Thus the Lord God showed me: Behold, a basket of summer fruit.
And He said, "Amos, what do you see?"
And I said, "A basket of summer fruit."
Then the Lord said to me:
The end has come upon my people Israel;
I shall never again pass by them.
The songs of the Temple shall become wailings
in that day, says the Lord God.
The dead bodies shall be many;
in every place they shall be
cast out in silence.
Hear this, you who trample upon the needy
and bring the poor of the land to an end--
saying "When will the new moon be over
that we may sell grain;
and the Sabbath,
that we may offer wheat for sale?
"That we may make the ephah small
and the shekel great
and deal deceitfully with false balances?
"That we may buy the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and sell the refuse of the wheat?"
The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
"Surely I will never forget any of their deeds!"
Shall not the land tremble on that account,
and everyone mourn who dwells in it,
and all of it rise like the Nile,
and be tossed about, and sink again
like the Nile of Egypt?
1 comment:
"The end has com upon my people Israel; I shall never again pass by them."
Okay, the Kingdom of Israel is over-run by the Assyrians some time after this, many of its people removed to distant parts of the Assyrian Empire... and roughly 100 years after that, so is the Kingdom of Judah largely displaced by the Babylonians
But that long "Why me!?" interaction between Israel & her God is only beginning! So, maybe this amounts to saying, "This is the end of the Kingdom of Israel & its use of Me for its state religion?" Plus some very unpleasant consequences.
We've read a lot of prophesying against specific kings & their families, so far. This is the first 'book' that I know of where a prophet is speaking of the fall of the whole kingdom.
And it's happening right at what's said to be their most properous peak. Why is that, precisely, when God gives up on the institutional arrangements they've been long accustomed to?
Post a Comment