Amos 6:1

This chapter continues the further elaboration of the prophetic doom pronounced upon Israel at the conclusion of Amos 2. First, he uttered the second woe over the careless and indulgent leaders of the nation, sunk in their revellings and indifference (Amos 6:1-6). For them, he pronounced their destruction and the overthrow of their nation (Amos 6:7-11), emphasizing that they had acted perversely, trusting in their own power (Amos 6:12-14). The blunt reiteration of their doom in Amos 6:14 concludes this section of the prophecy.

In the first sub-section of the chapter (Amos 6:1-6), "The link word is first."[1] They considered themselves first among the nations (Amos 6:1); they only used the finest oils (literally, first)[2] (Amos 6:6); and then in the first line of the second section is revealed the fact that they shall also be first into captivity (Amos 6:7). The whole chapter is pointed squarely at the over-confidence and conceit of the nation, as exhibited in its evil leaders.

Amos 6:1

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion, and them that are secure in the mountain of Samaria, the notable men of the chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel come."

God's gospel of dealing with mankind is a gospel of grace; but in Amos the emphasis is not upon grace but upon law and obedience, an emphasis which should certainly be observed in our own times; because as McFadden put it:

"It is the gospel of law, for that, too, is gospel. To understand and obey the laws by which God governs his world is the way of peace; to ignore or defy them is the way to destruction."[3]

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion ..." This is the second great woe, the first being in Amos 5:18, where it is written. "Woe unto you that desire the day of Jehovah!" Zion here is the poetic name of Jerusalem, and some of the commentators would like to get it out of the text on the basis that, "It would seem out of keeping with his habit of concentration upon the immediate situation for him";[4] but such a view ignores one of the outstanding features of Amos, the fact that Judah is by no means left out of these prophecies of destruction, as in Amos 2:4,5; 3:1; 5:1,5, etc. To be sure Amos was sent particularly to the Northern Kingdom; but Judah is always in the back of his mind; for it is not the Northern Kingdom only, but, "The whole family which I brought up out of the land of Egypt" (Amos 3:1) which is under the judgment of God for their sins. Hammershaimb has brilliantly refuted the allegations of those intent upon disturbing the validity of the text here as it has come down to us. "We must nevertheless keep the Masoretic Text, which must be understood as showing the threat worked out with poetic parallelism against the two capital cities."[5]

The over-confidence of the entire nation of the Jews was founded in their regard for Zion (Jerusalem) as the place where the name of God was recorded, and considered by them invulnerable to any disaster of whatever nature, and (especially in the Northern Kingdom) upon the strength and military fortifications of the "mountain of Samaria." The confidence they had in Samaria, although destined to be frustrated, was nevertheless justified to a certain extent by the unusual strength of the place. When it finally fell, some three years were required to subdue it. The great error lay in the people's having forgotten that, "Unless the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain" (Psalms 127:1).

"These people misunderstood the terms of the covenant, thinking that God would spare Jerusalem regardless of what they did; they were at ease in Zion ... (in Samaria) they were trusting in the mountain of Samaria, a natural fortress which Israel's leaders must have thought impregnable."[6]

"At ease in Zion ..." has entered all languages as an idiom for self-indulgent complacency, indifference and over-confidence.