8 The Lord God showed to me these things; and lo! an hook of apples. (The Lord God showed me these things; and lo! a basket of summer fruit.)
2 And the Lord said, What seest thou, Amos? And I said, An hook of apples. And the Lord said to me, The end is come on my people Israel; I shall no more put to, that I pass by him. (And the Lord said, What seest thou, Amos? And I said, A basket of summer fruit[a]. And the Lord said to me, The end is come for my people Israel; no more shall I pass them by.)
3 And the hinges, either twists, of the temple shall greatly sound in that day, saith the Lord God. Many men shall die, silence shall be cast forth in each place. (And on that day, wailings shall be heard in the palace, saith the Lord God. Many shall die everywhere; they shall be thrown out in silence./Many shall die; they shall be thrown out everywhere! Silence!)
4 Hear ye this thing, which all-break a poor man, and make needy men of the land for to fail; (Hear ye this, which shall altogether break the poor, and shall make the needy of the land to fail;)
5 and ye say, When shall harvest pass, and we shall sell merchandises? and the sabbath, and we shall open (our) wheat (again)? that we make less the measure, and increase the shekel, and that we set privily guileful balances; (and ye say, When shall the new moon pass, and then we can sell our corn again? and the sabbath end, and we can sell our wheat again? and we can make the measure less, and increase the shekel, and we can secretly, or privately, set deceptive balances, or scales, again;)
6 that we wield for silver needy men, and poor men for shoes, and we sell outcastings of wheat? (and we can buy the needy for some silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes, and we can sell the refuse of our wheat again?)
7 The Lord swore against the pride of Jacob, (yea,) I shall not forget till to the end all the works of them. (The Lord swore by the pride of Jacob, Yea, I shall never forget any of their works, or their deeds.)
8 Whether on this thing, the earth shall not be moved together, and each dweller thereof shall mourn? And it shall go up as all the flood, and shall be cast out, and shall float away, as the strand of Egypt. (For on this matter, shall not the earth be altogether moved, and each of its inhabitants shall mourn? It all shall go up like a river, and shall be thrown out, and shall flow away, like the River of Egypt, that is, the Nile.)
9 And it shall be, saith the Lord, in that day the sun shall go down in midday, and I shall make the earth to be dark in the day of light. (And it shall be, saith the Lord, on that day the sun shall go down at midday, and I shall make the earth to be dark in the light of day.)
10 And I shall convert your feast days into mourning, and all your songs into wailing; and I shall bring in on each back of you a sackcloth, and on each head of you baldness; and I shall put it as the mourning of [an] one begotten son, and the last things thereof as a bitter day. (And I shall turn your feast days into mourning, and all your songs into wailing; and I shall put a sackcloth on every back, and baldness on every head; and I shall make it like the mourning for an only son, and the last things, or the end, of it shall be like a bitter day.)
11 Lo! the days come, saith the Lord [God], and I shall send out hunger into (the) earth; not hunger of bread, neither thirst of water, but of hearing the word of God (Lo! the days shall come, saith the Lord God, and I shall send out hunger, or famine, into the earth; not a hunger for food, or a thirst for water, but a hunger for hearing the word of God.)
12 And they shall be moved (al)together from the sea till to the sea, and from the north till to the east they shall compass (about), seeking the word of the Lord, and they shall not find. (And they shall wander about from the Dead Sea unto the Mediterranean Sea, and they shall go all around, from the north unto the east, seeking the word of the Lord, but they shall not find it.)
13 In that day fair maidens shall fail, and young men in thirst, (On that day beautiful young women, and strong young men, shall fail for thirst,)
14 which swear in the trespass of Samaria, and say, Dan, thy god liveth, and the way of Beersheba liveth; and they shall fall, and they shall no more rise again. (yea, they who swear by the trespass of Samaria, and say, O Dan, as thy god liveth, or By the god of Dan, and By the sacred way of Beersheba; they all shall fall, and they shall never rise again.)
Footnotes
- Amos 8:2 A play on the Hebrew words for ‘summer (fruit)’ and ‘end’, which sound similar.