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Now the Lord has sworn this oath
    by his own name, the Pride of Israel[a]:
“I will never forget
    the wicked things you have done!
The earth will tremble for your deeds,
    and everyone will mourn.
The ground will rise like the Nile River at floodtime;
    it will heave up, then sink again.

“In that day,” says the Sovereign Lord,
“I will make the sun go down at noon
    and darken the earth while it is still day.
10 I will turn your celebrations into times of mourning
    and your singing into weeping.
You will wear funeral clothes
    and shave your heads to show your sorrow—
as if your only son had died.
    How very bitter that day will be!

11 “The time is surely coming,” says the Sovereign Lord,
    “when I will send a famine on the land—
not a famine of bread or water
    but of hearing the words of the Lord.
12 People will stagger from sea to sea
    and wander from border to border[b]
searching for the word of the Lord,
    but they will not find it.
13 Beautiful girls and strong young men
    will grow faint in that day,
    thirsting for the Lord’s word.
14 And those who swear by the shameful idols of Samaria—
    who take oaths in the name of the god of Dan
    and make vows in the name of the god of Beersheba[c]
they will all fall down,
    never to rise again.”

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Footnotes

  1. 8:7 Hebrew the pride of Jacob. See note on 3:13.
  2. 8:12 Hebrew from north to east.
  3. 8:14 Hebrew the way of Beersheba.

Yahweh has sworn by the pride of Jacob, “Surely I will never forget any of their deeds! On account of this, will not the land tremble and will not every living thing in it mourn? And all of it will rise like the Nile and it will be tossed about and subside like the Nile of Egypt. And then in that day,” declares[a] my Lord Yahweh, “I[b] will make the sun go down at noon and I will darken the land on a day of light. 10 And I will turn your feasts into mourning and all of your songs into lament, and I will put sackcloth on all loins and baldness on every head. And I will make it like the mourning for an only child, and its end like a bitter day. 11 Look, the days are coming,” declares[c] my Lord Yahweh, “when I will send a famine in the land, not a famine for bread and not a thirst for water, but of hearing[d] the words of Yahweh! 12 And they will wander from sea to sea and from the north and to the east. They will roam about to seek the word of Yahweh, but they will not find it! 13 In that day the beautiful young women and the young men will faint because of thirst. 14 These are those who swear by the guilt of Samaria and say, ‘By the life of your gods, O Dan,’ and ‘By the life of the way of Beersheba,’ they will fall and they will not rise again.”

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Footnotes

  1. Amos 8:9 Literally “a declaration of”
  2. Amos 8:9 Literally “and I”
  3. Amos 8:11 Literally “a declaration of”
  4. Amos 8:11 Literally “but if to hear”