John Calvin Commentary Amos 5:21-23

"I hate, I despise your feasts, and I will take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Yea, though ye offer me your burnt-offerings and meal-offerings, I will not accept them; neither will I regard the peace-offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols." — Amos 5:21-23 (ASV)

Here the Prophet, anticipating an objection, shows that the Israelites deceived themselves, because they believed that God was pacified by their sacrifices. He declares all these to be useless; not only, as I think, because they themselves were impure, but because all their sacrifices were mere profanations. We have said elsewhere that sacrifices are often reprehended by the Prophets when not accompanied by godliness and sincerity. For why did God command sacrifices to be offered to Him under the law, except as religious exercises?

Therefore, it was necessary that they should be accompanied with penitence and faith. But hypocrites thought, as we have seen, that they thereby discharged their whole duty; it was then a profanation of divine worship. Though the Jews, as to the external form, had not departed from the rule of the law, yet their sacrifices were corrupt and repudiated by God. "I cannot bear them—they are a weariness to me—I repudiate them—I loathe them"—these are expressions we meet with everywhere in Isaiah.

And yet hypocrites regarded their worship as conformable to the law; but impurity of heart vitiated all their works, and this was the reason that God rejected everything which the Jews thought available for holiness. But different, as I think, was the Prophet's intention. For it was not only for this reason that he blamed the Israelites—because they falsely invoked God’s name in their sacrifices—but because they were apostates. For they had departed from the teaching of the law and built for themselves a spurious temple.

It is still true that they were deluded with this false notion, that their sins were expiated by sacrifices. But God reproved the Israelites, not only for this gross error with which the Jews were also infected, but for having renounced His true and lawful worship. Hence, the external form of their worship deserved to be condemned, for it was not right to offer sacrifices except on Mount Zion. But they, without having the Ark of the Covenant, devised a worship elsewhere, and even there worshipped the calves.

We now understand the Prophet's intention, and this ought to be carefully observed. For interpreters think that the Prophet had nothing else in mind but to condemn a false presumption in the Israelites, because they sought to satisfy God with external sacrifices while they were still continuing obstinately in their sins. But the other evil ought to be added: that they had corrupted the true worship of God even in its outward form.

Having now pointed out the Prophet’s objective, I come to consider his words, I have hated, I have rejected, etc. The word חגג, chegig, means to leap and to dance; therefore חג, cheg, signifies a sacrifice as well as a festal day. Some then render the words, "I have rejected your sacrifices," and those which follow, thus, "I will not smell at your solemnities." Others render the last word, "assemblies." עצר, otser, means to restrain, and sometimes to gather; therefore עצרה, ostare, means an assembly or a congregation. But עצרת, osteret, means a festal day, because the people, as it is well known, were then restrained from work, and also because they were detained in the sanctuary.

But with respect to the subject itself, it makes little difference whether we read "assembly" or "a festal day." We see that what the Prophet meant was this: that God rejected all the rites by which the Israelites thought that He was pacified, as though they were the most effectual expiations. He does not simply declare that they were of no account before God; but he speaks much more strongly and says that God despised and abhorred them. "I regard," he says, "with hatred your festal days." He also speaks of burnt offerings.

When you offer Me sacrifices and your gift, etc. מנחה, meneche, properly means a gift of flour, which was an addition to the sacrifice, but it is often taken generally for any kind of offering.

It is indeed certain that the Prophet meant that however much the Israelites accumulated their ritual observances, they did nothing towards appeasing God, since they did not observe the law that was given them. They also turned their sacrifices to a wrong purpose, for they did not exercise themselves in piety and in the spiritual worship of God. On the contrary, they spread veils before God so that by presenting a fictitious form of worship, they might cover all their sins, for they thought themselves to be hidden from God.

This is the reason why the Prophet declares that these offerings would not be received by God, לא ארצה, la areste, I will not accept them. The Prophet no doubt alludes here to those promises which are to be found everywhere in the law, as he did when he said in the last verse, לא אריח, la arich, I will not smell. רוחה, ruch, means to smell; and Moses often uses the expression that God is delighted with the odor of sacrifices or with the smell of incense.

But when the Lord declares that odor is pleasant to Him, He means that it is so, provided the people sacrificed rightly—that is, when they brought not sacrifices as false veils to cover their sins, but as true and real evidences of their faith and repentance. God promised in that case that sacrifices would be a sweet odor to Him. Now, on the contrary, He declares that the perfume would not be acceptable to Him, nor sacrifices appeasing.

But sacrifices not only were acceptable to God, but also pacified Him. Since then the Lord had so often said that He would be propitious to His people when sacrifices were offered, it was necessary expressly to cut off this confidence from the Israelites when they did not deal faithfully with God. God never disappointed His true worshipers but always received them into favor, provided they approached Him in sincerity. But as these hypocrites dealt falsely with Him, they were necessarily disappointed of their hope, as the Prophet here declares.

"The peace-offerings of your fat things," he says, "I will not regard." God indeed promised in the law that He would regard their sacrifices provided they were lawful. But as the Israelites had in two ways departed from pure worship, God now justly says, I will not look on your sacrifices, nor on the peace-offerings of your fat things.

He calls them the peace-offerings of fat things, intimating that though the beasts were the choicest, they would not yet be acceptable to Him, for the Lord does not regard fatness, as He needs neither meat nor drink. Then, in a word, the Prophet here sets this fatness in opposition to true godliness and obedience too. In both respects there was, as we have seen, a defect among the Israelites, for they did not obey the law as to its outward requirements, and their hearts were impure and perverse; therefore, all their sacrifices were necessarily polluted and corrupt.

It follows, Take away from Me the multitude of your songs. By speaking of multitude, he aims at hypocrites, who toil much in their devices without measure or end, as we see done today by those under the Papacy. For they accumulate endless forms of worship and greatly weary themselves, morning and evening. In short, they spend days and nights performing their ceremonies, and everyone devises some new thing, and all these they heap together.

Since, then, men, when they have begun to turn aside from the pure word of God, continually invent various kinds of trifles, the Prophet here touches indirectly on this foolish laboriousness (stultan sedulitatem—foolish sedulity) when he says, Take away from Me the multitude of your songs. He might have simply said, "Your songs do not please Me;" but he mentions their multitude because hypocrites, as I have said, fix no limits to their outward ceremonies, and a vast heap especially follows when once they take to themselves the liberty of devising this or that form of worship. Therefore, God testifies here that they spend labor in vain, for He rejects what He does not command and whatever is not rightly offered to Him.

And the harmony of lyres, or of musical instruments. But נבל, nabel, was an instrument which, as to its kind, is unknown to us now. Take away, then, from Me the harmony of lyres; for the verb, take away, may refer to both clauses, though some connect them with the final verb, “לא אשמע, la ashimo, I will not hear.” The difference really is very little, but their view is the most probable who join together the two clauses, ‘Take away from Me the multitude of your songs and the harmony of lyres,’ with which you think Me to be delighted. They afterwards take לא אשמע, I will not hear, by itself. But I do not contend about such minute things; it is enough to know the Prophet's intention.