Amos 7-9

Locusts, Fire and a Plumb Line 1This is what the Sovereign LORD showed me: He was preparing swarms of locusts after the king’s share had been harvested and just as the late crops were coming up.

2When they had stripped the land clean, I cried out, “Sovereign LORD, forgive! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!”

3So the LORD relented. “This will not happen,” the LORD said. 4This is what the Sovereign LORD showed me: The Sovereign LORD was calling for judgment by fire; it dried up the great deep and devoured the land.

5Then I cried out, “Sovereign LORD, I beg you, stop! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!”

6So the LORD relented. “This will not happen either,” the Sovereign LORD said. 7This is what he showed me: The Lord was standing by a wall that had been built true to plumb, The meaning of the Hebrew for this phrase is uncertain. with a plumb line The meaning of the Hebrew for this phrase is uncertain; also in verse 8. in his hand.

8And the LORD asked me, “What do you see, Amos?” “A plumb line,” I replied. Then the Lord said, “Look, I am setting a plumb line among my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.

9“The high places of Isaac will be destroyed and the sanctuaries of Israel will be ruined; with my sword I will rise against the house of Jeroboam.”

Amos and Amaziah 10Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent a message to Jeroboam king of Israel: “Amos is raising a conspiracy against you in the very heart of Israel. The land cannot bear all his words.

11For this is what Amos is saying: “ ‘Jeroboam will die by the sword, and Israel will surely go into exile, away from their native land.’ ” 12Then Amaziah said to Amos, “Get out, you seer! Go back to the land of Judah. Earn your bread there and do your prophesying there.

13Don’t prophesy anymore at Bethel, because this is the king’s sanctuary and the temple of the kingdom.” 14Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees. 15But the LORD took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

16Now then, hear the word of the LORD . You say, “ ‘Do not prophesy against Israel, and stop preaching against the descendants of Isaac.’ 17“Therefore this is what the LORD says: “ ‘Your wife will become a prostitute in the city, and your sons and daughters will fall by the sword. Your land will be measured and divided up, and you yourself will die in a pagan Hebrew an unclean country. And Israel will surely go into exile, away from their native land.’ ”

A Basket of Ripe Fruit 1This is what the Sovereign LORD showed me: a basket of ripe fruit.

2“What do you see, Amos?” he asked. “A basket of ripe fruit,” I answered. Then the LORD said to me, “The time is ripe for my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.

3“In that day,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “the songs in the temple will turn to wailing. Or “the temple singers will wail Many, many bodies—flung everywhere! Silence!”

4Hear this, you who trample the needy and do away with the poor of the land,

5saying, “When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?”— skimping on the measure, boosting the price and cheating with dishonest scales,

6buying the poor with silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling even the sweepings with the wheat.

7The LORD has sworn by himself, the Pride of Jacob: “I will never forget anything they have done.

8“Will not the land tremble for this, and all who live in it mourn? The whole land will rise like the Nile; it will be stirred up and then sink like the river of Egypt.

9“In that day,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight.

10I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day.

11“The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “when I will send a famine through the land— not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD .

12People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the LORD, but they will not find it.

13“In that day “the lovely young women and strong young men will faint because of thirst. 14Those who swear by the sin of Samaria— who say, ‘As surely as your god lives, Dan,’ or, ‘As surely as the god Hebrew the way of Beersheba lives’— they will fall, never to rise again.”

Israel to Be Destroyed 1I saw the Lord standing by the altar, and he said: “Strike the tops of the pillars so that the thresholds shake. Bring them down on the heads of all the people; those who are left I will kill with the sword. Not one will get away, none will escape.

2Though they dig down to the depths below, from there my hand will take them. Though they climb up to the heavens above, from there I will bring them down.

3Though they hide themselves on the top of Carmel, there I will hunt them down and seize them. Though they hide from my eyes at the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent to bite them.

4Though they are driven into exile by their enemies, there I will command the sword to slay them. “I will keep my eye on them for harm and not for good.”

5The Lord, the LORD Almighty— he touches the earth and it melts, and all who live in it mourn; the whole land rises like the Nile, then sinks like the river of Egypt;

6he builds his lofty palace The meaning of the Hebrew for this phrase is uncertain. in the heavens and sets its foundation The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain. on the earth; he calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land— the LORD is his name.

7“Are not you Israelites the same to me as the Cushites That is, people from the upper Nile region ?” declares the LORD . “Did I not bring Israel up from Egypt, the Philistines from Caphtor That is, Crete and the Arameans from Kir?

8“Surely the eyes of the Sovereign LORD are on the sinful kingdom. I will destroy it from the face of the earth. Yet I will not totally destroy the descendants of Jacob,” declares the LORD .

9“For I will give the command, and I will shake the people of Israel among all the nations as grain is shaken in a sieve, and not a pebble will reach the ground.

10All the sinners among my people will die by the sword, all those who say, ‘Disaster will not overtake or meet us.’

Israel’s Restoration 11“In that day “I will restore David’s fallen shelter— I will repair its broken walls and restore its ruins— and will rebuild it as it used to be,

12so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that bear my name, Hebrew; Septuagint so that the remnant of people / and all the nations that bear my name may seek me ” declares the LORD, who will do these things.

13“The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman and the planter by the one treading grapes. New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills,

14and I will bring my people Israel back from exile. Or will restore the fortunes of my people Israel “They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them. They will plant vineyards and drink their wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit. 15I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land I have given them,” says the LORD your God.