Amos
Chapter 5
1 Listen to this message I speak against you, which is a sad song, O people of Israel.
2 The young woman of Israel has fallen; she will not get up again: she is left alone on her land; there is no one to help her up.
3 God says: The city that sends out a thousand will only have a hundred left, and the one that sends out a hundred will only have ten left for the people of Israel.
4 God says to the people of Israel, “Look for me, and you will live.”
5 Do not look for Bethel, do not go to Gilgal, and do not travel to Beersheba. Gilgal will be taken captive, and Bethel will be destroyed.
6 Look for God, and you will live; or he might burst out like fire in Joseph’s house, consume it, and no one in Bethel can put it out.
7 You who make fair decisions bitter, and abandon what is right in the world,
8 Look for the one who created the seven stars and Orion, who changes deep darkness into morning, and turns day into night: who commands the sea waters and pours them over the earth: God is his name.
9 God gives power to the weak to stand against the mighty, so the weak can attack the stronghold.
10 They dislike the person who corrects others publicly, and they detest the one who speaks honestly.
11 Since you step on the poor and take their wheat, you build stone houses but won’t live in them; you plant vineyards but won’t drink their wine.
12 I know your many wrongs and your big sins: they hurt good people, they accept bribes, and they push away the poor from getting their rights at the gate.
13 So the wise will stay quiet at that time, because it is a bad time.
14 Look for good, not bad, so you may live, and then God will be with you as you have said.
15 Dislike what’s bad, like what’s good, and set up fair decisions in your communities. Maybe then God will show kindness to the survivors of Joseph’s family.
16 So God, the Lord of all, says: There will be crying in all the streets and people will say in every road, “Oh no, oh no!” Farmers will be called to grieve, and those good at grieving to cry.
17 In all the grape gardens there will be crying, because I will come through you, says God.
18 You who wish for God’s day, why do you want it? That day is dark, not light.
19 It’s like a man running from a lion, only to meet a bear; or he goes into his house, rests his hand on the wall, and a snake bites him.
20 Won’t God’s day be full of darkness, without any light? Very dark, with no brightness at all?
21 I hate and reject your festivals, and I won’t enjoy your formal gatherings.
22 Even if you give me burnt sacrifices and food offerings, I will not accept them: I will not consider the peace sacrifices of your fat animals.
23 Stop singing your songs to me; I won’t listen to your music.
24 Let fair judgment flow like water, and let justice be strong like a flowing river.
25 Did you give me sacrifices and offerings in the desert for forty years, O people of Israel?
26 You have carried the tent of your god Moloch and the star of your god Chiun, which you made for yourselves.
27 So I will make you captive and send you away beyond Damascus, says God, who is called the God of armies.