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10 “The people don’t know how to do what is right,” says the Lord.
    “Their strong cities are filled with treasures they took by force from others.”

11 So this is what the Lord God says:

“An enemy will take over the land.
    He will pull down your strong towers.
    He will take the treasures you hid in your strong cities.”

12 This is what the Lord says:

“A shepherd might save from a lion’s mouth
    only two leg bones or a scrap of an ear of his sheep.
In the same way only a few Israelites will be saved.
    These people now sit on their beds in Samaria.
    They sit on their couches.”

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10 “They do not know how to do right,(A)” declares the Lord,
    “who store up in their fortresses(B)
    what they have plundered(C) and looted.”

11 Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says:

“An enemy will overrun your land,
    pull down your strongholds
    and plunder your fortresses.(D)

12 This is what the Lord says:

“As a shepherd rescues from the lion’s(E) mouth
    only two leg bones or a piece of an ear,
so will the Israelites living in Samaria be rescued,
    with only the head of a bed
    and a piece of fabric[a] from a couch.[b](F)

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Footnotes

  1. Amos 3:12 The meaning of the Hebrew for this phrase is uncertain.
  2. Amos 3:12 Or Israelites be rescued, / those who sit in Samaria / on the edge of their beds / and in Damascus on their couches.