Albert Barnes Commentary Amos 6:8

"The Lord Jehovah hath sworn by himself, saith Jehovah, the God of hosts: I abhor the excellency of Jacob, and hate his palaces; therefore will I deliver up the city with all that is therein." — Amos 6:8 (ASV)

The Lord God - He who alone is and who alone has power, “has sworn by Himself,” literally, “by His soul,” as our “self” comes from the same root as “soul.”

Jerome says: “So God says in Isaiah, Your new moons and your appointed feasts My soul hateth (Isaiah 1:14); not that God has a soul, but that He speaks in the manner of human feelings. Nor is it any wonder that He condescends to speak of Himself as having a soul, seeing He speaks of Himself as having the other members—feet, hands, bowels—which are less precious than the soul. In God the Father, the head, hands, and the rest are not members; rather, by these words a diversity of powers is expressed. So also by the soul is intended not a substance, but the inward affections and the seat of thought by which God indicates His Will.”

In truth, it is one and the same condescension in Almighty God to use of Himself any words taken from our nature—our thoughts, acts, feelings—as those taken from the members of the body.

It is an even greater condescension that God should confirm the truth of His word by an oath. For we call God to witness, lest, because of the vast reign of falsehood among people, we should be thought not to speak the truth.

But for God to act as though He needed the assurance of an oath in order to be believed is more condescending than for Him to speak as though He had a soul or limbs, such as He gave to man.

Yet God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of His promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath. He swore by Himself saying, surely blessing I will bless thee (Hebrews 6:17, Hebrews 6:13–14).

“Now,” when Israel had, by apostasy, forfeited that blessing, and a portion of it was to be withdrawn from him, God affirms by an oath that rejection of Israel.

If the words, “by His soul,” are emphatic, they relate to those attributes in God of which man’s holy affections are an image. God’s love, justice, righteousness, and holiness were concerned, to vindicate the oppressed and punish the oppressor. To these He appeals. Our oaths mean, “As God is true, and as He avenges untruth, what I say is true.” So God says, “As I am God, this is true.” God then must cease to be God, if He did not hate oppression.

I abhor the excellency of Jacob - The word “excellency” is used of the Majesty of God Himself; then, since man’s relation to God is his only real greatness, God speaks of Himself as “the Excellency of Jacob” (Amos 8:7); then of that “excellency” which God had given to “Jacob” (Psalms 47:4). That “excellency of their strength,” He had forewarned them in the Law, that He would break (Leviticus 26:19).

Now that Israel took as his own what he held from God, his “excellency” became pride, and God says, “I abhor” it, as a thing loathsome and abominable, and “hate his palaces.” For they had been built, adorned, inhabited, and filled with luxury, in the midst of oppression and through hard-hearted exaction. He calls them Jacob, perhaps as Hosea does (Hosea 12:12), to remind them of the poverty and low estate of their forefather, from which God had raised them, and the faithfulness of their forefather in that state, in contrast to their luxury and unfaithfulness.

Therefore (And) I will deliver up - Originally, “shut up” (Leviticus 14:23; Leviticus 13:4–5, and so on), then, “shut up in the hands of,” so that he should have no escape. Here, where the enemy is not spoken of, it may mean, that God “shut up the city,” so that there should be no going out or coming in, in the severity of the siege, upon which follows the fearful description of the ravages of the pestilence. “The city” is, what was to them, above others, “the” city, the place of their luxury, pride, and boast, where their strength lay, Samaria.