Amos 5:4-15

Modern English Version

Seek Me and live!
⁵     But do not seek Bethel,
and do not enter into Gilgal
    or cross over to Beersheba;
for Gilgal will surely go into captivity,
    and Bethel shall be no more.
⁶ Seek the Lord and live,
    or He will break out like fire in the house of Joseph,
and it will devour Bethel,
    with no one to quench it.

⁷ You who turn justice into bitterness
    and cast righteousness down to the ground!

⁸ The One who made the Pleiades and Orion,
    who turns the deep darkness into dawn
    and darkens the day into night,
who summons the waters of the sea
    and pours them out on the surface of the earth—
    the Lord is His name,
⁹ the One who flashes destruction against the strong,
    so that destruction comes against the fortress.

¹⁰ They hate the one who prosecutes at the gate,
    and abhor the one who speaks with integrity.

¹¹ Therefore, because you trample on the poor
    and take from him a levy of wheat,
though you have built houses of hewn stone,
    you will not dwell in them;
though you have planted pleasant vineyards,
    you will not drink their wine.
¹² For I know your transgressions are many
    and your sins are grievous,
you who oppress the just,
    who take a bribe and subvert the needy at the gate.
¹³ Therefore the prudent are silent at such a time,
    for it is an evil time.

¹⁴ Seek good and not evil,
    so that you may live;
then the Lord, the God of Hosts, will truly be with you,
    as you claim.
¹⁵ Hate evil and love good,
    and establish justice at the gate.
It may then be that the Lord God of Hosts will be gracious
    to the remnant of Joseph.