Amos 1King James Version
Amos, a herdsman of Tekoa. The Lord roareth from Zion. Then a series of oracles against the surrounding nations: Damascus, Gaza, Tyre, Edom, Ammon. For three transgressions, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof. The rhythm of the coming judgment builds.
Amos opens with God roaring from Zion, then fires a sequence of indictments at Israel's neighbors: Damascus for brutality in Gilead, Gaza and Tyre for slave trading, Edom for relentless violence, Ammon for atrocities in war. Each oracle follows the same hammer-rhythm: 'For three transgressions and for four, I will not turn away the punishment.' The surrounding nations are lined up and condemned one by one.
God holds every nation accountable for how it treats human beings, not just Israel. Basic moral law is not a Jewish franchise. It belongs to everyone.
"The LORD will roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither." (1:2) The opening image sets the entire book's tone: this is not a complaint filed quietly, it is the sound of a lion before the kill.
Around 760 BC, the ancient Near East is a crowded neighborhood of competing powers. Israel under Jeroboam II is prosperous but politically tense, surrounded by nations with long memories of war and trade. Amos speaks two years before a famous earthquake, a detail his first hearers would have recognized immediately. He is a Judean outsider standing in northern Israel, and the crowd around him likely nodded along as each enemy nation got named.
Amos is a herdman and fig-tree farmer from Tekoa in Judah, not a professional prophet, sent north to deliver a message to Israel. Hazael and Benhadad represent Damascus. The nations named in these oracles are Syria, Philistia, Tyre, Edom, and Ammon, each condemned for specific acts of cruelty.
The oracles against nations were likely heard with approval by an Israelite audience. Damascus is condemned first, then the old enemies down the list. The rhetorical trap is being set deliberately: Amos is walking his listeners around the table, nation by nation, building agreement, before he turns the same formula on Israel itself. The book opens as a crowd pleaser on its way to becoming something else entirely.
There is a cold, rhythmic dread to these oracles. The same phrase repeats like a gavel: 'I will not turn away the punishment.' By the fifth or sixth nation, it stops sounding like a list and starts sounding like inevitability.
1The words of Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa, which he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel, two years before the earthquake.
2And he said, The LORD will roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither.
3Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron:
4But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Benhadad.
5I will break also the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the plain of Aven, and him that holdeth the sceptre from the house of Eden: and the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir, saith the LORD.
6Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they carried away captive the whole captivity, to deliver them up to Edom:
7But I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the palaces thereof:
8And I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him that holdeth the sceptre from Ashkelon, and I will turn mine hand against Ekron: and the remnant of the Philistines shall perish, saith the Lord GOD.
9Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Tyrus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and remembered not the brotherly covenant:
10But I will send a fire on the wall of Tyrus, which shall devour the palaces thereof.
11Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because he did pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually, and he kept his wrath for ever:
12But I will send a fire upon Teman, which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah.
13Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of the children of Ammon, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have ripped up the women with child of Gilead, that they might enlarge their border:
14But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it shall devour the palaces thereof, with shouting in the day of battle, with a tempest in the day of the whirlwind:
15And their king shall go into captivity, he and his princes together, saith the LORD.