3:7 Certainly the sovereign Lord does nothing without first revealing his plan to his servants the prophets.
3:8 A lion has roared! 1 Who is not afraid?
The sovereign Lord has spoken! Who can refuse to prophesy? 2
20:2 The king’s terrifying anger 3 is like the roar of a lion;
whoever provokes him 4 sins against himself. 5
42:13 The Lord emerges like a hero,
like a warrior he inspires himself for battle; 6
he shouts, yes, he yells,
he shows his enemies his power. 7
25:30 “Then, Jeremiah, 8 make the following prophecy 9 against them:
‘Like a lion about to attack, 10 the Lord will roar from the heights of heaven;
from his holy dwelling on high he will roar loudly.
He will roar mightily against his land. 11
He will shout in triumph like those stomping juice from the grapes 12
against all those who live on the earth.
13:8 I will attack them like a bear robbed of her cubs –
I will rip open their chests.
I will devour them there like a lion –
like a wild animal would tear them apart.
2:11 The voice of the Lord thunders 13 as he leads his army. 14
Indeed, his warriors 15 are innumerable; 16
Surely his command is carried out! 17
Yes, the day of the Lord is awesome 18
and very terrifying – who can survive 19 it?
3:16 The Lord roars from Zion;
from Jerusalem 20 his voice bellows out. 21
The heavens 22 and the earth shake.
But the Lord is a refuge for his people;
he is a stronghold for the citizens 23 of Israel.
1 sn The roar of the lion is here a metaphor for impending judgment (see 1:2; cf. 3:4, 12). Verses 7-8 justify Amos’ prophetic ministry and message of warning and judgment. The people should expect a prophetic message prior to divine action.
2 sn Who can refuse to prophesy? When a message is revealed, the prophet must speak, and the news of impending judgment should cause people to fear.
3 tn Heb “the terror of a king” (so ASV, NASB); The term “terror” is a metonymy of effect for cause: the anger of a king that causes terror among the people. The term “king” functions as a possessive genitive: “a king’s anger” (cf. NIV “A king’s wrath”; NLT “The king’s fury”).
4 tn The verb מִתְעַבְּרוֹ (mit’abbÿro) is problematic; in the MT the form is the Hitpael participle with a pronominal suffix, which is unusual, for the direct object of this verb usually takes a preposition first: “is angry with.” The LXX rendered it “angers [or, irritates].”
5 sn The expression “sins against himself” has been taken by some to mean “forfeits his life” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV) or “endangers his life” (cf. NCV, NLT). That may be the implication of getting oneself in trouble with an angry king (cf. TEV “making him angry is suicide”).
6 tn Heb “like a man of war he stirs up zeal” (NIV similar).
7 tn Or perhaps, “he triumphs over his enemies” (cf. NIV); NLT “will crush all his enemies.”
8 tn The word “Jeremiah” is not in the text. It is supplied in the translation to make clear who is being addressed.
9 tn Heb “Prophesy against them all these words.”
10 tn The words “like a lion about to attack” are not in the text but are implicit in the metaphor. The explicit comparison of the
11 sn The word used here (Heb “his habitation”) refers to the land of Canaan which the
12 sn The metaphor shifts from God as a lion to God as a mighty warrior (Jer 20:11; Isa 42:13; Zeph 3:17) shouting in triumph over his foes. Within the metaphor is a simile where the warrior is compared to a person stomping on grapes to remove the juice from them in the making of wine. The figure will be invoked later in a battle scene where the sounds of joy in the grape harvest are replaced by the sounds of joy of the enemy soldiers (Jer 48:33). The picture is drawn in more gory detail in Isa 63:1-6.
13 tn Heb “the
14 tn Heb “before his army.”
15 tn Heb “military encampment.”
16 tn Heb “very large.”
17 tn Heb “he makes his word powerful.”
18 tn Or “powerful.” Heb “great.”
19 tn Heb “endure.” The MT and LXX read “endure,” while one of the Qumran manuscripts (4QXXIIc) has “bear.”
20 map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.
21 tn Heb “he sounds forth his voice.”
22 tn Or “the sky.” See the note on “sky” in 2:30.
23 tn Heb “sons.”