Amos 5 Footnotes

5:25 The Lord’s rhetorical question about Israel’s offering sacrifices in the wilderness expected the answer, “No, we did not.” This answer would fit the context in which the Lord found the many sacrifices of the people offensive because of the injustice the nation had come to tolerate. But this appears to contradict passages that show that Israel did offer sacrifices during the wilderness wanderings (Ex 24:4-8; Nm 7). One suggestion is that Israel did not sustain her relationship with the Lord by regularly offering these sacrifices. But Scripture nowhere else indicates that the Israelites did not offer sacrifices in the wilderness, and the presence of the tabernacle suggests that they did so frequently. Another solution places the main emphasis of the passage with to me, so that the Lord was saying, “It was not to me that you offered sacrifices.” The reference to false gods in the following verse (“Sakkuth” and “Kaiwan,” v. 26) would support this view.

Either Israel’s worship in the wilderness had been insincere, or it had consisted of idolatrous practices. If the Lord expected the answer “yes” to his rhetorical question, the meaning of his statement would be, “Indeed you did offer sacrifices and grain offerings in the wilderness, but now you will take up your idols, since you have rejected me, and I will send you into exile.”