Therefore a prudent person keeps silent in such a time, for it is an evil time.
Parallel Translations
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Therefore a prudent person keeps silent in such a time, for it is an evil time.
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Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time; for it is an evil time.
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Therefore the prudent doth keep silence in such a time; for it is an evil time.
Cross-references (14)
Passages linked to Amos 5:13 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Ecclesiastes 3:7 a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
- Hosea 4:4 “Yet let no man bring a charge, neither let any man accuse; for your people are like those who bring charges against a priest.
- Micah 2:3 Therefore Yahweh says: “Behold, I am planning against these people a disaster, from which you will not remove your necks, neither will you walk haughtily; for it is an evil time.
- Ephesians 5:15-16 Therefore watch carefully how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
- 2 Timothy 3:1 But know this: that in the last days, grievous times will come.
- Ecclesiastes 9:12 For man also doesn’t know his time. As the fish that are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare, even so are the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it falls suddenly on them.
- Isaiah 36:21 But they remained silent, and said nothing in reply, for the king’s commandment was, “Don’t answer him.”
- Isaiah 37:3 They said to him, “Hezekiah says, ‘Today is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the birth, and there is no strength to give birth.
- Amos 6:10 “When a man’s relative carries him, even he who burns him, to bring bodies out of the house, and asks him who is in the innermost parts of the house, ‘Is there yet any with you?’ And he says, ‘No;’ then he will say, ‘Hush! Indeed we must not mention Yahweh’s name.’
- Micah 7:5-7 Don’t trust in a neighbor. Don’t put confidence in a friend. With the woman lying in your embrace, be careful of the words of your mouth! For the son dishonors the father, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house. But as for me, I will look to Yahweh. I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.
- Habakkuk 3:16 I heard, and my body trembled. My lips quivered at the voice. Rottenness enters into my bones, and I tremble in my place, because I must wait quietly for the day of trouble, for the coming up of the people who invade us.
- Zephaniah 2:2-3 before the appointed time when the day passes as the chaff, before the fierce anger of Yahweh comes on you, before the day of Yahweh’s anger comes on you. Seek Yahweh, all you humble of the land, who have kept his ordinances. Seek righteousness. Seek humility. It may be that you will be hidden in the day of Yahweh’s anger.
- Matthew 27:12-14 When he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he answered nothing. Then Pilate said to him, “Don’t you hear how many things they testify against you?” He gave him no answer, not even one word, so that the governor marveled greatly.
- Ephesians 6:13 Therefore put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain Some interpreters think that a punishment is here denounced…
Some interpreters think that a punishment is here denounced on the people of Israel, and that is, that the Lord would deprive them of Prophets and teachers. We indeed know that nothing is more to be dreaded, than that the Lord should extinguish the light of sound doctrine, and suffer us to go astray in darkness, yea, to stumble, and to rush headlong to ruin, as they do who are destitute of wholesome counsels. But I think that the meaning is quite different. Another exposition may be deemed probable, which is this, that the prudent dared not to speak on account of the prevailing tyranny; for Amos had said before that the judges, who then ruled, would not bear reproof. Hence, the prudent were forced to be silent at that time, for that time was evil; and every liberty of teaching was taken away. And this meaning opens still wider; for the silent would have to bear the wrongs done to them, and to devour inwardly their own groans, for they dared not to complain; nay, the very teachers did not oppose the torrent, for they saw that it was not the time to resist haughty and violent men. But this view may be also fitly applied to God’s judgment, that the prudent would be silent, being put in fear: for silence is often connected with fear: and it is a dreadful judgment of God, when the prudent closes his mouth, or puts his hand, as it is said elsewhere, on his mouth.
As to the first exposition, I have already rejected it, and it has certainly nothing in its favor: but the second may be accommodated to the general meaning of the Prophet, that is, the prudent shall be silent at that time, because all liberty shall be taken away. I am, at the same time, unwilling thus to restrict it, as they do; for it became not a wise man to pass by in silence sins so grievous: though tyrants threatened hundred deaths, yet those on whom was laid the necessity of teaching ought not to have been silent. But the Prophet here speaks not of what the prudent would do or omit to do; on the contrary, he intimates, that whenever they began to speak, the arrogance of the judges would be so great as to repel all reproofs. The prudent then shall be silent, not willingly; for that, as I have said, would have been unworthy of wise men. And the Prophet here, by way of honor, calls those prudent who rightly discern things, who are not led away by corruptions, but remain upright; who, though they see the whole order of things collapsing, and though they see heaven and earth, as it were, mingled together, yet retain a sound judgment. Since the Prophet speaks of such men, he certainly does not mean that they would be willingly silent; for it would have been a base indolence in them thus to betray the truth and a good cause. What then does he mean? Even this — that the wickedness of tyrants would be so great, as not to allow one word to be declared by the prudent; when any one came forth to reprove their vices, he was not suffered.
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When therefore he says, that the time would be evil, he means, that such audacity would prevail, that all liberty would be denied to wise men. They would then be forced to be silent, for they could effect nothing by speaking, nay, they would have no freedom of speech allowed them: and though they attempted to discharge their office, yet tyrannical violence would instantly impose silence on them. Similar was the case with Lot, of whom it is said that he groaned and vexed his own heart, (Genesis 16:1) He was constrained, I have no doubt, to be silent after having often used free reproofs; nay, he doubtless exposed himself to many dangers by his attempts to reprove the Sodomites. Such seems to me to be the meaning of the Prophet, when he says, that the prudent would be silent, because these tyrants would impose silence on all teachers, — now throwing them into prisons, then banishing them, — now denouncing death on them, then visiting them with some punishment, or loading them with reproaches, or treating them with ridicule as persons worthy of contempt. We now understand the Prophet’s, design. We may further observe, that men have then advanced to the extremity of evil, when reception is no more given to sound doctrine and salutary counsels, and when all liberty is sternly suppressed, so that prudent men dare not to reprove vices, however rampant they may be, which even children observe, and the blind feel. When licentiousness has arrived to this pitch, it is certain that the state of things is past recovery and that there is no hope of repentance or of a better condition: and this was the meaning of the Prophet.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain God will so plague them that they shall not…
God will so plague them that they shall not suffer the godly once to open their mouths to admonish them of their faults.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Amo 5:13 Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in…
Amo 5:13 Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time; for it [is] an evil time.
Ver. 13. Therefore the prudent shall keep silence] According to that old and good rule, Either keep silence, or speak that which is better than silence, η σιγαν, η κρεισσονα οιγης λεγειν. There is "a time to keep silence, and a time to speak," Ecc 3:7, and it is a singular skill to time a word, Isa 50:4, to set it upon its circumferences, Pro 25:11, so to speak, and so to do, as those that shall be judged by the law of liberty, Jas 2:12. He that would be able to speak right and forcible words, must first learn how and when to keep silence. It is not good casting pearls before swine; nor pulling a bear or mad dog by the ear. It is the true ambition of a Christian, to study to he quiet, to meddle with his own business, 1Th 4:11, ιδιοπραγμονειν, to affect rather quietness from the wicked world than acquaintance with it, and to pass through it with as little noise and notice as he can. Not but that God’s faithful servants must cry aloud, and not spare, lifting up their voices like a trumpet, &c., Isa 58:1, and casting away the inverse trumpets of Furius Fulvus, which sounded a retreat, when they should have sounded an alarm. But this must be done with godly discretion. Zeal should eat us up, but not eat up our wisdom (saith one), nor should policy eat up our zeal. The apostles professed that they could not but speak the things that they had heard and seen; they must either vent or burst. And yet holy Paul (who was full of the spirit of judgment and of burning, Isa 4:4), though he preached at Ephesus (where he lived two years and more together) that they be no gods that are made with hands; yet he made no particular invective against their great goddess Diana, whereon they so impotently doted, Act 19:26; Act 19:37, He that hath a good mixture of zeal and prudence is like a ship well ballasted, that sails with a prosperous gale; but zeal without discretion is like fire on the chimney top; or like mettle in a blind horse; or the devil in the demoniac, that cast him sometimes into the fire, and sometimes into the water. What a storm of persecution raised Bishop Abdias in Persepolis by his intemperate zeal, not bridled with discretion; as the poets fable that Minerva put a golden bridle upon Pegasus, lest he should fly too fast? And it was some disadvantage to Paul, when in the council (though provoked and unjustly smitten) he called the high priest whited wall; he was glad to excuse it by his ignorance. We may not he too bold or too forward to speak in a good matter, to such as hate him that rebuketh in the gate, and abhor him that speaketh uprightly, Amo 5:10.
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For it is an evil time] By reason of an evil and adulterous generation, that make it so. It is a day of evil, as Psa 41:1, that is, of difficulty and danger, to those that dare speak out: such as were Tiberius’s times. That tiger laid hold with his teeth on all the brave spirits that could speak their minds fitly, and dared to do it freely. He put to death a certain poet, which in a tragedy had inveighed against Agamemnon; suspecting himself to be intended. Freedom of speech used by the Waldenses in blaming and reproving the vices, dissolute manners, life, and actions of great ones, made them looked upon and persecuted as heretics and enemies to the see apostolic, as Manichees, Catharists, what not? (Girardus).
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Therefore, because that men are so universally impatient of…
Therefore, because that men are so universally impatient of hearing reproof, and yet their sins so much abound, and so much deserve reproof; since they will sooner turn against the speaker, than turn from the sin spoken against.
The prudent; the wise men; prophets, say some, but I rather think other private men are here meant, whose private capacity alloweth them to keep silence when others must speak.
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Shall keep silence; be forced to it, say some, they shall be silenced; this is true, but rather here is a voluntary, chosen silence toward vile corrupters of law and justice, who will nothing mend though reproved; or a silence before God, owning his justice in punishing such sinners.
For it is an evil time; both for the sinfulness of it, which provoketh God to wrath, and for the sorrows, troubles, wars, and captivity of this people, by the Assyrians.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Therefore the prudent shall keep silence at that time,....…
Therefore the prudent shall keep silence at that time,.... Not the prophets of the Lord, whose business it was at all times to reprove, and not hold their peace, let the consequence be what it would; though the Targum calls them teachers; but private persons, whose wisdom it would be to say nothing; since reproof would do no good to these persons, and they would bring a great deal of hatred ill will, and trouble upon themselves as well as would hear the name of God blasphemed, which would be very afflictive to them: or the sense is, they would not speak to God on the behalf of these wicked men, knowing the decree was gone forth; nor say one murmuring word at it, believing it was in righteousness; and being struck also with the awfulness of God's righteous judgments:
for it is an evil time; in which sin abounded, and miseries and calamities on account of it.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Shall keep silence - Be forced to it. Evil…
Shall keep silence - Be forced to it. Evil - Both for the sinfulness of it, and for the troubles, wars, and captivity now at hand.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 13. The prudent shall keep silence] A wise…
Verse 13. The prudent shall keep silence] A wise man will consider that it is useless to complain. He can have no justice without bribes; and he has no money to give: consequently, in such an evil time, it is best to keep silence.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time…
Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time - The “time” may be either the time of the obduracy of the wicked, or that of the common punishment. For a time may be called “evil,” whether evil is done, or is suffered in it, as Jacob says, “Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been” Gen 47:9. Of the first, he would perhaps say, that the oppressed poor would, if wise, be silent, not complaining or accusing, for, injustice having the mastery, complaint would only bring on them fresh sufferings. And again also he may mean that, on account of the incorrigibleness of the people, the wise and the prophets would be silent, because the more the people were rebuked, the more impatient and worse they became. So our Lord was silent before His judges, as had been foretold of Him, for since they would not hear, His speaking would only increase their condemnation. “If I tell you, ye will not believe; and if I also ask you, ye will not answer Me, nor let Me go” Luk 22:67-68. So God said by Solomon: “He that reproveth a scorner getteth himself shame, and he that rebuketh a wicked man getteth himself a blot” Pro 9:7. And our Lord bids, “Give not that which is holy unto dogs, and cast not your pearls before swine” Mat 7:6. They hated and rejected those who rebuked them. Mat 7:10. Since then rebuke profited not, the prophets should hold their peace. It is a fearful judgment, when God withholds His warnings. In times of punishment also the prudent keep silence. Intense affliction is “dumb and openeth not its month,” owning the hand of God. It may be too, that Amos, like Hosea Hos 4:4, Hos 4:17, expresses the uselessness of all reproof, in regard to the most of those whom be called to repentance, even while he continued earnestly to rebuke them.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Time. It is to no purpose speaking to the…
CHAPTER V.
Time. It is to no purpose speaking to the deaf, (Ecclesiasticus xxxii. 9.) or throwing pearls before swine, Matthew vii. 6. Amos was silent for a while, till God opened his mouth again, chap. iii. 8., and vii. 12.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain the prudent--the spiritually wise.
the prudent--the spiritually wise.
shall keep silence--not mere silence of tongue, but the prudent shall keep himself quiet from taking part in any public or private affairs which he can avoid: as it is "an evil time," and one in which all law is set at naught. Eph 5:16 refers to this. Instead of impatiently agitating against irremediable evils, the godly wise will not cast pearls before swine, who would trample these, and rend the offerers (Mat 7:6), but will patiently wait for God's time of deliverance in silent submission (Psa 39:9).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 13. In a time such as that, the prudent…
13. In a time such as that, the prudent man will keep silence; a complaint, or accusation, or attempt to redress the wrongs which he sees about him, will be perilous to him, if he be in a good position, and will only add to his sufferings, if he be poor.
shall keep] will keep, viz. if he is guided by his prudence.
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in that time] not, at a future time, but at a time such as that which has been just described.
an evil time] a time when a man may well be anxious for his personal safety (cf. Psa_49:5).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (13) Prudent . . . silence.—The dumb silence of…
(13) Prudent . . . silence.—The dumb silence of the prudent is the awful curse which comes upon a people when they are given up to selfishness and rapacity. Thus the doom:—“Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Even while he speaks, the prophet feels that his…
Even while he speaks, the prophet feels that his reproof is useless. (comp. Jer_7:27, etc.; Hos_4:1, Hos_4:17) In that time; at such a time as this, the man who acts wisely holds his peace, because it is a time of moral corruption and of personal danger. But the prophet cannot restrain his call (comp. Eze_33:3, etc.) in Mic_2:3 the "evil time" is one of calamity.
A time to be silent.
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the prudent shall keep silence in that time; for it is an evil time." These words describe an evil time, and specify one of its most evil features. It is a time of culminating wickedness, of imminent destruction, and, as related to both, of Divine non-intervention. "There is a time to keep silence" (Ecc_3:7) as well as "a time to speak." And that time, as pointed out by characteristic features, was at hand in this case. Israel, which in vain had been pled with and plagued, would then be severely left alone. Her victims would suffer in silence. Her prophets would cease to expostulate. God, in judgment, would cease to strive for her restraint or turning. In an awful and unnatural calm she would pass the moments before there broke on her the storm of doom. And the dawning of this "dies irae" was almost come. As to the particular charactsristic of this day, note that God"s servants are silent
I WHEN THERE IS NOTHING THAT CAN BE SAID TO THE PURPOSE. This will often happen. Seasonable speech is a valuable thing. But men are not infallible, and occasions are often puzzling, and the right thing to say is hard to find.
1. Silence is sometimes the resource of feeling too deep for words. There are unspeakable things. "Speech is but broken light on the depth of the unspoken." The finest thoughts, the deepest feelings, are unuttered often because they cannot be expressed in words. As a noted Shakespearian character says
Silence is the perfectest herald of joy: I were but little happy if I could say how much.
And the sentiment is not uncommon. "Does the wind write what it sings in those sounding leaves above our heads? Does the sea write the moaning of its surge? Nothing is fine that is written; the divinest in man"s heart never issues forth. The instrument is flesh, the note is fire. What would you have? Between what one feels and what one expresses, there is the same space as between the soul and the twenty-four letters of the alphabet; that is to say, the Infinite. Can you on a rosewood flute give forth the harmony of the spheres?" (Raffaelle).
2. Silence is often more impressive than any speech.
The silence of pure innocence Persuades, when speaking fails.
So also do the silence of deep feeling and of strong passion, uttering "speech in their dumbness, language in their very gesture." Christ but looked on the recreant Peter after his miserable desertion and denial. Yet that silent look, as the denied One passed him in the hall, was eloquent of wounded love, and cut the denier more keenly than any words. No word was uttered on the cross where the dying thief was brought to faith. The God-like fortitude, the ineffable meekness of the Saviour, suffering silently the devilish malice of sin, it was that broke his heart and won his free allegiance. In this dumbness was speech to the power of which articulate speech admits of no comparison. The gift of being "eloquently silent" is one that is not unworthy of more general cultivation. To Israel the sudden silence of the prophets, after centuries of expostulation, would tell its own startling tale. It would indicate discouragement and disgust, and duplicate to their minds the "let him alone" (Hos_4:17) of Divine desertion at a similar crisis. And this unequivocal proof that they are given up might bring the tardy repentance which all else had failed to stir. When communications are broken off, the dream of a lasting peace is over. The patient will believe that death is at hand when the physician turns away and refuses to prescribe.
3. Silence is always better than haphazard speech. When a man knows not what to say he should guard against saying he knows not what. "Silence, when nothing need be said, is the eloquence of discretion." Peter would have escaped some blunders and rebukes if he had followed this rule. But it was when "he wist not what to say" (Mar_9:6) that he was given to saying most. Such speech is more likely to be inappropriate than silence, and being inappropriate there are many more ways in which it can work evil. Hence the numerous Scripture references to the tongue, the power of it, the difficulty of governing it, and the danger of it if unruly. Indeed, so liable are men to err and so specially liable to err in speech as compared with overt act, that the proper government of the tongue is made the highest religious act. (Jam_3:2)
II WHEN IT IS EVIDENT THAT SPEECH MUST BE UNAVAILING. There are many such cases.
1. Sometimes men will refuse to listen. The Jews did in the beginning of the gospel. Faithfully and firmly Stephen pressed the truth home; but they "stopped their ears, and ran upon him". (Act_7:57) Here was an ease for silence. Speech, had it been possible, would have been unheeded. Those men, with murder in their hearts, and their fingers in their ears, would listen to no words. With Israel now things had come to a like pass. Their ears were stopped, and their hearts within them were set to do iniquity. For such a state of matters the appropriate measure is the silence which the prophet predicts. And all God"s servants, in the exercise of their enlightened judgment, will do likewise in a like case. When men will not hear, they will refuse to waste on them unregarded speech. Bawling into an ear that is deaf or stopped is effort thrown away, and unworthy of common (Mat_10:14; Mar_6:11)
2. Sometimes evil has gone so far that words can be of no avail. God"s Spirit will not always strive. With the antediluvians by Noah"s preaching he strove above a century, but when iniquity reached a certain stage he ceased, and his ultima ratio was the Deluge. He strove with Saul for years, but when insensibility and hardness became confirmed, communications were broken off; and whether by dreams, or by Urim, or by prophets, God spoke no more. (1Sa_28:6) He strove with Israel during the ministry of our Lord, but they would not listen to his word, and at last he was silent, sad the doomed people were left to die. (Luk_19:42) God ceases to speak when he is ready to strike. Expostulation would be an anachronism when execution is imminent. The point at which he will give up the persistent wrong doer and withdraw all deterrent measures none can fix. But there is such a point, and, to each of the ungodly, the danger of passing it. (Pro_1:26) Every hour we continue in rebellion is cutting down our chance of being longer striven with. Those who speak for God to men are sometimes conscious that the time to be silent has come. The sinner seems to have reached a final fixity. In the nature of things he cannot be expected now to change. Paul at a certain stage concluded the Jew to be incorrigible, and turned deliberately to the Gentile. (Act_13:46) And like Paul, when it becomes clear that further dealing with men must be barren of result, the servant of Christ will transfer his strength from the hopeless to some hopeful form of effort.
III WHEN IT IS JUST AS LIKELY TO DO HARM AS GOOD. This is no remote contingency. Such times are cropping up continually. Under certain circumstances speech:
1. May do harm to men. The truth of God and the sinful heart are uncongenial. Men love the darkness and hate the light. The truth forbidding all lust is actually through the corruption of our nature the occasion of stirring it up. (Rom_7:7-9) This, of course, is no reason for withholding it or suppressing our testimony to it. But there are circumstances and moods in which this tendency attains its maximum of strength, and it will then be prudent to keep silence "even from good." It is as "fishers of men" that we speak the truth, and we must justify our claim to the title by presenting the truth in the time and way in which it is most likely to tell. If we "testify" at random, and uniformly, in all companies and on all occasions, we shall oftener harm than help the people whom we wish to serve.
2. It may do harm to the truth. There is such a thing as "casting pearls before swine" (Mat_7:6) to no better purpose than the prostitution of sacred things The difference between truth profaned and necessarily inoperative, and the same truth listened to and the power of God, is often the difference between the untimely presentation of it and the timely. To force it on men when they are out of humour and will not give it a fair hearing is only to bring it into contempt to lessen its dignity in the eyes of others, and diminish its chance of winning their acceptance. The truth is meant to sanctify and save, and we must be careful to do nothing that would place it at a disadvantage in the work.
3. It may do harm to ourselves without any compensating advantage. "He that reproveth a scorner getteth himself shame the shame of aggravating the ease and bringing needless evil on himself. No Scottish Covenanter was called on to enter the camp and preach the gospel of good will and peace to the bloodthirsty troopers of Claverhouse or Dalziel. The thing would have been good in itself, and was deeply needed, but to attempt it meant not merely failure, but death. If there was no one else to do it, this work must be left undone. There is room for judgment and discretion in timing and planning the work of winning souls. The most acceptable service and the most useful we can give to God is our "reasonable service." We are not to "count our lives dear to us" in comparison with his work; but it must appear that the work demands the sacrifice, and will benefit by it, before we are at liberty to give up the life which we hold in trust for God. Pearls are to be withheld from swine for this among other reasons, "lest they turn again and rend you." The characters of the "time to keep silence" deserve attention no less than those of the "time to speak," and he has mastered both who rightly divides the Word of life.
1. Silence is sometimes a Divine form of appeal.
2. In that case it is probably the last appeal.
3. Disregarded, it is the lull before the storm.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain Woe upon Fools and Hypocrites
Woe upon Fools and Hypocrites
v. 13. Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time, for it is an evil time, and when things have reached such extremities as here pictured, all admonitions are futile. Still the love of the prophet for his people and his desire to further their welfare in every possible way causes him to address them once more.
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v. 14. Seek good, and not evil, that ye may live, for there lies the way to true life; and so the Lord, the God of hosts, shall be with you as ye have spoken, that is, by following His will and not by a mere external membership in the Church of Israel.
v. 15. Hate the evil and love the good, Cf Rom 12:9, and establish judgment in the gate, so that justice would truly be administered in all cases brought to trial; it may be that the Lord God of hosts, in that event, will be gracious unto the remnant of Joseph, to the few of the northern nation who would be left after the punishment now impending.
v. 16. Therefore the Lord, the God of hosts, the Lord, the one and only true God, saith thus, Wailing shall be in all streets, mourning on account of the chastisement which has come upon them for ignoring the appeal of the prophet; and they shall say in all the highways, expressing their grief in open lamentations, Alas! Alas! And they shall call the husbandman to mourning, to join in the death-wail over some relative, and such as are skilful of lamentation, the professional wailing women, to wailing, so that the entire country would resound with cries of grief.
v. 17. And in all vineyards shall be wailing, instead of the shouts of joy formerly heard there; for I will pass through thee, saith the Lord, with His visitation of wrath.
v. 18. Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! believing that their external communion with the Lord’s people would save them from the judgment which was to strike the heathen. To what end is it for you? What result would it have for them? What good would it bring them?. The day of the Lord is darkness and not light; it would bring to willful sinners destruction and not deliverance.
v. 19. As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him, so it would be with those who desired the day of the Lord’s judgment, or went into the house and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him. Hoping to escape the one calamity, the wicked Israelites would be overtaken by another.
v. 20. Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness and not light? full of tribulation and misery; the day of the Lord is darkness and not light; it would bring no deliverance to those who trample justice and right beneath their feet; even very dark, and no brightness in it? not a ray for the willful transgressors. Therefore even the feasts of the people would avail them nothing under the circumstances as here presented.
v. 21. I hate, I despise, your feast-days, as the Lord calls out to them, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies, by taking pleasure in the odor of the offerings brought by them.
v. 22. Though ye offer Me burnt offerings and your meat-offerings, as they still continued to do in their effort to have the Lord accept their outward worship, I will not accept them; neither will I accept the peace-offerings, or thank-offerings, of your fat beasts, since their entire service was hypocrisy.
v. 23. Take thou away from Me the noise of thy songs, as He contemptuously calls their congregational singing; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols, of the harps and other instrumental music used in public services.
v. 24. But let judgment, the just punishment of the Lord, run down as waters, in a great and consuming flood, and righteousness, namely, that of the divine justice, as a mighty stream.
v. 25. Have ye offered unto Me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness, during the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, forty years, O house of Israel? Even at that time the people were guilty of idolatry, and since then they added to their guilt.
v. 26. But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch, the war-god of the Moabites and Ammonites, and. Chiun, a star-divinity, your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves. Even in the wilderness the children of Israel, as Ezekiel also shows, did not quite discard their idolatry, but carried their idol-pictures along with them and thus provoked the Lord,
v. 27. Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, in the power of a mighty Eastern nation, saith the Lord, whose name is The God of hosts. The last words were employed by Stephen in his powerful rebuke of the Jews after his arrest, Act 7:43, in order to show that idolatry had ever been in vogue among the people in spite of all the efforts of the Lord to stamp it out. The modern idolatry in high places is just as persistent and apparently cares as little for the admonitions and rebukes of the Bible.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 5:13 Witnesses pleaded that they saw and heard nothing.…
5:13 Witnesses pleaded that they saw and heard nothing. Truthfulness had become a liability (5:10) and might endanger the one who spoke it.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.