, as according to the
Alexandrian version; for the latter is quite correct and faithful in so
far as the sense is concerned. The _occupying_, in the sense in which
it is used by Amos, has the _seeking_ for its necessary supposition.
For how, indeed, can spiritual possession, spiritual dominion by the
people of the Lord exist, unless the Lord has been sought by those who
are to be ruled over? Compare the declaration: "The isles shall wait
for His law," Is. xlii. 4. The words, "And of all the heathen,"
following immediately after Edom, evidently prove that Amos mentions
Edom, only by way of individualizing; and the Idumeans, especially, as
a people, only because their former, specially violent hatred to the
Covenant-people (compare i. 11) made their future humble submission
more evidently a work of the omnipotence of God, and of His love
watching over His people; and at the same time there may be a reference
also to the former subjection by David. The LXX. [Pg 398] have done
nothing more, than at once to substitute for the particular, the
general which comprehends this particular,--a particular which is, by
Amos too, designated as a part of the general.[5]

Ver. 13. "_Behold, days come, saith the Lord, and the ploughman
reacheth to the reaper, and the treader of the wine-press to him that
soweth seed. And the mountains drop must, and all the hills melt._"

The fundamental thought in this passage is this:--Wheresoever the Lord
is, there also is the fulness of His gifts.--The imagery in the first
hemistich is taken from Lev. xxvi. 3-5: "If ye shall walk in My laws,
and keep My commandments and do them; then I will give your rains in
their seasons, and the land gives its produce, and the tree of the
field gives its fruit. And your threshing _reaches_ to the vintage, and
the vintage _reaches to the sowing_ time." After the Lord has purified
His congregation by His judgments, then the joyful time of blessing,
prophesied by His servant Moses, shall likewise come. _Cocceius_ says:
"One shall reap, the other shall immediately plough; one shall scatter
the seeds in the ploughed field, while another shall, at the same time,
tread the grapes,--a work is wont to be done at the last time of the
year. There shall be continual work, and continual fruit, and a
fruitfulness such as that in the land of the Troglodytes which
_Scaliger_ (_Exercit._ 249, 2) thus describes: 'Throughout the whole
year there is sowing and reaping at the same ti