I. Indignant irony flashes in that permission or command to persevere in the calf worship.  The seeming command is the strongest prohibition.  There can be no worse thing befall a man than that he should be left to go on forwardly in the way of his heart.  The real meaning is sufficiently emphasised by that second verb, ‘and transgress’.  ’Flock to one temple after another, and heap altars with sacrifices which you were never bid to offer, but understand that what you do is not worship, but sin.’  That is a smiting sentence to pass upon elaborate ceremonial.  The word literally means treason or rebellion, and by it Amos at one blow shatters the whole fabric.  Note, too, that the offering of tithes was not called for by Mosaic law, ‘every three days’ (Revised Version), and that the use of leaven in burnt offerings was prohibited by it, and also that to call for freewill offerings was to turn spontaneousness into something like compulsion, and to bring ostentation into worship.  All these characteristics spoiled the apparent religiousness, over and above the initial evil of disobedience, and warrant Amos’s crushing equation, ‘Your worship = rebellion.’  All are driven home by the last words of verse 5, ‘So ye love it.’  The reason for all this prodigal ostentatious worship was to please themselves, not to obey God.  That tainted everything, and always does.

The lessons of this burst of sarcasm are plain.  The subtle influence of self creeps in even in worship, and makes it hollow, unreal, and powerless to bless the worshipper.  Obedience is better than costly gifts.  The beginning and end of all worship, which is not at same time ‘transgression’ is the submission of tastes, will, and the whole self.  Again, men will lavish gifts far more freely in apparent religious service, which is but the worship of their reflected selves, than in true service of God.  Again, the purity of willing offerings is marred when they are given in response to a loud call, or, when given, are proclaimed with acclamations.  Let us not suppose that all the brunt of Amos’s indignation fell only on these old devotees.  The principles involved in it have a sharp edge, turned to a great deal which is allowed and fostered among ourselves.

II.  The blaze of indignation changes in the second part of the passage into wounded tenderness, as the Prophet speaks in the name of God, and recounts the dreary monotony of failure attending all God’s loving attempts to arrest Israel’s departure by the mercy of judgment.  Mark the sad cadence of the fivefold refrain, ’Ye have not returned unto Me, saith the Lord.’  The ‘unto’ implies reaching the object to which we turn, and is not the less forcible but more usual word found in this phrase, which simply means ‘towards’ and indicates direction, without saying anything as to how far the return has gone.  So there may have been partial moments of bethinking themselves, when the chastisement was on Israel; but there had been