Where is God when people are suffering oppressed, denied justice and the basic human right?
Where is God when evil on the increase and triumphing over the good and righteous is being suppressed?
Is god really silent? Is he really helpless in this situation or is He really unconcerned and a mere transcendent being?
These are the mind boggling and age old questions where people find it difficult to answer philosophy fails to explain and religions stumble.
What do we meant by silence of God? How does the scripture explains it? Does it mean the idleness of God?
The reality is entirely different. God is not always silent, and even the silence of God does not mean that the idle or helpless. God has a preferential option for the poor, needy and all those who are suffering under the different oppressive regimes.
The 8th century prophets explain that the silence of God has well defined meaning and purpose- a silence before a big cyclone or tsunami. The context of the 8th century prophets and the subsequent events support this argument. They emerged in the context where the so called existing prophets were soothing the kings and compromising the godly values.
God of the 8th century prophets was very much concerned about the happening in the society , its evils, oppression, denial of justice and imposed poverty.
They were not speaking about the situation that the people of God are being oppressed by others but of the situation that the so called people of God are oppressing their own fellow beings within the community. They longed to become richer, affluent and influencial at the expense of the poor.
In this context how did God break his silence?. What prompts Him to break and why did he break his silence?and how is God breaking His silence even today? With this introduction ,let’s come to the passage.
Amos pictures fairly well and deals with the 8th century situation along with his contemporaries, Isaiah of Jerusalem, Hosea, and Micah. The affluent of the Israel thought that they can silence God with their social affluence, religious sacrifices and the economic influence. But the Lord has broken the silence through His servants. Amos portrays how the Lord is acting in the history of Israel by breaking the silence. It has been portrayed by showing the character of God, series of indictments and the call of the prophet himself to act on behalf of God.
Why should God break his Silence? (the Biblical Basis)vs.8
The breaking of silence of God has been compared to as that of roaring of the Lion. Yahweh’s voice is compared in the O.T both to the sound of thunder (e.g:ps 29)and a lion’s roar(Amos 1:2,jer 25:30)
1. God’s own character and attributes:
The attributes and the character of God have been mentioned in various scriptures. Few of them are His love, just and righteous character. Because He is love, He loved Israel to the utmost. Hosea rightly pictures this. He cannot tolerate anything against to His basic principles. Wherever His principle has been violated He broke his silence. The period of prosperity in Israel and Judah during the 9th and early 8th century B.C prompt them to think that “might is right”. But God cannot deny his character. So God uses the prophets to break his silence. Just as the roaring of the Lion rouses fear in the people, the speaking of the Lord prompted them to prophesy. More than the soothing words, God’s words result in awe and fear in the people because their actions are contradictory to the basic character of God.
2. The universal power of God: God’s active intervention in history:
One of the task of the 8th century prophets was to de-nationalise Yahweh. So far they tried to restrict the power of Yahweh within the boundaries of Israel and Judah as a local or national deity. The first two chapters of Amos speak of Yahweh who stand behind all the nations and the punishments. Just like Yahweh brought Israel up from Egypt, it’s the same Yahweh who brought up Philistines from caphtor and Arameans from Kir. The universal God is universally powerful and active not only in the history of Israel but also in the historyof the universe. It is God who controls the history, so He breaks out in fury whenever people replace the sovereignty of God to the interim power of man.
When does God break His Silence? (context) vs.9,10:
The context is very clear,vs9 says, there is great unrest and oppression among them. Vs,10 says, they do not know how to do right, they store up violence and robbery in their strongholds.
The context of God’s judgement upon Judah and Israel is well portrayed in the prophetic books of Amos, Hosea , Isaiah and Micah. We could observe a great exploitation, violence and robbery in the of social, religious, political and economic realm.
Politically, there was less threat from outside to both the kingdoms. Jeroboam ll and Uzziah enjoyed more political freedom and extension of the kingdoms after the division. Temporary prosperity and absence of war feel proud and to ignore the coming threat from Assyria and from Egypt.
In the socio-economic realm, there was a stability and prosperity. More political stability made the elites to invest more in the business. This brought more money to the rich and to the king’s treasury. But the newly formed two extremely opposite communities-like the rich and the poor-started to play the opposite roles of the game. The gap between the rich and the poor was trying to oppress the destitute and crush the needy(Amos:4:1). Their greed came up to the extreme situation of impatience of ending the religious festivals as dosing the false balance and other false methods of cheating(Am:8:4-6)..
Religiously , at the surface level everything was going well. The sacrificial system, the Sabbath and other festivals wee performed very systematically. All the religious activities became mere ritualistic and were used for profit. Their heart was far from the Lord. There was no sincerity in it. The basic principles of justice and righteousness were ignored. Religion became another type of business and a hidden way of enjoying prosperity.
Today’s context :
The contemporary situation is not too far from the 8th century B.C. the socio-religious economic and political situation is far worse than the 8th century.
Socially, casteism is still predominant barbaric evil, even the Indian churches and the organisations are bound by its clutches. There is no possibility of a religious operation without a caste designation.
On the land issue, the land is hold by the minority rich and the majority poor were are under privileged and landless. Thus they are under the bonded labour and virtual slavery.
Environmentally, the modern development projects and the speedy industrialisation which has not spared even the church institutions are causing a big irreparable damage to the aboriginals and the eco-system.
Corruption, on the high places added shame to the Indian contemporary scenario,especially in election of Bishop’s and religious authorities.
Child labour, child mal nutrition, commercialisation of health and education and the privatisation of water are the new forms of social domination and oppression.
Economically, Despite all the attempts of the Govt.,the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. The economic growth of the country and the decrease in the inflation rates has not helped the poor at all; rather the number of the poor and the landless are increasing. Rather than providing the basic amenities and food security, govt. and other agencies are concerned in the special economic zone ,shopping malls and the foreign direct investment, which favour more to the greedy rich
As this is the worldwide phenomenon, India is no exception to it. So from the above discussion the 21st century can aptly be compared with the 8th century B.C.
How does God break His silence(our role) vs9:
Vs 9, says ,proclaim to the strongholds in Ashdod, and to the strongholds in the land of Egypt, and say. Here God told the prophet to break the silence and to proclaim the impending judgement. Prophets are to speak for God.
But concerning today’s situation many people are very much pessimistic and they have come to the conclusion that God is silent, God is unconcerned or transcendent, God is idle or God of Bible has nothing to do with the happening in the contemporary society, Christianity has no answer to post modern issues or the bible is irrelevant today, sowe there it is better to keep silent
Our other worldly beliefs added fuel to idleness .Let the religions do the business of the religion and let it not interfere in the social political and the economic aspects of the nation. This is the common attitude of the day.
Here the question is, does God has something to offer? Or Do we have any answer to the contemporary issues?
This will decide the destiny, contemporaneity of the powerfulness of the church. This is the calling of the church, to speak forth of God, in other words to break the silence of God. God uses human to speak forth for him, to break his silence or to pronounce his values on earth today. So our role is very crucial and decisive in connection with the destiny of the world or the world will have to face a complete destruction.
We have a prophetic role. As the prophets stood between the God and human to proclaim his judgement ,we are to stand on behalf of God and of the people to preach the impending judgement. Love is to love, hatred is to hatred.
We are the prophets in our generation that the the Lion has roared ,and to tell either to change or to face total destruction in all realms of life.
God is so disturbed and pained with contemporary national and international scenario.
God need the mouth pieces to break the silence. We are to break the silence for God and his people.
The true community which prophets and Jesus envisage is the Kingdom of God which represents God in every respect. We have to ask ourselves are we?
Being a prophet is a challenge. This risks our identity even threatens our existence itself. But when it compared to the reason for the calling and the reason for existence there is no other option but to become the mouth piece of God. To proclaim the kingdom of God and to denounce al earthly evil structures in any form, let us stand with the Lord to break the silence by our words and deeds.
[Meditation lead by Byju Eapen, Final Year BD]
