Amos 6:7

6:7 Therefore they will now be the first to go into exile, ¹ 

and the religious banquets ²  where they sprawl on couches ³  will end.

Amos 5:13

5:13 For this reason whoever is smart ⁴  keeps quiet ⁵  in such a time,

for it is an evil ⁶  time.

Amos 3:2

3:2 “I have chosen ⁷  you alone from all the clans of the earth. Therefore I will punish you for all your sins.”

Amos 3:11

3:11 Therefore,” says the sovereign Lord, “an enemy will encircle the land. ⁸ 

He will take away your power; ⁹ 

your fortresses will be looted.”

Amos 4:5

4:5 Burn a thank offering of bread made with yeast! ¹⁰ 

Make a public display of your voluntary offerings! ¹¹ 

For you love to do this, you Israelites.”

The sovereign Lord is speaking!

Amos 4:12

4:12 “Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel.

Because I will do this to you,

prepare to meet your God, Israel! ¹² 

Amos 5:14

5:14 Seek good and not evil so you can live!

Then the Lord, the God who commands armies, just might be with you,

as you claim he is.

Amos 3:12

3:12 This is what the Lord says:

“Just as a shepherd salvages from the lion’s mouth a couple of leg bones or a piece of an ear,

so the Israelites who live in Samaria will be salvaged. ¹³ 

They will be left with just a corner of a bed, ¹⁴ 

and a part ¹⁵  of a couch.”

Amos 5:11

5:11 Therefore, because you make the poor pay taxes on their crops ¹⁶ 

and exact a grain tax from them,

you will not live in the houses you built with chiseled stone,

nor will you drink the wine from the fine ¹⁷  vineyards you planted. ¹⁸ 

Amos 5:16

5:16 Because of Israel’s sins ¹⁹  this is what the Lord, the God who commands armies, the sovereign One, ²⁰  says:

“In all the squares there will be wailing,

in all the streets they will mourn the dead. ²¹ 

They will tell the field workers ²²  to lament

and the professional mourners ²³  to wail.

Amos 7:17

7:17 “Therefore this is what the Lord says:

‘Your wife will become a prostitute in the streets ²⁴ 

and your sons and daughters will die violently. ²⁵ 

Your land will be given to others ²⁶ 

and you will die in a foreign ²⁷  land.

Israel will certainly be carried into exile ²⁸  away from its land.’”

[6:7]  ¹ tn Heb “they will go into exile at the head of the exiles.”

[6:7]  ² sn Religious banquets. This refers to the מַרְזֵחַ (marzeakh), a type of pagan religious banquet popular among the upper class of Israel at this time and apparently associated with mourning. See P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 137-61; J. L. McLaughlin, The “Marzeah” in the Prophetic Literature (VTSup). Scholars debate whether at this banquet the dead were simply remembered or actually venerated in a formal, cultic sense.

[6:7]  ³ tn Heb “of the sprawled out.” See v. 4.

[5:13]  ⁴ tn Or “the wise”; or “the prudent.” Another option is to translate “the successful, prosperous” and understand this as a reference to the rich oppressors. See G. V. Smith, Amos, 169-70. In this case the following verb will also have a different nuance, that is, the wealthy remain silent before the abuses they perpetuate. See the note on the verb translated “keeps quiet” later in this verse.

[5:13]  ⁵ tn Or “moans, laments,” from a homonymic verbal root. If the rich oppressors are in view, then the verb (whether translated “will be silenced” or “will lament”) describes the result of God’s judgment upon them. See G. V. Smith, Amos, 170.

[5:13]  ⁶ tn If this is a judgment announcement against the rich, then the Hebrew phrase עֵת רָעָה (’et ra’ah) must be translated, “[a] disastrous time.” See G. V. Smith, Amos, 170.

[3:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “You only have I known.” The Hebrew verb יָדַע (yada’) is used here in its covenantal sense of “recognize in a special way.”

[3:11]  ¹⁰ tc The MT reads “an enemy and around the land.” It is also possible to take the MT as an exclamation (“an enemy, and all about the land!”; see S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 118; NJPS; cf. NLT).Most scholars and versions emend the text to יְסוֹבֵב (yÿsovev, Polel imperfect), “will encircle.”

[3:11]  ¹¹ tn Heb “He will bring down your power from you.” Some emend the text to read “Your power will be brought down from you.” The shift, however, from an active to a passive sense also appears at 3:14 (“I will destroy Bethel’s altars. The horns of the altar will be cut off.”) The pronouns (“your…you”) are feminine singular, indicating that the personified city of Samaria is addressed here. Samaria’s “power” here is her defenses and/or wealth.

[4:5]  ¹³ sn For the background of the thank offering of bread made with yeast, see Lev 7:13.

[4:5]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “proclaim voluntary offerings, announce.”

[4:12]  ¹⁶ tn The Lord appears to announce a culminating judgment resulting from Israel’s obstinate refusal to repent. The following verse describes the Lord in his role as sovereign judge, but it does not outline the judgment per se. For this reason F. I. Andersen and D. N. Freedman (Amos [AB], 450) take the prefixed verbal forms as preterites referring to the series of judgments detailed in vv. 6-11. It is more likely that a coming judgment is in view, but that its details are omitted for rhetorical effect, creating a degree of suspense (see S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 149-50) that will find its solution in chapter 5. This line is an ironic conclusion to the section begun at 4:4. Israel thought they were meeting the Lord at the sanctuaries, yet they actually had misunderstood how he had been trying to bring them back to himself. Now Israel would truly meet the Lord – not at the sanctuaries, but face-to-face in judgment.

[3:12]  ¹⁹ sn The verb translated salvaged, though often used in a positive sense of deliverance from harm, is here employed in a sarcastic manner. A shepherd would attempt to salvage part of an animal to prove that a predator had indeed killed it. In this way he could prove that he had not stolen the missing animal and absolve himself from any responsibility to repay the owner (see Exod 22:12-13).

[3:12]  ²⁰ tn Heb “with a corner of a bed.”

[3:12]  ²¹ tn The meaning of the Hebrew word דְּמֶשֶׁק (dÿmesheq), which occurs only here, is uncertain. If not emended, it is usually related to the term ַדּמֶּשֶׂק (dammeseq) and translated as the “Damask linens” of the bed (cf. NASB “the cover”) or as “in Damascus” (so KJV, NJB, NIV). The differences in spelling (Damascus is spelled correctly in 5:27), historical considerations, and the word order make both of these derivations unlikely. Many emendations have been proposed (e.g., “a part from the foot [of a bed],” based on a different division of the Hebrew letters (cf. NEB, NRSV); “on the edge,” based on a Hebrew term not attested in the Bible (NKJV). Some suggest a resemblance to an Akkadian term which means “sideboard [of a bed],” which is sometimes incorrectly rendered “headboard” (NJPS; see S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 121-22). Most likely another part of a bed or couch is in view, but it is difficult to be more specific.

[5:11]  ²² tn Traditionally, “because you trample on the poor” (cf. KJV, ASV, NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). The traditional view derives the verb from בּוּס (bus, “to trample”; cf. Isa. 14:25), but more likely it is cognate to an Akkadian verb meaning “to exact an agricultural tax” (see H. R. Cohen, Biblical Hapax Legomena [SBLDS], 49; S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 172-73).

[5:11]  ²³ tn Or “lovely”; KJV, NASB, NRSV “pleasant”; NAB “choice”; NIV “lush.”

[5:11]  ²⁴ tn Heb “Houses of chiseled stone you built, but you will not live in them. Fine vineyards you planted, but you will not drink their wine.”

[5:16]  ²⁵ tn Heb “Therefore.” This logical connector relates back to the accusation of vv. 10-13, not to the parenthetical call to repentance in vv. 14-15. To indicate this clearly, the phrase “Because of Israel’s sins” is used in the translation.

[5:16]  ²⁶ tn Or “the Lord.” The Hebrew term translated “sovereign One” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[5:16]  ²⁷ tn Heb “they will say, ‘Ah! Ah!’” The Hebrew term הוֹ (ho, “ah, woe”) is an alternate form of הוֹי (hoy), a word used to mourn the dead and express outwardly one’s sorrow. See 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5. This wordplay follows quickly, as v. 18 begins with הוֹי (“woe”).

[5:16]  ²⁸ tn Or “farmers” (NIV, NCV, NRSV, TEV, CEV, NLT).

[5:16]  ²⁹ tn Heb “those who know lamentation.”

[7:17]  ²⁸ tn Heb “in the city,” that is, “in public.”

[7:17]  ²⁹ tn Heb “will fall by the sword.”

[7:17]  ³⁰ tn Heb “will be divided up with a [surveyor’s] measuring line.”

[7:17]  ³¹ tn Heb “[an] unclean”; or “[an] impure.” This fate would be especially humiliating for a priest, who was to distinguish between the ritually clean and unclean (see Lev 10:10).

[7:17]  ³² tn See the note on the word “exile” in 5:5.