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Amos

About this book
Chapter 8

1 The Sovereign Lord showed me this: I saw a basket of summer fruit. 2 He said, “What do you see, Amos?” I replied, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then the Lord said to me, “The end has come for my people Israel! I will no longer overlook their sins.⁠ 3 The women singing in the temple will wail in that day.” The Sovereign Lord is speaking. “There will be many corpses littered everywhere! Be quiet!” 4 Listen to this, you who trample the needy and do away with the destitute in the land. 5 You say, “When will the new moon festival be over, so we can sell grain? When will the Sabbath end, so we can open up the grain bins?⁠ We’re eager to sell less for a higher price, and to cheat the buyer with rigged scales!⁠ 6 We’re eager to trade silver for the poor, a pair of sandals for the needy. We want to mix in some chaff with the grain!” 7 The Lord confirms this oath by the arrogance of Jacob: “I swear I will never forget all you have done! 8 Because of this the earth will quake, and all who live in it will mourn. The whole earth will rise like the Nile River; it will surge upward and then grow calm, like the Nile in Egypt. 9 In that day,” says the Sovereign Lord, “I will make the sun set at noon and make the earth dark in the middle of the day. 10 I will turn your festivals into funerals and all your songs into funeral dirges. I will make everyone wear funeral clothes and cause every head to be shaved bald. I will make you mourn as if you had lost your only son; when it ends it will indeed have been a bitter day. 11 Be certain of this, the time is coming,” says the Sovereign Lord, “when I will send a famine through the land—not a shortage of food or water but an end to divine revelation. 12 People will stagger from sea to sea, and from the north around to the east. They will wander about looking for a message from the Lord, but they will not find any.⁠ 13 In that day your beautiful young women and your young men will faint from thirst. 14 These are the ones who now take oaths in the name of the sinful idol goddess of Samaria. They vow, ‘As surely as your god lives, O Dan,’ or, ‘As surely as your beloved one lives, O Beer Sheba!’ But they will fall down and not get up again.”

Texts in conversation

Compare Deuteronomy 5:14 and Amos 8:5

Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Deuteronomy presents the Sabbath as a day of rest for all, based on Israel’s freedom from slavery. Amos later criticizes merchants eager for the Sabbath to end so they can trade again, showing how greed eroded Sabbath observance.

Passages

Deuteronomy 5:14

Hebrew Bible
12 “Be careful to observe the Sabbath day just as the Lord your God has commanded you. 13 You are to work and do all your tasks in six days, 14 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. On that day you must not do any work, you, your son, your daughter, your male slave, your female slave, your ox, your donkey, any other animal, or the resident foreigner who lives with you, so that your male and female slaves, like yourself, may have rest. 15 Recall that you were slaves in the land of Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there by strength and power. That is why the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day. 16 “Honor your father and your mother just as the Lord your God has commanded you to do, so that your days may be extended and that it may go well with you in the land that he is about to give you.
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Deuteronomy

Amos 8:5

Hebrew Bible
3 The women singing in the temple will wail in that day.” The Sovereign Lord is speaking. “There will be many corpses littered everywhere! Be quiet!” 4 Listen to this, you who trample the needy and do away with the destitute in the land. 5 You say, “When will the new moon festival be over, so we can sell grain? When will the Sabbath end, so we can open up the grain bins? We’re eager to sell less for a higher price, and to cheat the buyer with rigged scales! 6 We’re eager to trade silver for the poor, a pair of sandals for the needy. We want to mix in some chaff with the grain!” 7 The Lord confirms this oath by the arrogance of Jacob: “I swear I will never forget all you have done!
600–501 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Amos

References

"... Deuteronomy 5:12-15 and Jeremiah 17:21-24 ... One of the aspects of covenant concerns concerning the Sabbath was to make the Israelites adhere to their God as a sign of their fidelity. If the new Israelites were to disregard the Sabbath as their fathers disobeyed God, there would be further captivity. Similarly, Huey, Jr. says the people were warned to prepare well for the weekly worship. This law contains most elements of the other laws to enable them serve their God, including for instance, buying and selling on the Sabbath, which appear in the pre-exilic prophecy of Amos 8:5. It is against this background that Lundbom alleged this is among the easiest laws to keep, since it requires just observing the day’s celebration and resting. Here Jeremiah was only concerned with how they prioritise their daily business over God’s business. It looks as though the rich who want to do business did not like this idea as opposed to the poor, who like to rest from daily work. Moreover, Longman III affirms that God challenged his people through his prophet, pointing to them to remember how good and loving he has been. Their Kings, Priests, Levites, scribes and the rest of the people ought to be sure that everyone obey by keeping the Sabbath. The theme of the Sabbath appeared in almost every section of the Scripture, these are just few that were highlighted. There appears to be continuity from the oral texture used to teach younger people by recitation. This text is among the most recited in other part of the Old Testament, at some point it is re-contextualized in a new setting and at another place it is reconfigured to fit the context. Most of all, the narrative is amplified in some occasions concurrently with elaboration of themes. There are other themes in the Decalogue, which appear in the concluding section of the text. They are cultic and social responsibilities related to YHWH, Israel and their community (verses 16-21). These are criteria used in the society to correlate texts which raise social issues that relate to its ancient context ..."
Zachariah Bulus Takore, "Sin of the Fathers upon the Children to the Third and Fourth Generation": An Appraisal of Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9 in Relation to an African Theological Understanding of Original Sin (Stellenbosch University, 2017), 98–99.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Deuteronomy 5:14 and Amos 8:5

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