock” (Luke 19:4). I heard from someone who described the places there that the fruit of this tree does not ripen unless some small cut is made on it. This is probably what the seventy meant by using the word here: κν ί ζων instead of καρακῶν (purifying) or βυλλέγων (gathering). Therefore, Amos says: the Lord took me, who was engaged in farming and tending sheep, from the sheep and commanded me to prophesy. Therefore, listen, Amaziah, to the prophecy about yourself, since you forbid me to prophesy about Israel, fearing that I will put an end to your unjust enrichment. So, know this: you will see for yourself how the wife who now lives with you will be publicly and openly mocked by her enemies; because you also encouraged the people to the lewdness of idolatry, you will see that your newborns will be killed, and you yourself will end your life in a foreign land, and all the people will suffer the same punishment as you. And when this befalls you, your land will be given and crushed to others. The seventy says κν ό ζων i.e. cutting or piercing