Commentary on Joel Amos Obadiah Jonah Micah and Nahum John Calvin
JOHN CALVIN
for they would find that to be near God is to be near destruction. Be silent, then, for there is no reason for us to remember the name of Jehovah. It follows ---
Amos 6:11
11. For, behold, the Lord commandeth, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
11. Quia ecce Jehova praecipiens et percutiet domum magnum mixtionibus (vel, contritionibus,) et domum parvam rimis (vel, rupturis, aut, scissionibus, ut vertunt, vel, scissuris.)
This verse is added only to confirm the former sentence. The Prophet indeed intimates, that the common people, as well as the chiefs, in vain trusted in their quiet state; for the Lord would destroy them all together, from the highest to the lowest. Behold, Jehovah, he says, commands etc.; by using the word commands, he means, that God had many reasons why he should take away and destroy them all.
But he goes farther than this, and intimates that their destruction was dependent on the sole will of God; as though he said, ``Though the Lord may not send for ministers of vengeance, though he may not prepare great forces, yet his word only, whenever it shall go forth, will consume you all.'' We now then perceive what the Prophet means by the word ``commands.''
He afterwards adds, He will smite the great house with confusions, or, according to some, with breaking {,}רססresas, means properly to mingle. The Prophet therefore, I doubt not, refers here to those dreadful falls which commonly happen to great and splendid palaces. When a cottage is overturned so great a ruin is not occasioned by its weight; nay, when its ruin begins to appear, fragments fall down one after another, so that the whole work falls without any violence. This, I say, is the case with small and common houses; but when there is a great building, its downfall is tremendous. I am therefore inclined to render the word ``confusion,'' and the difference between small and great houses will then be more evident. Great houses then shall be smitten with confusions, (mixtionibus, with minglings) but small houses shall be smitten with fissures or clefts. But yet, as I have already reminded you, the Prophet means that there would be a ruin, both to the principal men and to the common people, so that they would all perish, from the least to the greatest. We hence learn how great was the corruption of that people; for God punishes none but the wicked. It then follows that equity was everywhere subverted and that all orders of men were become vicious and corrupt. It follows ---
Amos 6:12
12. Shall horses run upon the rock? will one plow there with oxen? for ye have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock:
12. An current in rupe equi? An arabitur bobus (est, an arabit quispiam in bobus; sed quia est verbum indefinitum, ideo verto impersonaliter, an ergo aratio fiet bobus, nempe in rupe?) quia vertistis in fel judicium et fructum justitiae in absynthium.
This verse interpreters misrepresent; for some think that the Prophet, by these figurative expressions, means, that the people were wholly unprofitable as to any thing good; as some one says, ``The slothful ox wishes for the saddle, the horse wishes to plough.'' They therefore suppose that this is the meaning of the words,