Amos 7–8

Chapter 7

¹Thus did the Lord Jehovah shew unto me; and behold, he formed locusts in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth, and behold, it was the latter growth after the king’s mowings. ²And it came to pass, when they had wholly eaten the grass of the land, that I said, O Lord Jehovah, forgive, I beseech thee! How shall Jacob arise? for he is small. ³Jehovah repented for this: It shall not be, said Jehovah. ⁴Thus did the Lord Jehovah shew unto me; and behold, the Lord Jehovah called to contend by fire; and it devoured the great deep, and ate up the inheritance. ⁵Then said I, O Lord Jehovah, cease, I beseech thee! How shall Jacob arise? for he is small. ⁶Jehovah repented for this: This also shall not be, said the Lord Jehovah. ⁷Thus did he shew unto me; and behold, the Lord stood upon a wall made by a plumb-line, with a plumb-line in his hand. ⁸And Jehovah said unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumb-line. And the Lord said, Behold, I will set a plumb-line in the midst of my people Israel: I will not again pass by them any more. ⁹And the high places of Isaac shall be desolated, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will arise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.

¹⁰Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not able to bear all his words. ¹¹For thus Amos saith: Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall certainly go into captivity out of his land. ¹²And Amaziah said unto Amos, Thou seer, go, flee away into the land of Judah, and eat bread there, and prophesy there. ¹³But prophesy not again any more at Bethel; for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is the house of the kingdom. ¹⁴And Amos answered and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdman, and a gatherer of sycamore fruit. ¹⁵And Jehovah took me as I followed the flock, and Jehovah said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel. ¹⁶And now hear thou the word of Jehovah: Thou sayest, Prophesy not against Israel, and utter not words against the house of Isaac. ¹⁷Therefore thus saith Jehovah: Thy wife shall be a harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided with the line; and thou shalt die in a land that is unclean; and Israel shall certainly go into captivity, out of his land.

Chapter 8

¹Thus did Jehovah shew unto me; and behold, a basket of summer-fruit. ²And he said, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A basket of summer-fruit. And Jehovah said unto me, The end is come upon my people Israel: I will not again pass by them any more. ³And the songs of the palace shall be howlings in that day, saith the Lord Jehovah. The dead bodies shall be many; in every place they shall be cast forth. Silence!

⁴Hear this, ye that pant after the needy, even to cause to fail the poor of the land, ⁵saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat? making the ephah small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances for deceit: ⁶that we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; and that we may sell the refuse of the wheat. ⁷Jehovah hath sworn by the glory of Jacob, Certainly I will never forget any of their works. ⁸Shall not the land tremble for this, and every one mourn that dwelleth therein? And it shall wholly rise up like the Nile; and it shall surge and sink down, as the river of Egypt. ⁹And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord Jehovah, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the land in the clear day. ¹⁰And 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 for an only son, and the end thereof as a bitter day.

¹¹Behold, days come, saith the Lord Jehovah, when I will send a famine in the land; not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of Jehovah. ¹²And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north to the east; they shall run to and fro to seek the word of Jehovah, and shall not find it. ¹³In that day shall the fair virgins and the young men faint for thirst; ¹⁴they that swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, As thy god, O Dan, liveth! and, As the way of Beer-sheba liveth! even they shall fall, and never rise up again.