Amos 5:21

21 I hate, and have rejected your festivities: and I will not receive the odour of your assemblies.

Amos 5:21 Meaning and Commentary

Amos 5:21

I hate, I despise your feast days
Kimchi thinks this is said, and what follows, with respect to the kingdom of the house of Judah, which kept the feast the Lord commanded; but it is not necessary so to understand it; for doubtless the ten tribes imitated the worship at Jerusalem, and kept the feasts as the Jews did there, in the observance of which they trusted; but the Lord rejects their vain confidence, and lets them know that these were no ways acceptable to him; and were so far from atoning for their sins, that they were hated, abhorred, and despised by him, being observed in such a manner and with such a view as they were; and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies;
a sweet savour of rest, as in ( Genesis 8:21 ) ; take no pleasure in their duties and services performed, in their solemn assemblies convened together for religious purposes, nor accept of them; but, on the contrary, dislike and abhor them; see ( Isaiah 1:11-14 ) .

Amos 5:21 In-Context

19 As if a man should flee from the face of a lion, and a bear should meet him: or enter into the house, and lean with his hand upon the wall, and a serpent should bite him.
20 Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not light: and obscurity, and no brightness in it?
21 I hate, and have rejected your festivities: and I will not receive the odour of your assemblies.
22 And if you offer me holocausts, and your gifts, I will not receive them: neither will I regard the vows of your fat beasts.
23 Take away from me the tumult of thy songs: and I will not hear the canticles of thy harp.
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