Amos
Summary
The indictment of SELF-INDULGENCE and the call to repentance. it begins with a scathing address to the 'kine of Bashan' who oppress the poor. it features the five-fold refrain: 'YET HAVE YOU NOT RETURNED TO ME, SAYS THE LORD', as the LORD recounts His various judgements: famine, drought, pestilence, and destruction: designed to bring the nation to its knees. it concludes with the solemn warning to 'prepare to meet your God' and a majestic portrayal of the LORD of hosts who forms the mountains and creates the wind.
Hear this word, you cows of Bashan who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor and crush the needy, who say to your husbands, 'Bring wine, let us drink!'
The Lord GOD has 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.
And you shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her; and you shall cast them into the palace, says the LORD.
Come to Bethel, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years:
And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings: for this liks you, O you children of Israel, says the Lord GOD.
And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have you not returned to Me, says the LORD.
And 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.
So two or three cities wandered to one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have you not returned to Me, says the LORD.
I 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 you not returned to Me, says the LORD.
I 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 into your nostrils: yet have you not returned to Me, says the LORD.
I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have you not returned to Me, says the LORD.
Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel: and because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel.
For, lo, He that forms the mountains, and creates the wind, and declares to man what is his thought, that makes the morning darkness, and treads upon the high places of the earth, The LORD, The God of hosts, is His name.