Amos 2:9

9 Though I sent destruction on the Amorite before them, who was tall as the cedar and strong as the oak-tree, cutting off his fruit from on high and his roots from under the earth.

Amos 2:9 Meaning and Commentary

Amos 2:9

Yet destroyed I the Amorite before them
Here the Lord by the prophet reckons up the many favours and blessings he had bestowed upon Israel, which was an aggravation of their sins, and showed them to be guilty of great ingratitude, and a justification of him in his punishment of them he drove out the seven nations of Canaanites from before them, to make way for them, and destroyed them, of which the Amorite was a principal, and is here put for all the rest: whose height [was] like the height of the cedars;
being both tall of stature, and in great honour and dignity with the other nations, and in very opulent and flourishing circumstances: and he was strong as the oaks:
not only like the tall cedars of Lebanon for their height and largeness of stature, but like the sturdy oaks for the strength of their bodies, being of the race of the giants, ( Numbers 13:28 Numbers 13:32 Numbers 13:33 ) ( Deuteronomy 3:11 ) ; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath;
that is, utterly destroyed him, root and branch, so that nothing of him remained; still persisting in the metaphor of a tree. Jarchi interprets it of their superior and inferior princes; but it seems best to understand it of children with their parents, the one being the fruit, the other the root; and, both being destroyed, there must be utter ruin.

Amos 2:9 In-Context

7 Crushing the head of the poor, and turning the steps of the gentle out of the way: and a man and his father go in to the same young woman, putting shame on my holy name:

8 By every altar they are stretched on clothing taken from those who are in their debt, drinking in the house of their god the wine of those who have made payment for wrongdoing.

9 Though I sent destruction on the Amorite before them, who was tall as the cedar and strong as the oak-tree, cutting off his fruit from on high and his roots from under the earth.

10 And I took you up out of the land of Egypt, guiding you for forty years in the waste land, so that you might take for your heritage the land of the Amorite.

11 And some of your sons I made prophets, and some of your young men I made separate for myself. Is it not even so, O children of Israel? says the Lord.