< Amos 3 >
1 Hear you this word, O house of Israel, which the Lord has spoken concerning you, and against the whole family whom I brought up out of the land of Egypt, saying,
2 You especially have I known out of all the families of the earth: therefore will I take vengeance upon you for all your sins.
3 Shall two walk together at all, if they do not know one another?
4 Will a lion roar out of his thicket if he has no prey? will a [lion's] whelp utter his voice at all out of his lair, if he have taken nothing?
5 Will a bird fall on the earth without a fowler? will a snare be taken up from the earth without having taken anything?
6 Shall the trumpet sound in the city, and the people not be alarmed? shall there be evil in a city which the Lord has not wrought?
7 For the Lord God will do nothing, without revealing instruction to his servants the prophets.
8 A lion shall roar, and who will not be alarmed? the Lord God has spoken, and who will not prophesy?
9 Proclaim it to the regions amongst the Assyrians, and to the regions of Egypt, and say, Gather yourselves to the mountain of Samaria, and behold many wonderful things in the midst of it, and the oppression that is in it.
10 And she knew not what things would come against her, says the Lord, [even] those that store up wrong and misery in their countries.
11 Therefore thus says the Lord God; O Tyre, your land shall be made desolate round about [you]; and he shall bring down your strength out of you, and your countries shall be spoiled.
12 Thus says the Lord; As when a shepherd rescues from the mouth of a lion two legs or a piece of an ear, so shall be drawn forth the children of Israel who dwell in Samaria in the presence of [a foreign] tribe, and in Damascus.
13 Hear, O you priests, and testify to the house of Jacob, says the Lord God Almighty.
14 For in the day wherein I shall take vengeance of the sins of Israel upon him, I will also take vengeance on the altars of Bethel: and the horns of the altar shall be broken down, and they shall fall upon the ground.
15 I will crush and strike the turreted-house upon the summer-house; and the ivory-houses shall be destroyed, and many other houses also, says the Lord.