Amos 5

A Lamentation against Israel

¹Hear this word, O house of Israel, this lamentation I take up against you:

• AMOS 5:1[NOTE]A FUNERAL SONG. Amos sings a lament for Israel while Israel is still alive and rich.

²“Fallen is Virgin Israel,

never to rise again.

She lies abandoned on her land,

with no one to raise her up.”

³This is what the Lord Yahweh says:

“The city that marches out a thousand strong

will have but a hundred left,

and the one that marches out a hundred strong

will have but ten left in the house of Israel.”

A Call to Repentance// Joel 1:13–20; Zephaniah 2:1–3; Luke 13:1–5

⁴For this is what Yahweh says to the house of Israel:

“Seek Me and live!

• AMOS 5:4[NOTE]SEEK ME AND LIVE. Not a place, Bethel, Gilgal or Beersheba, but God Himself.

⁵Do not seek Bethel or go to Gilgal;

do not journey to Beersheba,

for Gilgal will surely go into exile,

and Bethel will come to nothing.

• AMOS 5:5[DEMONIC]Do not seek Bethel, Gilgal, or Beersheba, the idol shrines

⁶Seek Yahweh and live,

or He will sweep like fire through the house of Joseph;

it will devour everything,

with no one at Bethel to extinguish it.

• AMOS 5:6[NOTE]AMOS SPEAKS. He talks about Yahweh as He, so 5:6 to 7 and 5:13 to 15 are black.

⁷There are those who turn justice into wormwood

and cast righteousness to the ground.

⁸He who made the Pleiades and Orion,

who turns darkness into dawn

and darkens day into night,

who summons the waters of the sea

and pours them over the face of the earth—

Yahweh is His name—

• AMOS 5:8[NOTE]THE PLEIADES AND ORION. Two star groups people still see today. Job names them too, Job 9:9 and 38:31.

⁹He flashes destruction on the strong,

so that fury comes upon the stronghold.

¹⁰There are those who hate the one who reproves in the gate

and despise him who speaks with integrity.

• AMOS 5:10[NOTE]THE GATE. A city's court met at its gate. The one who reproves is the honest witness or judge.

¹¹Therefore, because you trample on the poor

and exact from him a tax of grain,

you will never live

in the stone houses you have built;

you will never drink the wine

from the lush vineyards you have planted.

¹²For I know that your transgressions are many

and your sins are numerous.

You oppress the righteous by taking bribes;

you deprive the poor of justice in the gate.

¹³Therefore, the prudent keep silent in such times,

for the days are evil.

¹⁴Seek good, not evil,

so that you may live.

And Yahweh, the God of Hosts,

will be with you, as you have claimed.

• AMOS 5:14[NOTABLE]Real faith shows up in how we treat people, especially in court and in business.

¹⁵Hate evil and love good;

establish justice in the gate.

Perhaps Yahweh, the God of Hosts,

will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”

Woe to Rebellious Israel// Acts 7:39–43

¹⁶Therefore this is what Yahweh, the God of Hosts, the Lord, says:

“There will be wailing in all the public squares

and cries of ‘Alas! Alas!’ in all the streets.

The farmer will be summoned to mourn,

and the mourners to wail.

¹⁷There will be wailing in all the vineyards,

for I will pass through your midst,”

says Yahweh.

¹⁸Woe to you who long for the Day of Yahweh!

What will the Day of Yahweh be for you?

It will be darkness and not light.

• AMOS 5:18[FORESHADOW]The Day of Yahweh would be darkness, not light, for those who thought they were safe → Fulfilled in successive judgments: 722 BC, 586 BC, AD 70MEDIUM
• AMOS 5:18[NOTE]THE DAY OF YAHWEH. Israel thought that day meant God would beat their enemies. Amos says it means darkness for them. These woe lines speak of Yahweh as He, so they are black.

¹⁹It will be like a man who flees from a lion,

only to encounter a bear,

or who enters his house and rests his hand against the wall,

only to be bitten by a snake.

²⁰Will not the Day of Yahweh

be darkness and not light,

even gloom with no brightness in it?

²¹“I hate, I despise your feasts!

I cannot stand the stench of your solemn assemblies.

• AMOS 5:21[NOTE]I HATE YOUR FEASTS. See Did God Want Sacrifices?

²²Even though you offer Me burnt offerings and grain offerings,

I will not accept them;

for your peace offerings of fattened cattle

I will have no regard.

²³Take away from Me the noise of your songs!

I will not listen to the music of your harps.

²⁴But let justice roll on like a river,

and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

• AMOS 5:24[NOTABLE]God wants justice more than religious ceremony. Martin Luther King Jr. quoted it in his I Have a Dream speech.
• AMOS 5:24[NOTE]LET JUSTICE ROLL ON. Martin Luther King Jr. quoted this verse in his I Have a Dream speech in 1963.

²⁵Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings

forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

• AMOS 5:25[DEMONIC]Israel carried star gods Sakkuth and Kaiwan through the wilderness
• AMOS 5:25[QUOTED]Quoted in the New Testament → ACTS 7:42-43

²⁶You have taken along Sakkuth your king

and Kaiwan your star god,

the idols you made for yourselves.

• AMOS 5:26[NOTE]SAKKUTH AND KAIWAN. Star gods from Mesopotamia, both often tied to the planet Saturn. In the Greek Bible the names read Moloch and Rephan, and Stephen quotes it that way, Acts 7:43.

²⁷Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,”

says Yahweh, whose name is the God of Hosts.

• AMOS 5:27[PROPHECY]Israel would be sent into exile beyond Damascus → 2KI 17:6; ACTS 7:42-43