Passage

Amos 3.6

Book: Amos · ASV / WEB / KJV / YLT

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV

4. Will a lion roar in the forest, when he hath no prey? will a young lion cry out of his den, if he have taken nothing? 5. Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth, where no gin is set for him? shall a snare spring up from the ground, and have taken nothing at all?

6. Shall the trumpet be blown in a city, and the people not be afraid? shall evil befall a city, and Jehovah hath not done it?

Surely the Lord Jehovah will do nothing, except he reveal his secret unto his servants the prophets. 8. The lion hath roared; who will not fear? The Lord Jehovah hath spoken; who can but prophesy? (Amos 3:4-8, ASV)

WEB

4. Will a lion roar in the thicket, when he has no prey? Does a young lion cry out of his den, if he has caught nothing? 5. Can a bird fall in a trap on the earth, where no snare is set for him? Does a snare spring up from the ground, when there is nothing to catch?

6. Does the trumpet alarm sound in a city, without the people being afraid? Does evil happen to a city, and Yahweh hasn’t done it?

Surely the Lord Yahweh will do nothing, unless he reveals his secret to his servants the prophets. 8. The lion has roared. Who will not fear? The Lord Yahweh has spoken. Who can but prophesy? (Amos 3:4-8, WEB)

KJV

4. Will a lion roar in the forest, when he hath no prey? will a young lion cry out of his den, if he have taken nothing? ^{cry: Heb. give forth his voice} 5. Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth, where no gin is for him? shall one take up a snare from the earth, and have taken nothing at all?

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? ^{be afraid: or, run together? the LORD: or, shall not the L.doe somewhat?}

Surely the Lord GOD will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets. 8. The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord GOD hath spoken, who can but prophesy? (Amos 3:4-8, KJV)

YLT

4. Roar doth a lion in a forest and prey he hath none? Give out doth a young lion his voice from his habitation, If he hath not caught? 5. Doth a bird fall into a snare of the earth, And there is no gin for it? Doth a snare go up from the ground, And prey it captureth not?

6. Is a trumpet blown in a city, And do people not tremble? Is there affliction in a city, And Jehovah hath not done [it]?

For the Lord Jehovah doth nothing, Except He hath revealed His counsel unto His servants the prophets. 8. A lion hath roared, who doth not fear? The Lord Jehovah hath spoken, who doth not prophesy? (Amos 3:4-8, YLT)

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Setting

Speaker: Amos of Tekoa, a herdsman (noqed, sheep breeder) and tender of sycamore figs from Judah, speaking the word of the LORD.
Audience: The northern kingdom of Israel, addressed at the height of its prosperity under Jeroboam II.
Location: Delivered in the northern kingdom, principally at Bethel, the royal sanctuary and state temple (Amos 7:13).
Time period: c. 760-750 BC, in the reigns of Uzziah of Judah and Jeroboam II of Israel, "two years before the earthquake" (Amos 1:1). Amos is generally reckoned the earliest of the writing prophets.

Theological reading

The last in a chain of seven rhetorical questions (Amos 3:3-8), each pairing an effect with its necessary cause: two people walking together have agreed to meet, a lion roars because it has prey, a bird falls because a trap was set, a trumpet sounds and the city is afraid. The chain is an argument about inference, and the final two links apply it to God: if calamity strikes a city, the LORD is behind it; if the Lord GOD has spoken, the prophet must prophesy.

On the word rendered "evil." The noun is ra'ah, which spans moral evil and disaster or calamity, and the context here is unambiguously the second: the parallel term in the verse is the trumpet of a city under attack. Every major modern translation renders it "disaster" or "calamity" for that reason. The same lexical point governs Isaiah 45:7, and the two verses are usually treated together; see Isaiah 45.7 I Create Evil.

What the verse claims and what it does not. It claims that judgment falling on a city is not a random misfortune but an act with an agent behind it, which is the premise Amos needs before he can call for repentance. It does not claim that God is the author of moral evil, and reading it that way would put it against James 1:13 and against Amos's own insistence two chapters later that Israel's crimes are Israel's (Amos 5:12).

The verse is a standard citation in the problem-of-evil literature and in discussions of divine sovereignty over disaster; see Divine Providence and Problem of Evil.

Key words

Theologically-loaded Greek or Hebrew words in this verse may have entries in the lexicon. Curated to roughly 100 contested terms across the corpus, not every word; see Lexicon Roadmap.

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Quoted in

Concepts:

Passages:

Isaiah 45.7

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.