Amos 8:4-14

4 Hear this, you who trample the needy and do away with the poor of the land,

5 saying, “When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?”— skimping on the measure, boosting the price and cheating with dishonest scales,

6 buying the poor with silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling even the sweepings with the wheat.

7 The LORD has sworn by himself, the Pride of Jacob: “I will never forget anything they have done.

8 “Will not the land tremble for this, and all who live in it mourn? The whole land will rise like the Nile; it will be stirred up and then sink like the river of Egypt.

9 “In that day,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight.

10 I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day.

11 “The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “when I will send a famine through the land— not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD.

12 People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the LORD, but they will not find it.

13 “In that day “the lovely young women and strong young men will faint because of thirst.

14 Those who swear by the sin of Samaria— who say, ‘As surely as your god lives, Dan,’ or, ‘As surely as the god^[a] of Beersheba lives’— they will fall, never to rise again.”

Amos 8:4-14 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO AMOS 8

In this chapter a fourth vision is delivered, the vision of a "basket of summer fruit"; signifying the destruction of the ten tribes, for which they were ripe, and which would quickly come upon them, Am 8:1-3; the rich are reproved for their oppression of the poor, their covetousness and earthly mindedness, Am 8:4-6; for which they are threatened with entire ruin, sudden calamities, and very mournful times, instead of light, joy, and gladness, Am 8:7-10; and particularly with a famine of hearing the word of God, Am 8:11,12; the consequence of which would be, a fainting of the young men and virgins for thirst, and the utter and irrecoverable ruin of all idolaters, Am 8:13,14.

Cross References

• 1. S Proverbs 30:14
• 2. S Job 20:19; S Psalms 14:4; S Amos 2:7
• 3. S Numbers 10:10
• 4. Isaiah 58:13
• 5. S Nehemiah 10:31
• 6. S Genesis 31:7
• 7. Deuteronomy 25:15; 2 Kings 4:23; Nehemiah 13:15-16; Ezekiel 45:10-12; S Hosea 12:7; Micah 6:10-11; Zechariah 5:6
• 8. Amos 5:11
• 9. S Amos 2:6; S Amos 4:1
• 10. S Psalms 47:4; Amos 6:8
• 11. S Hosea 8:13
• 12. S Job 35:15
• 13. S Job 9:6; Jeremiah 51:29; Hosea 4:3
• 14. Psalms 18:7; S Jeremiah 46:8; Amos 9:5
• 15. S Job 5:14; Isaiah 59:9-10; Jeremiah 13:16; Jeremiah 15:9; S Ezekiel 32:7; S Amos 5:8; Micah 3:6; Matthew 27:45; Mark 15:33; Luke 23:44-45
• 16. S Leviticus 26:31
• 17. S Lamentations 5:15; S Hosea 2:11
• 18. S Joel 1:8; Jeremiah 48:37
• 19. S Leviticus 13:40; S Isaiah 3:17
• 20. S Genesis 21:16; Jeremiah 6:26; Zechariah 12:10
• 21. S Jeremiah 2:19; S Ezekiel 7:18
• 22. Jeremiah 30:3; Jeremiah 31:27
• 23. S Isaiah 30:20
• 24. S 1 Samuel 3:1; S 1 Samuel 28:6; S 2 Chronicles 15:3; Ezekiel 7:26
• 25. S Ezekiel 20:3,31
• 26. S Isaiah 9:17
• 27. Isaiah 41:17; Hosea 2:3
• 28. Micah 1:5
• 29. S 1 Kings 12:29
• 30. S Amos 5:5
• 31. S Psalms 46:2
• 32. S Amos 5:2

Footnotes

• [a] Hebrew "the way"