Amos the Prophet עמוס הנביא

The opening verse dates him more precisely than any other: the days of Uzziah king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Joash king of Israel, "two years before the earthquake." That earthquake was remembered so firmly that two and a half centuries later Zechariah still measures time by it.

Amos begins far away and very deliberately. Eight oracles in a row: Damascus, Gaza, Tyre, Edom, Ammon, Moab — to each, "for three transgressions and for four I will not revoke it." The listener at Bethel nods: quite right, serves the neighbours right. The seventh oracle is about Judah. The eighth is about Israel, and it is longer than all the rest together.

In it stands what the book was written for: "they sell the righteous for silver and the poor for a pair of sandals"; they lie on beds of ivory, eat lambs from the flock and calves from the stall, drink wine by the bowlful and "are not grieved at the ruin of Joseph"; and in the gate, where judgement is given, there is no truth. The demand is put in a single line still quoted today: "let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream."

Amaziah, priest of Bethel, denounced him to the king and told him to go and earn his bread in Judah. Amos's answer became his most famous words: I am no prophet by office and not from a prophet's house; I am a herdsman, and the LORD took me from the flock.