(1, 2) The visions are resumed as though the priest at Bethel had trembled at the presence of Amos, and had ceased to persecute him. There is a remarkable play of words, qaits being the Hebrew for "summer fruit," and qets for "end." It is harvest time, the end of the agricultural year. Israel is ripe for his final doom, that shall sweep down like a scythe. For "pass by" see on Amos 7:8.
Verses 1-14. - § 5. In the fourth vision, the basket of summer fruit, the Lord shows that the people is ripe for judgment. Explaining this revelation, Amos denounces the oppression and greed of the chieftains (vers. 4-10), and warns them that those who despise the Word of God shall some day suffer from a famine of the Word (vers. 11-14). Verse 1. - A basket of summer fruit; Septuagint, ἄγγος ἰξευτοῦ, "a fowler's vessel;" Vulgate, uncinus pomorum, which Jerome explains," Sicut uncino rami arborum detrahuntur ad poma carpenda, ita ego proximum captivitatis tempus attraxi." The word chelub is taken to mean "a basket of wickerwork;" it is used for "a cage" in Jeremiah 5:27, but is found nowhere else. The gathering of fruit was the last harvest of the year, and thus fitly typified the final punishment of Israel. This is set forth by the play on the word in the next verse.
8:1-3 Amos saw a basket of summer fruit gathered, and ready to be eaten; which signified, that the people were ripe for destruction, that the year of God's patience was drawing towards a conclusion. Such summer fruits will not keep till winter, but must be used at once. Yet these judgments shall not draw from them any acknowledgement, either of God's righteousness or their own unrighteousness. Sinners put off repentance from day to day, because they think the Lord thus delays his judgments.
Thus hath the Lord God showed unto me,.... Another vision, which is the fourth, and after the following manner:
and, behold, a basket of summer fruit; not of the first ripe fruit, but of such as were gathered at the close of the summer, when autumn began. So the Targum,
"the last of the summer fruit;''
such as were fully ripe, and would not keep till winter; or, if kept, would rot; but must be eaten directly, as some sort of apples, grapes, &c. denoting the people of Israel being ripe for destruction, and would be quickly devoured by their enemies; and that, as they had had a summer of prosperity, they would now have a sharp winter of adversity.
and, behold, a basket of summer fruit; not of the first ripe fruit, but of such as were gathered at the close of the summer, when autumn began. So the Targum,
"the last of the summer fruit;''
such as were fully ripe, and would not keep till winter; or, if kept, would rot; but must be eaten directly, as some sort of apples, grapes, &c. denoting the people of Israel being ripe for destruction, and would be quickly devoured by their enemies; and that, as they had had a summer of prosperity, they would now have a sharp winter of adversity.