12 For I know how many your offenses, and how great are your sins- you who afflict the just, who take a bribe, and who turn aside the needy in the courts.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
The Prophet introduces God here as the speaker, that the threatening might be more authoritative: for we know, at it has been before stated, that the Prophets were despised by haughty men; but when God himself appeared as it were before them, it was strange if no fear laid hold on them; they had at least no excuse for their presumption, if God's name did not touch their hearts and humble them. I know, he says, your iniquities; as though he said, "Ye do not think yourselves bound to render an account to men, as probably no such account; will be rendered by you; but how will you be able, think you, to escape my tribunal? for I am your judge, and mine is the government: however ferociously ye now tread on the poor, and evasively contend with me, your crimes must necessarily be judged by me; I know your crimes. And as the rich by their splendor covered every wickedness, particularly the magistrates, who were adorned with a public character, God says that their turpitude was fully known to him: as though he said "Contend as much as you please, still your iniquities are sufficiently apparent to me; ye will gain nothing by your subtle evasions." Moreover, he reprehends them not merely for slight offenses, but says that they were wholly past being borne with. When something is done amiss by the highest power, indulgence is commonly granted; for nothing is more difficult than for one who sustains so great and heavy a burden, to retain so much integrity as to be free from every blame: but the Lord shows here that they were not lightly culpable, but that their crimes were so grievous and flagrant that they could not be endured. We now then understand what was the object of the Prophet. When therefore their own greatness dazzles the eyes of proud men, let us know that they cannot deprive God of his right; for though he may not judge them to-day, he will yet shortly ascend his tribunal: and he reminds them, that those pompous displays by which they cover their many crimes, are only shadows which will vanish. This is what the Prophet means. Then he calls them, The oppressors of the just He enumerates here some particulars, with regard to which, the iniquity of the judges whom he now addresses might be, as it were, felt to be gross and abominable. Ye oppress he says, the just; this was one thing: then follows another, They take kphr, capher, expiation, or, the price of redemption. The Prophet, I have no doubt, meant to point out here something different from the former crime. Though interpreters blend these two things, I yet think them to be wholly different; for these mercenary judges made an agreement with the wicked, whenever any homicide or other violence was perpetrated; in short, whenever any one implicated himself in any grievous sin, they saw that there was a prey taken, and anxiously gaped for it: they wished murders to be committed daily, that they might acquire gain. Since, then, these judges were thus intent on bribery, the Prophet accuses them as being takers of ransom. They ought to have punished crimes; this they did not; but they let go the wicked unpunished; they spared murderers, and adulterers, and robbers, and sorcerers not indeed without rewards, for they brought the price of redemption, and departed as if they were innocent. We now perceive what the Prophet means here; and well would it be were this crime not so common: but at this day, the cruelty of many judges appears especially in this -- that they hunt for crimes for the sake of gain, which seems to be as it were a ransom; for this is the proper meaning of the word kphr, capher. As then this evil commonly prevails it is no wonder that the Prophet, while reprehending the corruptions of his time, says, that judges took a ransom. Then he adds, The poor they turn aside from judgment in the gate This is the third crime: the Prophet complains, that they deprived miserable men of their right, because they could not bring so large a bribe as the rich; though relying on the goodness of their cause, they thought themselves sure of victory. The Prophet complains, that they were disappointed of their hope, and their right was denied them in the gate, that is, in the court of justice; for we know that it was an ancient custom for judges to sit in the gates, and there to administer justice; And hence Amos mentions here gate twice: and what he complains of was the more disgraceful, inasmuch as the judicial court was, as it were, a sacred asylum, to which injured men resorted, that they might have their wrongs redressed. When this became the den of robbers, what any more remained for them? We now then see that the Prophet speaks not here of the common people, but that he mainly levels his reproofs against the rulers. Let us go on --
For I know - Literally, "I have known." They thought that God did not know, because He did not avenge; as the Psalmist says, "Thy judgments are far above out of his sight" Psalm 10:5. People who do not act with the thought of God, cease to know Him, and forget that He knows them. "Your manifold transgressions;" literally, "many are your transgressions and mighty your sins." Their deeds, they knew, were mighty, strong, vigorous, decided. God says, that their "sins" were so, not many and great only, but "mighty, strong" , "issuing not out of ignorance and infirmity, but out of proud strength" , "'strong' in the oppression of the poor and in provoking God," and bringing down His wrath. So Asaph says of the prosperous; "Pride encompasseth them, as a chain; they are corrupt, they speak oppression wickedly; they speak from on high" Psalm 73:6, Psalm 73:8.
They afflict the just - Literally, "afflicters of the just," that is, such as habitually afflicted him; whose habit and quality it was to afflict him. Our version mostly renders the word "enemies." Originally, it signifies "afflicting, persecuting" enemies. Yet it is used also of the enemies of God, perhaps such as persecute Him in His people, or in His Son when in the flesh. The unjust hate the just, as is said in the book of Wisdom; "The ungodly said, Therefore let us lie in wait for the righteous, because he is not for our turn, and is clean contrary to our doings: he upbraideth us with our offending the law. He profeseth to have the knowledge of God, and he calleth himself the child of the Lord. He was made to reprove our thoughts. He is grievous unto us even to behold, for his life is not as other people's, his ways are of another fashion" (Wisdom Psalm 2:1, Psalm 2:12-15). So when the Truth and Righteousness came into the world, the Scribes and Pharisees hated Him because He reproved them, "denied" Acts 3:14 and crucified "the Holy one and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto" them, haters and "enemies of the Just," and preferring to Him the unjust.
That take a bribe - Literally, "a ransom." It may be that, contrary to the law, which forbade, in these same words Numbers 35:22, "to take any ransom for the life of a murderer," they took some ransom to set free rich murderers, and so, (as we have seen for many years to be the effect of unjust acquittals,) blood was shed with impunity, and was shed the more, because it was disregarded. The word, however, is used in one place apparently of any bribe, through which a man connives at injustice 1-Samuel 12:3.
I know your manifold transgressions - I have marked the multitude of your smaller crimes, as well as your mighty offenses. Among their greater offenses were,
1. Their afflicting the righteous.
2. Taking bribes to blind their eyes in judgment. And,
3. Refusing to hear the poor, who had no money to give them.
For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins,.... Their sins were numerous, and of the first magnitude, attended with very heavy aggravations; and these with all their circumstances were well known to the omniscient God, and therefore he determined to punish them as he had threatened. Some of their transgressions are pointed out, as follow:
they afflict the just; who are so both in a moral and evangelic sense; not comparatively only, but really; and particularly whose cause was just, and yet were vexed and distressed by unjust judges, who gave the cause against them, made them pay all costs and charges, and severely mulcted them: they take a bribe; of those that were against the just, and gave the cause for them. The word signifies "a ransom" (f). The Targum it false mammon. Corrupt and unjust judges are here taxed:
and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right; in the court of judicature, where they should have done them justice, such courts being usually held in the gates of cities; but instead of that they perverted their judgment, and did them wrong.
(f) "pretium redemptionis", Mercerus, Liveleus, Drusius, Lytron, Cocceius.
they afflict . . . they take--rather, "(ye) who afflict . . . take."
bribe--literally, a price with which one who has an unjust cause ransoms himself from your sentence (1-Samuel 12:3, Margin; Proverbs 6:35).
turn aside the poor in the gate--refuse them their right in the place of justice (Amos 2:7; Isaiah 29:21).
In the gate - In their courts of justice.
*More commentary available at chapter level.