054. Moses--War with Amalek
Moses--War with Amalek
Exo 17:8-13. Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek: tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand. So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek. And Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And it came to pass when Moses field up his hand, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. But Moses’ hands were heavy; and they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat thereon: and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
Nothing can be more afflicting to a humane and serious mind, than to reflect on that strife and contention which have in every age deluged the world with human blood. Who could believe, if all history did not prove it, and who can think of it without horror, that men should be continually lying in wait, like beasts of prey, to catch and devour men; that the strong, the cunning, and the fierce should be forever on the watch, to take advantage of the weak, the simple, and the gentle? And must it be? Father of Mercies! must it needs be, that war should continue to waste the nations! shall the earth be forever a field of blood? Must the peace of private families, and the repose of kingdoms, be eternally disturbed by lust and pride, avarice and ambition, envy and revenge? Blessed God! send forth the Spirit of thy Son into the hearts of men. Prince of Peace! command this troubled ocean into a calm. Spirit of Love! put a full end to bitterness and wrath. Subdue this carnal mind, which is enmity against God. Glorious gospel of salvation! as thou bringest goodwill from God to men, restore good-will to men among themselves.
It is difficult to say whether men suffer most from their own folly, or from the cruelty and injustice of others. We generally find, that when evil from without would, for a while, permit wretched mortals to breathe and be at peace, they perversely become self-tormentors, and ingeniously contrive sources of vexation to themselves. And, which is the greater evil of the two? That, undoubtedly, of which we are the authors to ourselves. We have, then, to encounter an enemy from whom we cannot hope to escape, and whom we are unable to overcome. From a conflict with Amalek, Israel comes off with both credit and comfort; but a strife of discontent, impatience, and rebellion against God, must of necessity issue in shame and loss.
God, rich in mercy, slow to anger, and of great kindness, has graciously forgiven the murmuring at Horeb, and extracted water from the rock, for the relief of his people. But this woe is no sooner past than another overtakes them. “Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim.” The transaction recorded here, so simply and uncircumstantially, is mentioned again in Deuteronomy, with many circumstances of aggravation, which greatly increase our detestation of this conduct in Amalek, and explain the deep resentment which a holy and righteous God himself expresses upon the occasion, and which, by a positive statute, he transmits to Israel. “Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt; how he met thee by the way and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary; and he feared not God. Therefore it shall be, when the Lord thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it.”[*]Deu 25:17-19
Amalek, the father of this nation, as we learn from Gen 36:12, was grandson to Esau, and son to Eliphaz, by a concubine named Timna. The Amalekites indeed are mentioned much earlier in Scripture, even in the days of Abraham when Chedorlaomer is represented, with his victorious army, as ravaging all their country. But it is well known that the sacred writers, when treating of various periods, give appellations to regions and countries which did not belong to them till ages afterwards, but by which they wore better known at the time when the historian wrote. They possessed a large tract of country, extending from the confines of Idumaea to the eastern shore of the Red Sea; and from their neighborhood to, and commerce with, Phoenicia, they are by some called Phoenicians.
Immediately on their passing through the Red Sea, it behoved the children of Israel to enter into this territory, on their way to Canaan. And probably the paternal relation which subsisted between them and Amalek, encouraged the posterity of Jacob to advance on their way with greater confidence. “It is the land of our brethren through which we are to pass;” would they say one to another. “The heart of Esau himself relented, when he saw his brother Jacob return, encumbered with a train of women and children, and cattle. He forgot his resentments: he became the protector of the man whom he had, in the hour of passion, vowed to destroy. The injury done him in the matter of the birthright, and of the blessing, he generously forgave. Surely the posterity of Esau, after many generations, will not revive a quarrel which is extinguished and forgotten, first in the reconciliation, and then in the death of the original parties to it. After a servitude so long and so bitter in Egypt, we shall at length find a time and a place to breathe; and the soothings of fraternal love shall console us for the rigors of oppression.”
Vain expectation! What foe so dreadful as a brother disaffected! Egypt smote with the rod; Amalek smites with the sword; he basely, cruelly seizes the moment of Israel’s languor, weakness, and dejection, and attempts to crush those whom a sanguinary tyrant had persecuted, and whom Heaven itself had bruised. The cowardice of this behavior is equal to the unkindness of it. Had they boldly appeared at the first, to dispute the passage of the Red Sea, and to repel by force of arms the invasion of their country, their conduct, though ungenerous and unkind, had been ingenuous and manly. But, either through fear or policy, they permit Israel to advance, they watch the moment of their difficulty and distress, and, like dastards, steal upon the rear of an army whose front they dared not to oppose.
Neither good qualities nor bad are found single in the human breast. And, in the nation whose character is now the object of our censure, we find a combination of the worst qualities of which our nature is capable, all originating in the deficiency of one great principle, which is at the root of all the evil which men commit, “he feared not God.” Why did Amalek rake up the ashes of an ancient grudge? “He feared not God.” Why did he join to afflict the miserable, and to overwhelm the oppressed? “He feared not God.” Why did he meanly attack the weaker and more vulnerable part of his adversary, in the hope of safety and impunity? “He feared not God.” Wherefore, in general, are men subtle, revengeful, cunning, and selfish? “They fear not God;” they “harden themselves against him,” and yet think “to prosper.” They “love not their brother whom they have seen,” because they are wilfully ignorant of, or hate God, “whom they have not seen.”
Such is the union which Providence has established between all the parts of the natural and of the political body, that the weakness or distress of one member is the infirmity and suffering of the whole. The hindmost and the feeble of Israel are smitten; the foremost and the strong feel and immediately resent it. “And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose out men, and go out, fight with Amalek: tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill, with the rod of God in mine hand.” We have here a combination which ought never to be separated, and in which safety and success are ever to be found, namely, the acknowledgment of Heaven, and the use of appointed means, the sword in the hand of Joshua, the rod in that of Moses, the embattled host below in the valley, the intercessor with God, “wrestling” and “making supplication” upon the hill. In vain had Moses prayed if Joshua had not fought. Destitute of “the effectual, fervent prayer of the righteous man,” the skill and courage of the warrior had failed before the enemy. The rod of God! in how many different services is it employed! how many various purposes does it answer! It smites the river of Egypt, and it becomes blood. It smites the rock in Horeb, and it sends forth a stream of water. It is extended towards heaven, on the top of the hill, and Amalek is destroyed. Striking and instructive type of that “rod of God’s mouth,” wherewith “he slays the wicked:” of that sword of the Spirit “which is the word of God: of that hammer which breaketh the rock in pieces:” of that gospel, which is “a savour of God in them that believe, and them that perish.”
Observe how God appoints to every man his station of usefulness and importance. It was not for want either of zeal or courage, that Moses takes his post at a distance on the hill. It is not for want of piety, that Joshua leads on the armies of Israel on the plain. The mistakes and miscarriages of the world arise from the weakness and wickedness of men; at one time overrating their talents, and thrusting themselves forward into situations for which they are wholly unfit; and at another, through timidity shrinking from the duties of that station which Providence has assigned them; and at a third, treacherously, through some bias of private interest, passion, or party, selling the trust committed to them, to the foe. Happily, in the case before us, the head which directed, and the hand which executed, were in perfect unison. The spirit that fought, and the spirit that prayed, were one.
Let us first ascend the hill with Moses and his two friends, and adopt the feelings of men, who at once felt for the public cause, were not without well founded apprehensions from the common enemy, and at the same time feared and trusted the Lord. Moses has given his orders to Joshua, and he has so far done well; but to stop there had been doing nothing. He has set the means to work, and now he can confidently look up to Heaven for that blessing which can give success to the means. He ascends to meet God, but ascends not alone. As wickedness seeks to fortify and to keep itself in countenance by the society of the wicked, so the fire of devotion keeps itself alive by the sacred communication of a kindred flame. The hands of Moses alone had soon become feeble, and must have dropped down, and Amalek finally had prevailed; supported by Aaron and Hur, they continue. “steady till the going down of the sun;” and Amalek and his people are discomfited with the edge of the sword. Of Aaron, one of the companions of Moses upon the mount, we know much; of Hur, the other, the Scripture account is more sparing. Those who are never at a loss so long as fancy and invention can create, make him the son of Caleb, and the husband of Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron. It appears from the history, that he was the father of Uri; and the grandfather of Bezaleel, the famous artist, employed, by special endowment and appointment of Heaven, for the construction of the more curious and costly furniture of the tabernacle and sanctuary. But it is of more importance for us to know him, and for him to be reported, as a person of the first quality, and his quality supported by that which gives rank its highest luster, genuine piety. Moses left him, in commission with Aaron, to judge the people, when a short while after this he went up alone into Mount Sinai, to meet God. This is argument sufficient of his high rank; and the assumption of him to assist his devotion in Mount Horeb, while Israel was engaged with Amalek, is a proof equally clear and decisive of his extraordinary piety.
Behold then the man of God, supported and encouraged by two such companions, discovering all the honest anxiety of the patriot, together with all the confidence and fervor of the saint; with his eyes eagerly bent on the conflicting armies in the plain below; and his hands, with his heart, lifted up to God in the heavens, from whom his help came. It was clearly the intention of Providence, that the deliverance which should be wrought for Israel on this occasion, though not wholly independent on the use of means, should evidently appear to flow chiefly and only from the interposition and grace of Heaven. “It came to pass when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed; and when he let down his hand, that Amalek prevailed.” This is the first battle which Israel was called to fight; and it was designed to be a model of all that should follow; of assured success to them, and victory over all their enemies, provided they constantly acknowledged God, with hands continually lifted up to heaven. And it had undoubtedly a farther view, namely, to represent in general, the powerful and certain effect of prayer to God, and of a sense of dependence upon him; to show that our strength is in exact proportion to the perception of our own weakness, and to our confidence in almighty grace. The lesson inculcated in this history is the same which Christ taught his disciples in the parable of the unjust judge and the importunate widow, “That men ought always to pray, and not to faint.”[*]Luk 18:1 If importunity and the love of ease have power to constrain a man to do his duty, though he have no inclination to it, how much more certain the effect of earnestness and importunity with the Hearer of prayer, the Father of mercies; who is ever more ready to grant than man to ask? “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him.”[*]Mat 7:11 Have you considered then, my Christian friend, what a powerful instrument is put into your hand, mighty as the rod of God in the hand of Moses, wherewith he did wonders? “Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain; and it rained not on the earth for the space of three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit.”[*]Jas 5:17-18 Surely, then, “the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”[*]Jas 5:16 God has not given you assurance of success in all your undertakings, but he has bestowed upon you the privilege, and promised you the spirit of prayer, by which you shall certainly obtain one of two things; either that blessing from above upon your honest endeavors, which maketh rich, which insures success, and makes it durable; or, that resignation of spirit, and submission to the will of God, which subdue misfortune, and which turn calamity and disappointment themselves into advantage. God has not given thee, my friend, the promise of riches; but he has given thee, what is much better, the spirit of grace and supplication to form thy soul to contentment. You have no security against pain and sorrow; but you have that which produces patience and fortitude. You cannot promise yourself long life; but habitual intercourse with God by prayer, overcomes the fear of death.
Glorious privilege! Whatever my situation in life be, here is something to improve it, if good; something to mend it, if evil. Here is the ornament and essence of prosperity, the cure and cordial of adversity. Here is the guardian and the guide of life; the sweetener and subduer of death. Prayer brings all the glorious perfections of Deity into our possession. “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”[*]Jas 1:5 “When I am weak, then am I strong:” “for I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” Is the thorn not removed, the messenger of Satan not rebuked, though the Lord be thrice besought that they may depart? No matter. Is it not said, “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness? Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”[*]2Co 12:9 But where are the hands which never hang down? Those of Moses himself became heavy. “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Fatal omen to Israel! Amalek instantly gains the ascendant. But happily, Moses was not alone in the mount “And they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.” “As iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend;” and so devotion kindles and keeps alive devotion. Secret prayer, like the melody of one sweet-toned voice stealing upon the ear, gently wafts the soul to heaven: social worship, as a full chorus of harmonized sounds, pierces the sky, and raises a great multitude of kindred spirits to the bright regions of everlasting love, and places them together before the throne of God. How happy are Aaron and Hur, in lending this aid to the wearied hands of Moses, and to the declining interest of the Israel of God! How happy is Moses in being thus supported! But there is an Intercessor whose hands never hang down, whose fervor never cools, whose mediation never fails, whose attention is never relaxed. “We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.” Him “the Father heareth always:” “as a Prince he hath power and prevaileth.”
Let us now turn our eyes to the struggle in the valley below. There we meet “the confused noise of the warrior, and garments rolled in blood:” the alternate shouts of acclamation and triumph, mingling with the piercing shrieks of the wounded, and the groans of the dying. Israel, now hurrying on to victory, and anon flying before the insulting foe. The event for a while is awfully in doubt; turning upon the strength and feebleness, not of thousands, but of one single arm; decided at length, not by the edge of the sword, but the elevation or depression of a rod; and that rod swayed, not by the skill and prowess of Joshua, but the firmness and devotion of Moses. But now, doubt and anxiety are at an end. The hands of Moses are propped up, and Israel finally prevails. And what heart save that of an Amalekite but must rejoice in the issue? “The cunning is taken in his own craftiness.” A design of violence and blood falls upon the head of him that contrived it. The righteous and innocent cause bears down pride and cruelty. We behold the destination of heaven standing good, the birthright sold away, the blessing anticipated; the elder made subject to the younger. “God is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who hath hardened himself against him and hath prospered?”[*]Job 11:4
Israel has conquered. But it is impossible to mistake the means by which he has gotten the victory. “The hand of the Lord, and his holy arm, they have gotten him the victory.” The altar, therefore, which was built to celebrate this signal success, shall by its name perpetuate the remembrance of God the deliverer. Jehovah-Nissi, “the Lord my banner,” was inscribed upon it by the divine appointment; and a reason is assigned in the sixteenth verse. “For he said, Because the Lord hath sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”
These words, having been variously rendered, have given occasion to various opinions among interpreters. Some read the passage thus, “Because the hand of Amalek is against the throne of the Lord, the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” This reading, resolves the guilt of Amalek, not into an insidious and cruel design against Israel, but into a rash and impious attempt to defeat the plan of Providence, which was to bring Israel into the quiet possession of Canaan, and to exalt that nation, favored of God but envied of man, to wealth, power, and empire. God therefore was pleased to vindicate in person the cause which was his own, and to write disappointment and a curse upon every plan which Amalek could form, of greatness and prosperity. So “fearful a thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God,” so dangerous to form a combination “against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.”[*]Psa 2:2-4
Others literally translate the words thus, “With the hand upon the throne of the Lord, he hath sworn that he will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” He, that is, Moses, hath sworn, with the most awful solemnities, and recorded the oath in a book for perpetual preservation, that there shall be no peace between Israel and Amalek till he be utterly destroyed. The hand which was extended towards heaven, the throne of the great and terrible God, with the rod in it; the instrument of a victory which was interrupted by the going down of the sun, has been lifted up, to “swear by him that liveth forever,” that the triumph of that day shall be followed up, till the hated name of Amalek be extinguished from under heaven.
Some make Jehovah himself to be the person who binds himself by this solemn oath. “The hand,” that is, Jehovah’s own hand, upon the throne of the Lord. “Because he could swear by no greater, he hath sworn by himself, that He will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” We have a prophesy in the mouth of Balaam to the same effect; “And when he looked on Amalek, he took up his parable and said, Amalek was the first of the nations, but his latter end shall be that he perish forever.”[*]Num 24:20 The execution of this dreadful sentence was reserved to the days of Samuel, four hundred and twelve years after; and was committed to Saul, who, through an impolitic and sinful lenity, failed to fulfill the design of Providence, and thereby incurred the displeasure of Heaven, and forfeited his life and crown by his disobedience. I transcribe the passage.
“Samuel also said unto Saul, The Lord sent me to anoint thee to be king over his people, over Israel; now therefore hearken thou unto the voice of the words of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel; how he laid wait for him in the way when he came up from Egypt. Now go, and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.”[*]1Sa 15:1-3 This order Saul obeyed but in part. He assumed and exercised a dispensing power, and it became a snare to him. He took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive; and reserved the best of the spoil. The prophet is sent of God to reprove his disobedience; which Saul attempting to palliate, brings down this censure upon his head. “When thou wast little in thine own sight, wast thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel, and the Lord anointed thee king over Israel? And the Lord sent thee on a journey, and said, Go, and utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they be consumed. Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the Lord, but didst fly upon the spoil, and didst evil in the sight of the Lord. And Samuel said, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice; and to hearken, than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king.”[*]1Sa 15:17, etc. Has God commanded to destroy? Who shall presume to save? Has he commanded to spare? Who dares destroy? “I say unto you, be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom you shall fear: fear him, which, after he hath killed, hath power, to cast into hell: yea, I say unto you, fear him.”[*]Luk 12:4-5