The Author. 

            Some twelve miles south of Jerusalem on the brink of the drop down to the Dead Sea lay the fortified village of Tekoa (For a description of the landscape see G. A. Smith, I, p. 74.), near enough to the desert to bear its stamp, near enough to the high road up the backbone of the country through Beer-Sheba, Hebron and Jerusalem to know what was happening in the world. This was the home of Amos, who lived the arduous life of a shepherd (cf. Gen. 31:39f). He may have been the owner of his flock, for the same tech­nical expression is used of him and Mesha, king of Moab (IIKings 3:4), i.e. noqed.

        Amos otters us no indication of his spiritual history or of how God called him (but see p. 33). We can, however, from his prophecy recognize how he had been stamped in his think­ing by the desert, where there is no place for half tones, for fine distinctions between light and dark. G. A. Smith is probably correct in suggesting (ibid. p. 79.) that Amos will have visited the towns of Israel on business, and that what he saw there must have created the certainty of Israel’s doom in his heart. Then in rapid succession came the signs of God’s wrath, drought (4:6ff), locusts (4:9; 7:1), plague (4:10) — it ravished the Near East in 765 B.C). and a total eclipse of the sun (5:20 — 763 B.C. It was clear to Amos that the coming doom was at hand, so he wrapped his cloak around him and went off with his message — “The lion hath roared, who will not fear? The Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?” (3:8). It was as simple as all that.

        It is vital to realize that Amos represents something new in Hebrew religion. The indignant denial, “I am no prophet, neither am I one of the sons of the prophets” (7:14, R.V. mg.) goes beyond the rejection of the idea that he prophesied for money. Once he finished his brief ministry in the North, he will have gone back to his flock, and he probably never pro­phesied again, i.e. he was never an official prophet at all.

        Though Amos’ great successors could not have echoed his indignant denial, for they had known God’s appointment as prophet, yet in their opposition to the “false prophets,” in their  their willing­ness to stand outside the normal framework of society they show that they had learnt the lesson of Amos activity. The passage 3:3-8 is particularly interesting as showing the spiritual compulsion behind his message.

        The actual course of Amos’ activity is not clear. It can­not have lasted long; it will have been cut short by the authorities, for in spite of the king’s indifference Amaziah will have had the power to enforce his demands (7:10-13). But it seems reasonably certain that his prophecy was given at the great autumn, i.e. New Year, festival at Bethel. It was probably spread over three days.

        It may well be that it was Amos’ prophecy of the coming earthquake (8:8; 9:5) — a prophecy fulfilled by one of the worst in Palestinian history (1:1) for it was still remembered two and a half centuries later (Zech. 14:5) — that stamped his message on men’s minds and caused them to approach him with the request that it should be written down.