Amos 4

Listen to this message, you cows of Bashan on the mountain of Samaria: you women who press down the poor and crush the needy, and who say to your husbands, "Bring us something to drink."

1Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say to their masters, Bring, and let us drink.

NoteBashan was a fertile grazing region east of the Jordan River, famous for its unusually well-fed cattle; calling these women "cows of Bashan" pictures them as sleek, pampered animals. Samaria was the capital city of the northern kingdom of Israel, built on a hill, so "the mountain of Samaria" means the city itself. The word rendered "husbands" is the ordinary Hebrew word for "lord" or "master", which a wife could use of her husband; the King James "masters" keeps the wider sense.

2The Lord GOD has sworn by his own holiness: Look, the days are coming when you will be carried off with hooks, and the last of you with fishhooks.

2The Lord GOD hath sworn by his holiness, that, lo, the days shall come upon you, that he will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fishhooks.

NoteAssyrian and Egyptian art shows prisoners of war being led away by ropes attached to hooks or rings through the lip or nose, and captives were sometimes dragged off like a catch of fish. "Posterity" in the King James means descendants, or simply the last ones left.

3You will go out through the gaps in the broken wall, each woman straight ahead of her, and you will be thrown out toward Harmon, says the LORD.

3And ye shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her; and ye shall cast them into the palace, saith the LORD.

NoteWhen a besieged city's wall was broken through, survivors escaped through the gaps rather than the gates. The last word of the verse is uncertain in Hebrew: it may be a place name, Harmon, otherwise unknown, and the King James translators guessed at "the palace" instead. Nobody knows for certain what it means.

4Go to Bethel and sin; go to Gilgal and sin even more. Bring your sacrifices every morning and your tenth part every three days.

4Come to Bethel, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years:

NoteBethel and Gilgal were the two main worship sites of the northern kingdom, both busy and popular. The command to go there and sin is sarcastic: it is an invitation phrased like the summons a priest would call out to worshipers. A "tithe" is a tenth of one's harvest or livestock given as a religious due. The Hebrew here says literally "every three days", which is absurdly frequent and part of the mockery; the King James "after three years" reflects the law that set the tithe on a three-year cycle.

5Burn bread with yeast in it as a thank offering, and announce your freewill gifts out loud so everyone hears. This is what you love to do, people of Israel, says the Lord GOD.

5And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings: for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel, saith the Lord GOD.

NoteYeast was normally kept off the altar fire, though leavened loaves did accompany a thanksgiving sacrifice as a gift to the priests. A "freewill offering" was a voluntary gift, given beyond what was required, and by definition private generosity, which is why announcing it out loud is the point of the jibe.

6I gave you clean teeth in all your cities and no bread in any of your towns. Yet you did not come back to me, says the LORD.

6And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

Note"Cleanness of teeth" is an idiom: teeth stay clean when there is no food to put between them. It means famine, not hygiene.

7I also held back the rain from you when the harvest was still three months away. I sent rain on one city and kept it from another. One field got rain; the field with no rain dried up.

7And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered.

NoteIn this climate the rain came in two seasons, and the later rains falling about three months before harvest were what filled out the grain. Losing them meant losing the crop.

8People from two or three cities staggered to another city to get water to drink, but there was never enough. Yet you did not come back to me, says the LORD.

8So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

9I struck your crops with scorching wind and mildew. When your gardens, vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees grew, locusts ate them. Yet you did not come back to me, says the LORD.

9I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

Note"Blasting" is the scorching of grain by a hot dry east wind off the desert; mildew is the fungus that ruins damp grain. "Palmerworm" is one of several King James words for locusts, insects that strip vegetation bare in swarms.

10I sent disease among you like the diseases of Egypt. I killed your young men with the sword, and your horses were taken away. I made the stench of your camp rise into your noses. Yet you did not come back to me, says the LORD.

10I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

Note"After the manner of Egypt" points back to the plagues that struck Egypt in the exodus story, which had become a byword for devastating epidemics. The stench is that of unburied bodies in a defeated army's camp.

11I overthrew some of you the way God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were like a burning stick pulled out of the fire. Yet you did not come back to me, says the LORD.

11I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

NoteSodom and Gomorrah were cities destroyed by fire in Genesis, and their name became shorthand for total, sudden ruin. A "firebrand plucked out of the burning" is a stick snatched from a fire, saved, but charred and useless.

12So this is what I will do to you, Israel. And because I am going to do this to you, get ready to meet your God, Israel.

12Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

NoteThe threat is deliberately left blank: "this" is never specified. The phrase "prepare to meet your God" uses the language of getting ready for a formal encounter, as Israel prepared to meet God at Sinai, and also of an army mustering to face an enemy in the field. Both senses are available in the Hebrew.

13Look: he is the one who shapes the mountains and makes the wind, and who tells people what his thought is. He turns the morning into darkness and walks on the high places of the earth. The LORD, the God of armies, is his name.

13For, lo, he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and declareth unto man what is his thought, that maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth, The LORD, The God of hosts, is his name.

NoteThese lines have the shape and rhythm of a hymn, and may be a piece of an existing song quoted here. "What is his thought" is ambiguous in Hebrew: it can mean God revealing his own thought to man, or God telling a person what that person is thinking. "High places of the earth" means the ridges and summits of the land. "God of hosts" means commander of armies, the massed forces of heaven, and sometimes the stars.