Amos 8
Good News Translation
A Vision of a Basket of Fruit
8 I had another vision from the Sovereign Lord. In it I saw a basket of fruit. 2 The Lord asked, “Amos, what do you see?”
“A basket of fruit,” I answered.
The Lord said to me, “The end[a] has come for my people Israel. I will not change my mind again about punishing them. 3 On that day the songs in the palace will become cries of mourning. There will be dead bodies everywhere. They will be cast out in silence.”[b]
Israel's Doom
4 Listen to this, you that trample on the needy and try to destroy the poor of the country. 5 You say to yourselves, “We can hardly wait for the holy days to be over so that we can sell our grain. When will the Sabbath end, so that we can start selling again? Then we can overcharge, use false measures, and fix the scales to cheat our customers. 6 We can sell worthless wheat at a high price. We'll find someone poor who can't pay his debts, not even the price of a pair of sandals, and we'll buy him as a slave.”
7 The Lord, the God of Israel, has sworn, “I will never forget their evil deeds. 8 And so the earth will quake, and everyone in the land will be in distress. The whole country will be shaken; it will rise and fall like the Nile River. 9 The time is coming when I will make the sun go down at noon and the earth grow dark in daytime. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken. 10 I will turn your festivals into funerals and change your glad songs into cries of grief. I will make you shave your heads and wear sackcloth, and you will be like parents mourning for their only child. That day will be bitter to the end.
11 “The time is coming when I will send famine on the land. People will be hungry, but not for bread; they will be thirsty, but not for water. They will hunger and thirst for a message from the Lord. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken. 12 People will wander from the Dead Sea to the Mediterranean and then on around from the north to the east. They will look everywhere for a message from the Lord, but they will not find it. 13 On that day even healthy young men and women will collapse from thirst. 14 Those who swear by the idols of Samaria, who say, ‘By the god of Dan’ or ‘By the god of Beersheba’—those people will fall and not rise again.”
Amos 8
English Standard Version
The Coming Day of Bitter Mourning
8 (A)This is what the Lord God showed me: behold, a basket of summer fruit. 2 And he said, (B)“Amos, what do you see?” And I said, (C)“A basket of summer fruit.” Then the Lord said to me,
(D)“The end[a] has come upon my people Israel;
I will never again pass by them.
3 (E)The songs of the temple[b] (F)shall become wailings[c] in that day,”
declares the Lord God.
(G)“So many dead bodies!”
“They are thrown everywhere!”
(H)“Silence!”
4 Hear this, (I)you who trample on the needy
and bring the poor of the land to an end,
5 saying, “When will (J)the new moon be over,
that we may sell grain?
And (K)the Sabbath,
that we may offer wheat for sale,
that we may make (L)the ephah small and the shekel[d] great
and deal deceitfully with false balances,
6 that we may buy the poor for (M)silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals
and sell the chaff of the wheat?”
7 The Lord has sworn by (N)the pride of Jacob:
“Surely (O)I will never forget any of their deeds.
8 (P)Shall not the land tremble on this account,
and everyone mourn who dwells in it,
(Q)and all of it rise like the Nile,
and be tossed about (R)and sink again, like the Nile of Egypt?”
9 “And on that day,” declares the Lord God,
(S)“I will make the sun go down at noon
and darken the earth in broad daylight.
10 (T)I will turn your feasts into mourning
and all your songs into lamentation;
(U)I will bring sackcloth on every waist
(V)and baldness on every head;
(W)I will make it like the mourning for an only son
and the end of it like a bitter day.
11 “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God,
“when (X)I will send a famine on the land—
not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,
(Y)but of hearing the words of the Lord.
12 (Z)They shall wander from sea to sea,
and from north to east;
they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the Lord,
(AA)but they shall not find it.
Amos 8
New International Reader's Version
Amos Has a Vision of a Basket of Ripe Fruit
8 The Lord and King gave me a vision. He showed me a basket of ripe fruit. 2 “What do you see, Amos?” he asked.
“A basket of ripe fruit,” I replied.
Then the Lord said to me, “The time is ripe for my people Israel. I will no longer spare them.
3 “The time is coming when the songs in the temple will turn to weeping,” announces the Lord and King. “Many, many bodies will be thrown everywhere! So be quiet!”
4 Listen to me, you who walk all over needy people.
You crush those who are poor in the land.
5 You say,
“When will the New Moon feast be over?
Then we can sell our grain.
When will the Sabbath day come to an end?
Then people can buy our wheat.”
But you measure out less than the right amount.
You raise your prices.
You cheat others by using dishonest scales.
6 You buy poor people to make slaves out of them.
You buy those who are in need for a mere pair of sandals.
You even sell the worthless parts of your wheat.
7 People of Jacob, you are proud that the Lord is your God. But he has made a promise in his own name. He says, “I will never forget anything Israel has done.
8 “The land will tremble because of what will happen.
Everyone who lives in it will mourn.
So the whole land will rise like the Nile River.
It will be stirred up.
Then it will settle back down again
like that river in Egypt.”
9 The Lord and King announces,
“At that time I will make the sun go down at noon.
The earth will become dark in the middle of the day.
10 I will turn your holy feasts into times for mourning.
I will turn all your songs into weeping.
You will have to wear the clothing of sadness.
You will shave your heads.
I will make you mourn as if your only son had died.
The end of that time will be like a bitter day.”
11 The Lord and King announces,
“The days are coming
when I will send hunger through the land.
But people will not be hungry for food.
They will not be thirsty for water.
Instead, they will be hungry
to hear a message from me.
12 People will wander from the Dead Sea to the Mediterranean.
They will travel from north to east.
They will look for a message from me.
But they will not find it.
13 “At that time
“the lovely young women and strong young men
will faint because they are so thirsty.
14 Some people make promises in the name of Samaria’s god.
That god has led them astray.
Others say, ‘People of Dan, you can be sure
that your god is alive.’
Still others say, ‘You can be sure
that Beersheba’s god is alive.’
But all these people will fall dead.
They will never get up again.”
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.
The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. ESV Text Edition: 2025.
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