Amos 3: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

The LORD speaks against the whole nation he brought out of Egypt, saying that because he singled them out, he will punish them for all their sins. A chain of questions makes the point that effects have causes, and that when God speaks, a prophet must speak too. Foreign nations are called to look down on Samaria and see the violence stored in its fortresses, and the LORD announces that an enemy will surround the land, that almost nothing will be left of the people, that the altars of Bethel will be broken, and that the fine houses will be destroyed.

Claim by Claim

1. 3:1
   • The hearers are commanded to hear this word.
   • The LORD has spoken this word against them.
   • The addressees are the children of Israel.
   • The word is spoken against the whole family that the LORD brought up from the land of Egypt.
   • What follows is introduced as the LORD's speech.
2. 3:2
   • The LORD says he has known only them out of all the families of the earth.
   • Therefore the LORD will punish them for all their iniquities.
3. 3:3
   • It is asked whether two walk together unless they have arranged to meet.
4. 3:4
   • It is asked whether a lion roars in the forest when it has no prey.
   • It is asked whether a young lion gives his voice from his den unless he has caught something.
5. 3:5
   • It is asked whether a bird falls into a trap on the ground when there is no snare set for it.
   • It is asked whether a trap springs up from the ground when it has caught nothing.
   • The second question is ambiguous between a trap springing up having caught nothing and someone lifting a trap that has taken nothing.
6. 3:6
   • It is asked whether a ram's horn is blown in a city and the people do not tremble.
   • It is asked whether disaster comes to a city and the LORD has not done it.
7. 3:7
   • The Lord GOD does nothing without revealing his counsel to his servants the prophets.
   • The prophets are called the servants of the Lord GOD.
8. 3:8
   • The lion has roared.
   • It is asked who will not fear.
   • The Lord GOD has spoken.
   • It is asked who will not prophesy.
9. 3:9
   • The hearers are commanded to proclaim over the citadels in Ashdod.
   • The hearers are commanded to proclaim over the citadels in the land of Egypt.
   • They are to say: assemble on the mountains of Samaria.
   • They are to say: look at the great tumults within her.
   • They are to say: look at the oppression within her.
   • The word rendered 'the oppressed' is ambiguous between oppressed people and acts of oppression.
10. 3:10
    • They do not know how to do what is right.
    • This is declared by the LORD.
    • They store up violence and plunder in their citadels.
11. 3:11
    • Therefore the Lord GOD says the following.
    • An adversary will surround the land.
    • The adversary will bring down her strength from her.
    • Her citadels will be plundered.
12. 3:12
    • The LORD says the following.
    • A shepherd rescues two legs or a piece of an ear from the mouth of the lion.
    • In that same way the children of Israel who dwell in Samaria will be rescued.
    • Those rescued are described as with the corner of a bed and with a couch of Damascus.
    • The final phrase about Damascus and a couch is obscure in the Hebrew.
13. 3:13
    • The hearers are commanded to hear.
    • The hearers are commanded to testify in the house of Jacob.
    • The Hebrew is ambiguous between testifying in the house of Jacob and testifying against it.
    • This is declared by the Lord GOD, the God of hosts.
14. 3:14
    • On the day the LORD punishes Israel for his transgressions, the LORD will also punish the altars of Bethel.
    • The horns of the altar will be cut off.
    • The horns will fall to the ground.
15. 3:15
    • The LORD will strike the winter house along with the summer house.
    • The houses of ivory will perish.
    • Many houses will come to an end.
    • This is declared by the LORD.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

3:1

The family "brought up out of the land of Egypt" is the whole nation descended from Jacob, whose founding story was escape from slavery in Egypt into the land of Canaan. By Amos's day (about the eighth century BC) that nation had split in two: the northern kingdom, called Israel, with its capital at Samaria, and the southern kingdom, Judah, with its capital at Jerusalem. Amos is addressing the northern kingdom.

3:2

"Known" translates a Hebrew verb whose range runs from knowing about something to acknowledging someone as your own, singling one party out for a close, formal, binding relationship. It does not mean God was unaware other nations existed.

3:3

Verses 3 to 8 are a chain of questions, each expecting an obvious answer of yes or no. Each one pairs a thing you can observe with the cause that must lie behind it: you do not get the one without the other.

3:4

Lions still lived in the thickets along the Jordan in Amos's day and were a real danger to shepherds. The two halves describe two different sounds: the roar as a lion takes its prey in the open, and the low growl of a young lion over food already dragged back to its den.

3:5

The Hebrew trapping terms here are uncertain. The word behind "trap set for it" may mean the bait, or the throwing-stick that sprang a net. The picture in both halves of the verse is a bird-net that does not close on nothing.

3:6

The trumpet is the shofar, a ram's horn. It was sounded from the walls as a public alarm when an enemy force was sighted, so hearing it meant an attack was already coming. "Disaster" translates a Hebrew word that covers both moral wrongdoing and physical calamity; here it means calamity (war, siege, plague, famine), not wickedness. The older King James word "evil" misleads modern readers on this point.

3:7

The King James "secret" is a Hebrew word for the private council of a king: the inner circle where plans are settled before being made public. The picture is of decisions passed on to the prophets in advance of their being carried out.

3:8

"Prophesy" here means speaking aloud a message one has been given, not chiefly foretelling the future. The comparison is that a prophet can no more stay silent after God speaks than a person can stay calm when a lion roars nearby.

3:9

Ashdod was one of the five main Philistine cities, on the coast southwest of Israel; Egypt was the old imperial power to the south. Both were foreign nations with no stake in Israel's own religion, and they are summoned to stand and watch, as onlookers or witnesses. (Some ancient Greek copies read "Assyria" rather than "Ashdod.") Samaria, Israel's capital, stood on a hill ringed by higher ground, so spectators on those hills would be looking down into the city. "Strongholds" (King James "palaces") translates a word for the fortified great house of a ruler or wealthy family, part residence, part treasury, part citadel.

3:10

The KJV "palaces" here means fortified strongholds, the thick-walled buildings of the rich and powerful rather than a royal residence. The sting is that the treasure locked inside them is itself the proceeds of violence and theft.

3:11

"Spoiled" in 1611 English means plundered, stripped of everything valuable, not gone rotten. Amos does not name the enemy; within about forty years it was Assyria, which destroyed Samaria in 722 BC.

3:12

Shepherds were held liable for animals lost from a flock, and a shepherd could clear himself of the charge of stealing one by producing the remains, a couple of leg bones or a torn ear, as proof that a predator had taken it. The rescued scraps are worthless; they only show the animal is gone. The Hebrew of the last clause is obscure. The words rendered "corner of a bed" and "in Damascus on a couch" may describe expensive furniture, and the word read as "Damascus" may instead be the name of a fabric or a part of a couch.

3:13

"The house of Jacob" means the descendants of Jacob, that is, the nation, "house" in the sense of household or family line. "God of hosts" (rendered here "God of armies") is a standing title; "hosts" translates a word for massed ranks, understood variously as Israel's fighting men, the heavenly powers, or the stars.

3:14

Bethel was the chief royal sanctuary of the northern kingdom, set up by its kings so that worshipers would not travel south to Jerusalem. The horns were four projections, one at each upper corner of the altar; blood from sacrifices was smeared on them, and a person in danger of death could claim protection by taking hold of them. Cutting them off puts the altar out of use and removes that refuge.

3:15

Wealthy Israelites kept two residences, a sheltered one for winter and a cooler one for summer. "Houses of ivory" refers to buildings and furniture faced with carved ivory panels, a display of great wealth; carved ivory of exactly this kind has been dug up at Samaria.