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Amos 7:5

in Amos 7

Then I said, “Lord GOD, please stop! How will Jacob survive, since he is so small?”

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

Then said I, O Lord Jehovah, cease, I beseech thee: how shall Jacob stand? for he is small.

KJV

Then said I, O Lord God, cease, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.

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This verse in Amos 7

Commentary

6 notes on this verse

A commentator

Jerome

Commentary on Amos · Written before 420.

(Vers. 4 seqq.) This the Lord God showed me, and behold, the Lord God called for judgment by fire, and it devoured the great deep and will consume it together with a portion. And I said: O Lord God, please cease; who will raise up Jacob since he is small? The Lord had mercy on this also, but even this shall not be, said the Lord God. LXX: Thus the Lord God showed me, and behold, He called for judgment by fire, and it devoured the great deep and consumed a portion.

This site's exposition

called to contend by fire

on Amos 7:4-6

The second vision escalates from crop to catastrophe: a fire that devours the great deep and eats up a part of the land itself, a judgment reaching past drought into the created order. Amos repeats the same plea in nearly the same words, cease, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small, and the Lord repents again, this also shall not be. The bench reads the doubled reprieve as mercy already stretched twice before the third vision arrives with no plea answered, the pattern itself a warning that intercession has a limit the prophet does not control.

The record, by era

The Puritans and the Awakening3 voices

Then said I, O Lord God, cease, I beseech thee,.... From destroying the land; suffer not this calamity to proceed any further; using the same argument as before: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small; See Gill on Amo 7:2.

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

proposed

He that foretold the judgment in his preaching to the people, yet deprecated it in his intercessions for them. He is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee. It was the business of prophets to pray for those to whom they prophesied, and so to make it appear that though they denounced they did not desire the woeful day.

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

proposed

It it Jacob's case that is in this prayer spread before the God of Jacob. [2.] Jacob is small, very small already, weakened and brought low by former judgments; and therefore, it these come, he will be quite ruined and brought to nothing. The people are few; the dust of Jacob, which was once innumerable, is now soon counted.

The Nineteenth Century1 voice

As our Lord repeated the same words in the Garden, so Amos interceded with God with words, all but one, the same, and with the same plea, that, if God did not help, Israel was indeed helpless. Yet a second time God spared Israel. To human sight, what so strange and unexpected, as that the Assyrian and his army, having utterly destroyed the kingdom of Damascus, and carried away its people, and having devoured, like fire, more than half of Israel, rolled back like an ebb-tide, swept away to ravage other countries, and spared the capital?

The words behind it

11 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Related verses

7 in all, six open

The number beside each verse is how many compiled reference works tie it to this one. The strongest six stand open.

Psalms 85:4Restore us, O God of our salvation, and put away Your displeasure toward us.3 worksJoel 2:17Let the priests who minister before the LORD weep between the portico and the altar, saying, “Spare Your people, O LORD, and do not make Your heritage a reproach, an object of scorn among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’”3 worksJeremiah 30:19Thanksgiving will proceed from them, a sound of celebration. I will multiply them, and they will not be decreased; I will honor them, and they will not be belittled.2 worksIsaiah 10:25For in just a little while My fury against you will subside, and My anger will turn to their destruction.”2 worksAmos 7:2–3And when the locusts had eaten every green plant in the land, I said, “Lord GOD, please forgive! How will Jacob survive, since he is so small?”2 worksIsaiah 1:9Unless the LORD of Hosts had left us a few survivors, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.2 works
The other 1 cross-references, with their words ▾
Ezekiel 11:13Now as I was prophesying, Pelatiah son of Benaiah died. Then I fell facedown and cried out in a loud voice, “Oh, Lord GOD, will You bring the remnant of Israel to a complete end?”2 works

The walk

8 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Jeremiah 30:19

    Thanksgiving will proceed from them, a sound of celebration. I will multiply them, and they will not be decreased; I will honor them, and they will not be belittled.

    it leads to

    • Jeremiah 33:22

      As the hosts of heaven cannot be counted and as the sand on the seashore cannot be measured, so too will I multiply the descendants of My servant David and the Levites who minister…

    • Isaiah 51:11

      So the redeemed of the LORD will return and enter Zion with singing, crowned with everlasting joy. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee.

    • Isaiah 60:22

      The least of you will become a thousand, and the smallest a mighty nation. I am the LORD; in its time I will accomplish it quickly.

    • Isaiah 35:10

      So the redeemed of the LORD will return and enter Zion with singing, crowned with everlasting joy. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee.

    • Ezekiel 36:37

      This is what the Lord GOD says: Once again I will hear the plea of the house of Israel and do for them this: I will multiply their people like a flock.

  • Through

    Isaiah 1:9

    Unless the LORD of Hosts had left us a few survivors, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.

    it leads to

    • Romans 9:29

      It is just as Isaiah foretold: “Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.”

    • Isaiah 37:31–32

      And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah will again take root below and bear fruit above.

    • Genesis 19:24

      Then the LORD rained down sulfur and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the LORD out of the heavens.

About Amos

The Prophet Amos, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
The Prophet Amos, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
Amos: the study guide →Read Amos 7 →

This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Jerome, Commentary on Amos; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.

Read on in Amos 7 →