Amos 5:1-12 ▼

1 Hear this word, O house of Israel (he wrestles with God), this lamentation I take up against you⁺:

2 “Fallen is Virgin Israel (he wrestles with God), never to rise again. She lies abandoned on her land, with no one to raise her up.”

3 This is what the Lord GOD {Adonai YHWH} says: “The city that marches out a thousand strong will have but a hundred left, and the one that marches out a hundred strong will have but ten left in the house of Israel (he wrestles with God).”

4 For this is what the LORD {YHWH} says to the house of Israel (he wrestles with God): “Seek Me and live!

5 Do not seek Bethel (house of God) or go to Gilgal (a wheel); do not journey to Beersheba (well of seven), for Gilgal will surely go into exile, and Bethel will come to nothing \to Aven/.

6 Seek the LORD {YHWH} and live, or He will sweep like fire through the house of Joseph (YHWH has added); it will devour everything, with no one at Bethel (house of God) to extinguish it.

7 There are those who turn justice into wormwood and cast righteousness to the ground.

8 He who made the Pleiades and Orion, who turns darkness into dawn and darkens day into night, who summons the waters of the sea and pours them over the face of the earth—the LORD {YHWH} is His name—

9 He flashes destruction on the strong, so that fury comes upon the stronghold.

10 There are those who hate the one who reproves in the gate and despise him who speaks with integrity.

11 Therefore, because you⁺ trample on the poor and exact from him a tax of grain, you⁺ will never live in the stone houses you⁺ have built; you⁺ will never drink the wine from the lush vineyards you⁺ have planted.

12 For I know that your⁺ transgressions are many and your⁺ sins are numerous. You oppress the righteous by taking bribes; you deprive the poor of justice in the gate.