DOES AMOS 5:1-17 NEED CORRECTING?

 I am the last one in the world to defend the King James Version as an accurate rendering of the original Greek and Hebrew text as best we are able to reconstruct it. And I realize that, on occasion where the text appears to make no sense whatsoever, one is best advised to go to early translations to see if there might be a preferred reading to be found. However, in reading at least two modern translations, New English Bible and Jerusalem Bible, even I think that some modern scholars have gone way too far in jettisoning the received text in favor of a critical reconstruction that they feel makes more sense. This is especially dangerous when they have absolutely no textual evidence to go on, just their own feelings as to how they would have written it instead to “make more sense.” As an example, look at Amos 5:1-17, a passage which is usually taken as a discrete literary section by scholars.

I came across this passage when randomly looking for occasions where the Jerusalem Bible actually rearranged the order of the verses in the Bible, and I didn't have far to look. This is the sort of thing that would be very easy for a reader to miss unless he or she bothered to look at the small digits in the margin indicating the verse numbers. As you go through the passage, you will note that JB has moved verse 7 to a place between 9 and 10. And you can search through the numerous notes at the bottom of the page in vain for any explanation of why that move was made.

The only justification appears to be so that the warning in v. 7 (“Trouble for those who turn justice into wormwood, throwing integrity to the ground.”) can be placed in proximity with the equally negative comments in vv. 10-11. However, scanning Amos 5, one can see a regular alternation of positive and negative comments, none of which the translators of JB felt needed emending.

Consulting other translations of Amos 5, I ran across an even more egregious example in the New English Bible of tampering with the text. It also moved v. 7 between 9 and 10, but in addition took the final phrase of v. 8 (“The LORD is his name.”) and relocated it at the conclusion of v. 9. The notes in NEB give no justification for either of these drastic moves, but it appears that they were done in order to produce a text that had a more “logical” way of presenting the material. The problem with such reasoning is that it assumes the only sort of organization allowable is a logical one, not a literary arrangement instead.

As Carroll R. states, “Critics sense an abrupt shift from the imperatives of vv. 4-6 to the participial opening of this line and deem v. 7 to be awkward intrusion into the flow of the passages.” Therefore they emend the passage. In doing so, this “reflects a linear logic that misses the chiastic structure of 5:1-17.” J. DeWaard explains the same thing in more scholarly language:

“It has long been recognized that Amos v 1-17 forms a discourse unit... Amos v 1-17 is both opened and closed, in verses 1 f. and verses 16 f., respectively, by the same theme of mourning which encloses all the other sayings...Research[s] into the 'prehistory' of the text or endeavors to disentangle the layers of textual tradition...have their own merits, though it should be noted that in the past decisions in these domains have often been taken on the basis of a supposed lack of meaningful relationships within a given discourse. In modern times, in which research into the meanings of discourse structures has increasingly become the joint concern of both linguists and philologists, scholars are much more careful and it is to be hoped that nobody wants any longer to defend the thesis that meaningful relationships do not exist since they have not yet been discovered.”

DeWaard therefore proposed the following literary organization to explain the current order of the verses without recourse to any rearrangements:

Figure 1: DeWaard's Structure for Amos 5:1-17

1. Lament for Israel by Survivors (5:1-3)

2. Seek God and Live (5:4-6)

3. Warning to Sinners (5:7)

4. The Power of God to Create (5:8a)

5. The LORD is his Name (5:8b)

4'. The Power of God to Punish (5:9)

3'. Warning to Sinners (5:10-13)

2'. Seek Good and Live (5:14-15)

1'. Lament for Israel by Survivors (5:16-17)

A number of scholars have followed his lead with some variations:

    Dorsey offers a similar symmetrical arrangement in which the paired sections 5:1-3 & 5:16-17, 5:4-6a & 5:14-15, and 5:6b-7 & 5:10-13 flank the center passage 5:8-9.

    Paul Noble’s own variation on DeWaard’s organization also revolves around 5:8-9 but involves some textual rearrangement of its own to achieve its symmetry.

    Chisholm offers the same structure shown above except that he does not break out verses 8 and 9 into separate sections as pictured there. In addition, he notes that each of the sections in the second half of the chapter expands on its parallel in the first half.

The only problem with Figure 1, as noted by DeWaard himself, is that Amos 5:13 (“Therefore he who is prudent will keep silent in such a time; for it is an evil time.” – RSV) seems ill-placed in Unit 3' whose thrust is a warning to sinners. But there are several ways around that rather minor issue:

One is to take the statement as an ironic one giving sarcastic advice to the sinners (“And so, keeping quiet in such evil times is a smart thing to do.” – TEV).

Or one could paraphrase the verse as in The Message: “Justice is a lost cause. Evil is epidemic. Decent people throw up their hands. Protest and rebuke are useless, a waste of breath.” In other words, v. 13 merely accentuates the sinful condition of the day.

The Living Bible takes the view that the warning in v. 13 only applies to the Day of Judgment itself. “Therefore those who are wise will not try to interfere with the Lord in the dread day of your punishment.” This interpretation indicates that no one should try to defend their own evil actions or the evil actions of others. One advantage of this view is that it answers the objection of Andersen and Freedman who are concerned that this verse teaches silence on the part of the righteous when rampant evil prevails in society.

Andersen and Freedman come up with their own interpretation of v. 13 to say that it does not express advice to the righteous to keep their mouth shut, but instead explains that the times are so evil that the righteous have been forcibly silenced by others.

The bottom line is that we should be very cautious before attempting to “correct” Scripture and be highly suspicious of translations who make a practice of that custom.