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Commentary Critical and Explanatory

Amos 3:6

Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it? Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? When the sound of alarm is trumpeted by the watchman in the city, the people are sure to run to and fro in alarm, (Hebrew, literally.) Yet Israel is not alarmed though God threatens judgments.

Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it? This is the explanation of the preceding similes: God is the Author of all the calamities which are about to happen you, and which are foretold by His prophets. The evil of sin is from ourselves; the evil of trouble is from God, whoever be the instruments.

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See also Amos 3:6 in other biblical comments:

  • Adam Clarke Bible Commentary

    Verse Amos 3:6. _SHALL A TRUMPET BE BLOWN_] The sign of alarm and invasion. _AND THE PEOPLE NOT BE AFRAID?_] Not take the alarm, and provide for their defence and safety? _SHALL THERE BE EVIL IN A...

  • Albert Barnes' Bible Commentary

    IS THERE EVIL IN THE CITY AND THE LORD HATH NOT DONE IT? - Evil is of two sorts, evil of sin, and evil of punishment. There is no other; for evil of nature, or evil of fortune, are evils, by God’s Pro...

  • Annotated Bible by A.C. Gaebelein

    II. THE PROPHETIC MESSAGES UNCOVERING THE CONDITION OF THE PEOPLE CHAPTER 3 The First Discourse _ 1. There is cause for judgment (Amos 3:1) _ 2. The coming judgment visitation (Amos 3:9) Amos 3:1...

  • Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible

    ISRAEL'S RESPONSIBILITY AND THE PROPHET'S OBLIGATION. Amos, after addressing the children of Israel, includes Judah by adding the whole family, unless this is a gloss, as it may be, since the inclusio...

  • Bullinger's Companion Bible Notes

    SHALL... ? Figure of speech _Erotesis._ App-6. trumpet. Hebrew. _shophar._ NOT BE AFRAID. not run together. EVIL. calamity; as in Amos 5:13.Psalms 141:5. Feb. _ra'a'._ App-44. = evil: not moral evil,...

  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

    Such a severe rebuke might provoke contradiction among the prophet's hearers: he therefore proceeds to indicate the authority upon which it rests, arguing by means of a series of illustrations drawn f...

  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

    IS _A_ HORN (Amos 2:2) _blown in_ A _city, and_ ARE _the people not_ IN ALARM?] Of course they are: for they know it to be the signal of approaching danger. The horn was blown as a summons to repel a...

  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

    Similarly the horn is a signal of danger; calamity is a sign that Jehovah has willed it; and the appearance of a prophet is an indication that Jehovah has sent him....

  • Charles Box Commentaries

    _THE LORD WILL PUNISH EVIL -- AMOS 3:4-6_ God wanted it understood that there was a cause for the punishment that He would bring upon Israel. The Lord would do this to Israel because of her transgress...

  • Charles Simeon's Horae Homileticae

    DISCOURSE: 1187 GOD THE SOURCE AND CAUSE OF ALL THINGS Amos 3:6. _Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?_ IT is a generally acknowledged truth, that every thing proceeds from G...

  • Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

    CAN TWO WALK, &C.— The similies in these verses have the same meaning, and they all tend to shew that calamities happen according to the appointing, permissive, or suffering will of God; and that prop...

  • College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

    PENITENCE PROMOTEDREASON CALLS FOR REPENTANCE THE LORD DOES NOT ROAR WITHOUT CAUSE TEXT: Amos 3:1-8 1 Hear this word that Jehovah hath spoken against you, O children of Israel against the whole fam...

  • Darby's translation notes (1890)

    3:6 [it]? (f-27) Or 'not have acted.'...

  • Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible

    THE FIRST ADDRESS 1-8. A call to attention. 9, 10. The oppressions practised by the powerful. 11-15. The disasters which should overtake them, their sanctuary and their palaces. 1. 'Race' would be...

  • EasyEnglish Bible Commentaries

    THE MAN WITH A DIFFICULT MESSAGE FROM GOD AMOS _MARK KIRKPATRICK_ CHAPTER 3 GOD WARNS ISRAEL’S PEOPLE V1 People in Israel, listen to this message. The *Lord has spoken against you. This message...

  • Ellicott's Commentary On The Whole Bible

    SURELY THE LORD... — In this, and the preceding verse, the future tense should be replaced by a present. Render _doeth nothing,_ and in Amos 3:6 _is a trumpet sounded_... _are not afraid_... _is there...

  • ETCBC data on Hebrew bible

    אִם ־יִתָּקַ֤ע שֹׁופָר֙ בְּ עִ֔יר וְ עָ֖ם

  • Expositor's Bible Commentary (Nicoll)

    Amos 3:3, Amos 7:14 THE MAN AND THE PROPHET THE Book of Amos opens one of the greatest stages in the religious development of mankind. Its originality is due to a few simple ideas, which it propels...

  • Expositor's Bible Commentary (Nicoll)

    CIVILIZATION AND JUDGMENT Amos 3:1 - Amos 4:3 WE now enter the Second Section of the Book of Amos: Chapter s 3-6. It is a collection of various oracles of denunciation, grouped partly by the recurren...

  • Frederick Brotherton Meyer's Commentary

    THE LORD'S WORD MUST COME TRUE Amos 3:1-15 The closer our relationship with God, the more searching His scrutiny and chastening. The sins of God's children which may seem of slight consequence are ri...

  • G. Campbell Morgan's Exposition on the Whole Bible

    Having thus uttered the declamations of Jehovah's judgment on all the nations, the prophet delivered his special message to Israel in a series of three discourses. In each the introductory word is, "H...

  • Geneva Study Bible Commentary

    (f) Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there (g) be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done [it]? (f) Will the Prophet's threaten God's judgments and the peo...

  • George Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

    _Afraid. Yet you can hear these terrible truths without consternation! Will you therefore escape? (Calmet) --- Evil. He speaks of the evil of sin, of which God is not the author. (Challoner) --- All e...

  • Hawker's Poor man's commentary

    The Lord is going on in his expostulations. He first shews, that by Israel's revolt that sweet communion between the Lord and his people was interrupted. Ca n two walk together except they be agreed?...

  • Introductory Lectures - Commentary by William Kelly

    Lectures on the Minor Prophets. W. Kelly. "The words of Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa, which he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the...

  • John Calvin's Bible Commentary

    He adds, in the last place, _Shall a trumpet sound and the people tremble not? _Here he reprehends, as I have said, the torpidity of the people, to whom all threatening were a sport: “When a trumpet s...

  • John Darby's Synopsis

    After having specified each one of the nations that were found on the territory promised to Abraham, God addresses Judah and Israel together-the whole family whom He had brought up from Egypt. These o...

  • John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

    SHALL A TRUMPET BE BLOWN IN THE CITY,.... Meaning not any trumpet blown, as the silver trumpet for the gathering of the people to worship, or the jubilee trumpet, which proclaimed liberty to them, or...

  • John Trapp Complete Commentary

    _Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done [it]?_ Ver. 6. _Shall a trumpet be blown_] _sc._ out of a watch-tower in...

  • Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

    _Will a lion roar, &c., when he hath no prey?_ “Naturalists assert that when the lion sees his prey, he roars before he rushes on it; and that at this roaring many animals show great fear. He likewise...

  • Kretzmann's Popular Commentary of the Bible

    Shall a trumpet be blown in the city and the people not be afraid? As the signal of the trumpet was intended to arouse the people out of their security, so the message of the prophet was intended to a...

  • Kretzmann's Popular Commentary of the Bible

    THE LORD READY TO PUNISH...

  • Marginal Notes in the King James Version (1611)

    NOT BE AFRAID? OR, NOT RUN TOGETHER and the LORD hath not done it?: Or, and shall not the L. do somewhat?...

  • Matthew Henry Commentary on the Whole Bible

    1-8 The distinguishing favours of God to us, if they do not restrain from sin, shall not exempt from punishment. They could not expect communion with God, unless they first sought peace with him. Whe...

  • Matthew Poole's Concise Commentary On The Bible

    SHALL A TRUMPET BE BLOWN, when an alarm is sounded, by which notice is given of danger approaching, of an enemy invading the land, in the city, any city, but particularly in a frontier city, in which...

  • Patchworkid's Personal Study Bible Notes

    Amos 3:6 trumpet H7782 blown H8628 (H8735) city H5892 people H5971 afraid H2729 (H8799) calamity H7451 city...

  • Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible

    THE INEVITABILITY OF JUDGMENT, BOTH BECAUSE OF WHAT YHWH IS, AND BECAUSE HE WILL ACT (AMOS 3:1). Following up on the idea in Amos 2:9 Amos commences this section of his prophecy (introduced by ‘hear t...

  • Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible

    THE COVENANT RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN YHWH AND HIS PEOPLE (AMOS 3:1). The covenant relationship between YHWH and His people is revealed in this carefully constructed passage in which there is constant re...

  • Summarized Bible Commentary

    CONTENTS: Jehovah's controversy with Israel. CHARACTERS: God, Amos. CONCLUSION: Judgment begins at the house of God. The nearer men are to God in profession, and the kinder notice God has taken of t...

  • Sutcliffe's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

    Amos 3:1. _Against the whole family_ of the twelve tribes, _which I brought up from Egypt._ It was a laborious work to make them hear. The prophets did not confine their labours to local districts. Am...

  • The Biblical Illustrator

    _Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?_ GOD AS THE AUTHOR OF EVIL The principal scope and design of the prophecy of Amos is this,--Though the Jews had by their sins provoked G...

  • The Biblical Illustrator

    _Will a lion roar in the forest when he hath no prey?_ RETRIBUTION I. Retribution springs out of the nature of things. Poiset, in his travels, states that the lion has two different modes of hunting...

  • The Biblical Illustrator

    _You only have I known of all the families of the earth._ SIN IN THE HIGHLY-FAVOURED This is shameful ingratitude. The honour and blessing conferred on the Israelites gave the stain of ingratitude to...

  • The ESV Global Study Bible's Study Notes

    AMOS—NOTE ON AMOS 3:3 With a series of questions, Amos shows that disaster is coming for Israel. In nature, certain sequences of events lead to predictable outcomes. If a LION roars (vv....

  • The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary

    CRITICAL NOTES.] AMOS 3:3. TWO] The prophet and the Spirit of God. Israel did not believe that _God_ threatened such denunciations by the prophets (ch. Amos 6:1; Amos 1:7). Amos spoke because God com...

  • The Pulpit Commentaries

    EXPOSITION VERSE 1-CH. 6:14 Part II. THREE ADDRESSES PARTICULARIZING THE SINS OF ISRAEL AND ANNOUNCING IMMINENT JUDGMENT. AMOS 3:1 § 1.

  • Through The Bible C2000 Serie by Chuck Smith

    Hear this word [Amos said] that the LORD hath spoken against you, O children of Israel, and against the whole family (Amos 3:1) So that would include Judah also. which I brought up from the land of...

  • Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

    2 Corinthians 5:11; Acts 2:23; Acts 4:28; Ezekiel 33:3; Genesis 50:20;

  • Wesley's Explanatory Notes

    Afraid — Affected with the danger. Evil — Such as plague or famine. Done it — Either immediately by his own hand, or by the hands of those he employs. Whoever are the instruments, God is the principal...

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