You shall take up Sikkuth your king, and Kiyyun your star-god — your images that you made for yourselves,
Amos speaks to a nation full of feast days and sacrifices. Then he names what they were also carrying in the wilderness. Two hard questions follow. Who were these gods with the strange names? And why does God charge a later generation with a sin from the wilderness?
Idols Carried Out of Egypt
The names in the verse belong to foreign gods. Acts quotes the passage in Stephen's speech to the council. One reference work traces the charge all the way back to Egypt:
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe expression "the tabernacle of your Molech," Amos 5:26, is quoted in Acts 7:43-44. For forty years in the wilderness the Israelites had not worshipped Jehovah. Instead they carried symbols of Molech and Chiun (or Remphan) and worshipped them. The root of their idolatry was that in heart they had never made a clean break from Egypt.
Worship Behind the Worship
The timing is what shocks. These idols moved with Israel while the nation honoured God's tabernacle. One writer reads this as a warning about religion that looks sound, and about judgment that waits:
William KellyWhen the Spirit of prophecy announced their coming captivity, He did not go back to the wicked kings of Israel, or to the shameless sons of David who ruled Judah. He went back to the idolatry in the wilderness — at the very time when they were outwardly honouring the tabernacle of Jehovah and the priesthood of Aaron. But all the while God saw how hollow their offerings and sacrifices in His name were. In their hearts, in secret, they took up the tent of Moloch and the star of the god Raiphan (or Romphan) — the images they made in order to worship them. God may wait with wonderful patience, but it is the early sin left unjudged that decides the outcome, even though the judgment may not be carried out for many centuries.
The same writer notices what people will spend on a false god:
William KellyEven the poorest can afford to be lavish in honour of false gods. Yet these are the people who complain about what is due to the true God, as if He were a harsh collector of dues and not the Giver of every good and every perfect gift.
Why God Reaches Back So Far
The sin named here is not his own generation's. It belongs to their ancestors in the wilderness. One writer applies that to our own failures:
William KellyGod, we may see, always goes back to the beginning when He judges. In the time of the Babylonian captivity, why did He judge Israel? He looks at what they did in the wilderness. It was because of Moloch and Chiun (Amos 5:26). They had learned to worship their images in the wilderness, and so they were to be carried captive beyond Damascus… So our wisdom as Christians, when we fail, is to go back to our first departure. We never get right by judging just this or that outbreak. We must always search out the cause.
The Names and the Judgment
Translators handle the Hebrew names in more than one way. Commentators differ: some keep "Moloch and Chiun" as names, and others read the words as objects — a shrine, a base, a star. One writer takes the second route. He also notes that Stephen says "Babylon" where Amos says "Damascus":
William KellyThey had not got rid of the gods of Egypt then. They brought these worthless gods with them into the wilderness, and now God charges them with it. "But you have borne the shrines of your king, and the base of your images, the star of your god, which you made for yourselves." Notice the circumstances. "Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity" (the deportation to the cities of the Medes) "beyond Damascus." Stephen says beyond Babylon — and that is indeed what happened — perhaps to mark it off from the Babylonian captivity.
The ESV keeps the Hebrew names, "Sikkuth your king" and "Kiyyun your star-god." It also reads the line as something still to come, while the older rendering used above puts it in the past.
An Evil Restrained but Never Removed
Israel's later idols were not a new invention. One writer traces them back to the same root:
J. N. DarbyThe evil principle that ruined them had been among them from the beginning. God's power stepped in, held it in check and turned its effect aside; but it was still there. As faith and godliness declined, and human interests no longer held it back, the same evil reappeared. The calves at Dan and Bethel were only a repeat of the calf they made in the wilderness.
Another writer follows that decline to its end:
Frederick W. GrantIt is only one step in a general, persistent departure from God — a departure never retraced and never repented of. It is solemn to say it, but however many people may be delivered, the body as a whole never recovers from such a decline. Every step downward makes the fall faster… There were many reformations afterward, more or less partial, but no fresh start.
Summary
- Root — The idols came from Egypt. Israel left the country; their hearts never did.
- Cargo — What they carried told the truth. A false king's shrine went with them while they honoured God's tabernacle.
- Cover — The sacrifices never stopped, and God called that worship hollow.
- Cause — When God judges, He goes back to the first departure, not the latest outbreak — and so should we when we fail.
- Consequence — Captivity "beyond Damascus" grew out of one wilderness sin. Unjudged evil only sleeps.