3:15 I will destroy both the winter and summer houses. 1
The houses filled with ivory 2 will be ruined,
the great 3 houses will be swept away.” 4
The Lord is speaking!
7:4 The sovereign Lord showed me this: I saw 5 the sovereign Lord summoning a shower of fire. 6 It consumed the great deep and devoured the fields.
1 tn Heb “the winter house along with the summer house.”
sn Like kings, many in Israel’s wealthy class owned both winter and summer houses (cf. 1 Kgs 21:1,18; Jer 36:22). For a discussion of archaeological evidence relating to these structures, see P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 64-65.
2 tn Heb “houses of ivory.” These houses were not made of ivory, but they had ivory panels and furniture decorated with ivory inlays. See P. King, Amos, Hosea, Micah, 139-48.
3 tn Or “many,” cf. NAB “their many rooms.”
4 tn The translation assumes the form is from the Hebrew verb סָפָה (safah, “to sweep away”) rather than סוּף (suf, “to come to an end”), which is the choice of most versions. Either option effectively communicates the destruction of the structures.
5 tn Heb “behold” or “look.”
6 tc The Hebrew appears to read, “summoning to contend with fire,” or “summoning fire to contend,” but both are problematic syntactically (H. W. Wolff, Joel and Amos [Hermeneia], 292; S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 230-31). Many emend the text to לרבב אשׁ, “(calling) for a shower of fire,” though this interpretation is also problematic (see F. I. Andersen and D. N. Freedman, Amos [AB], 746-47).