Amos 8
1 This is what the Lord God showed me. I saw a basket of fruit.
The Lord God showed me this: a basket of summer fruit.
2 He asked me, “What do you see, Amos?” I said, “A basket of fruit.” Then the Lord told me, “This is the end of my people Israel! I won't ignore their sins anymore.
‘What do you see, Amos?’ he asked. I replied, ‘A basket of ripe summer fruit.’ Then the Lord said to me: The time is ripe for my people Israel, I will no longer overlook their crimes.
3 On that day the Temple songs will become sorrowful wailing. There will be dead bodies scattered everywhere. Silence!” declares the Lord.
The singing women in the palace will howl on that day, says the Lord: Corpses everywhere, thrown out in silence.
4 Listen to this, you who trample down the needy, and wipe out the poor of the land.
Listen to this, you who trample on the needy, who oppress the poor of the earth,
5 You who ask, “When will the holy day be over so we can get back to selling grain? When will the Sabbath be over so we can open our storehouses, and cheat people with short measures and unfair scales?”
saying: When will the feast of the new moon be over so that we may sell grain? And the sabbath ended so that we may offer wheat for sale? Reducing the measure and increasing the price, cheating with false scales,
6 You buy the poor for silver, the needy for a pair of sandals, and you sell grain mixed with chaff.
mixing the sweepings in with the wheat. Then we can buy the poor for money, the needy for a pair of shoes.
7 The Lord God, of whom the descendants of Jacob are so proud, has sworn an oath: I will never forget the evil you have done.
Now the Lord has taken an oath by the Pride of Jacob: I will never forget all their deeds!
8 Shall not the land tremble because of this, and everyone who lives there mourn? The earth will rise up like the Nile river in flood, be tossed around, and then fall again.
Because of this won’t the land quake, and all its inhabitants mourn? Won’t the whole of it rise like the Nile, churn and subside like the Nile in Egypt?
9 On that day, declares the Lord God, I will make the sun go down at noon, and darken the land during the daytime.
On that day, says the Lord God, I will make the sun set at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight.
10 I will turn your festivals into times of mourning, your happy songs into laments. I will make you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make your mourning like that for an only son. At the end of it all it will be a bitter day.
I will turn your feasts into mourning, all your songs into dirges. I will cause you to dress in sackcloth, every head shaved. I will make you mourn like you have lost your only son, all that happens will end in bitterness.
11 The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will send a famine on the land—not a famine of bread, or a lack of water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.
The day is coming, says the Lord God, when I will send hunger in the land. Not a famine of bread or thirst for water, but for hearing the message of the Lord.
12 People will wander from sea to sea, from north to east, running to and fro searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.
Then they will wander from sea to sea, from the north to the east, to seek a message from the Lord, but they will not find it.
13 On that day, even the beautiful girls and healthy young men will collapse from thirst.
In that day beautiful girls and strong young men will faint from thirst.
14 Those who swear by the disgraceful idols of Samaria, who take oaths like, “By the life of your god, Dan,” or “A pilgrimage to the god of Beersheba”—they will fall, and never rise again.
Those who take oaths by the shameful idol of Samaria, who swear, “As surely as your God lives, O Dan!” and, “By the sacred way to Beer-sheba!” – they will fall and never rise again.
