crops were good and plentiful?

"Therefore," said they, "God is on our side. Let us go up to the
sanctuaries and offer sacrifices upon His altars."

And so, at festival times, Bethel and Gilgal, and Dan and Beersheba
were crowded with the rich, offering their sacrifices, feasting,
drinking and rejoicing. It never entered their minds that God is the
God of the poor, as well as of the rich. Though they continued to rob
and oppress and enslave the poor and the needy and the helpless, they
were perfectly satisfied with the idea that all God asked of them was
to offer the prescribed sacrifices. If there were any who knew
differently, or thought differently, they seemingly did not dare say
so in anybody's hearing. For the poor, these were, indeed, evil times.


At this point in his musings, the "farmer" actually shuddered. He was
not aware that his peculiar dress and his peculiar position at the
moment had attracted attention. While he was contrasting in his mind
the great difference between the rich and the poor in Samaria, several
men, having nothing better to do, had stopped to stare at the yokel.
As is always the case when people stand in the street and gawk, a
large crowd soon assembled. A military chariot stopped near the group
of curious gazers to see what was going on. Soon several others were
halted there, including gilded and gaudy litters, in which fashionably
dressed women were being conveyed. All stared, called each other's
attention to the queerly garbed stranger, and finally laughed
outright.

The man who was the center of attraction became aware of the crowd