Chapter 8

Basket of Fruit and Israel’s Captivity

1 Thus the Lord 1God showed me, and behold, there was a basket of summer fruit.

2 He said, “What do you see, Amos?” And aI said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then the Lord said to me, “The bend has come for My people Israel. I will 1cspare them no longer.

3 “1The asongs of the palace will turn to bwailing in that day,” declares the Lord God. “Many will be the ccorpses; in every place 2they will cast them forth 3in silence.”

4 Hear this, you who 1atrample the needy, to do away with the humble of the land,

5 saying,

“When will the anew moon 1be over,

So that we may sell grain,

And the bsabbath, that we may open the wheat market,

To make the 2bushel smaller and the shekel bigger,

And to ccheat with 3dishonest scales,

6 So as to abuy the helpless for 1money

And the needy for a pair of sandals,

And that we may sell the refuse of the wheat?”

7 The Lord has asworn by the bpride of Jacob,

“Indeed, I will cnever forget any of their deeds.

8 “Because of this will not the land aquake

And everyone who dwells in it bmourn?

Indeed, all of it will crise up like the Nile,

And it will be tossed about

And subside like the Nile of Egypt.

9 “It will come about in that day,” declares the Lord God,

“That I will make the asun go down at noon

And bmake the earth dark in 1broad daylight.

10 “Then I will aturn your festivals into mourning

And all your songs into 1lamentation;

And I will bring bsackcloth on everyone’s loins

And baldness on every head.

And I will make it clike a time of mourning for an only son,

And the end of it will be like a bitter day.

11 “Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord God,

“When I will send a famine on the land,

Not a famine for bread or a thirst for water,

But rather afor hearing the words of the Lord.

12 “People will stagger from sea to sea

And from the north even to the east;

They will go to and fro to aseek the word of the Lord,

But they will not find it.

13 “In that day the beautiful avirgins

And the young men will bfaint from thirst.

14 “As for those who swear by the 1aguilt of Samaria,

Who say, ‘As your god lives, O bDan,’

And, ‘As the way of cBeersheba lives,’

They will fall and dnot rise again.”