Amos: Silencing the Prophets

     The haftara for Parashat Vayeshev is taken from Sefer Amos, where the prophet presents a blistering condemnation of the selfish, self-absorbed, crooked and abusive upper class of the Northern Kingdom of Israel.  The prophet here lists numerous offenses committed by the kingdom’s socioeconomic elite, most of which relate to the mistreatment of the poor.  However, just before proceeding to describing the calamities God threatens to visit upon the people in response to their offenses, Amos turns to a much different type of wrongdoing: “I set up some of your sons as prophets, and some of your young men as nazirites… Yet you gave the nazirites wine to drink, and you commanded the prophets, ‘Do not prophesy’” (Amos 2:11-12).  As mentioned, these verses conclude Amos’ list of wrongs committed by his audience, suggesting that they represent the climax of his scathing condemnation.  The question thus arises as to how we might explain the special significance of this particular crime – giving wine to the nazirites and silencing the prophets.  How does this offense, or these offenses, fit into the overall message Amos seeks to convey in this prophecy?

            Dr. Shani Bechhofer (in Yeshiva University’s From Within the Tent: The Haftarot, p. 88) explains:

The navi and the nazir are both individuals who stand apart from society, who choose to partake not in its material pleasures as much as in its spiritual assets.  They aspire to a more elevated way of being in the world, and choose to pursue this aspiration.

They are the idealists, the nazir enacting and the navi voicing an implicit or explicit critique of that which is taken for granted and unquestioned about personal and societal functioning.  They thus serve as instigators of reflection and enemies of complacency.  Amos points out that the disposition to pursue the spiritual and the sacred, to protest injustice and immorality, and to seek to improve oneself and one’s community, is a heavenly gift… The test is whether or not we will respond to the disequilibrium they create with reflection and teshuvah.  How will the Jewish people nurture idealism among their young, what truths will they be ready to hear, how much spiritual ambition will they tolerate?

The prophets and nazirites were the nation’s idealists, and thus represented the silent or spoken voice of conscience, of protest to the status quo.  The Israelite society’s forceful rejection of these idealists reflected the core of the ills decried by Amos.  Underlying the specific offenses he enumerates is a general preoccupation with indulgence and greed that left no room for serious contemplation or moral conscience.  The people would not for a moment allow the cries of the poor interfere with their orgies which included wine taken in lieu of unpaid debts (“yayn anushim” – 2:8).  And certainly they had no patience or tolerance for the whistle-blowers who sought to disrupt their pursuit of vanity with inconvenient and uncomfortable reminders about substantive and meaningful values.

            Amos’ censure of the people’s reaction to the nazirites and prophets is essentially a call to revisit our attitude toward idealism and calls for change.  How do we respond to the “sons” and “young men,” the youthful idealists, who refuse to resign themselves to the conventional emphasis on material indulgence and comforts?  What is our attitude to those who, through either word or deed, call for a reevaluation of our priorities, passions and values?  In Amos’ time, these voices of conscience were resoundingly and cynically silenced.  The prevailing attitude was one of, “Everything’s fine the way it is,” or “Leave us alone and mind your own business.”  The presence of nevi’im and nezirim threatened to interfere with the people’s carefree complacency and self-indulgent pursuits.  And thus their rejection of the nazirites and prophets is indeed the climax of Amos’ caustic portrayal of the Israelite society of his time.

            This insight into Amos’ prophecy sheds new light on his famous prediction which appears toward the end of the sefer, foreseeing the time when God will send “hunger in the land – not a hunger for bread or a thirst for water, but rather to hear the word of the Lord” (8:11).  Amos proceeds to describe how the people will scurry about pathetically in frantic search of the “devar Hashem,” to hear God’s instructions and admonitions.  The people who now refuse to allow the “word of the Lord” the time of day, who angrily and viscerally reject, ridicule and revile the courageous voices of conscience among them, will one day search in desperation for some guidance.  The time will come, the prophet predicts, when people will recognize the emptiness of vanity and will search high and low for something to fill the excruciating vacuum in their lives.  They will seek out the prophets and nazirites whom they had either banished or tormented to death, but these will, of course, not be found.  The result will be a great “hunger” for meaning and substance.  Amos’ message is to relish idealism instead of ridiculing it, to welcome voices of conscience instead of silencing them; to satiate ourselves with the spiritual nourishment offered by the idealism in our midst, before it is driven away, leaving us with a dire thirst for something meaningful with which to fill our lives.