GOD ROARS LIKE A LION

 The Dictionary of Biblical Imagery explains that the “Israelites based their opinion of the lion on their encounters with it as pastoralists...A significant portion of the references to lion in scripture concerns its voice...No doubt many more people had heard a lion than had seen one, and this enhanced the mythology surroundings lions.” I would like to concentrate on five of these references (quoting from the RSV) which compare the voice of God with the roaring of a lion.

Jeremiah 25:30 – “The LORD will roar from on high and from his holy habitation utter his voice; he will roar mightily against his fold and shout, like those who tread grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth.”

This is actually a rather confusing prophecy. If one concentrates on the phrase “his fold,” then that would seem to point to Israel and Judah as the objects of God's wrath. But “all the inhabitants of the earth” could refer to either the foreign nations only or to all the nations including Israel and Judah. Then there is the related question as to whether these two phrases are parallel to one another or refer to different nations. Thus, the following comments from the scholarly literature demonstrate that there are mixed explanations as to what is being said here.

D.R. Jones begins by stating that “the pattern of this sentence is exactly that of Am. 1.2, with which there must be some unexplained connection, cf. also Jl 3.16.” But there is also a drastic difference also, as you can see by looking at those latter two verses below. Jones' explanation is as follows: “The difference is that in Am. the LORD roars 'from Zion' and utters his voice 'from Jerusalem'. Jeremiah could not express the divine intervention thus, for the LORD is to destroy Zion (his fold) and declare his judgment over Jerusalem, as over all the nations of the earth. The change is therefore necessary and deliberate...Here it may be that the picture is of the thunder, itself a figure of the divine judge pronouncing his terrible judgment from one end of the world to the other in the vicissitudes of history.”

Bright: “The second part of the chapter (vss. 15-38) is concerned with Yahweh's judgment on the nations of the world...The very fact that he was commissioned as 'a prophet to the nations' (i 5) would lead one to expect that some of his sayings – as had been the case with most of the prophets since Amos – would concern peoples other than Israel.”

“It is at once evident that vv. 15-39 are closely related to the oracles against the foreign nations in chs. 46-51).” (Thompson)

And Lamb adds, “Perhaps more than any another OT genre, prophetic literature is concerned with nations other than Israel and Judah, but ultimately all peoples and nations...Although most of these oracles involve judgment on those nations and cities, in Isaiah, Yahweh calls Egypt, 'my people' and Assyria 'the work of my hands' (Is 19:25).”

But Schnittjer states, “The shift from Zion [in Amos 1:2] to on high signals, for Jeremiah's readership, the fall of Jerusalem.”

Hosea 11:10 – “They shall go after the LORD, he will roar like a lion; yes, he will roar, and his sons shall come trembling from the west.”

“One day, Israel will return to Yahweh and they will be able to return upon their conversion...When the great lion Yahweh will roar, not one will fail to hear, and the restoration of Israel will be at hand (cf. Joel 3:16). Here that roaring is emphasized by the repetition of the verb...Hosea's audience presumably understood this cliche as a signal of the new age for Israel (cf. 2:16-23; 3:5). But the restoration promised here will apply to reconverted Israelites only (cf. Deut 4:29). Thus first the condition is stated: 'After Yahweh they shall go.' The new Israel will be characterized by righteous behavior and true faith (cf. Zeph 3:12-13).” (Stuart)

Joel 3:16 – “And the LORD roars from Zion and utters his voice from Jerusalem, and the heavens and the earth shake. But the LORD is a refuge to his people, a stronghold to the people of Israel.”

Barker points out that Joel 3:14 “emphasizes the way in which this prophetic book enacts a complete reversal of the sense of the Day of the Lord. This is evident in a comparison of the use of the Day of the Lord in Joel 2:1-2, 10-11 and Joel 3:14-16. In the former passage the call goes up to sound an alarm in Zion because the day of Yahweh is near. Joel 2:10-11 then reveals that this Day of the Lord entails Yahweh leading an unstoppable army against Zion. Meanwhile, Joel 3:14 also announces that the Day of the Lord is near, using almost the same vocabulary. In Joel 3:14-16, however, Zion is the location of Yahweh's divine activity. Following the announcement in Joel 3:14 that the Day of the Lord is near. Joel 3:16 declares that Yahweh roars from Zion, essentially rendering it impregnable by his very presence.”

Martens says, “A major feature of the Day of the Lord is Yahweh's judging of the peoples. The upshot is safety and protection for some (Joel 3:16b-17) and dire disaster for others (Joel 3:19).”

And Crenshaw adds, “The reversal of normal order for verb and subject places the emphasis on the subject, YHWH, who charges forth from Zion, the sacred city, to lead an army against the assembled warriors from surrounding lands.”

Thus, in these three scholars we see the gamut of concepts from God taking up a purely defensive stand to an image of both judgment and attack, to Him leading an army against the enemy. And Stuart adds, “In the Old Testament, at least, and perhaps in the New Testament also, all detailed statements regarding God's voice describe it as thunderous to the hearer...He will not, however, roar against Israel anymore.”

Before moving on to Amos 1:2, here are some varying comments regarding the obvious correspondences between Joel 3:16 and this verse.

Briggs notes that one recent topic of interest in prophetic studies has been the way in which the 12 minor prophets can be viewed as a unified book. “One suggestion has been the phenomenon of 'catchword linkages,'whereby a noteworthy word or phrase at the end of one prophet is taken up at the beginning of the next (such as 'Yahweh roars from Zion' [Joel 3:16, Amos 1:2]), perhaps to draw attention to some broader thematic link.”

On the other hand, Garrett feels that “Perhaps the framers of the canon had no idea when Joel was written, and thus they used this catchphrase as the best basis for positioning the book in the canon.” Adding to this supposition is Sweeney's confirmation that “Joel is notoriously difficult to date.”

Finally, Crenshaw says, “It is impossible to determine which prophet influenced the other. Both Joel and Amos probably took the sentence from a floating tradition, each one investing it with his own application to the historical situation.” That brings us up to a consideration of the Amos passage.

Amos 1:2 – “The LORD roars from Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds mourn, and the top of Carmel withers.”

G.V. Smith states, “The roar of God is not just a reference to his 'secret words to the prophets', it is a warning of judgment, a symbol of the beginning of an attack...For a herdsman like Amos, two of the best illustrations of devastation would be the withering of the shepherd's pasture and the lush Carmel ridge...The introduction not only summarized the prophet's prediction that God will judge the nation, it also confirms the validity of the words of judgment spoken by Amos while in Israel.”

Then there is the question of the verb tense. “A few scholars take this initial declaration as the introduction to the Oracles Against the Nations [only]...But this claims too little. It is better, as may commentators agree, to consider 1:2 as the thematic key to the entire book...the actions are beginning even as Yahweh speaks. The voice of God and the roar are the announcement and commencement of the following judgments...His roar resounds like thunder, and he comes not to deliver but to judge his people...” (Carroll R)

But who are his people? Mobley speaks a little more accurately in pointing out what is obvious from the rest of Amos, namely, that it is all of the nations, including Israel and Judah, who are under God's judgment.

And what about the verb tense? Andersen and Freedman devote a number of pages to a detailed study of this one verse. However, I will confine myself to this one comment from them: “Amos 9:13-15, if it is at all like Joel 4:15-18, makes Amos 1:2 a prediction of the general devastation that will be followed by universal reconstruction. And the lion's roar is the boast of the predator after the kill. If, however, Amos 1:2 is connected with Amos 3:8, which is clearly in the past tense ('the Lord has spoken'), the lion's roar is the announcement of coming judgment (1:3-3:8). We suggest that the ambiguity in the verb forms of v 2 (preterit or future) leaves it open for a double connection shown by the literary structure.”

Revelation 10:3 – “And [he] called out with a loud voice, like a lion roaring: when he called out, the seven thunders sounded.”

This reference is not as clearly talking about God as the first four above since it is said to refer to a mighty angel, but here is how Beale explains the situation: “The lion metaphor also connotes the sovereign position the angel has over creation by virtue of possession of the scroll, since the lion image has a similar connotation with respect to the scroll in 5:5. A further hint that the angel is Christ or at least his unique representative is that in 4 Ezra 11:37; 12:31 the messiah's judgment of the wicked is described with the wording 'as it were a lion...roaring.' It is also probable that the reference to the roar of a lion in Rev. 10:3 alludes to Amos 3:8, since there is a clear allusion to Amos 3:7 in Rev. 10:7...This underscores further not only the christological nature but also the divine aspect of the angelic speaker in v 3...”

As to the context and meaning of this verse, Mounce says that “the angel's voice had a deep resonance which would demand the attention of those who heard. The voice of the angel calls forth a response from the seven thunders. They too utter their voices. According to Beckworth they are 'premonitions of God's anger about to burst forth in judgment. Elsewhere in Revelation thunder is associated with divine retribution. In 8:5 it follows the casting of fire upon the earth. In 11:19 it is associated with the trumpet-plague, and in 16:18 with the final bowl of God's wrath. Here as well it forebodes the coming peril of divine retribution.”

Conclusion

As you can see, these seemingly similar prophecies are each so ambiguous that they can be interpreted in a number of ways. And that is not at all unusual when it comes to almost all Old Testament prophecies. That is why I tend to be suspicious any time a self-proclaimed prophecy expert claims to have the unique key to what is going to happen in the future and when it when it will occur.