1. This is what the Sovereign Lord showed me: a basket of ripe fruit.
2. ‘What do you see, Amos?’ he asked.‘A basket of ripe fruit,’ I answered.Then the Lord said to me, ‘The time is ripe for my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.
3. ‘In that day,’ declares the Sovereign Lord, ‘the songs in the temple will turn to wailing. Many, many bodies – flung everywhere! Silence!’
4. Hear this, you who trample the needyand do away with the poor of the land,
5. saying,‘When will the New Moon be overthat we may sell grain,and the Sabbath be endedthat we may market wheat?’ –skimping on the measure,boosting the priceand cheating with dishonest scales,
6. buying the poor with silverand the needy for a pair of sandals,selling even the sweepings with the wheat.
7. The Lord has sworn by himself, the Pride of Jacob: ‘I will never forget anything they have done.
8. ‘Will not the land tremble for this,and all who live in it mourn?The whole land will rise like the Nile;it will be stirred up and then sinklike the river of Egypt.
9. ‘In that day,’ declares the Sovereign Lord,‘I will make the sun go down at noonand darken the earth in broad daylight.
10. I will turn your religious festivals into mourningand all your singing into weeping.I will make all of you wear sackclothand shave your heads.I will make that time like mourning for an only sonand the end of it like a bitter day.