Amos 4:9

9 “I struck your farms and vineyards with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured all your fig and olive trees. But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD .

Amos 4:9 Meaning and Commentary

Amos 4:9

I have smitten you with blasting and mildew
"Blasting" is what we commonly call "blights", generally occasioned by an east wind; and so Kimchi interprets the word here used; and the Vulgate Latin version renders it, "a burning wind"; which causes the buds and leaves of trees to shrivel up as if they were burnt with fire. "Mildew" is a kind of clammy dew, which falling upon corn corrupts and destroys by its moisture; and is a kind of jaundice to the fruits of the earth; and has its name as that, from yellowness, in the Hebrew language: when the Lord is said to smite them with these the sense is, that he sent these upon the fruits of their gardens, fields and vineyards, which consumed them: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive
trees increased, the palmer worm devoured [them];
just when they were budding and blossoming, and bringing forth fruit; and so what the blasting and mildew did not consume, that the palmer worm, a kind of locust, did; which has its name from its biting and cutting off the leaves and branches of trees, as of those mentioned vines, olives and fig trees, with which the land of Canaan abounded, the cutting off which was a great calamity. The Targum is,

``the multitude of your gardens the palmer worm hath eaten:''
yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord;
this dispensation of Providence was also without its desired fruit and effect; (See Gill on Amos 4:6).

Amos 4:9 In-Context

7 “I kept the rain from falling when your crops needed it the most. I sent rain on one town but withheld it from another. Rain fell on one field, while another field withered away.
8 People staggered from town to town looking for water, but there was never enough. But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD .
9 “I struck your farms and vineyards with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured all your fig and olive trees. But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD .
10 “I sent plagues on you like the plagues I sent on Egypt long ago. I killed your young men in war and led all your horses away. The stench of death filled the air! But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD .
11 “I destroyed some of your cities, as I destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Those of you who survived were like charred sticks pulled from a fire. But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD .
Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007, 2013 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.