Hear this word, you cows of Bashan on Mount Samaria, you women who oppress the poor and crush the needy and say to your husbands, “Bring us some drinks!” – Amos 4:1

Today’s Scripture Reading (November 27, 2016): Amos 4

Lee Kuan Yew once remarked that “I always tried to be correct, not politically correct.” Yew was the founding father of Singapore and Prime Minister of the nation from 1959 until 1990, and apparently, he fought the same battle with political correctness as some of the rest of us. And most of us can understand his frustration with political correctness. Part of the problem is that politically correct speech often seems to be a moving target. Our language seems to change so fast. As a public speaker, I often struggle with the politically correct way to say things. I know that the politically correct way to phrase something yesterday might not be the way to phase it tomorrow. And every once in a while I get caught saying something that used to be okay to say but is okay no longer. A faction of our population even seems to wear political incorrectness as a badge of honor. So the language wars continue.

Amos would definitely be guilty of politically incorrect speech, even in his own day. At no point in history has characterizing a woman as a “fat cow” been the politically correct thing to do. But we need to remember that Amos was not a politician – or even an educator or a man used to speaking in public. He was a simple herdsman from the backcountry. So he speaks of what he knows. And what he knows is livestock.

The cows in Bashan, an area in the modern-day Golan Heights, were known for being fat and healthy. But it is not the weight of the woman in Bashan that is the problem. While the Modern day image of a beautiful woman might be one that is thin, throughout most of history fatness was a sign of affluence and beauty. Amos is arguing that the problem is that, while these women that Amos is calling “fat cows” are well cared for, the way their husbands became affluent was to crush the poor and the needy. But the reason for their spouse’s behavior was the women with whom that they lived. The women’s insatiable appetite for luxury has driven their husbands to commit greater and greater injustices. And, as a result, they are not innocent of the sins of their husbands.

These women were narcissistic – and, in the eyes of the shepherd Amos, nothing separated them from the fat cows that covered the hillside. In the end, Amos may have been politically incorrect, but he got his message across.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Amos 5