Social Justice in the Book of Amos

Abstract

Only when justice and righteousness roll down [like waters] is there hope either for the individual or for his religious institutions. 1 My intention in this article is to explore the possibility of a dialogue with the book of Amos from a church social work perspective. To accomplish this task, I will depend on the work of Old Testament scholars 2 who have already explored the intricacies of the exegetical, historical and grammatical challenges; their insights provide us with five basic assumptions: (1) the book refers to the ministry of Amos, a layperson from Tekoa, called by God to prophesy in the Northern Kingdom of Israel; (2) Amos's ministry took place approximately between the years 780 and 750 B.C.; (3) Amos of Tekoa opted to disassociate himself from the professional clergy of his times; (4) the book confronts today's believer with the reality of corporate sin (abusive religious and political practices among the nations targeted by the prophet had created a state of hopelessness for the socially marginalized); (5) and justice and righteousness are interchangeable terms. We part from these five assumptions to navigate what Berquist 3 has called the dangerous waters of justice and righteousness— dangerous indeed for both mind and spirit. Justice and righteousness are dangerous for the mind because, by nature, one is confined to the parameters of this side of God's creation; and for the spirit, because by attempting to understand God's justice, we might be tempted to build our own academic Babel. In order to avoid these dangers, and instead of exploring theoretical explanations of justice, 4 1 will rely on Robert Merton's concept of anomie to assist us in our journey. My contention is that Amos's message focuses on the reprehensible social acts of nations, especially God's Israel; these objectionable acts demanded God's interventive—salvific—judgment. 5 Anomie the social pollutant of Amos's times The concept of anomie was introduced by sociologist Emile Durkheim and was further developed by Robert Merton. 6 According to Durkheim, anomie occurs when society fails to produce norms which regulate individual and collective lives. In Merton's conceptualization, anomie emerges from the 169 incongruence between society's cultural goals and institutionalized norms which allow the attainment of those goals. For example, culturally we value financial success; however, due to institutionalized constraints, not everyone becomes financially successful. The discrepancy produces anomie which causes deviance. According to Merton, individuals respond to deviance with five modes of social adaptation: (1) Conformity, acceptance of both cultural goals and institutionalized norms (a person may decide to work two or three jobs); (2) Innovation, acceptance of cultural goals only but rejection of the institutionalized norms (the person becomes a drug dealer); (3) Ritualism, rejection of cultural goals but acceptance of the institutionalized norms (a person may become interested in enforcing the letter of the law, ignoring the spirit of the law); (4) Retreatism, this option is simply a helpless rejection of both cultural goals and institutionalized norms (a person may become an alcoholic or a substance abuser); (5) Rebellion, rejection of both cultural goals and institutionalized norms but hoping to create new ones. Amos's social critique addresses the anomie state of eight nations, not necessarily to incite revolt, but to underscore God's indignation for the abuse and to demand a halt to disparaging socio-religio-political practices. The first six nations, Syria, Philistia, Phoenicia, Edom, Ammon and Moab, had utilized their status to obstruct the well being of others. 7 Institutionalized oppression was rampant and thus divine judgment imminent. If these six nations were obviously accountable to God, much more so were the seventh and eighth: Judah and Israel. These two were treated as especially guilty on the basis of their personal relationship with God whose covenant they had breached. 8 Historically they had covenanted to walk with God (3:3) and had failed to keep the appointment; in so doing they had followed the path of the others who, although inexcusable, had never signed any covenant. From the post-diluvian Noachic covenant through the covenant with Abraham, Moses and David, God had selected a group of people to be the instruments of God's grace; Judah and Israel were the final recipients of such privilege. Throughout their own history, these covenant people had moved between two opposite poles: human wickedness and God's righteousness. As long as they walked with God—kept the covenant—they would behave righteously and consequently the nations of the earth would be blessed. To act righteously was a consequence, not a cause. With time, they inverted the process and began to exercise righteousness of their own in order to fulfill the covenant. The resulting effect was goal displacement and adoption of norms which contradicted the original goals set forth by God. These two contradictory processes may be illustrated as follows: 170