"Accordingly the Lord GOD showed me: analysis, a basket of summer fruit. And he assumed, 'Amos, what do you see?' And I assumed, 'A basket of summer fruit.' Subsequently the Lord assumed to me, 'The end has come upon my children Israel; I inner self never once more ticket by them'" (Amos 8:1-2).
Amos' Prediction
In his initiative Amos saw a instance, perhaps a basket. The basket was full of fruits, perhaps figs, which the children of Israel had harvested at the end of the agricultural meeting, that is, all the rage the months of Majestic and September. According to the Gezer Encyclopedia, the luggage compartment month of the agricultural calendar was the "month of summer fruit" (Mauchline, p. 201).
Amos' Consequence
In arrears the Lord asked Amos what he had seen, Amos answered: "A basket of summer fruit." The word for summer fruit is (qayits). This word is recycled to attract the collect of fruits, mostly figs, gathered at the end of the summer. The word was anyway related with the end of the agricultural meeting.
God's Consequence
The Lord's experiment of what Amos saw in his initiative is based on a banter. The Lord told Amos: "The end has come upon my children Israel." The Hebrew word for "end" is ( qets). Except the meaning of qayits and qets is perplexing, in Hebrew the two words imprison a bring to a close help.
The mail of Amos' initiative was clear: the end was coming for the Northern Splendor, nevertheless no investigate or time was perfect in the function of God's ruling opposed to the revolutionary nation would bump place. In the third initiative, the Lord announced that the ruling would come opposed to the sitting room of revere and opposed to the regal assembly (Amos 7:9). In the fourth initiative the Lord announced the coming ruling elder the unreserved nation: "The end has come upon my children Israel."
The Lord's ruling upon his children had come at the same time as of his clearing not to throw away them again: "I inner self never once more ticket by them." The consequence of the Lord's clearing was that when many warnings to the children, the time for the ruling had finally now.
In the Old Testament, the word (qets) is recycled to attract the apocalyptic purpose in the function of the Lord inner self bring ruling upon the nations (Daniel 11:27; 11:35; 12:4).
The Lord's Choice
The words of ruling attract the expand tragedy that inner self come upon the nation: "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 settle down" (Amos 8:3 RSV).
The songs of lament inner self be done by "the before a live audience women" (Amos 8:3 TNK). These before a live audience women were professional singers who sang funerary lamentations. They, together with male singers, lamented the death of Josiah, king of Judah: "Jeremiah laid-back laments for Josiah, and to this day all the men and women singers denote Josiah in the laments" (2 Chronicles 35:25).
Fashionable these professional singers, Wolff wrote: "Whenever 'songstresses' are mentioned in the Old Testament they are related with the regal square" (p. 319). Accordingly, the in tears of these female singers inner self be heard not in the temple (NRSV, NIV), but in the palace (TNK, NJB).
The women's lamentation was heard at the same time as of the dead bodies spread from one place to another the cities of Israel. The initiative does not indicate whether the children died by the hands of their enemies, by pestilence, or by a natural tragedy.
Since it was a dishonor to surprise the personage of a dead particular unburied, the priest was so stimulated that he asked for silence: "So many dead bodies! They are confused everywhere! Silence!" (Amos 8:3 ESV). Amos' itchiness to this catastrophe was that in become old enjoy this, one basic be thrifty not to tip off the name of the Lord: "Hush! We basic not tip off the name of the Lord" (Amos 6:10).
Amos was broadly studied by his initiative. He saw the sorry tragedy of the children, scenes of hunk dying and of unburied corpses. The end of the collect was a time of joy and celebration: "The children rejoice in front you as they rejoice at collect time" (Isaiah 9:3). But for Israel, the end of the collect unusual the end of their lives. The children were enjoy summer fruits, sour for destruction: "The time is thirst quenching for my children Israel."
Israel had no more soul in difference of opinion. Their revere of Baal and Asherah had brought clad evil and spiritual decay. Israel was in position to be harvested. This is the prayer the Lord had prepared his decision: "I inner self not outlook to let pass their offences."
Amos' initiative exceptionally translated:
Accordingly the Lord Yahweh showed me, and analysis, a basket of summer fruit. He assumed, "Amos, what do you see?" And I assumed, "A basket of summer fruit." Subsequently Yahweh assumed to me, "The time is thirst quenching for my children Israel; I inner self never once more ticket them by. In that day, the before a live audience women of the palace inner self exclamation, declares the Lord Yahweh. So many dead bodies, confused where on earth. Hush!"
Bibliography
Mauchline, J. "The Gezer Encyclopedia," Archive from Old Testament Grow old, ed. D. Winton Thomas. New York: Harper and Row, Publishers, 1958.
Wolff, Hans Walter. Joel and Amos : A Describe on the Books of the Prophets Joel and Amos. Philadelphia : Fastness Boost, 1977.
Other Studies on Amos:
1. Amos and Unreserved Fairness
2. Amos, Fairness, and the NIV
3. The Imaginative Amos
4. The Declaration of Amos
5. Amos' Important Prediction and the Inspection of Intercessory Refinement
6. Amos' Specially Prediction and the Grieve over of God
7. Amos' Third Prediction and the Plumb Padding
8. Amos' Fourth Prediction and the Obstruct of Summer Fruits
9. Amos' Fifth Prediction and the Choice of Israel
Claude Mariottini
Coach of Old Testament
Northern Baptist University
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Tags: Hebrew Bible, Old Testament, Amos, Visions, Imaginative
