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LXX Amos

Septuagint

About this book
Chapter 9

1 I saw the Lord standing on the altar: and he said, Strike the mercy-seat, and the porch shall be shaken: and cut through into the heads of all; and I will kill the remnant of them with the sword: no one of them fleeing shall escape, and no one of them, striving to save himself shall be delivered. 2 Though they hid themselves in hell, from there shall my hand drag them forth; and though they go up to heaven, from there I will bring them down. 3 If they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, from there I will search them out and take them; and if they should go down from my presence into the depths of the sea, there I will command the serpent, and he shall bite them. 4 And if they should go into captivity before the face of their enemies, there I will command the sword, and it shall kill them: and I will set my eyes against them for evil, and not for good. 5 And the Lord, the Lord God Almighty, is he that takes hold of the land, and causes it to shake, and all that inhabit it shall mourn; and its destruction shall go up as a river, and shall descend as the river of Egypt. 6 It is he that builds his ascent up to the sky, and establishes his promise on the earth; who calls the water of the sea, and pours it out on the face of the earth; the Lord God Almighty is his name. 7 Are you not to me as the sons of the Ethiopians, children of Israel? says the Lord. Did I not bring Israel up out of the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Cappadocia, and the Syrians out of the deep? 8 Look, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the kingdom of sinners, and I will cut it off from the face of the earth; only I will not utterly cut off the house of Jacob, says the Lord. 9 For look, I will give commandment, and sift the house of Israel among all the Gentiles, as grain is sifted in a sieve, and yet a fragment shall not in any way fall upon the earth. 10 All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, who say, Calamities shall certainly not draw near, nor come upon us. 11 In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and will rebuild the ruins of it, and will set up the parts of it that have been broken down, and will build it up as in the ancient days: 12 that the remnant of men, and all the Gentiles upon whom my name is called, may earnestly seek me, says the Lord God who does these things.⁠ 13 Look, the days come, says the Lord, when the harvest shall overtake the vintage, and the grapes shall ripen at seed time; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall be planted. 14 And I will turn the captivity of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities, and shall inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and shall drink the wine from them; and they shall form gardens, and eat the fruit of them. 15 And I will plant them on their land, and they shall no more be plucked up from the land which I have given them, says the Lord God Almighty.

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Compare Amos 9:12 and LXX Amos 9:12

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint

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Summary

Amos 9 describes the restored Davidic rule expanding to conquer Edom and other nations. The Greek Septuagint translation changes “Edom” to “humanity” and “possess” to “search,” shifting the emphasis from conquest to universal inclusion.

Passages

Amos 9:12

Hebrew Bible
10 All the sinners among my people will die by the sword—the ones who say, ‘Disaster will not come near, it will not confront us.’ 11 “In that day I will rebuild the collapsing hut of David. I will seal its gaps, repair its ruins, and restore it to what it was like in days gone by. 12 As a result they will conquer those left in Edom and all the nations subject to my rule.” The Lord, who is about to do this, is speaking. 13 “Be sure of this, the time is coming,” says the Lord, “when the plowman will catch up to the reaper, and the one who stomps the grapes will overtake the planter. Juice will run down the slopes; it will flow down all the hillsides.
600–501 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Amos

LXX Amos 9:12

Septuagint
11 In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and will rebuild the ruins of it, and will set up the parts of it that have been broken down, and will build it up as in the ancient days: 12 that the remnant of men, and all the Gentiles upon whom my name is called, may earnestly seek me, says the Lord God who does these things. 13 Look, the days come, says the Lord, when the harvest shall overtake the vintage, and the grapes shall ripen at seed time; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall be planted.
100–1 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Amos

References

"... but Luke’s citation from Amos continues, “so that the rest of humanity might seek the Lord, and all the nations on whom my name has been invoked, says the Lord who is doing these things.” When we consult the LXX, we discover the words “the Lord” are absent. The LXX has simply, “the rest of humanity might seek.” Luke apparently has supplied the proper object of the seeking. What is even more striking, however, is the LXX’s having “that they might seek” at all. In the Masoretic text of Amos 9:12, there is instead this: “that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations who are called by my name, says the Lord who does this” ... It appears that the LXX translators read the Hebrew [of Amos 9:12] before them as yîrsu (from yaras´, “possess”) as yidre˘rshû (from daras, “seek”), and they read ’edom (Edom) as ’adam (humanity). The Masoretic text of Amos envisaged a restored Davidic dynasty in an expansionist mode. The LXX changed it to a restored people that attracts humanity to itself. It is this sense, rooted entirely in the LXX but impossible in the Hebrew, that Luke has James exploit as a text that prefigures the attraction of the Gentiles into the “restored people of God” that is the Christian movement ..."
Luke Timothy Johnson, Septuagintal Midrash in the Speeches of Acts, The Père Marquette Lecture in Theology 2002 (Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press, 2002), 17–18.

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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Comments

  • Key Hebrew words in the underlying text used by the translators of the Septuagint unlock this mystery. Yarash/Darash, EdomAdam. Inherit/Seek, Adam=humankind/Edom. The MT (received Hebrew text): Will [Israel] “inherit Edom” (and circumcise Edomites, cf. King Herod, the Edomite/Idumean), or LXX [proto ...

    Jeffrey Feinberg, February 7, 2026

Amos 9:12 and LXX Amos 9:12

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