From: Amos 8:4-7
Exploiters denounced
[4] Hear this, you who trample upon the needy,
and bring the poor of the land to an end,
[5] saying, “When will the new moon be over,
that we may sell grain?
And the Sabbath,
that we may offer wheat for sale,
that we may make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and deal deceitfully with false balances,
[6] that we may buy the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and sell the refuse of the wheat?”
[7] The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
“Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.
[8] Shall not the land tremble on this account,
and every one mourn who dwells in it,
and all of it rise like the Nile,
and be tossed about and sink again, like the Nile of Egypt?”
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Commentary:
8:1-14. The fourth vision, that of the ripe fruit (vv. 13), introduces a denunciation
of injustices (vv. 4-8 and a further description of the “day of the Lord” (vv 9-14).
The three things are interconnected. In the vision, the prophet plays with the
words (v. 2) “summer fruit”, qayits, and “end”, qets (see notes q and r). In this
way he is saying that Israel’s rottenness has run its course (vv. 4-8); nothing can
be done about it now – nothing but wait for the day of the Lord’s judgment (vv. 9-
14).
In his denunciation of injustices, Amos mentions, specifically, fraud (v. 5) and
exploitation of others when they are suffering need (v. 6). Church catechesis
uses this and other passages (cf. Deut 24:14-15; 25:13-16; Jas 5:4) to spell out
what the virtue of justice involves: “We should not dedicate our lives to the
accumulation of money and wealth when there are so many others who struggle
to survive in abject poverty; thus shall we heed the warning contained in the
words of the prophet Amos: Hear this, you who trample upon the needy, and
bring the poor of the land to an end, saying, ‘When will the new moon be over,
that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may offer wheat for sale’”
(St Gregory Nazianzen, De pauperum amore [Oratio, 14], 24).
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States