Amos 4:9

4:9 “I destroyed your crops ¹  with blight and disease.

Locusts kept ²  devouring your orchards, ³  vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

Amos 6:14

6:14 “Look! I am about to bring ⁴  a nation against you, family ⁵  of Israel.”

The Lord, the God who commands armies, is speaking.

“They will oppress ⁶  you all the way from Lebo-Hamath ⁷  to the Stream of the Arabah.” ⁸ 

Amos 7:10

Amos Confronts a Priest

7:10 Amaziah the priest of Bethel ⁹  sent this message ¹⁰  to King Jeroboam of Israel: “Amos is conspiring against you in the very heart of the kingdom of Israel! ¹¹  The land cannot endure all his prophecies. ¹² 

[4:9]  ¹ tn 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]  ² tn 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]  ³ tn Or “gardens.”

[6:14]  ⁴ tn Or “raise up” (KJV, NASB); NIV “stir up.”

[6:14]  ⁵ tn Heb “house.”

[6:14]  ⁶ sn Once again there is irony in the divine judgment. The oppressive nation itself will suffer oppression. The verb “oppress” (לָחַץ, lakhats) in this verse is not the same as that used in 4:1 (עָשַׁק, ’ashaq).

[6:14]  ⁷ tn Or “from the entrance to Hamath.” The Hebrew term לְבוֹא (lÿvo’) can either be translated or considered a part of the place name.

[6:14]  ⁸ sn Lebo-Hamath refers to the northern border of Israel, the Stream of the Arabah to its southern border. See 2 Kgs 14:25. Through this invader the Lord would reverse the victories and territorial expansion Israel experienced during the reign of Jeroboam II.

[7:10]  ⁹ map For location see Map4 G4; Map5 C1; Map6 E3; Map7 D1; Map8 G3.

[7:10]  ¹⁰ tn The direct object of the verb translated “sent” is elided in the Hebrew text. The words “this message” are supplied in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.

[7:10]  ¹¹ tn Heb “in the middle of the house of Israel.”

[7:10]  ¹² tn Heb “words.”