Amos 8:4-14
Summary for Amos 8:4-14: 8:4-14 a This section expands the indictments and judgments listed earlier (read with 2:6–6:14 b).8:5 c Work was explicitly forbidden on the Sabbath day (Exod 20:9-10 d); Amos implies that shops were closed during pagan new-moon religious festivals as well.
• Merchants were cheating their customers by measuring grain with small ephahs and cheating their suppliers by using heavy shekels on the scales. This practice was forbidden by God’s law (Lev 19:35-36 e; Deut 25:13-16 f; see Prov 11:1 g; 16:11 h; 20:10 i, 23 j).
8:7 k the Pride of Israel: The same Hebrew phrase alludes in 6:8 l to Israel’s arrogance. Here, the phrase is probably a name for God, who is the legitimate object of Israel’s pride. Elsewhere (Ps 47:4 m; Nah 2:2 n), this phrase refers to the Promised Land under a king from David’s line (cp. Jer 13:9 o; Ezek 32:12 p). If the phrase here means the land, it would spotlight Israel’s perverse pride in its national and geographic identity.
8:9 q The day of the Lord would invert the cosmos. Jeremiah used similar imagery to describe the desecration of Judah as the Babylonian armies approached (Jer 4:23 r; see also Isa 13:10 s; 34:4 t; 50:3 u; Ezek 32:7-8 v; Joel 2:10 w, 31 x; Mic 3:6 y).
Summary for Amos 8:11-14: 8:11-14 z famine ... of hearing the words of the Lord: God sent prophets to Israel to speak his words directly to them, but Israel commanded the prophets not to prophesy (2:11-12 aa). Now they had what they wanted, but it was a silence more terrible than his roar and thunder: God became distant (see Ezek 7:26 ab; 20:3 ac; Mic 3:4 ad, 7 ae). The time for speaking was over; the time of judgment had come.
8:12 af from border to border: The natural boundaries of Israel were from sea to sea: the Mediterranean Sea on the west and the Dead Sea on the east. The other borders are simply called the north and the east.
8:14 ag The god of Dan refers to the northern shrine of the gold calf established by Jeroboam I (see 1 Kgs 12:28-29 ah; 2 Kgs 10:29 ai).
• the god of Beersheba: Evidently Beersheba had become a center of worship in the southern kingdom. Archaeologists have found the remains of a horned altar in the ruins of Beersheba.
Copyright information for
TNotes