Amos

1 The words of Amos, who was among the herd men 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: YHVH will roar from Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem; and the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither. 3 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron. 4 But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Benhadad. 5 I will break also the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the plain of Aven, and him who holds the sceptre from the house of Eden, and the people of Syria, shall go into captivity to Kir. So says YHVH! 6 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they carried away captive the whole captivity, to deliver them up to Edom. 7 But I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour its palaces, 8 and I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him who holds the sceptre from Ashkelon, and I will turn My hand against Ekron, and the remnant of the Philistines shall perish. So says Adonai our Elohim! 9 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Tyrus, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and did not remember the brotherly covenant. 10 But I will send a fire on the wall of Tyrus, which shall devour its palaces. 11 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he did pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear 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 YHVH: For three transgressions of the children of Ammon, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have ripped up the women with child of Gilead, that they might enlarge their border. 14 But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it shall devour its palaces, with shouting in the day of battle, with a tempest in the day of the whirlwind, 15 and their king shall go into captivity; he and his princes together. So says YHVH!

1 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Moab, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime. 2 But I will send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the palaces of Kirioth, and Moab shall die with tumult, with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet. 3 And I will cut off the judge from its midst, and will slay all its princes with him. So says YHVH! 4 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have despised the law of YHVH, and have not kept His commandments, and their lies caused them to err, after which their fathers have walked. 5 But I will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem. 6 Thus says YHVH: For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes; 7 who pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek, and a man and his father will go in to the same maid, to profane My holy name. 8 And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every altar, and they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their gods. 9 Yet I destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath. 10 I also brought you up from the land of Egypt and led you forty years through the wilderness, to possess the land of the Amorite. 11 And I raised up of your sons for prophets, and of your young men for Nazarites. Is it not even thus, O you children of Israel? 12 But you gave the Nazarites wine to drink, and commanded the prophets, saying: Prophesy not! 13 Behold, I am pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves. 14 Therefore, the flight shall perish from the swift, and the strong shall not strengthen his force, neither shall the mighty deliver himself. 15 Neither shall he stand who handles the bow; and he who is swift of foot shall not deliver himself; neither shall he who rides the horse deliver himself. 16 And he who is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day. So says YHVH!

1 Hear this word that YHVH 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 be 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 taken nothing? 5 Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth, where no gin is for him? Shall one take up a snare from the earth, and have taken nothing at all? 6 Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? Shall there be evil in a city, and YHVH has not done it? 7 Surely Adonai Elohim will do nothing, unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets. 8 The lion has roared, who will not fear? YHVH has spoken; who can but prophesy? 9 Publish in the palaces at Ashdod {Assyria}, and in the palaces in the land of Egypt, and say: Assemble yourselves upon the mountains of Samaria and behold the great tumults in its midst and the oppressed in its midst! 10 For they know not to do right, says YHVH, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces. 11 Therefore, thus says Adonai Elohim: An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down your strength from you, and your palaces shall be spoiled. 12 Thus says YHVH: As the shepherd takes out of the mouth of the 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 in Damascus in a couch. 13 Hear, and testify in the house of Jacob, said Adonai, the Elohim of Hosts, 14 that in the day that I shall visit the transgressions of Israel upon him I will also visit the altars of Bethel, and the horns of the altar shall be cut off, and fall to the ground. 15 And I will smite the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end. So says YHVH!

1 Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are in the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to their masters: Bring and let us drink! 2 Adonai Elohim has sworn by His holiness: Lo the days shall come upon you, that He will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fishhooks. 3 And you shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her; and you shall cast them into the palace. So says YHVH! 4 Come to Bethel, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years. 5 And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings; for this you like, O you children of Israel. Says Adonai Elohim. 6 And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places, yet you have not returned to Me. So says YHVH! 7 And also I have withheld the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest, and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city; one piece was rained upon and the piece whereupon it did not rain, withered. 8 So two or three cities wandered to one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied; yet you have not returned to Me. So says YHVH! 9 I have smitten you with blasting and mildew; when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them; yet you have not returned to Me. So says YHVH! 10 I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt; I have slain your young men with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up to your nostrils: yet you have not returned to Me. So says YHVH! 11 I have overthrown some of you, as Elohim overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning; yet you have not returned to me. So says YHVH! 12 Therefore, thus I will do to you, O Israel, and because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your Elohim, O Israel. 13 For, lo, He who forms the mountains, and creates the wind, and declares to man what are His thoughts; who makes the morning darkness, and treads upon the high places of the earth! Adonai Tzva'ot is His Name!

1 Hear this word which I take up against you, even a lamentation, O house of Israel. 2 The virgin of Israel is fallen; she shall no more rise; she is forsaken upon her land; there is none to raise her up. 3 For thus says Adonai your Elohim: The city that went out by a thousand shall leave a hundred, and that which went forth by a hundred shall leave ten, to the house of Israel. 4 For thus says YHVH to the house of Israel: Seek Me and you shall live! 5 But seek not Bethel, nor enter into Gilgal, and pass not to Beersheba, for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity and Bethel shall come to naught. 6 Seek YHVH and you shall live; lest He break out like fire in the house of Joseph and devour it, and there be none to quench it in Bethel. 7 You who turn judgment to wormwood, and leave off righteousness in the earth! 8 Seek Him who makes the seven stars and Orion, and turns the shadow of death into the morning, and makes the day dark with night; who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out upon the face of the earth! YHVH is His name! 9 Who strengthens the spoiled against the strong, so that the spoiled shall come against the fortress. 10 They hate him who rebukes in the gate, and they abhor him who speaks uprightly. 11 For as much therefore, as your treading is upon the poor, and you take from him burdens of wheat; you have built houses of hewn stone, but you shall not dwell in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink wine of them. 12 For I know your manifold transgressions, and your mighty sins; they afflict the just; they take a bribe and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their rights. 13 Therefore, the prudent shall keep silence in that time; for it is an evil time. 14 Seek good and not evil, that you may live, so YHVH, Elohim of Hosts, shall be with you, as you have spoken. 15 Hate the evil and love the good, and establish judgment in the gate; it may be that Adonai, Elohim of Hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph. 16 Therefore, YHVH, the Elohim of Hosts; Adonai said thus: Wailing shall be in all streets, and they shall say in all the highways: Alas! Alas! And they shall call the husbandman to mourning, and such as are skillful of lamentation to wailing. 17 And in all vineyards shall be wailing, for I will pass through you. So says YHVH! 18 Woe to you who desire the day of YHVH! To what end is it for you? The day of YHVH is darkness and not light! 19 As if a man did flee from a lion and a bear met him; or went into the house and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him. 20 Shall not the day of YHVH be darkness and not light? Even very dark and no brightness in it? 21 I hate; I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies. 22 Though you offer me burnt offerings and your gift offerings, I will not accept them; neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts. 23 Take away from Me the noise of your hymns; for I will not hear the melody of your viols. 24 But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream. 25 Have you offered to Me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel? 26 But you have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch, and Chiun your images, the star of your gods, which you made to yourselves. 27 Therefore, I will cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus. So say YHVH, whose appellation is The Elohim of Hosts!

1 Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and trust in the mountain of Samaria, who are named chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel came! 2 Pass to Calneh, and see; and from there go to Hamath the great; then go down to Gath of the Philistines. Are they better than these kingdoms? Or their border greater than your border? 3 You who put the evil day far away, and cause the seat of violence to come near; 4 who lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall; 5 who chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of music, like David; 6 who drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments, but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph. 7 Therefore, now they shall be among the first who go into captivity, and the banquet of those who stretched themselves shall be removed. 8 Adonai Elohim has sworn by Himself; so says YHVH, Elohim of Hosts: I abhor the excellency of Jacob, and hate his palaces. Therefore, I will deliver up the city with all that is in it! 9 It shall come to pass, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die. 10 A man's uncle shall take him up, and he who burns him, to bring the bones out of the house, and shall say to him who is by the sides of the house: Is there yet any with you? And he shall say: No! Then shall he say: Hold your tongue, for we may not make mention of the name of YHVH! 11 For, behold, YHVH commands, and He will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts. 12 Shall horses run upon the rock? Will one plow there with oxen? For you have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock. 13 You who rejoice in a thing of naught, who say: Have we not taken to us horns by our own strength? 14 Behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel. Says YHVH, Elohim of Hosts! And they shall afflict you from the entering in of Hemath to the river of the wilderness.

1 Thus Adonai Elohim showed to me; and, behold, He formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and, lo, it was the latter growth after the king's mowing. 2 And it came to pass, that when they had made an end of eating the grass of the land, then I pleaded: O Adonai my Elohim, forgive, I beseech You, by whom shall Jacob arise? For he is small. 3 YHVH relented for this: It shall not be! So said YHVH. 4 Thus Adonai Elohim showed to me, and, behold, Adonai Elohim called to contend by fire, and it devoured the great deep, and ate up a part. 5 Then I pleaded: O Adonai my Elohim, cease, I beseech you, by whom shall Jacob arise? For he is small. 6 YHVH relented for this: This also shall not be! So said YHVH! 7 Thus He showed me, and, behold, Adonai stood upon a wall made by a plumb line, with a plumb line in His hand. 8 And YHVH asked me: Amos, what do you see? And I replied: A plumb line! Then Adonai stated: Behold, I will set a plumb line in the midst of My people Israel; I will not again pass by them anymore. 9 And the high places of Isaac shall be desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword. 10 Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying: Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words. 11 For thus Amos said: Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land. 12 Also Amaziah said to Amos, O you seer, go, flee you away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there: 13 But do not prophesy again anymore at Bethel, for it is the king's chapel, and it is the king's court. 14 Then answered Amos and said to Amaziah: I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son; but I was a herd man and a gatherer of sycamore fruit. 15 But YHVH took me as I followed the flock, and YHVH said to me: Go, prophesy to My people Israel! 16 Now therefore, hear the word of YHVH: You say not to prophesy against Israel, and do not drop your word against the house of Isaac. 17 Therefore thus says YHVH: Your wife shall be a harlot in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided by line; and you shall die in a polluted land, and Israel shall surely go into captivity forth of his land.

1 Thus, Adonai Elohim showed to me, and behold a basket of summer fruit. 2 And He asked: Amos, what do you see? And I answered: A basket of summer fruit! Then YHVH told me: The end is come upon My people of Israel; I will not again pass by them anymore. 3 The hymns of the temple shall be howling in that day, says Adonai your Elohim; there shall be many dead bodies in every place; they shall cast them forth with silence. 4 Hear this, O you who swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail, 5 saying: When will the new moon be gone that we may sell grain? And the sabbath that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit? 6 Or that we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yes and sell the refuse of the wheat? 7 YHVH has sworn by the excellency of Jacob; surely I will never forget any of their works! 8 Shall not the land tremble for this, and everyone mourn who dwells in it? And it shall rise up wholly as a flood; it shall be cast out and drowned as by the flood of Egypt. 9 It shall come to pass in that day, says Adonai your Elohim, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day. 10 I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness upon every head; and I will make it as the mourning of an only son, and its end as a bitter day. 11 Behold, the days come, says Adonai your Elohim, that I will send a famine in the land; not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of YHVH! 12 And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east; they shall run to and fro to seek the word of YHVH, and shall not find it. 13 On that day shall the fair virgins and young men faint for thirst. 14 They who swear by the sin of Samaria, and say: Your gods, O Dan, lives! And: The manner of Beersheba lives! Even they shall fall and never rise up again!

1 I saw Adonai standing upon the altar saying: Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake, and cut them in the head, all of them; and I will slay the last of them with the sword. He who flees of them shall not flee away, and he who escapes of them, shall not be delivered. 2 Though they dig into Sheol, from there shall My hand take them; though they climb up to the heavens, from there I will bring them down. 3 And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out from there; and though they be hid from My sight in the bottom of the sea, from there I will command the serpent and he shall bite them. 4 Though they go into captivity before their enemies, from there I will command the sword, and it shall slay them, and I will set My eyes upon them for evil, and not for good! 5 Adonai, Elohim of Hosts, is He who touches the land, and it shall melt, and all who dwell in it shall mourn, and it shall rise up wholly like a flood, and shall be drowned, as by the flood of Egypt. 6 It is He who builds His stories in the heavens, and has founded His troop on the earth; He who calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out upon the face of the earth: YHVH is His name! 7 Are you not as children of the Ethiopians to Me, O children of Israel? Have I not brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt and the Philistines from Caphtor and the Syrians from Kir? 8 Behold, the eyes of Adonai Elohim are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob. 9 For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as grain is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth. 10 All the sinners of My people shall die by the sword, who say: The evil shall not overtake nor harm us! 11 In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen, and close up its breaches; and I will raise up its ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old, 12 that they may possess the remnant of Edom, and of all the heathen who are called by My name! So says YHVH who does all this! 13 Behold, the days will come when the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes, him who sows seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. 14 And I will bring again the captivity of My people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink their wine; they shall also make gardens and eat the fruit of them. 15 I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them! So says Adonai Elohim! (Back)