Amos 4:6-10

Context

4:6 “But surely I gave¹ you no food to eat in any of your cities;

you lacked food everywhere you live.²

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:7 “I withheld rain from you three months before the harvest.³

I gave rain to one city, but not to another.

One field⁴ would get rain, but the field that received no rain dried up.

4:8 People from⁵ two or three cities staggered into one city to get⁶ water,

but remained thirsty.⁷

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:9 “I destroyed your crops⁸ with blight and disease.

Locusts kept⁹ devouring your orchards,¹⁰ vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:10 “I sent against you a plague like one of the Egyptian plagues.¹¹

I killed your young men with the sword,

along with the horses you had captured.

I made the stench from the corpses¹² rise up into your nostrils.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

[4:6] ¹tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic (pronoun + verb). It underscores the stark contrast between the judgments that the Lord had been sending with the God of blessing Israel was celebrating in its worship (4:4-5).

[4:6] ²tn Heb “But I gave to you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of food in all your places.” The phrase “cleanness of teeth” is a vivid way of picturing the famine Israel experienced.

[4:7] ³sn Rain…three months before the harvest refers to the rains of late March-early April.

[4:7] ⁴tn Heb “portion”; KJV, ASV “piece”; NASB “part.” The same word occurs a second time later in this verse.

[4:8] ⁵tn The words “people from” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[4:8] ⁶tn Heb “to drink.”

[4:8] ⁷tn Or “were not satisfied.”

[4:9] ⁸tn Heb “you.” By metonymy the crops belonging to these people are meant. See the remainder of this verse, which describes the agricultural devastation caused by locusts.

[4:9] ⁹tn The Hiphil infinitive construct is taken adverbially (“kept”) and connected to the activity of the locusts (NJPS). It also could be taken with the preceding sentence and related to the Lord’s interventions (“I kept destroying,” cf. NEB, NJB, NIV, NRSV), or it could be understood substantivally in construct with the following nouns (“Locusts devoured your many orchards,” cf. NASB; cf. also KJV, NKJV).

[4:9] ¹⁰tn Or “gardens.”

[4:10] ¹¹tn Heb “in the manner [or “way”] of Egypt.”

[4:10] ¹²tn Heb “of your camps [or “armies”].”