Amos

6 Episodes

Amos is an eighth-century prophetic book that attacks social violence, elite exploitation, and piety detached from justice during a period of unusual prosperity in Israel and Judah. Its oracles became foundational for later prophetic ethics because they frame public worship as hollow when the poor and vulnerable are being crushed.

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Why this book matters

Amos returns on the show as one of the clearest starting points for what the hosts call the prophetic critique. When they want to explain why ritual observance, sacrifice, and public religiosity do not count as righteousness on their own, Amos is one of the key books in the background: wealth without justice, worship without mercy, and national confidence without concern for the poor all become signs that a society is fundamentally disordered.

The book also matters because later authors keep reusing it, sometimes badly. Discussions of Acts 7 and Acts 15 turn Amos into a case study in how the Septuagint, translation choices, and later Christian interpretation can transform what an eighth-century prophetic text originally meant. That makes Amos important both for biblical ethics and for understanding how scripture gets renegotiated across communities.

Where to start

Start here for the strongest listening on Amos.

Quotes from the Data

“According to the 8th century prophets, and this is where it starts... the poor, the oppressed, the orphan, the widow, these always come up as kind of the canary in the coal mine of social justice.”

Dan McClellan Episode 158

“The condemnation of the public displays of piety is precisely because for the 8th century prophets, the purpose of the law is to generate a just and righteous society.”

Dan McClellan Episode 158

“This is a quotation of the prophetic book of Amos... and this is the Septuagint's pretty flagrant mistranslation of a part of Amos that in the Hebrew says something entirely different.”

Dan McClellan Episode 150

“When we go look at the Hebrew of what's going on in Amos 5, it's a little different.”

Dan McClellan Episode 150

All episodes

Every episode currently tagged with Amos.