Amos 5:8

5:8 (But there is one who made the constellations Pleiades and Orion;

he can turn the darkness into morning

and daylight into night.

He summons the water of the seas

and pours it out on the earth’s surface.

The Lord is his name!

Amos 8:10

8:10 I will turn your festivals into funerals,

and all your songs into funeral dirges.

I will make everyone wear funeral clothes

and cause every head to be shaved bald.

I will make you mourn as if you had lost your only son;

when it ends it will indeed have been a bitter day.


tn Heb “darkens the day into night.”

tn Heb “mourning.”

tn Heb “I will place sackcloth on all waists.”

sn Mourners wore sackcloth (funeral clothes) as an outward expression of grief.

tn Heb “and make every head bald.” This could be understood in a variety of ways, while the ritual act of mourning typically involved shaving the head (although occasionally the hair could be torn out as a sign of mourning).

sn Shaving the head or tearing out one’s hair was a ritual act of mourning. See Lev 21:5; Deut 14:1; Isa 3:24; 15:2; Jer 47:5; 48:37; Ezek 7:18; 27:31; Mic 1:16.

tn Heb “I will make it like the mourning for an only son.”

tn Heb “and its end will be like a bitter day.” The Hebrew preposition כְּ (kaf) sometimes carries the force of “in every respect,” indicating identity rather than mere comparison.