Amos 7:16

(2.) The royal family shall sink first, as an earnest of the ruin of the whole kingdom: I will rise against the house of Jeroboam, Jeroboam the second, who was now king of the ten tribes; his family was extirpated in his son Zecharias, who was slain with the sword before the people, by Shallum who conspired against him, 2 Kings xv.

); for, when the contest is between God and man, it is easy to foresee, it is very easy to foretel, who will come off with the worst of it. 1 Thus hath the Lord G OD shewed unto me; and, behold, he formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and, lo, it was the latter growth after the king's mowings.

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens

Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord,.... Which I have from him concerning thee, and which he has pronounced upon thee and thy family: thou sayest, prophesy not against Israel; when God has bid me prophesy: and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac; say nothing against it, though in ever so soft and gentle a manner: it designs the same thing as before, only in different words; and is a prohibition of the prophet to prophesy against the ten tribes that descended from Isaac, in the line of Jacob.

Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord - While he was speaking in his own vindication, God seems to have inspired him with the awful prediction which he immediately delivers.

Amaziah then was in direct rebellion and contradiction against God. He was in an office forbidden by God. God’s word came to him. He had his choice; and, as people do, when entangled in evil courses, he chose the more consciously amiss. He had to resign his lucrative office and to submit to God speaking to him through a shepherd, or to stand in direct opposition to God, and to confront God; and in silencing Amos, he would silence God. But, like one who would arrest the lightning, he draws it on his own head. Amos contrasts the word of Amaziah, and the word of God; Rup.: “Hear thou the word of the Lord; Thou sayest; prophesy not against Israel. Therefore thus saith the Lord.” Not only will I not cease to prophesy against Israel, but I will also prophesy to thee. Hear now thine own part of the prophecy.” Drop not - The form of expression, (not the word) is probably taken from Moses. “My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distill as the dew; as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass” Deu 32:2. Micah speaks of the word as used by those who forbade to prophesy, as though the prophecy were a continual wearisome “dropping.” God’s word comes as a gentle dew or soft rain, not beating down but refreshing; not sweeping away, like a storm, but sinking in and softening even hard ground, all but the rock; gentle, so as they can bear it. God’s word was to people, such as they were toward it; dropping like the dew on those who received it; wearing, to those who hardened themselves against it. It drops in measure upon the hearts which it fertilizes, being adapted to their capacity to receive it. And so contrariwise as to the judgments with which God’s prophets are charged. : “The prophets do not discharge at once the whole wrath of God, but, in their threatenings, denounce little drops of it.”