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Course 6 · Lesson 4.2

Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Micah: justice, loyalty and judgment

11 minute read

Lessons in this course

Course 6 outline

Module 1: Israel in the Ancient Near East

  1. Egypt, Mesopotamia and Canaan: the world of the Old Testament
  2. What archaeology and ancient texts can and cannot show
  3. Genesis 1 to 3 beside other ancient creation accounts
  4. Ancient cosmology and how Christians and Jews read Genesis

Module 2: Covenant: Abraham and Moses

  1. What a covenant is, and covenant forms in the ancient world
  2. The covenants with Noah and Abraham
  3. The exodus and the covenant at Sinai
  4. The Torah: law, worship and the tabernacle
  5. Covenant in Jewish, Catholic, Orthodox and Reformed thought

Module 3: Kingship in Israel

  1. From the judges to the first kings
  2. David, Jerusalem and the promise of a lasting house
  3. Solomon, the temple and the divided kingdom
  4. How Samuel and Kings tell the story: sources and purpose

Module 4: The Prophets, Exile and Restoration

  1. What a prophet was in Israel and in the ancient world
  2. Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Micah: justice, loyalty and judgment
  3. Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the fall of Jerusalem
  4. The return, Ezra, Nehemiah and the rebuilt temple
  5. How the prophetic books were formed: the debate over Isaiah and others

Module 5: Wisdom and Apocalyptic Writing

  1. Proverbs and the way of the wise
  2. Job and Ecclesiastes: wisdom that questions
  3. What apocalyptic writing is: Daniel and its setting
  4. Reading apocalyptic images responsibly

Module 6: Second Temple Judaism and the Development of Jewish Thought

  1. Persian, Greek and Maccabean periods
  2. Temple, synagogue and the main groups in Jewish life
  3. Development in Jewish thought: angels, resurrection, wisdom and law
  4. Sources: the Dead Sea Scrolls, the deuterocanonical books and Josephus

Module 7: Messianic Expectation and the Shape of the Covenants

  1. Anointed ones in the Old Testament: king, priest, prophet
  2. Messianic texts in the prophets and psalms
  3. How Jews and Christians read the messianic texts
  4. The promise of a new covenant
  5. Mapping the development of covenant across the Old Testament

All courses

Program / Course 6: Old Testament Theology and History / Lesson 4.2

What you will learn

  • Place Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Micah in the political setting of the eighth century BC.
  • Summarize the main message of each prophet in a sentence or two.
  • Explain how these prophets use covenant ideas to accuse, warn and promise.
  • Describe how Jews and Christians read the sign of Immanuel in Isaiah 7.

The big idea

In the eighth century BC the Assyrian Empire grew strong, and Israel and Judah were prosperous but unjust. Four prophets spoke in this setting. Amos attacked the oppression of the poor. Hosea told of Israel’s unfaithfulness through the image of a broken marriage. Isaiah called Judah’s kings to trust God and not alliances. Micah promised judgment on the cities and a ruler from Bethlehem. Their shared claim is that worship without justice and loyalty is empty.

Key terms

Day of the Lord
A time of God’s decisive action. Many hoped it meant victory for Israel, and Amos warned it would be darkness for the unjust.
Hesed
A Hebrew word for steadfast love or loyalty, central to Hosea and to covenant language.
Remnant
The part of a people that survives judgment. Isaiah uses the idea of a remnant that will return.
Oracle against the nations
A prophetic announcement of judgment on foreign peoples, as in Amos 1 and 2.
Immanuel
A Hebrew name meaning God with us, given in Isaiah 7 as the name of a child who is a sign to King Ahaz.
Syro-Ephraimite war
A conflict about 734 BC when Aram and Israel attacked Judah to force it into an alliance against Assyria.
Prophetic lawsuit
A speech form in which God brings a charge against the people before heaven and earth, as in Micah 6 and Hosea 4.

Background

About 760 BC, Israel under Jeroboam II enjoyed peace and wealth, and Judah under Uzziah did too. Assyria was weakened for a time, and then under Tiglath-pileser III from 745 BC became the dominant power. Israel was swallowed up in the next decades. This is the world in which the four prophets worked.

The books bear the stamp of their times. Amos and Hosea spoke in the north, Amos from the south. Isaiah and Micah spoke in Judah, Isaiah in Jerusalem near the king and Micah from a rural town. Their books were edited later, and scholars disagree on how much of each belongs to the prophet. The summary here follows the traditional titles and the common scholarly view that the core of each book goes back to the named prophet.

What they share is attention to the covenant. They hold Israel to the terms of Sinai and Deuteronomy: worship the Lord alone and treat the poor justly. They accuse, warn and, at times, console.

Step-by-step explanation

Step 1: Amos, justice for the poor

Amos, a herdsman from Tekoa in Judah, goes north to Bethel to prophesy. He begins with oracles against Israel’s neighbors and then turns on Israel itself. The charges are social: they sell the righteous for silver, trample the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek (Amos 2:6 and 7). He rejects their festivals, saying God hates their feast days, and calls for justice to roll down like waters (Amos 5:21 to 24).

Amos also upsets hopes about the Day of the Lord. For those who expected light, he says it is darkness and not light (Amos 5:18). The priest Amaziah orders him to go home, and Amos refuses. The book ends with a promise of restoration for the fallen house of David (Amos 9:11 to 15), which some scholars consider a later addition and others the prophet’s own.

Step 2: Hosea, the broken marriage

God tells Hosea to take a wife of whoredoms, and she bears children given symbolic names. The marriage becomes a picture of God and Israel: Israel has gone after other lovers, the Baals, and God is a wounded husband. Scholars and traditions differ on whether the marriage is literal, visionary or symbolic. Hosea speaks of the people’s lack of knowledge of God and of their lack of faithful love, hesed (Hosea 4 and 6).

The book carries both judgment and tenderness. God says, I desired mercy, and not sacrifice (Hosea 6:6), a verse Jesus quotes in Matthew 9. In chapter 11, God is a parent who taught Ephraim to walk and cannot give him up. The kingdom Hosea addressed fell to Assyria soon after his work.

Step 3: Isaiah, trust in God

Isaiah is called in the year King Uzziah died, in a vision of the Lord on a high throne with seraphim crying Holy, holy, holy (Isaiah 6). He serves in Jerusalem for decades under several kings. When Aram and Israel threaten Judah, he meets King Ahaz and urges calm, saying that if he does not stand firm in faith he will not stand at all (Isaiah 7:9). He offers a sign, a young woman will conceive and bear a son and call his name Immanuel.

The meaning of this sign is a matter of long discussion. In its setting, the child is a sign for Ahaz that the threat will pass before the child is old enough to know right from wrong. Jewish readers have identified the child with a child born in Ahaz’s time, such as Hezekiah. Matthew 1:23 quotes the Greek version of the verse, which uses a word for virgin, and applies it to Jesus. The Hebrew word almah means a young woman, and Christians who hold that Matthew reads the verse in a deeper sense speak of a double fulfillment. The disagreement is real.

Step 4: Micah, the farmer’s critic

Micah, from the country town of Moresheth, accuses the rich of seizing fields and the leaders of Jerusalem of building Zion with blood. He says that because of them Zion shall be plowed as a field (Micah 3:12), words later recalled by elders in Jeremiah 26 to protect Jeremiah. In Micah 6:8 he sums up what the Lord requires: to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.

Micah 5:2 promises a ruler from Bethlehem Ephratah, whose origins are from of old. Jewish readers have taken this as pointing to a future Davidic king, and Matthew 2 applies it to the birth of Jesus.

  1. What do Amos, Hosea and Micah accuse Israel and Judah of, and how are their accusations alike?
  2. Why would Amos’s words about the Day of the Lord have been unwelcome?
  3. What does Hosea’s marriage image say about God’s relationship with Israel?
  4. What did Isaiah ask of King Ahaz, and why?
  5. How do Jewish and Christian readers differ on Isaiah 7:14?
  6. What does Micah 6:8 say that the Lord requires?

Examples

Justice like a stream

Amos 5:24 says, Let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream. The image is of a wadi that flows all year and not a dry bed. The prophet asks for justice that does not fail.

Isaiah and the king

King Ahaz was afraid and was already looking for help from Assyria. Isaiah met him at the end of the water channel and told him not to fear. Ahaz appealed to Assyria anyway (2 Kings 16). Judah became a vassal of Assyria. The story shows the conflict between trust in God and political calculation.

A farmer’s complaint

Micah 2:2 says that people covet fields and take them by violence, and oppress a man and his house. Land in Israel was a family inheritance tied to the covenant, so seizing it was treated as an offense against God as well as a wrong against the family.

Different perspectives

Jewish readers

Jewish tradition reads these books as the voice of God calling Israel to the covenant. The prophets are read weekly in synagogue. Isaiah 7:14 is read as referring to a child in the time of Ahaz, and Micah 5:2 as a promise of a Davidic ruler.

Catholic readers

Catholic teaching reads these prophets in their own setting and also as pointing to Christ. Matthew’s use of Isaiah 7:14 and Micah 5:2 is understood as a deeper sense of the texts. The Church draws on Amos and Micah for social teaching.

Orthodox readers

The Orthodox read Isaiah in the Greek text, where the word for virgin appears, and sing the Isaiah verses at Christmas and in the Advent season. They treat the prophets as inspired witnesses of Christ.

Protestant readers

Protestants read Amos and Micah as demands for justice and Hosea as a picture of divine love. Many evangelicals see Isaiah 7:14 as a direct prediction of Jesus. Many mainline scholars see a first fulfillment in Ahaz’s time and a second in Christ. Some hold that the verse concerns only the child of the time.

Scholarly views

Scholars debate how much of each book comes from the eighth century and how much was added in later periods. The oldest layers are thought to be the sharpest words of judgment, and promises of restoration are more often thought to be later.

Why it matters

These prophets define the moral voice of the Old Testament. Their words have been used in debates about justice, poverty and worship for centuries, and the New Testament cites them often. A student who reads them in their setting can see that they are not simply denouncing religion but asking that worship and justice go together.

Common misunderstandings

Misunderstanding: The prophets rejected sacrifice and ritual altogether.

Correction: They rejected worship that was cut off from justice and loyalty. Hosea 6:6 sets mercy beside sacrifice. Most scholars think the prophets criticized misuse, not the institution.

Misunderstanding: Isaiah 7:14 has only one possible reading.

Correction: Jewish and Christian readers, and Christians among themselves, disagree about the original meaning and the New Testament’s use. A fair account states each.

Misunderstanding: These prophets were social reformers with no religious message.

Correction: Their social concern is rooted in their faith in the Lord of the covenant. Amos and Hosea address worship as much as economic life.

Knowledge check

What did Amos criticize in Israel?

Amos criticized the oppression of the poor, the sale of the needy for small debts, corrupt courts and festivals held without justice. He said that God would not accept their offerings and called for justice to flow like a stream. He also warned that the Day of the Lord would be darkness for those who expected light.

What is the central image of the book of Hosea?

It is the marriage between the prophet and a woman who proves unfaithful, which pictures God’s relationship with Israel. Israel has pursued other gods like a wife who seeks other lovers, and yet God longs to bring her back. The word hesed, steadfast love, stands at the center, as do God’s judgment and mercy.

What was Isaiah’s counsel to Ahaz in Isaiah 7?

Isaiah told Ahaz not to fear the kings of Aram and Israel and to trust the Lord. He said that if Ahaz did not stand firm in faith he would not stand at all. He offered a sign, the birth of a child named Immanuel. Ahaz chose an alliance with Assyria instead, and Judah later became its vassal.

What does Micah 6:8 say?

It says that the Lord has shown what is good and what he requires: to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. The verse comes at the end of a lawsuit speech in which God asks Israel what he has done to deserve their unfaithfulness. It is among the best-known summaries of the prophetic message.

Think it through

  1. What is the difference between criticizing religion and criticizing its misuse?
  2. Why might Hosea’s marriage image be both powerful and difficult?
  3. How does a call to trust God differ from a call to avoid politics?
  4. Which of the four prophets speaks most directly to your own time, and why?

Independent assignment

Four prophets in a table

In your own notebook, make a table with columns for Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Micah. For each, fill in place, date, main charge, main promise and a verse you chose. Then write 250 to 350 words comparing how two of them use covenant ideas. Mention one verse where Jews and Christians read differently. Keep it for yourself.

Further study