Amos 1 — Hebrew and Greek compared

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: The kings, the patronymic and the two-year interval before the earthquake agree exactly. Two things do not. First, the object of the vision: Hebrew 'asher chazah 'al-Yisra'el, 'which he saw concerning Israel'; Greek names Jerusalem. Second, ba-noqdim: Hebrew has the article plus a plural common noun (Rd/Ncmpa), 'among the sheep-breeders', of which the only other biblical instance is Mesha king of Moab (2 Kings 3:4); the Greek column leaves the word untransliterated as nakkarim, so the Greek reader is told nothing about Amos's occupation. Hebrew hayah is 3ms and its antecedent is Amos; in the Greek column the grammatical antecedent is 'the words'. Category confirmed as Disparate against the earlier note: the stated object of the prophecy changes. Disclosure: the Hebrew column throughout is translated from the Westminster Leningrad Codex (OpenScriptures morphhb), not from BHS itself; the result is provisional. Rabbinic: Rashi on Amos 1:1 glosses ba-noqdim by Targum Jonathan as 'an owner of livestock' (mare gitin), comparing 2 Kings 3:4, 'Mesha king of Moab was a noqed'; on 'two years before the earthquake' he dates it two years before Uzziah was stricken, citing Isaiah 6:4 and Zechariah 14:5. Ibn Ezra on the same verse glosses noqdim simply ro'im, 'shepherds', with the same Mesha proof-text. Radak adds that Amos was 'among the noqdim' to mark him as the greatest of them in Tekoa. Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Amos.1.1 ; https://www.sefaria.org/Ibn_Ezra_on_Amos.1.1 ; https://www.sefaria.org/Radak_on_Amos.1.1

Classification & Notes

Similar. Text: Zion, Jerusalem, the voice, the shepherds' pastures and the top of Carmel all correspond. The difference is aspect: Hebrew yish'ag and yitten are imperfect (ongoing or future), and the following weqatal forms we-'avelu and we-yavesh carry that force forward; the Greek column reports the whole sequence as past ('spoke', 'gave', 'mourned', 'dried up'). Hebrew ro'sh ha-Karmel is 'the head/summit of the Carmel'; Greek 'Carmel's summit' agrees. Category confirmed as Similar.

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: The messenger formula, Damascus, the three-and-four count and the iron implements agree. The accusation does not. Hebrew 'al dusham ba-charutsot ha-barzel 'et ha-Gil'ad has an infinitive construct of dush, 'thresh', with a 3mp suffix, the sharp iron threshing-sledges as instrument, and ha-Gil'ad marked by 'et as the direct object: the territory itself is threshed. The Greek column has them sawing the pregnant women of those in Gilead with iron saws, which names human victims and a different act and imports the atrocity that Hebrew reserves for Ammon at 1:13. Two further systematic differences begin here and hold through every occurrence in these chapters: Hebrew pish'e, 'transgressions', appears as 'impieties'; and Hebrew lo' 'ashivennu is hiphil imperfect 1cs with a bare 3ms suffix and no expressed noun – 'I will not turn it back' – where the Greek column supplies a personal object, 'I will not turn away from him'. The Greek here also opens 'The Lord said' rather than the 'Thus says the Lord' used at 1:6, 1:9, 1:11, 1:13, 2:1, 2:4 and 2:6. Category confirmed as Disparate. Rabbinic: Rashi on Amos 1:3 reads the three-and-four count as a limit on forbearance, citing Job 33:29, 'Lo, all these things does God work, twice, yea thrice, with a man', and glossing the refrain: at the fourth transgression 'I need no longer turn him back empty-handed from taking his recompense.' Rashi thus takes the unexpressed object of 'ashivennu as the offender himself. Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Amos.1.3

Classification & Notes

Different. Text: Same agent, same fire, same two royal houses. Hebrew 'armenot (Ncmpc) are fortified palaces or citadels; the Greek column has 'foundations' throughout the oracle series, and that recurrent substitution begins here. The second king is Hebrew Ben-hadad; the Greek column keeps its own form, 'son of Ader', unharmonised. Category confirmed as Different.

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: Damascus, the breaking, the cutting off and the exile of Aram/Syria agree. Almost everything else differs. Hebrew beriach is singular, 'the bar'; the Greek column has plural bars. Hebrew yoshev is a singular participle, 'the inhabitant'; Greek has plural inhabitants. Hebrew tomekh shevet, 'the holder of the scepter', a ruling office, appears in Greek as 'a tribe' – the same consonants shevet read as 'tribe' rather than 'scepter', a substitution that recurs at 1:8. Biq'at 'Aven, 'the Valley of Aven', appears as 'the Plain of On'; Beth-eden appears as 'the men of Harran'; and Hebrew Qirah, 'to Kir', with directional he, has no counterpart at all, the Greek instead having Syria 'called by name' taken captive. Category confirmed as Disparate: the office targeted and the geography both change, and the exile's destination is absent. Rabbinic: Rashi on Amos 1:5 identifies Biq'at Aven as 'a place in Aram' and Beth-eden as a place name, and glosses Qirah as 'a place, and there Sennacherib exiled them in the days of Ahaz' – so the Hebrew destination that the Greek column lacks is, for Rashi, the load-bearing historical point of the verse. Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Amos.1.5

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: Gaza, the count, the deportation and the destination Edom/Idumea agree. The deported group does not. Hebrew galut shelemah is a noun plus feminine adjective, 'a complete exile', i.e. an entire population carried off with none left; the Greek column reads the adjective as the personal name Solomon and has 'Solomon's captives'. A proper name stands where Hebrew has a common adjective. Hebrew le-hasgir is a hiphil infinitive, 'to hand over, deliver up'; Greek 'to shut them up' matches the same verb's other sense. Category confirmed as Disparate. Rabbinic: Rashi on Amos 1:6 reads galut shelemah of Israel, 'that the exile be complete, that no man escape' – the Philistines standing on the roads to seize fugitives and hand them back. The rabbinic reading turns precisely on shelemah being the adjective 'complete', which is the word the Greek column takes as a name. Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Amos.1.6

Classification & Notes

Different. Text: Identical action and target. Hebrew chomat is a feminine singular construct, 'the wall of Gaza'; the Greek column has plural walls. Hebrew 'armenoteha, 'her citadels', appears as 'her foundations', the same recurrent substitution as at 1:4. Category confirmed as Different.

Classification & Notes

Different. Text: The four Philistine cities correspond exactly under their source-specific forms: Ashdod/Azotus, Ashkelon/Ascalon, Ekron/Accaron. Hebrew yoshev is again singular against Greek plural, and tomekh shevet, 'the holder of the scepter', is again 'a tribe'. Hebrew she'erit Pelishtim, 'the remnant of the Philistines', is 'the remaining foreigners' in Greek – the ethnic name is generalised. The closing formula differs in the divine title: Hebrew 'adonai YHWH, two names, against the Greek column's single 'the Lord'. Category confirmed as Different.

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: Tyre, the count, Edom/Idumea and the unremembered covenant of brothers all agree. As at 1:6, Hebrew galut shelemah, 'a complete exile', appears in Greek as 'Solomon's captives': an adjective becomes a personal name, and the deported group is redefined. Hebrew here has hasgiram, the hiphil of sagar with 3mp suffix – the very verb that was the purpose clause at 1:6 is now the offence itself. The Greek formula's personal object is feminine here ('from her'), masculine at 1:3; Hebrew has the same invariable 3ms suffix at both. Category confirmed as Disparate.

Classification & Notes

Different. Text: Word-for-word parallel to 1:7 in both columns, and the same two differences: Hebrew singular 'wall' against Greek plural, and Hebrew 'citadels' against Greek 'foundations'. Category confirmed as Different.

Classification & Notes

Disparate. Text: Edom, the count, and the pursuit of a brother with the sword agree. The three clauses that follow do not, and the divergence looks like the same consonants read differently. Hebrew rachamav, 'his compassions', is read in the Greek column as a womb (rechem), giving 'he ravaged a womb upon the earth'. Hebrew la-'ad, 'perpetually', is read as le-'ed, 'for testimony', giving 'seized his shuddering as testimony'. Hebrew netsach, 'perpetuity', appears as 'victory', the other sense of the same root, giving 'kept his onrush for victory'. Note also that Hebrew shemarah is 3ms verb with a 3fs suffix agreeing with 'evratho, 'his fury' – 'he kept it' – while the Greek reads the noun as 'onrush'. The Hebrew here is itself difficult and the rendering above is literal rather than resolved. Category confirmed as Disparate. Rabbinic: Rashi on Amos 1:11 reads the last two clauses of persistence rather than of violence: on wa-yitrof la-'ad appo he says 'he clung to his anger and did not let it go', and on we-'evrato shemarah netsach that he kept his wrath and never retracted it. That is the Hebrew sense the Greek column does not carry. Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Amos.1.11

Classification & Notes

Divergent. Text: Both send fire into Teman. But Hebrew names a second Edomite city, Botsrah, and makes its citadels the object; the Greek column has no Bozrah at all and instead reads 'the foundations of her walls'. A proper name present in Hebrew is absent from Greek, and the destroyed object is recast. Category confirmed as Divergent rather than merely Different, because it is the loss of material, not a change within it.

Classification & Notes

Similar. Text: This is the closest correspondence in the oracle series: the sons of Ammon, the ripping open (Hebrew biq'am, infinitive of baqa' with 3mp suffix), harot ha-Gil'ad, 'the pregnant women of Gilead', and the purpose clause lema'an harchiv, 'in order to enlarge'. Two small differences: Hebrew ha-Gil'ad is the territory, Greek 'the Gileadites' its people; and Hebrew gevulam is singular, 'their border', against Greek plural 'borders'. The refrain keeps its usual Hebrew unstated object against Greek 'from him'. Note that this atrocity belongs to Ammon in both columns – the Greek's use of it at 1:3 for Damascus is an additional occurrence, not this one moved. Category confirmed as Similar.

Classification & Notes

Different. Text: Rabbah, the fire, the devouring and the shout on the day of war agree; Hebrew hitsatti is hiphil, 'I will kindle', matching Greek 'I will kindle'. The final clause differs: Hebrew be-sa'ar be-yom sufah keeps the storm imagery doubled, 'with a tempest on the day of the whirlwind', where the Greek column has 'she will be shaken on the day of her end'. Hebrew singular 'wall' against Greek plural, and 'citadels' against 'foundations', repeat as before. Category confirmed as Different.

Classification & Notes

Divergent. Text: Both have a royal deportation with a retinue. Hebrew malkam is a singular noun with 3mp suffix, 'their king', followed by hu' we-sarav, 'he and his officials' – one king, one accompanying class. The Greek column has plural kings and two accompanying classes, 'their priests and their rulers'. Priests are absent from the Hebrew entirely. Category confirmed as Divergent: material is added, not merely altered. The pointing malkam is kept as the royal expression it is pointed to be; no deity's name is substituted.