“Thus saith Jehovah; For three transgressions of Moab, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime: but I will send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the palaces of Kirioth: and Moab shall die with tumult, with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet” (vs. 1-2). It would seem that 2 Kings 3:26-2726And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was too sore for him, he took with him seven hundred men that drew swords, to break through even unto the king of Edom: but they could not. 27Then he took his eldest son that should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall. And there was great indignation against Israel: and they departed from him, and returned to their own land. (2 Kings 3:26‑27), contains the fact alluded to, which most like Josephus have misinterpreted. “His eldest son” means the eldest son of the king of Edom, the heir-apparent and probably joint king, whom the king of Moab threatened to burn, and did burn his bones, when Israel refused to raise the siege.
Followed by God’s Dealing in General With Judah and Israel
After this we come in Amos 2:44Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have despised the law of the Lord, and have not kept his commandments, and their lies caused them to err, after the which their fathers have walked: (Amos 2:4) to the solemn announcement that God must deal with Judah as with their Gentile neighbors. With God sin admits of no respect of persons any more than righteousness. “For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn back.” Here Jehovah’s law was broken and lies or idolatries were trusted.
Lastly, we come (vss. 6-8) to Israel’s transgressions. Here there are apparently four classes of wickedness: hard selfishness (summum jus summa injuria, we may perhaps say); covetous grinding of the poor; licentious profanity; and idolatrous revelry. The prophet sets before them the gracious and faithful care of God both in the land and before it in Egypt, to shame them (vss. 9-10), and His choice of their sons to be prophets and Nazarites; and what had they done? (vss. 11-12). Patience was over; no resources should keep or deliver. “Behold I am pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves. Therefore the flight shall perish from the swift, and the strong shall not strengthen his force, neither shall the mighty deliver himself: neither shall he stand that handleth the bow; and he that is swift of foot shall not deliver himself. And he that is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day, saith Jehovah” (vss. 13-16). Israel had failed as a nation before God; and certainly the righteousness that punished the heathen would not spare a more privileged people who bore His name. Yet we find that in these two chapters there is only a general dealing laid down, preparatory to all the details which follow. And this is the more remarkably shown by the fact that from Amos 3 what is special is said of the two houses or the whole family of Israel.
There is more henceforth than dealing generally with Judah and Israel. It was no small dishonor that they should come into the list of guilty nations in and around Palestine scourged for repeated transgressions always ending with the worst. But if Judah and Israel had sunk to the level of the Gentiles, this does not hinder His preferring a peculiar indictment against them, both as a whole and separately. Thus, though there was in Amos 1-2 The general inclusion of Judah and Israel with the heathen round about them, in Amos 3 we come to what is far closer, more serious and characteristic, for they are here viewed as distinguished from their neighbors.