Amos2chapter 2

Moab's crime is one nobody today would think of as a war crime: burning the bones of the king of Edom to lime. In that world, denying a body its resting place was an attack on the dead man's afterlife and on his family's honour, and burning bones to powder was the ultimate act of erasure. Notice that the victim is Edom — Amos condemns an atrocity committed against a nation Israel despised.

Selling the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals describes debt slavery at absurdly small sums. A man who could not repay could be taken as a bondservant, and Amos says judges were doing it for the price of footwear. The sandal also carried legal weight — handing over a sandal sealed a property transfer, which is what happens in the book of Ruth.

The garments taken in pledge are covered by an explicit law. A poor man's outer cloak doubled as his blanket, so a creditor holding it as security had to return it before nightfall. Amos says these men were lying down on those cloaks beside the altar, using the collateral as bedding at a religious festival.

The Nazirites and prophets named at the end were the two institutions God had given as a witness. A Nazirite took a vow that included touching no wine; forcing wine on him destroyed the vow. Telling a prophet not to prophesy silenced the other channel. Israel had closed both.