Amos 3:11 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Amos 3:11
Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled.
to say (used with great latitude) · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Lord
אֲדֹנָ֣י'a.do.Nai
H136
the Lord (used as a proper name of God only) · proper noun, a title
GOD
יְהוִ֔הYah.weh
H3069
YHWH · proper noun, a title
adversary
צַ֖רtzar
H6862
narrow · noun, common masculine singular absolute
about
וּסְבִ֣יבu.se.Viv
H5439
(as noun) a circle · conjunction + noun, common both genders singular construct
land
הָאָ֑רֶץha.'A.retz
H776
the earth (at large · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
down
וְהוֹרִ֤דve.ho.Rid
H3381
to descend (literally · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
strength
עֻזֵּ֔ךְ'u.Zekh
H5797
strength in various applications (force · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
palaces
אַרְמְנוֹתָֽיִךְ'ar.me.no.Ta.yikh
H759
a citadel (from its height) · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
spoiled
וְנָבֹ֖זּוּve.na.Vo.zu
H962
to plunder · conjunction + verb, niphal sequential perfect, 3rd person common plural
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
2 Kings 18:9-11 And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, that Shalmaneser k…
2 Kings 15:19 And Pul the king of Assyria came against the land: and Menahem gave Pul a thousand talents of silver, that his hand might be with him to con…
2 Kings 17:3-6 Against him came up Shalmaneser king of Assyria; and Hoshea became his servant, and gave him presents.
Amos 2:5 But I will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem.
Amos 6:14 But, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, saith the LORD the God of hosts; and they shall afflict you from the e…
2 Kings 15:29 In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abel-beth-maachah, and Janoah, and Kedesh, and…
2 Chronicles 36:19 And they burnt the house of God, and brake down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all the go…
Isaiah 7:17-25 The LORD shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, and upon thy father’s house, days that have not come, from the day that Ephraim departe…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Amos 3:9–end
The Israelites are here again convicted and condemned, and particular notice given of the crimes they are convicted of and the punishment they are condemned to.
1. Notice is given of it to their neighbours. The prophet is ordered to publish it in the palaces of Ashdod, one of the chief cities of the Philistines; nay, the summons must go further, even to the palaces in the land of Egypt. "The great men of both those nations, that dwell in the palaces, that are inquisitive concerning the affairs of the neighboring nations, and are conversant with the public intelligence, let them assemble themselves upon the mountains of Samaria," Amo 3:9. There, upon a throne high and lifted up, the judgment…
Translate, "An adversary (the abruptness produces a startling effect)! and that too, from every side of the land." So in the fulfilment, Kg2 17:5 : "The king of Assyria (Shalmaneser) came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years."
bring down thy strength from thee--that is, bring thee down from thy strength (the strength on which thou didst boast thyself): all thy resources (Pro 10:15).
palaces shall be spoiled--a just retribution in kind (Amo 3:10). The palaces in which spoils of robbery were stored up, "shall be spoiled."
Adam Clarke on Amos 3:11
An adversary, round about the land - Ye shall not be able to escape, wherever ye turn, ye shall meet a foe.
John Gill on Amos 3:11
Therefore thus saith the Lord God,.... Because of these tumults and riots, oppression and injustice, violence and robbery:
an adversary there shall be even round about the land: not Tyre, as Theodoret renders the word; but the king of Assyria, who invaded the land of Israel in the days of Hoshea, took Samaria, and carried Israel captive, and placed them in foreign countries, 2 Kings 17:6;
and he shall bring down thy strength from thee; take away their riches, demolish their fortresses, and strip them of everything in which they put their confidence:
and thy palaces shall be spoiled; plundered of the treasures laid up in them, and pulled down to the ground; and a just retaliation this for…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 11) Therefore thus says the Lord God: The land shall be troubled and surrounded, and your strength shall be taken away from you, and your houses shall be plundered. LXX: Therefore thus says the Lord God: Tyre and the surrounding land will be deserted by your strength, and your regions will be plundered. Regarding Tyre, which is written in Hebrew with two letters, Sade () and Res (); and it is called Sor (): which both Aquila and the Seventy translated similarly: a Hebrew who instructed me in the Holy Scriptures interpreted it as tribulation, and we did not reject his opinion: for Symmachus, who is accustomed to follow not the wordplay, but the order of meaning, says, siege and encirclement of the land. For the siege, which is called πολιορκία by him, was placed by Theodotion who thought not Sar and Sor (which is called tribulation, or Tyre, but Sur should be read: which properly refers to a very hard rock, which is called ἀκρότομος in Greek, and which we can call flint in Latin. Let us therefore speak about each one. The LXX said: Tyre and the land surrounding it. And the sentence seemed to hang: they added therefore of their own, it will be deserted: nor is it an error of the interpreters, where because of the ambiguity of the word, both tribulation and Tyre can be said. And the meaning is: Over the mountains of Samaria my people have done many insanities: slandering and completely ignoring what is right, and hoarding for themselves injustice and plunder: therefore they will be afflicted, or crushed, and surrounded by the Assyrian army, and, she says, strength will be taken away from you, o Samaria, o ten tribes, o once my people: and they will be plundered in your houses, which you have gathered through the tears of the wretched by means of slander. The heretics also will be afflicted on the day of judgment, and all their strength will be weakened, and what they had gained through plunder will be taken away, so that the people whom they had deceived may be freed: or certainly they will be afflicted every day by ecclesiastical men, and they will be surrounded by testimonies of the Scriptures, and strength of syllogisms, and clever words by which they had confirmed their own doctrine will be taken away from them. And their houses will be plundered: so that those who were taken from the Church may return to the Church.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Palaces · Often as punishment: Spoiled — Often as punishment: Spoiled
Samaria, Ancient · Predictions respecting its destruction — Predictions respecting its destruction
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Amos 3:11-12
11. Therefore thus saith the Lord God; An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled.
11. Propterea sic dicit Dominus Jehova, Adversarius et quidem in circuitu terrae, et tollet abs te robur tuum et diripientur palatia tua.
12. Thus saith the Lord; As the shepherd taketh out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear; so shall the children of Israel be taken out that dwell in Samaria in the corner of a bed, and in Damascus in a couch.
12. Sic dicit Jehova, Quemadmodum eripit pastor ex ore leonis duo crura vel externam partem auris, sic eripientur filii Israel qui habitant i…
Thus do they bring about the ruin of the kingdom. Amo 3:11. "Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, An enemy, and that round about the land; and he will hurl down thy glory from thee, and thy palaces are plundered. Amo 3:12. Thus saith Jehovah, As the shepherd delivers out of the mouth of the lion two shin-bones or an ear-lappet, so will the sons of Israel deliver themselves; they who sit on the corner of the couch and on the damask of the bed." The threat is introduced in the form of an aposiopesis. צר, enemy, וּסביב הארץ, and indeed round about the land ( ו explic. as in Amo 4:10, etc.; and סביב in the construct state construed as a preposition), i.e., will come, attack the land on all sid…