Amos 5:16

Therefore because of Israel's obduracy in wrong-doing.

wailing loud cries of grief: comp. Micah 1:8, "I will make a mispçdlike the jackals" in allusion to their doleful cries. The Orientals, especially women, on occasions of grief, are very demonstrative, and the -wailing" is a public ceremony (Ecclesiastes 12:5, -And the wailers go about in the streets"). Thomson, op. cit.i. 245 f., describes the funeral of a Moslem sheikh: in a corner of the cemetery was gathered a large company of women in three concentric circles; the outer circle consisted of sober, aged matrons, seated on the ground, who took but little active part in the solemnities; those constituting the inner circles were young women and girls, who "flung their arms and handkerchiefs about in wild frenzy, screamed and wailed like maniacs"; from time to time they would go in parties to the tomb of the departed sheikh, and there "dance and shriek around the grave in the wildest and most frantic manner."

streets … highways broad places … streets the -broad place" (we might say -square") being the open space in an Eastern city, especially near the gate (Nehemiah 8:1). The same two words often stand in parallelism: e.g. Isaiah 15:3 (also in a picture of national mourning).

shall say … Alas! alas! The Heb. (hô, hôelsewhere hôy, hôy) is onomatopoetic; and Ah! Ah! would correspond more closely. It must have been a common cry of lamentation. Comp. 1 Kings 13:30, "And they wailedover him, (saying,) Hôy, my brother!" Jeremiah 22:18, "They shall not wailfor him, Hôy, my brother! or Hôy, sister! They shall not wailfor him, Hôy, master! or Hôy, his glory!" Jeremiah 34:5, "And Hôy, master! will they wailfor thee." In the modern Syriac dialect of Urmia, ú hú, ú hú, is the cry of a lament.

and they shall call the husbandman to mourning The husbandman will be summoned from his occupation in the fields to take part in the general lamentation.

and such as are skilful of lamentation to wailing The Heb. is "And wailing to those skilled in lamentation," the construction being changed for variety, and the word -call" being understood from the preceding clause, in the sense of proclaim(which it also has in Hebrew, as Jeremiah 34:8). By those -skilled in (lit. understanding) lamentation" are meant professional mourners, such as were called in to assist at a funeral. They were usually women (Jeremiah 9:17 f. "call to the women who chant dirges that they may come, and send for the cunning (lit. wise) women that they may come; and let them hasten and take up a lamentation(same word as here) for us" &c.; cf. Amos 5:20, "And teach, O women, your daughters a lamentation, and every one her neighbour a dirge"), but might also, as here (where the gender is masc.), be men (cf. Ecclesiastes 12:5; 2 Chronicles 35:25). How the nĕhî(-lamentation") differed from the ḳînâh(-dirge") of Amos 5:1 is not certain: the passages in which it occurs make it probable that it was a slightly more general term of similar import: Jeremiah 9:10, "I will take up a weeping and lamentationfor the mountains, and a dirgefor the pastures of the wilderness"; Amos 5:18; Amos 5:20just quoted; 19, "a voice of lamentationis heard out of Zion, (saying,) -How are we spoiled" &c."; Micah 2:4; Ezekiel 27:32, "And they shall take up a dirgeover thee in their lamentation, and chant a dirgeover thee, (saying,) -Who is like Tyre?" &c." (comp. the verb, Micah 2:4; Ezekiel 32:18). See further the Additional Note, p. 232.

Additional Note on Chap. Amos 5:16 (Mourning ceremonies)

Mourning ceremonies belong to a class of institutions which change little from generation to generation; and Wetzstein, for many years Prussian Consul at Damascus, has given an account of them as observed in modern Syria, which throws light upon various allusions in the O.T. [222] The corpse, having immediately after death been washed, dressed, and bestrewed with spices, is laid out upon the -threshing-board" mentioned above (p. 227), on which, as it were, it lies in state, the head being supported on the end which is curved upwards: on the following morning a tent of black goats" skin is erected, sometimes, if the deceased was wealthy, on the flat open house-top, but usually, at least in Syria, on the village threshing-floor: thither the corpse is brought on the threshing-board; soon after, a procession of the female relatives of the deceased, unveiled, with bare heads and feet, and wearing long black goats"-hair mourning tunics, advance from his house and form a circle round the tent. The professional mourners now begin to play their part. In the cities these consist of a chorus of women (laṭṭâmât, -those who smite themselves on the face"), of whom one after another successively takes the lead; in the country a single singer, called the ḳawwâla, or "speaker," sometimes supported by one or two others, is deemed sufficient: in either case the singer must be able either to recite from memory, or to extemporise for the occasion, funeral dirges of sufficient length. Standing, if in Damascus, in the open court of the house, if in villages, round the tent just spoken of, in which the corpse lay, these women chant their ma-îd, or dirge (which must have a definite poetical form, with metre and rhyme), recounting the virtues of the deceased his goodness, his nobleness, his hospitality, &c., or the circumstances of his death, perhaps in defence of the cattle of his tribe against a raid of Bedawin, and bewailing the pain of separation: at the end of each dirge, or, if it be a long one, at the end of each stanza of it, the female relatives of the deceased, who form another chorus, called reddâdât, the -answerers," or neddâbât, or nawwâḥât, the -mourners," reply with the refrain, uttered with a prolonged note, into which much feeling is thrown, wêlî, "Woe is me!" The dirges for those who have fallen bravely consist of 30 or 40 stanzas, and are often, says Wetzstein, of great beauty. The dirges continue for two or three hours: at the end of this time invited guests from the neighbouring villages come in order, men and women forming two processions, to pay their last respects to the deceased and to offer their condolences to his relations. The interment then takes place. The ceremony of singing the dirges is repeated on the next day, and if the family be a wealthy one is continued during a whole week [223].

[222] In Bastian's Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, 1873, pp. 295 301: some particulars are quoted by Budde in the Zeitsch. für die alttest. Wiss., 1882, p. 26 f. Mariti, an Italian priest, witnessed a similar ceremonial near Jaffa in 1767; extracts from his description are given by Budde in the Zeitsch. des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins, 1883, p. 184 ff., and compared in detail with the particulars stated by Wetzstein.

[223] The -threshing-board" is regarded by the Syrian peasant with a superstitious reverence. It is used not only at funerals, but also at marriages: covered with a decorated cloth, it is arranged to form a throne, on which a newly-wedded couple, during the seven days (the "King's week") following their marriage, play king and queen, and songs are sung before them by the villagers and others (see the writer's Introduction, Exodus 5, p. 537, Exodus 6, under the Song of Songs). A threshing-board, it is said, is never stolen: the would-be thief, when he sees it, is reminded of the day when he will be laid upon it himself, and dreads to touch it.

A clear distinction, it will be here noticed, is drawn between the -dirge," which is an ode sung solely by the professional mourners, and the wailing refrain, which is joined in by all the others, whenever a pause is made by the singers. The ma-îdcorresponds to the ḳînâh, or artistically constructed -dirge," of the O.T. (comp. on Amos 5:1), the professional mourning women correspond to the -wise" women (i.e. those instructed in their art), who -chant dirges," to whom Jeremiah alludes (Jeremiah 9:17) [224] : the refrain of woe reminds us of the hôy, hôy(or hô, hô), quoted in the note on Amos 5:16.

[224] In later times such dirges were accompanied by the flute: see Matthew 9:23; Joseph. B. J.iii:9, § 5.