Life Meets Doctrine

“Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to your husbands, ‘Bring, that we may drink!’  Amos 4:1.

I know the title of this post might be shocking, but that is kind of what happened to me when I first read this verse.  I must admit that when I was in high school and I came across this particular verse, I was first amused.  I laughed.  I told my friends about how God called some women cows.  I thought it was interesting, entertaining, and cool.  Yes, cool.  Back then, I sunk my teeth into any sort of goofball, sarcastic passages of Scripture as though they were the hope of the world.  You, too, would have to admit that this passage is funny, especially for a 16 year old.

In the first 3 chapters of Amos, it is already clear that God is upset, angry, and demanding repentance.  There is no question about that.  The sins of the nations have disgusted him, and the sins of his own people have disgusted him.  His disgust is so strong that he has used sarcasm before, pointing out the blatant obvious in a pointed way so that his people might get a clue of what they are doing.  God’s disgust is so strong that he has even used unconventional methods, such as bringing in unholy nations to confirm his judgment of his own people.  God’s disgust has led him to paint word pictures that would  shock the Israelite of the day.

But this one still stands out.

God just called the wives of Israel cows.  What is going on with that?  The specific Hebrew word refers to a young, female cow before she has had any calves – basically, a virgin cow.   This really is shocking.  The only other time God comes close to such a statement is Hosea 4:16, when he says, “Like a stubborn heifer, Israel is stubborn; can the Lord now feed them like a lamb in a broad pasture?”  (Interestingly, Hosea was a contemporary of Amos.)  The type of cow God refers to are those that are raised in the mountains of Samaria where they get really fat eating off of the land.  They were big, strong, and stubborn.  Really big.  Really fat.

Furthermore, they were unruly and wouldn’t stay in their own field.  They would break over hedges and fences to get food from others.  To get really big, really fat.  They weren’t like sheep who – though unintelligient – could be led and kept within boundaries.  They were big, stubborn, fat cows who ran around eating everyone else’s food.

And that is why God calls them cows.  Not because they are literally fat, but because they are oppressing the poor, crushing the needy, and demand that their husbands get them some more beer.  They are getting bigger by squelching others.  Whether they are physically obese or not, they are acting like cows who just eat everybody else’s food all the time.  So God calls them on it using stark language: Hear this word, you cows of Bashan.  And they would do well to hear.