1 The words of
Amos, who was among the sheepbreeders[a] of Tekoa, which
he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah king
of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash,
king of Israel, two years before the earthquake.
2 And he said:
“ The LORD roars
from
And utters His voice from
The pastures of the shepherds mourn,
And the top of
3 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they have threshed
4
But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael,
Which shall devour the palaces of Ben-Hadad.
5
I will also break the gate bar of Damascus,
And cut off the
inhabitant from the
And the one who holds the scepter from Beth
Eden.
The people of
Says the LORD.
6 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they took captive the whole
captivity
To deliver them up to
7
But I will send a fire upon the wall of
Which shall devour its palaces.
8
I will cut off the inhabitant from
And the one who
holds the scepter from
I will turn My hand against Ekron,
And the remnant of the Philistines shall
perish,”
Says the Lord GOD.
9 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they delivered up the whole
captivity to
And did not remember the covenant of
brotherhood.
10
But I will send a fire upon the wall of
Which shall devour its palaces.”
11 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because he pursued his brother with the
sword,
And cast off all pity;
His anger tore perpetually,
And he kept his wrath forever.
12
But I will send a fire upon Teman,
Which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah.”
13 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of the people of Ammon, and for four,
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they ripped open the women with
child in
That they might enlarge their territory.
14
But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah,
And it shall
devour its palaces,
Amid shouting in the day of battle,
And a tempest in the day of the whirlwind.
15
Their king shall go into captivity,
He and his princes together,”
Says the LORD.
1 Thus says the
LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because he burned the bones of the king of
2
But I will send a fire upon
And it shall
devour the palaces of Kerioth;
With shouting and trumpet sound.
3
And I will cut off the judge from its midst,
And slay all its
princes with him,”
Says the LORD.
4 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they have despised the law of the
LORD,
And have not kept His commandments.
Their lies lead them astray,
Lies which
their fathers followed.
5
But I will send a fire upon
And it shall
devour the palaces of
6 Thus says the LORD:
“ For three
transgressions of
I will not turn away its punishment,
Because they sell the righteous for silver,
And the poor for a pair of sandals.
7
They pant after[a] the dust of the earth which is on
the head of the poor,
And pervert the
way of the humble.
A man and his father go in to the same
girl,
To defile My holy
name.
8
They lie down by every altar on clothes taken in pledge,
And drink the wine
of the condemned in the house of their god.
9
“ Yet it was I who destroyed the Amorite
before them,
Whose height was like the height of
the cedars,
And he was as strong as the oaks;
Yet I destroyed his fruit above
And his roots beneath.
10
Also it was I who brought you up from the
And led you forty years through the
wilderness,
To possess the
land of the Amorite.
11
I raised up some of your sons as prophets,
And some of your young men as Nazirites.
Is it not so, O you children of
Says the LORD.
12
“ But you gave the Nazirites
wine to drink,
And commanded the prophets saying,
‘ Do not prophesy!’
13
“ Behold, I am weighed down by you,
As a cart full of sheaves is weighed down.
14
Therefore flight shall perish from the swift,
The strong shall
not strengthen his power,
Nor shall the mighty deliver himself;
15
He shall not stand who handles the bow,
The swift of foot shall not escape,
Nor shall he who rides a horse deliver
himself.
16
The most courageous men of might
Shall flee naked in that day,”
Says the LORD.
1
Hear this word that the LORD has spoken against you, O children of Israel,
against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying:
2
“ You only have I known of all the families of the earth;
Therefore I will punish you for all your
iniquities.”
3
Can two walk together, unless they are agreed?
4
Will a lion roar in the forest, when he has no prey?
Will a young lion cry out of his den, if he
has caught nothing?
5
Will a bird fall into a snare on the earth, where there is no trap for it?
Will a snare spring up from the earth, if
it has caught nothing at all?
6
If a trumpet is blown in a city, will not the people be afraid?
If there is calamity in a city, will not
the LORD have done it?
7
Surely the Lord GOD does nothing,
Unless He reveals
His secret to His servants the prophets.
8
A lion has roared!
Who will not fear?
The Lord GOD has spoken!
Who can but prophesy?
9 “ Proclaim in the
palaces at
And in the palaces in the
‘ Assemble on the mountains of
See great tumults in her midst,
And the oppressed within her.
10
For they do not know to do right,’
Says the LORD,
‘ Who store up violence and robbery in
their palaces.’”
11 Therefore thus says the
Lord GOD:
“ An adversary shall be all around
the land;
He shall sap your strength from you,
And your palaces shall be plundered.”
12 Thus says the LORD:
“ As a shepherd takes from the mouth of a
lion
Two legs or a piece of an ear,
So shall the children of Israel be taken
out
Who dwell in Samaria—
In the corner of a bed and on the edge[b] of a couch!
13
Hear and testify against the house of Jacob,”
Says the Lord GOD, the God of hosts,
14
“ That in the day I punish Israel for their transgressions,
I will also visit destruction on the
altars of Bethel;
And the horns of the altar shall be cut off
And fall to the ground.
15
I will destroy the winter house along with the summer house;
The houses of
ivory shall perish,
And the great houses shall have an end,”
Says the LORD.
1 Hear this word,
you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria,
Who oppress the poor,
Who crush the needy,
Who say to your husbands,[a] “Bring wine, let us drink!”
2
The Lord GOD has sworn by His holiness:
“ Behold, the days shall come upon you
When He will take you away with fishhooks,
And your posterity with fishhooks.
3
You will go out through broken walls,
Each one straight
ahead of her,
And you will be cast into Harmon,”
Says the LORD.
4
“ Come to
At Gilgal
multiply transgression;
Bring your sacrifices every morning,
Your tithes every three days.[b]
5
Offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven,
Proclaim and announce the freewill
offerings;
For this you love,
You children of
Says the Lord GOD.
6 “ Also I gave you
cleanness of teeth in all your cities.
And lack of bread in all your places;
Yet you have not
returned to Me,”
Says the LORD.
7
“ I also withheld rain from you,
When there were still three months
to the harvest.
I made it rain on one city,
I withheld rain from another city.
One part was rained upon,
And where it did
not rain the part withered.
8
So two or three cities wandered to another city to drink water,
But they were not
satisfied;
Yet you have not returned to Me,”
Says the LORD.
9
“ I blasted you with blight and mildew.
When your gardens increased,
Your vineyards,
Your fig trees,
And your olive trees,
The locust devoured them;
Yet you have not returned to Me,”
Says the LORD.
10
“ I sent among you a plague after the manner of Egypt;
Your young men I killed with a sword,
Along with your captive horses;
I made the stench of your camps come up
into your nostrils;
Yet you have not returned to Me,”
Says the LORD.
11
“ I overthrew some of you,
As God overthrew
And you were like a firebrand plucked from
the burning;
Yet you have not returned to Me,”
Says the LORD.
12
“ Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel;
Because I will do this to you,
Prepare to meet your God, O Israel!”
13
For behold,
He who forms mountains,
And creates the wind,
Who declares to man what his[c] thought is,
And makes the morning darkness,
Who treads the high places of the earth—
The LORD God of hosts is His name.
1
Hear this word which I take up against you, a lamentation, O house of
2
The virgin of
She will rise no more.
She lies forsaken on her land;
There is
no one to raise her up.
3 For thus says the Lord
GOD:
“ The city that
goes out by a thousand
Shall have a hundred left,
And that which goes out by a hundred
Shall have ten left to the house of
4 For thus says the LORD
to the house of
“ Seek Me and
live;
5
But do not seek
Nor enter Gilgal,
Nor pass over to
For Gilgal shall
surely go into captivity,
And Bethel shall come to nothing.
6
Seek the LORD and live,
Lest He break out like fire in the
house of Joseph,
And devour it,
With no one to quench it in Bethel—
7
You who turn justice to wormwood,
And lay righteousness to rest in the
earth!”
8
He made the Pleiades and Orion;
He turns the shadow of death into morning
And makes the day dark as night;
He calls for the waters of the sea
And pours them out on the face of the
earth;
The LORD is His name.
9
He rains ruin upon the strong,
So that fury comes upon the fortress.
10
They hate the one who rebukes in the gate,
And they abhor the
one who speaks uprightly.
11
Therefore, because you tread down the poor
And take grain taxes from him,
Though you have built houses of hewn stone,
Yet you shall not dwell in them;
You have planted pleasant vineyards,
But you shall not drink wine from them.
12
For I know your manifold transgressions
And your mighty
sins:
Afflicting the just and taking
bribes;
Diverting the poor from justice at
the gate.
13
Therefore the prudent keep silent at that time,
For it is
an evil time.
14
Seek good and not evil,
That you may live;
So the LORD God of hosts will be with you,
As you have spoken.
15
Hate evil, love good;
Establish justice in the gate.
It may be that the LORD God of hosts
Will be gracious
to the remnant of Joseph.
16 Therefore the LORD God
of hosts, the Lord, says this:
“ There
shall be wailing in all streets,
And they shall say in all the highways,
‘ Alas! Alas!’
They shall call the farmer to mourning,
And skillful lamenters to wailing.
17
In all vineyards there shall be wailing,
For I will pass
through you,”
Says the LORD.
18
Woe to you who desire the day of the LORD!
For what good is the day of the LORD
to you?
It will be darkness, and not light.
19
It will be as though a man fled from a lion,
And a bear met
him!
Or as though he went into the house,
Leaned his hand on the wall,
And a serpent bit him!
20
Is not the day of the LORD darkness, and not light?
Is it not very dark, with no
brightness in it?
21
“ I hate, I despise your feast days,
And I do not savor your sacred assemblies.
22
Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain
offerings,
I will not accept them,
Nor will I regard your fattened peace
offerings.
23
Take away from Me the noise of your songs,
For I will not hear the melody of your
stringed instruments.
24
But let justice run down like water,
And righteousness like a mighty stream.
25
“ Did you offer Me sacrifices and offerings
In the wilderness forty years, O house of
26
You also carried Sikkuth[a] your king[b]
And Chiun,[c] your idols,
The star of your gods,
Which you made for yourselves.
27
Therefore I will send you into captivity beyond
Says the LORD, whose name is the God
of hosts.
1
Woe to you who are at ease in
And trust in
Notable persons in the chief nation,
To whom the house of
2
Go over to Calneh and see;
And from there go to Hamath
the great;
Then go down to
Are youbetter than these kingdoms?
Or is their territory greater than your
territory?
3
Woe to you who put far off the day of doom,
Who cause the seat of violence to come
near;
4
Who lie on beds of ivory,
Stretch out on your couches,
Eat lambs from the flock
And calves from the midst of the stall;
5
Who sing idly to the sound of stringed instruments,
And invent for yourselves musical
instruments like David;
6
Who drink wine from bowls,
And anoint yourselves with the best
ointments,
But are not grieved for the affliction of
Joseph.
7
Therefore they shall now go captive as the first of the captives,
And those who
recline at banquets shall be removed.
8
The Lord GOD has sworn by Himself,
The LORD God of hosts says:
“ I abhor the
pride of Jacob,
And hate his palaces;
Therefore I will deliver up the city
And all that is in it.”
9 Then it shall come to
pass, that if ten men remain in one house, they shall die. 10 And when a relative of the dead, with
one who will burn the bodies, picks up the bodies[a] to take them out of the house, he will say
to one inside the house, “Are there any more with you?”
Then someone will say, “None.”
And he will say, “Hold your tongue! For we dare not mention the name of the
LORD.”
11
For behold, the LORD gives a command:
He will break the great house into bits,
And the little house into pieces.
12
Do horses run on rocks?
Does one plow there with
oxen?
Yet you have turned justice into gall,
And the fruit of righteousness into
wormwood,
13
You who rejoice over Lo Debar,[b]
Who say, “Have we not taken Karnaim[c] for ourselves
By our own strength?”
14
“ But, behold, I will raise up a nation against you,
O house of Israel,”
Says the LORD God of hosts;
“ And they will afflict you from the
entrance of Hamath
To the Valley of the Arabah.”
1
Thus the Lord GOD showed me: Behold, He formed locust swarms at the beginning
of the late crop; indeed it was the late crop after the king’s mowings. 2
And so it was, when they had finished eating the grass of the land, that I said:
“ O Lord GOD,
forgive, I pray!
Oh, that Jacob may stand,
For he is
small!”
3
So the LORD relented concerning this.
“ It shall not
be,” said the LORD.
4 Thus the Lord GOD showed
me: Behold, the Lord GOD called for conflict by fire, and it consumed the great
deep and devoured the territory. 5
Then I said:
“ O Lord GOD,
cease, I pray!
Oh, that Jacob may stand,
For he is
small!”
6
So the LORD relented concerning this.
“ This also shall
not be,” said the Lord GOD.
7 Thus He showed me:
Behold, the Lord stood on a wall made with a plumb line, with a plumb
line in His hand. 8 And
the LORD said to me, “Amos, what do you see?”
And I said, “A plumb line.”
Then the Lord said:
“ Behold, I am
setting a plumb line
In the midst of My people
I will not pass by them anymore.
9
The high places of Isaac shall be desolate,
And the sanctuaries
of
I will rise with the sword against the
house of Jeroboam.”
10 Then Amaziah the priest of
‘ Jeroboam shall
die by the sword,
And
From their own land.’”
12 Then Amaziah said to Amos:
“ Go, you seer!
Flee to the
There eat bread,
And there
prophesy.
13
But never again prophesy at
For it is the king’s sanctuary,
And it is the royal residence.”
14 Then Amos answered, and
said to Amaziah:
“ I was no
prophet,
Nor was I a son of a prophet,
But I was a sheepbreeder[a]
And a tender of sycamore fruit.
15
Then the LORD took me as I followed the flock,
And the LORD said to me,
‘ Go, prophesy to My people Israel.’
16
Now therefore, hear the word of the LORD:
You say, ‘Do not prophesy against Israel,
And do not spout against the house of
Isaac.’
17 “Therefore thus says
the LORD:
‘ Your wife shall be a harlot in the city;
Your sons and daughters shall fall by the
sword;
Your land shall be divided by survey
line;
You shall die in a defiled land;
And Israel shall surely be led away captive
From his own land.’”
1
Thus the Lord GOD showed me: Behold, a basket of
summer fruit. 2 And He
said, “Amos, what do you see?”
So I said, “A basket of summer fruit.”
Then the LORD said to me:
“ The end has come
upon My people
I will not pass by them anymore.
3
And the songs of the temple
Shall be wailing in that day,”
Says the Lord GOD—
“ Many dead bodies everywhere,
They shall be thrown out in silence.”
4
Hear this, you who swallow up[a] the needy,
And make the poor of the land fail,
5 Saying:
“ When will the New Moon be past,
That we may sell grain?
And the Sabbath,
That we may trade
wheat?
Making the ephah
small and the shekel large,
Falsifying the scales by deceit,
6
That we may buy the poor for silver,
And the needy for a pair of sandals—
Even sell the bad wheat?”
7
The LORD has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
“ Surely I will never forget any of their
works.
8
Shall the land not tremble for this,
And everyone mourn who dwells in it?
All of it shall swell like the River,[b]
Heave and subside
Like the River of Egypt.
9
“ And it shall come to pass in that day,” says the
Lord GOD,
“ That I will make the sun go down at noon,
And I will darken the earth in broad
daylight;
10
I will turn your feasts into mourning,
And all your songs into lamentation;
I will bring sackcloth on every waist,
And baldness on every head;
I will make it like mourning for an only son,
And its end like a bitter day.
11
“ Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord GOD,
“ That I will send a famine on the land,
Not a famine of bread,
Nor a thirst for water,
But of hearing the words of the LORD.
12
They shall wander from sea to sea,
And from north to
east;
They shall run to and fro, seeking the word
of the LORD,
But shall not find it.
13
“ In that day the fair virgins
And strong young men
Shall faint from thirst.
14
Those who swear by the sin[c] of
Who say,
‘ As your god
lives, O Dan!’
And, ‘As the way of
They shall fall and never rise again.”
1
I saw the Lord standing by the altar, and He said:
“ Strike the
doorposts, that the thresholds may shake,
And break them on the heads of them all.
I will slay the last of them with the
sword.
He who flees from them shall not get away,
And he who escapes
from them shall not be delivered.
2
“ Though they dig into hell,[a]
From there My hand shall take them;
Though they climb up to heaven,
From there I will bring them down;
3
And though they hide themselves on top of Carmel,
From there I will search and take them;
Though they hide from My sight at the
bottom of the sea,
From there I will command the serpent, and
it shall bite them;
4
Though they go into captivity before their enemies,
From there I will command the sword,
And it shall slay them.
I will set My eyes on them for harm and not
for good.”
5
The Lord GOD of hosts,
He who touches the earth and it melts,
And all who dwell there mourn;
All of it shall swell like the River,[b]
And subside like the
6
He who builds His layers in the sky,
And has founded His strata in the earth;
Who calls for the waters of the sea,
And pours them out on the face of the
earth—
The LORD is His name.
7
“ Are you not like the people of
O children of
“ Did I not bring
up
The Philistines from Caphtor,
And the Syrians from Kir?
8
“ Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are on the
sinful kingdom,
And I will destroy it from the face of the
earth;
Yet I will not utterly destroy the house of
Jacob,”
Says the LORD.
9
“ For surely I will command,
And will sift the house of
As grain is sifted in a sieve;
Yet not the smallest grain shall fall to
the ground.
10
All the sinners of My people shall die by the sword,
Who say, ‘The calamity shall not overtake
nor confront us.’
11 “ On that day I will raise up
The tabernacle[c] of David, which has fallen down,
And repair its damages;
I will raise up its ruins,
And rebuild it as in the days of old;
12
That they may possess the remnant of Edom,[d]
And all the Gentiles who are called by My
name,”
Says the LORD who does this thing.
13
“ Behold, the days are coming,” says the LORD,
“ When the plowman shall overtake the
reaper,
And the treader
of grapes him who sows seed;
The mountains shall drip with sweet wine,
And all the hills shall flow with it.
14
I will bring back the captives of My people
They shall build the waste cities and
inhabit them;
They shall plant vineyards and drink wine
from them;
They shall also make gardens and eat fruit
from them.
15
I will plant them in their land,
And no longer
shall they be pulled up
From the land I have given them,”
Says the LORD your God.