Amos 5 OT Presentation

An Exegesis of Amos 5:18-27, 2012

2019

Amos was an angry prophet who condemned the people of Israel for their injustice and unorthodox worship practices.The book of Amos is the collection of what he saw concerning Israel. It is a book of woe and judgment. The book of Amos is renowned for its unparalleled social criticism: condemnation of practices most generally described as Oppression of the poor. The core of the book is dated by the scholarly consensus to the 8th century BCE. Amos is one of the most important books in the Old Testament.He has a rural background and comes from Judah (hence is viewed as an interloper by the priests of Bethel). He was not a member of the “Prophetic Guild” but was a prophet nevertheless.

Stone Campbell Journal Conference, 2022

The book of Amos has long been recognized as a prophetic text delivered by a non-prophetic Amos from the Judean village of Tekoa. Amos’s message is one of judgment to the northern kingdom of Israel—the first in the series of critical prophets of Israel and Judah. Yahweh is coming to judge unfaithful Israel, yet the way it is communicated is rhetorically rich and stylistically sophisticated. Scholars have long noted Amos’s masterful modus operandi and it has been extensively elucidated. However, several basic aspects of the prophet Amos and the message of the book still deserve investigation. In this paper, I will argue that Amos is in fact a prophet to the northern kingdom of Israel, but not as an outsider. Rather, Amos is a northerner possibly from a village of Tekoa identified in Galilee—not the Judean Tekoa. To do so, I review the standard account that connects the prophet Amos to southern Tekoa. Second, I analyze the relevant Tekoa passages in the Old Testament to show a northern Tekoa is possible and even likely for Amos and for two other citations of Tekoa. Third, I turn to two excellent philological elements within the text of Amos 7:10–12 which underwrite Amos’s northern provenance. Lastly, I trace the recent analysis by Gary A. Rendsburg of the Israelian Hebrew features of Amos 6 and then share some concluding thoughts and implications for Amos’s interpretation.

Scriptura, 2013

The prophetic book of Amos is widely studied yet one question remains unanswered: What happened to the prophet? This article attempts to answer this question. This article notes the brevity of the ministry of Amos as an indicator to a bad ending. By analyzing the narratives in 1 Kings 13 and 2 Kings 23, this article highlights similarities between Amos and the unnamed man of God such as place of origin, name of reigning king, centrality of Bethel and the lion. It is argued that on the balance of probabilities, Amos was a martyr. Through this analysis, this article argues that from Amos, Christians can learn from word and deed. Such an end is instructive for contemporary Christians faced with the options of being good neighbours or faithful believers. Overall, this article contends that while Christians must not actively seek persecution, they cannot compromise their faith to avoid persecution.

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