Moff JOS 1 CHR 2 CHR EZRA NEH EST JOB PSA PROV ECC SNG LAM EZE DAN HOS JOEL AMOS OBA YNA MIC NAH HAB ZEP HAG ZEC MAL MAT MARK LUKE YHN ACTs ROM 1 COR 2 COR GAL EPH PHP COL 1 TH 2 TH 1 TIM 2 TIM TIT PHM HEB YAC 1 PET 2 PET 1 YHN 2 YHN 3 YHN YUD REV

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Moff AMOS Chapter 4

◄ AMOS 4 ► ║ ═ ©

4 Listen to this, you cows of Bashan,

you women in high Samaria,

you who defraud the poor and are hard on the needy,

who tell your husbands, ‘Let us have wine to drink!’

2 As sure as I am God, the Lord Eternal swears,

your day is coming,

when you will be dragged out with prongs,

the last of you with fish-hooks;

3 out you go, through breaches in the walls,

each of you headlong,

chased to mount Hermon–

by order of the Eternal.

4 Go to Bethel, go on with your sins!

pile sin on sin at Gilgal!

aye, sacrifice in the morning,

and every third day pay your tithes,

5 burn your dough as a thank-offering,

announce your freewill gifts–

oh, make them public,

for you love all that, you Israelites!

The Lord Eternal declares:

6 ‘My way has been to starve your towns

and to spread famine over all the land;

yet, says the Eternal, yet

you would not come back to me.

7 I kept the rain from you,

three months before the harvest,

I would send rain on one town

and hold it from another,

one patch would get rain,

and the rainless patch dried up,

8 till two or three towns would crawl to another

in quest of water, all in vain;

and yet, says the Eternal, yet

you would not come back to me.

9 I smote you with blight and mildew,

I wasted your gardens and vineyards,

the locust spoiled your fig-trees and your vines;

yet, says the Eternal, yet

you would not come back to me.

10 I sent you an Egyptian plague,

I slew your soldiers in the fight

and the flower of your steeds,

till the stench of your camp

rose to your nostrils;

and yet, says the Eternal, yet

you would not come back to me.

11 I sent you a shattering earthquake,

like God’s own shattering of Sodom and Gomorrah,

till you only escaped

like charred sticks snatched from the fire;

and yet, says the Eternal, yet

you would not come back to me.

12 So now I will deal with you, O Israel, thus… Since thus I deal with you, O Israel, prepare to meet your God; 13 for it is he who forms the mountains and creates the wind and reveals His inner mind to man, he who makes the dawn and darkness, who marches over the heights of earth – his name is the Eternal, God of hosts;

8 he it is who made the Pleiades and Orion, who turns black darkness into dawn and darkens day again into the night, who summons floods and pours them on the earth; his name is the Eternal– 9 he flashes ruin on the mighty, till their forts fall to the ground.

5 Listen to this word of mine against you, house of Israel, listen to this dirge:

2 ‘Fallen, fallen, never to rise,

is maiden Israel;

low on her own land she lies,

with none to raise her.’

3 For the Lord Eternal has declared that the town which marched out a thousand strong will have only a hundred men left, and the town which marched out a hundred strong will have only ten men left.

4 Here is the Eternal’s message for the house of Israel:

Seek me and you shall live,

5 seek not Bethel,

go not to Gilgal,

cross not to Beêrsheba

(for Gilgal shall have a galling exile,

and Bethel sink to be bethral);

6 seek the Eternal and live,

lest he set Joseph’s house ablaze with fire

that none can quench in Israel.

7 You who make justice a bitter thing,

trampling on the law,

10 hating a man who exposes you,

loathing him who is honest with you!–

11 for this, for crushing the weak,

and forcing them to give you grain,

houses of ashlar you may build,

but you shall never dwell in them,

and vineyards you may plant,

but you shall drink no wine from them.

12 I know your countless crimes,

your manifold misdeeds–

browbeating honest men, accepting bribes,

defrauding the poor of justice.

13 (It is a time when the prudent make no protest,

so evil is the time!)

16 But the Eternal speaks,

the God of hosts declares:

“A wail shall ring through all your squares,

a cry of woe in all your streets,

the very peasants shall be moved

to wail with those well skilled in dirges,

17 and in all vineyards there shall be lamenting,

when I sweep through your midst,

the Eternal declares.”

18 You long for the day of the Eternal?

Ah, what will that avail you,

6 so eager to avert the evil day,

3 so keen upon injustice?

AMOS C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9