On the Possible Interpretations of Amos 7:14

Home , Amos 7, Hanani, Iddo (prophet), Isaac, Samuel

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David B. Ridge University of Chicago [email protected]

Abstract

The ambiguity of the vocabulary and grammar of Amos 7:14 has led to the proposal of numerous conflicting interpretations. I present a comprehensive evaluation of these proposals. I argue that both grammar and context indicate Amos 7:14 is made up of three declarative clauses, two negative and one affirmative, which describe either the past or present vocation of Amos. Whether they describe the past or present relative to the situation in the narrative, these clauses combine with the account of Amos’s prophetic call to indicate that his prophetic activity is not motivated by economic or other concerns but only by his desire to be obedient to YHWH.

Keywords

Amos – Amaziah – prophet – son of a prophet – nominal clauses – verbless clauses

Introduction

The clauses which begin Amos’s speech in Amos 7:14 play an important rhetorical role in the brief account of the conversation between Amos and Amaziah in Amos 7:10-17. The clauses contain several linguistic elements which obscure the meaning of the text, including the multivalent nature of the conjunctions the inherent temporal ambiguity of nominal clauses, and the disputed ,כי and ו and the verb ,בן נביא the nominal phrase ,נביא and חזה semantics of the nouns -Numerous solutions for the interpretation of these clauses have been pro .הנבא posed, but no consensus has emerged and their meaning remains uncertain.1

1 Julian Morgenstern, “Amos Studies I,” HUCA 11 (1936): 36-51; H.H. Rowley, “Was Amos a Nabi’?” in Festschrift Otto Eissfeldt (ed. J. Fuck; Halle: Niemeyer, 1947), 191-98; Ernst Würthwein,

Previous studies have produced valuable insights into the text, but many have employed inaccurate assertions about the semantics of the relevant linguistic elements and unsubstantiated generalizations about the rules of

“Amos-Studien,” ZAW 62 (1949): 10-52; E. Bauman, “Eine Einzelheit,” ZAW 64 (1952): 62; G.R. Driver, “Amos 7:14,” The Expository Times 67 (1955): 91-93; P.R. Ackroyd, “Amos 7:14,” The Expository Times 68 (1956): 94-95; J. MacCormack, “Amos 7:14, ‘I Was (Am) No Prophet, Neither Was (Am) I a Prophet’s Son’,” The Expository Times 67 (1956): 317-18; G.R. Driver, “Waw Explicative in Amos Vii 14,” The Expository Times 68 (1957): 302; Ernest Vogt, “Waw Explicative in Amos Vii 14,” The Expository Times 68 (1957): 301-2; John D.W. Watts, Vision and Prophecy in Amos (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1958), 10-12; Simon Cohen, “Amos Was a Navi,” HUCA 32 (1961): 175-78; Henry Neil Richardson, “Critical Note on Amos 7:14,” JBL 85 (1966): 89; Hans Heinrich Schmid, “ ‘Nicht Prophet Bin Ich, Noch Bin Ich Prophetensohn’: Zur Erklärung von Amos 7:14,” Jud 23 (1967), 68; James Luther Mays, Amos (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1969), 136-38; Ziony Zevit, “A Misunderstanding at Bethel, Amos VII 12-17,” VT 25 (1975): 783-90; Y. Hoffmann, “Did Amos Regard Himself as a Nābī’,” VT 27 (1977): 209-12; Hans Walter Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977); 306-13; Robert R. Wilson, “Prophecy and Ecstasy: A Reexamination,” JBL 98 (1979): 321-37; Ziony Zevit, “Expressing Denial in Biblical Hebrew and Mishnaic Hebrew, and in Amos,” VT 29 (1979): 505-9; R. Bach, “Erwägungen Zu Amos 7,14,” in Die Botschaft Und Die Boten (ed. J. Jeremias and L. Perlitt; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1981), 203-16; Francis I. Andersen and David Noel Freedman, Amos: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AB 24A; New York; Doubleday, 1989), 762-90; Max E. Polley, Amos and the Davidic Empire: A Socio-Historical Approach (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 11-12. Hans Joachim Stoebe, “Noch Einmal Zu Amos VII 10-17,” VT 39 (1989): 341-54; Gerhard F. Hasel, Understanding the Book of Amos: Basic Issues in Current Interpretations (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1991); Shalom M. Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991) 238-50; Terry Giles, “A Note on the Vocation of Amos in 7:14,” JBL 111 (1992): 690-92; Francisco O. García-Treto, “A Reader-Response Approach to Prophetic Conflict: The Case of Amos 7.10-17,” in The New Literary Criticism and the Hebrew Bible (eds. J. Cheryl Exum & David J.A. Clines; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993), 114-24; M. Tsevat, “Amos 7:14—Present or Preterit?” in The Tablet and the Scroll (ed. M.E. Cohen; Bethesda: CDL, 1993), 256-58; Åke Viberg, “Amos 7:14: A Case of Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 91-114; Pierre Gilbert, “A New Look at Amos’s Prophetic Status (Amos 7:10-17),” EgT 28 (1997): 291-300; Jörg Jeremias, The Book of Amos: A Commentary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998), 135-140; Paul R. Noble, “Amos and Amaziah in Context: Synchronic and Diachronic Approaches to Amos 7-8,” CBQ 60 (1998): 423-39; Jean Marcel Vincent, “ ‘Visionnaire, Va’t’en!’: Interprétation d’Amos 7/10-17 Dans Son Contexte,” ETR 75 (2000): 229-50; M. Dijkstra, “ ‘I Am Neither a Prophet nor a Prophet’s Pupil’: Amos 7:9-17 as the Presentation of a Prophet like Moses,” in The Elusive Prophet: The Prophet as Historical Person, Literary Character & Anonymous Artist (ed. Johannes C. de Moor; Leiden: Brill, 2001), 105-28; Duane A. Garrett, Amos: A Handbook on the Hebrew Text (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008), 222-23; Tchavdar S. Hadjiev, The Composition and Redaction of the Book of Amos (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2009); Erasmus Gass, “ ‘Kein Prophet Bin Ich Und Kein Prophetenschüler Bin Ich’: Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 1-24.

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Hebrew grammar. In addition, none have comprehensively gathered data on all possible grammatical solutions and analyzed them together.2 The purpose of this study is to evaluate all the proposed grammatical explanations of these clauses. I will show that the data indicate that the clauses must be understood to be two negative nominal declarative sentences followed by a clause which includes an affirmative nominal declarative sentence. Neither כי grammatical nor contextual evidence is sufficient to determine whether the clauses depict the past or present relative to the utterance of the speech. I will begin by examining the rhetorical context of the clauses of v. 14 within the conversation between Amos and Amaziah described in vv. 10-17. I will then review each of the proposed interpretations of these clauses and evaluate whether they are supported by the grammatical, semantic, and contextual data. I will conclude by examining how the remaining possible interpretations would function within the text of Amos 7:10-17.

Reading Amos 7:14 in Context

Grammatical explanations of the clauses of Amos 7:14 must be evaluated with consideration for how these clauses function rhetorically in Amos’s response to Amaziah in the literary unit of Amos 7:10-17. In his speech in vv. 12-13, Amaziah attempts to stop Amos from continuing to prophesy at Bethel. He demands this explicitly and attempts to persuade Amos to leave Bethel by appealing to what he believes are Amos’s concerns about his safety and his economic interests. Amos responds first by narrating the story of his call from YHWH to prophesy to the people of the northern kingdom of Israel, and then by prophesying again. Rhetorically, the call narrative indicates why Amaziah’s appeals are ineffective. Amos’s prophetic activity is not motivated by concerns about his safety or economic interests, but solely by his desire to obey YHWH. The nominal clauses in v. 14 support this interpretation of Amos’ motivation in that the clauses make clear that when Amos does pursue his economic interest, he can do so through agricultural, not prophetic, work. To fulfill his purpose of persuading Amos to stop prophesying in Bethel, Amaziah argues that Amos is not safe in Bethel, and that the economic motivations which led Amos to prophesy at Bethel could be fulfilled if Amos were

2 The recent article of Gass analyzes many of the possible grammatical solutions but does not include all of them and, as will be shown below, its conclusion is not supported by the weight of the evidence. See Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 1-24.

Vetus TestamentumDownloaded from 68 Brill.com09/25/2021(2018) 620-642 05:04:59AM via free access On the Possible Interpretations of Amos 7:14 623 to prophesy elsewhere. The concentration of terms that deal with place in Amaziah’s speech indicates that location is his main concern. The imperatives refer to movement to a new location, and Pierre Gilbert has ברח לך and לך there” and the parallel“ שם shown that the repeated appearance of the adverb contribute to the focus בית אל and יהודה appearance of the geographic terms on the location of his prophecy.3 Amaziah attempts to persuade Amos to leave Bethel with two arguments. He asserts that the economic motivations which led Amos to prophesy at Bethel could be fulfilled by prophesying in Judah. He tells Amos to “flee to the land of Judah, and eat bread there and prophesy there.”4 The instruction to “eat bread” there, in Judah, in conjunction with the imperative to prophesy refers to economic support, as it does in Gen 3:19, Gen 28:20, and Isa 4:1.5 Amaziah also appeals to what he assumes are Amos’s concerns about his personal safety. Amaziah suggests that Amos’s departure ,ברח By using the imperative form of from Bethel would be movement away from physical danger.6 Amaziah’s language here and in vv. 10-11 suggests that Amos is in danger because Amaziah himself can send the king information about the sanctuary. The text describes in vv. 10-11 Amaziah’s report to Jeroboam; here, when Amaziah associates Amos discontinuing his prophecy at Bethel with the site’s connection to the king, he

3 Gilbert, “Amos’s Prophetic Status,” EgT 28 (1997): 297. 4 This and all other translations are the author’s own unless specified. 5 This usage is less certain but possible in Lev 26:5 and Deut 8:9. The possibility that this phrase refers to economic concerns or professional status has been raised by most scholars who treat this passage, and more specifically by Morgenstern, “Amos Studies I,” HUCA 11 (1936): 46; Mays, Amos (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969), 136; Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 311; Andersen and Freedman, Amos (New York: Doubleday, 1989), 788; Jeremias, The Book of Amos (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 140; and Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 2. -expresses flight from danger in 59 out of its 63 occurrences. It car בר״ח The verbal form of 6 ries a different sense in the four remaining occurrences. Two occurrences are a physical to describe הבריח description of an inanimate object: Exod 26:28 and 36:33 use the verb a bar running from one end of the Tabernacle to another. In Song of Songs 8:14 it is used metaphorically, but comparing the lover’s rapid motion towards his beloved to the motion of animals on the mountainside, which can be seen as an extension of the semantic value of the flight from danger. The final occurrence describes the ‘flight’ of the Levites to farm fields when they were not ‘given their portions’ in Neh 13:10. This attestation does not include any explicit sense of flight from danger, but interestingly does explicitly involve immigration for economic or professional purposes, which would align well with Amaziah’s general rhetorical strategy in his speech to Amos.

Vetus Testamentum 68 (2018) 620-642 Downloaded from Brill.com09/25/2021 05:04:59AM via free access 624 Ridge implies that he can inform the king about prophecies that are given there.7 The implication is that if Amos remains at Bethel his prophecies will continue to be reported to Jeroboam and that the threat of the king’s response ought to motivate Amos to leave Bethel.8 This is followed by Amos’s speech in vv. 14-17 in which he responds both to the priest’s demand and to his arguments that it is in Amos’s interest to leave Bethel. Amos prophesies again at Bethel in vv. 16-17.9 The prophecy leaves no doubt that Amaziah’s attempt to end Amos’s prophetic activity at Bethel is unsuccessful. The call narrative in vv. 14-15 suggests that Amaziah’s arguments are ineffective because they fundamentally mischaracterize the motivation for Amos’s prophetic activity. In the call narrative, YHWH tells Amos to prophesy specifically to the people of the northern kingdom of Israel. That direction is laid out in v. 15: Go, prophesy to my people Israel.” Although the term“ לך הנבא אל עמי ישראל -can refer to several different geographical and political entities, through ישראל out the literary unit of Amos 7:10-17 it refers to the people of the northern kingdom alone and is not inclusive of the southern kingdom of Judah. Jeroboam, who ruled only the northern kingdom, is called the “king of Israel” in v. 10, and in Amaziah’s representation of Amos’s prophecies in v. 11 the fate of Jeroboam and Israel are parallel. In his speech, Amos uses the term ‘Israel’ in the same -to refer to Amaziah’s at בית ישחק in parallel with ישראל way. In v. 16 he uses tempt to restrict the audience of his prophecy. He cannot mean that Amaziah

are unique in the Hebrew Bible and are not בית ממלכה and מקדש מלך Although the phrases 7 -suggests that they designate a relation מל״כ perfectly understood, the presence of the root ship with the king and the state. On the realism of the situation at this sanctuary, see J. Blake Couey, “Amos Vii 10-17 and Royal Attitudes towards Prophecy in the Ancient Near East,” VT 58 (2008): 300-314, who provides comparative data on the role of royal officials such as priests who reported prophecy to the king as Amaziah does. 8 Because of the unclear relationship of Amos 7:10-17 to the other texts attributed to Amos, it is not certain, within the literary unit of vv. 10-17, whether Amaziah’s comments that Amos is “conspiring against the king” and that “the land cannot contain all his words” are meant to be seen as accurate or even if Amos is aware of the report at all. But the fact that there is so little context for this report (there is no indication in the text of why Amaziah reported it, whether the report reached Jeroboam, or what the king did with the information) suggests that the only possible rhetorical function of the description of the report in this text is to illuminate the danger to Amos asserted by Amaziah. 9 This is clearly marked as a prophecy by the description of the future of Israel, including -introduces proph שמע דבר יהוה .Amaziah’s death, and by the dual introductory statements ecy in 1 Kgs 22:19; 2 Kgs 20:16; Isa 39:5; Jer 22:2, 34:4; Ezek 21:3 (Ezek 20:47 in versification of -appears 293 times in the Hebrew Bible introducing pro כה אמר יהוה .(most English texts phetic speech.

Vetus TestamentumDownloaded from 68 Brill.com09/25/2021(2018) 620-642 05:04:59AM via free access On the Possible Interpretations of Amos 7:14 625 sought to restrain him from prophesying to the people of Judah because Amaziah explicitly told him to go prophesy there.10 This evidence, combined with the focus of the book of Amos upon the northern kingdom, suggests that -refers to the people of the north ישראל in YHWH’s direction to Amos the word ern kingdom alone. Amos believes Amaziah is forbidding him from fulfilling this direction from YHWH. In the beginning of his prophecy in v. 16, Amos quotes Amaziah “You say: ‘Do not prophesy to Israel, do not preach to the House of Isaac.’”11 The par- at the beginning of v. 17 links this statement with the remainder of the לכן ticle prophecy showing that it is Amaziah’s demand that leads to the prophecy. This illuminates the rhetoric of Amos’s speech. The logical progression of Amos’s response to Amaziah, not yet including the clauses in v. 14, is therefore summarized in the following points: 1) YHWH told me to prophesy to Israel, so even though 2) you are telling me not to prophesy to Israel, 3) I am prophesying to Israel. The unstated inference be- hind this progression is: I am prophesying to Israel because obeying YHWH is more important to me than anything you said. The purpose of the call narrative in vv. 14-15 is to make clear the importance of obedience to YHWH for Amos in his decision-making process. This purpose is the context within which the meaning of the clauses in Amos 7:14 must be evaluated.

10 Although the relationship of Amos 7:9 to vv. 10-17 is not clear, it is worth noting that there high“ במות ישחק appears as a geographical denominative in the phrase ישחק the name .בית ירבעם and the מקדשי ישראל places of Isaac” in parallel with the terms 11 Although it is sometimes translated as ‘prophesying about’, the combination of the finite indicates “prophesying to.” The noun following על preposition + הנבא form of the verb the preposition is the audience or the designated addressee of the prophetic message in all 41 attestations of this construction in the Hebrew Bible. See for example Ezek 36:6, הנבא על אדמת ישראל ואמרת להרים ולגבעות לאפיקים ולגאיות כה‘ where the phrase is not just the subject of the content of אדמת ישראל indicates that ’אמר אדני יהוה … the prophecy, but that literally the mountains, hills, ravines, and valleys are the addressee of the prophetic statement. See also 1 Kgs 22:8, 18; Jer 25:13; 26:20; 28:8; Ezek 4:7; 11:4; appear in this על and הנבא The two times .39:1 ;38:2 ;37:4 ;35:2 ;34:2 ;29:2 ;28:22 ;25:2 ;13:17 is a הנבא combination with a different meaning are in 1 Chr 25:2, 3, where the form of participle and thus carries a different sense. The second part of the quote contains the but the ,על preposition + נט״פ only attestation of the construction of a verbal form of -suggests that the expres נט״פ and נב״א semantic similarity between the verbal usage of sion could be similar. It is also worth noting that the words Amos attributes to Amaziah do not reflect any statement which appears in the literary unit, but this does not detract from its value for understanding Amos’s rhetoric.

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Evaluating the Possible Grammatical Solutions for Amos 7:14

In this section of the paper I will evaluate all the proposed interpretations of לא נביא אנכי ולא בן נביא אנכי כי בוקר :the beginning of Amos’s speech in v. 14 These proposals will be categorized, listed, and evaluated by .אנכי ובולס שקמים made) כי reference to their treatment of the phrases which precede the particle bold in the text above).

1 Negative Answer + Affirmative Declarative (Present) + Negative Declarative (Present)

No! I am a prophet, I am not even a member of the prophetic group.

This interpretation, in which Amos disputes Amaziah’s designation of him as in two clauses, was first בן-נביא but not a נביא and declares that he is a חזה a proposed by Simon Cohen in 1961 and again with some modification by Ziony -was an inde לא Zevit in 1975.12 Both Cohen and Zevit argue that the particle that he claimed the more ,חזה pendent clause in which Amos refused the title in the second clause, and then affirmed that he was not נביא accurate title of in the third clause. Zevit has provided examples demonstrating the בן-נביא a can indeed function in this manner in texts such as Num 22:30, but לא particle the real issue with this interpretation is that it requires Amos to take pains when the semantics of the term and its context in his חזה to refuse the title response provides no reason for him to do so.13

12 Cohen, “Amos Was a Navi,” HUCA 32 (1961): 175-78; Zevit, “A Misunderstanding at Bethel,” VT 25 (1975): 783-90. 13 Zevit, “Expressing Denial,” VT 29 (1979): 505-9; refuting the objections of Hoffmann, “Did Amos Regard Himself as a Nābī’,” VT 27 (1977): 209-12. Note that Zevit provides examples -being used as an independent clause contradicting a previous statement in mul לא of appears entirely alone as a negative response to a previous question לא (tiple contexts: (1 appears לא (marked with the interrogative particle in Num 22:30, Judg 12:5 and Job 23:6; (2 as a negative response to a previous statement and accompanied only by the vocative -appears as a negative response to a previous state לא (in Gen 23:11 and 42:10; and (3 אדוני which introduces a clause providing more information כי ment, followed by the particle about the situation. In this final context, Zevit claims “The word lōʾ expresses a denial of everything said [in the previous statement], it is used elliptically for a negative sentence”, citing J. Blau, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz, 1976), §81.1. Blau cites Gen 37:32 and 42:10.

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-because it was “obvious חזה For Cohen, Amos was anxious to reject the title ly a lesser title”.14 But Cohen gives no justification for the supposed lower status are not חזה and the sixteen occurrences of the title ,חזה of those referred to by accompanied by editorial comment as to the status of the title or those who had a specialized meaning which set חזה hold it.15 Zevit argues that the term the sole difference appears to have been that those nebīʾīm“ ,נביא it apart from who enjoyed or depended upon royal patronage were also called ḥōzīm”16 and that it is used in v. 13 by Amaziah to “emphasize the impropriety of Amos, whom he believed to be patronized by the king of Judah, in delivering oracles against Jeroboam at Bethel, an Israelite sanctuary.”17 is not strong enough to חזה However, the evidence for Zevit’s definition of is certainly not restricted חזה support the argument he builds upon it. The verb to describing the actions of individuals attached to royal courts. Numerous occurrences of the verb have as subject individuals or groups who are not associated with a royal position.18 The sixteen occurrences of the masculine as a substantive in the Hebrew Bible do not support even an חזה participle of took a specialized חזה argument that the substantive masculine participle of meaning related to but independent of the semantics of the verbal root. Of who is definitively associated with חזה those sixteen occurrences six refer to a in 2 Sam 24:11 and 1 Chr 21:9 and as חזה דוד a king: Gad who is referred to as in 2 Chr 29:25 (Gad is also referred to as a seer who recorded the acts of חזה המלך King David in 1 Chr 29:29, but without the definitive possessive syntax), Heman

14 Cohen, “Amos Was a Navi,” HUCA 32 (1961): 177. Gonçalves notes “De même que le groupe ,חזה Speaking of the connotations of the root 15 ,peut être pris en bonne ou en mauvaise part.” See Francolino J. Gonçalves חזה ,נביא lexical “Les ‘prophètes Écrivains’ Étaient-Ils Des Nbyym?,” in The World of the Arameans I: Biblical Studies in Honour of Paul-Eugène Dion (ed. P.M. Michèle Daviau, John W. Wevers, and Michael Weigl Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 159. 16 Zevit, “A Misunderstanding at Bethel,” VT 25 (1975): 787. On pg. 786 Zevit says Shalom Paul is the first to argue that this specialized meaning should be applied to all occurrences of .citing the 1971 article by Shalom Paul, et al., “Prophets and Prophecy,” EncJud 16: 1155 ,חזה Interestingly, Paul does not pursue or adopt this argument in his 1991 commentary of Amos but only discusses the arguments of Zevit and states that several of the criticisms of Hoffmann, “Did Amos Regard Himself as a Nābī’,” VT 27 (1977): 209-12, are valid. See Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 245. 17 Zevit, “A Misunderstanding at Bethel,” VT 25 (1975): 789. 18 This includes Balaam (Num 24:4, 16), Micah (Mic 1:1), Habakkuk (Hab 1:1), Ezekiel (Ezek 12:27), a group of women condemned by Ezekiel (Ezek 13:23), and the people חזה of Ammon (Ezek 21:34). For these examples and more on the usage of the root see Gonçalves, “Les prophètes,” in The World of the Aramaeans I (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2001), 159-165.

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in 1 Chr 25:5, and Jeduthun who is referred to חזה המלך who is referred to as -as a pro חזה in 2 Chr 35:15. In the ten remaining occurrences of חזה המלך as phetic title, four occurrences describe seers who prophesy or write to or about kings but without any special designation of possession or employment,19 and the remaining six occurrences, including Amos 7:13, do not suggest any special meaning or connection to the court but are used in a manner with no clear 20.נביא distinction from the usage of Zevit suggests that the term or the sense “court-prophet” may have been borrowed from Aramaic,21 but the inscription of Zakir of Hamath refers only -who speak to the king without containing any special reference of pos חזין to session or attachment and does not support Zevit’s proposal.22 Furthermore, Shalom Paul notes that the term also appears in the first line of the text from which would seem to contradict the ,חזה אלהן Deir ʾAlla referring to Balaam as special meaning of a seer attached to a royal court, particularly as the inscription depicts Balaam only as receiving messages from the Gods and not relaying messages to them as a royal functionary would.23 in the Hebrew Bible supports only that it is a term used to חזה The usage of ,Therefore .נביא designate revelatory actors and is used in much the same way as חזה there is no discernable reason for Amos to immediately refute the title .instead נביא and then claim the title

19 Iddo about Jeroboam in 2 Chr 9:29; Iddo about Rehoboam in 2 Chr 12:15; Hanani whose son speaks to Jehosaphat in 2 Chr 19:2; a group of unnamed seers who speak to Manasseh in 2 Chr 33:18. This can hardly be used as evidence for Zevit’s argument, as numerous also speak and write to or about kings without receiving this designation, such as נביאים Samuel (1 Sam 3:20; 2 Chr 35:18) and Nathan (2 Sam 7:2, 12:25, 1 Kgs 1:8). 20 2 Kgs 17:13; Isa 29:10, 30:10; Amos 7:12; and Mic 3:7. 2 Chr 29:30 refers obliquely to a seer named Asaph whose words were sung along with David’s by Levites as part of Hezekiah’s restoration of temple worship, but his status as a prophet and the nature of his relationship with David is unclear. 21 Zevit, “A Misunderstanding at Bethel,” VT 25 (1975): 789. 22 As translated by Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 241: “I lifted up my hands to and (חזין) Baalshamayn, and Baalshamayn answered me and spoke to me through seers diviners” [KAI I.202:11-12]. Paul describes the text as “the early eighth-century Aramaic inscription of Zakir, king of Hamath, a contemporary of Amos.” 23 Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 241. Note that the language of Deir Alla is debated, see P.K. McCarter, “The Balaam Texts from Deir Alla: The First Combination,” BASOR 239 (1980): 49-60; Jo Ann Hackett, The Balaam Text from Deir ’Alla (Chico: Scholars, 1984); J. Hofijzer and G. Van der Kooij, eds., The Balaam Text from Deir ’Alla Re-Evaluated: Proceedings of the International Symposium Held at Leiden 21-24 August 1989 (Leiden: Brill, 1991); Gary A. Rendsburg, “The Dialect of the Deir ʾAlla Inscription,” BO 50 (1993): 309-29.

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2 Affirmative Emphatic Declarative (Present) + Negative Declarative (Present)

I am surely a prophet but I am not a member of the prophetic group.

is an לא In this interpretation put forth by H. Neil Richardson in 1961, the first emphatic particle. The force of the first clause is to emphatically claim the title and the second clause rejects the ,חזה as a means of rejecting the title נביא of as a means to emphasize the following claim that he was called by בן נביא title YHWH.24 This interpretation can be disqualified because the evidence suggests that לא does not exist as an independent particle לא the emphatic or asseverative in Biblical Hebrew. There is evidence for an asseverative proclitic particle, but the form in v. 14 is very unlikely to be an exemplar.25 As it was established in was not derogatory nor objectionable, this חזה the previous subsection that interpretation does not explain why Amos would so forcefully claim the title In short, while this interpretation may be technically possible if the text .נביא is emended, there is little support for it.

3 Negative Declarative (Present) + Explicative Negative Declarative (Present)

I am not a prophet, that is, I am not a professional prophet/member of a prophetic group.

,has two meanings, “a professional nābîʾ נביא Ernest Vogt claimed in 1957 that one who by his own free choice joined one of the religious guilds of the něbîʾîm” or “the more specific meaning of a prophet whom God has called to announce

24 Richardson, “Critical Note on Amos 7:14,” JBL 85 (1966): 89. 25 John Huehnergard has shown that the particle lū in Biblical Hebrew is optative, intro- in concessive clauses, but ו duces unreal conditions, or is preceded by the conjunction the attestations suggested to be asseverative (such as 2 Kgs 5:26) may be equally well understood as rhetorical questions or a conditional protasis. Huehnergard does find in Qoh 9:4, Ps 89:19, and ל evidence for an emphatic or asseverative proclitic particle לא נביא Ps 119:91, but identifying such a form in v. 14 would require an emendation from -a reading that is not extant in any witness including the LXX render ,לנביא אנכי to אנכי ing, which preserves the negation in this clause. See John Huehnergard, “Asseverative *la and Hypothetical *lu/law in Semitic,” JAOS 103 (1983): 571-74, 583-84, 590-92. Note that the reference to 2 Sam 18:12 is actually cited by Huehnergard as 2 Sam 18:22; but the text he quotes is from v. 12 and this appears to be a typographical error.

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which precedes ו his words.” The second clause is marked by the explicative “a noun phrase specifying or glossing another noun”, in which he uses a term to clarify which ,בן נביא ,which can only mean a professional prophet by choice -he is denying.26 Jörg Jeremias adopts a similar inter נביא meaning of the term pretation. He states the second clause “is not intended to offer any additional statement, but rather a more precise delineation of the first one” in which Amos specifies that it is not training, but the direct call of YHWH that makes him a prophet.27 and נביא This interpretation must be rejected because the meanings of it assumes are incorrect. There is no evidence that the nominal forms בן נביא -carried two specific meanings referring either to professional or non נביא of professional prophets. Instead, the word seems to be applied to a wide range of people without consideration for their employment or means of support, whether they are named or anonymous, whether their prophecies are purely declarative or rhetorical or conditional, leading Gonçalves to state “L’AT ac- peut designer tout נביא״ corde ce titre à un très large éventail d’hommes” and prophète”.28 Whether the title may have had a more specific meaning at any point, as Gonçalves argues, or not, it is evident that in the received form of the Hebrew Bible as it has been transmitted to us, the term is used very broadly, without the type of distinction Vogt seeks to place upon it. refers to a group of בן נביא Even more problematic is the assumption that professional prophets or individuals who sought out the office of prophet. outside of this one, there is no clear בן נביא Among the eleven attestations of were or how they were assembled, and בני נביאים information about who the there is no evidence that individuals could become a member of the group by choice or that they are receiving material support due to their membership.29 There is also very little evidence that they were being trained as prophets.

26 Vogt, “Waw Explicative in Amos Vii 14,” The Expository Times 68 (1957): 301-2. For the defi- see Bruce K. Waltke and M. O’Connor, An Introduction to Biblical ו nition of explicative Hebrew Syntax (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1990), §39.2.1; also GKC §154a, footnote 1, and David W. Baker, “Further Examples of the Waw-Explicativum,” VT 30 (1980): 129-36. 27 Jeremias, The Book of Amos (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 135-40. 28 Gonçalves, “Les prophètes,” in The World of the Aramaeans I (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, .נביא after surveying the usage of 331 attestations of nominal forms of ,146-48 ,(2001 29 The term appears in 1 Kgs 20:35; 2 Kgs 2:3, 5, 7, 15; 4:1, 38 (2x); 5:22; 6:1; 9:1 and Amos 7:14. dies and בני נביאים The only time material wealth is mentioned at all is when one of the his widow asks Elisha for financial assistance, but there is no claim made that Elisha or the community supported the man or his family during his life, and she certainly would not be the first widow to receive financial assistance from a prophet without such a claim, see 1 Kgs 17:7-16.

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who are בני נביאים There is no indication of Elisha teaching anything to the associated with him, they act as servants more than anything else and do not who does something בני נביאים prophesy or receive oracles. The only one of the recognizably prophetic is the man in 1 Kgs 20:35-43 who receives no instruction or direction, but instead acts as any lone prophet would and speaks on behalf of YHWH to the King of Israel. This text might suggest that the term -could be used to refer to prophets in addition to its other usage refer בני נביאים ring to servants of prophets, but such a reading is ambiguous because the man in 1 Kgs 20:38.30 Even if this text is used to נביא is also referred to directly as a argue that the phrase could refer to people who engaged in prophecy, there by professional נביאים is nothing to suggest they are distinguished from other were בני נביאים status or by choice. In all attestations, there is no evidence that perceived as professional prophets, or as individuals who sought out the prophetic title of their own volition, and there is little to suggest they were prophets in training. in mind it is clear that בן נביא and נביא With the attested semantic values of that is to say, I am not a ,נביא there is no reason for Amos to declare: “I am not a ,in order to declare that he is not a professional or a prophet by choice ”בן נביא or that he had not received training.31 Neither title held any connotation that conflicted with his claim that he prophesies at YHWH’s behest.

it is not clear if this text ,נביא and a בן נביא Because this individual is referred to as both a 30 It is possible that .בני נביאים can be used as evidence for normal prophetic activity by but it is also possible that that ,בן נביא he was able to prophesy because of his status as and it is ,נביא before becoming a בן נביא designation was incidental, perhaps he was a in that capacity or another that he is able to prophesy. The groups referred to four times in 2 Kings 2 seem to be independent groups from Bethel, Jericho, and possibly a third group who meet Elisha at the Jordan, all of whom seem to understand that Elijah will be taken away, although perplexingly the group from Jericho asks Elisha afterward to look for Elijah in some distant geographic location. These may or may not be the same groups who appear to be companions and servants of Elisha in 2 Kgs 4:1; 38 (2x); 5:22; 6:1 and 9:1. In -to anoint Jehu, but he simply repeats the mes בני נביאים Kgs 9:1 Elisha sends one of the 2 sage, with some embellishment, and he does not prophesy or do anything else. 31 Another unsubstantiated proposal that focuses on volition is that of John D.W. Watts, Vision and Prophecy in Amos (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1958), 10-12. He reads the focus of the nominal clauses not on tense but on mood, as “a kind of subjunctive of volition” which stresses Amos’s lack of choice regarding his current vocation. This interpretation must be rejected due to a total lack of evidence for the very existence of verbless clauses which primarily express modality without contextual indication.

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4 Rhetorical Question + Rhetorical Question

Am I not a prophet? Am I not a member of the prophetic group?

G.R. Driver has proposed that Amos perceived that his prophetic commission was being called into question due to his agricultural occupations, leading him to indignantly reassert his authority in the form of two rhetorical questions suggesting an affirmative answer that he is indeed a prophet and a son of a -can mark rhetorical questions meant to as לא prophet.32 Driver is correct that sert the affirmative form of the clause which the particle precedes, even when -But the examples which he pro .ה not preceded by the interrogative particle vides have clear contextual support which is absent in v. 14, making this reading entirely speculative.33 What makes this speculative reading impossible is that it requires Amos to aggressively deny an assertion that Amaziah never made. Amaziah never calls חזה Amos’s status as a prophet into question. By addressing him by the title in Israel no longer, Amaziah is הנבא in Judah but to הנבא and telling him to rather supporting Amos’s prophetic identity; he is simply telling him to go be a prophet elsewhere. Likewise, Amaziah’s comments betray no rejection or even knowledge of Amos’s agricultural activities. This proposal is therefore to be rejected.

5 Negative Declarative (Ironic) + Negative Declarative (Ironic)

I am certainly not a prophet! I am certainly not a member of the prophetic group! [No, I am just a simple worker! You, the priest at Bethel, have totally overestimated my humble status!]

In his 1996 article, Åke Viberg claims that the lack of a straightforward solution suggests that these two clauses are spoken ironically by Amos to emphasize that his “status as a prophet owes nothing to man, and therefore he is not subject to any form of institution such as the cult at Bethel, only to the command

32 Driver, “Amos 7:14,” The Expository Times 67 (1955): 91-93; see also Ackroyd, “Amos 7:14,” The Expository Times 68 (1956): 94-95. 33 Driver provides as effective examples 2 Kgs 5:26; Jon 4:11; Job 2:10, 11:11, 14:16, 21:29, Lam 3:38. See also 1 Sam 21:16, which begins with a rhetorical question without the inter- .ה which is followed by a rhetorical question which is marked by interrogative ה rogative For another example of a rhetorical question anticipating an inverted response but which .see Exod 15:11 ,לא does not contain

Vetus TestamentumDownloaded from 68 Brill.com09/25/2021(2018) 620-642 05:04:59AM via free access On the Possible Interpretations of Amos 7:14 633 of YHWH. Amos is indeed a prophet, a nābîʾ, but that is not the issue; the important question is who has made him a prophet, who has commissioned him and who legitimates his message.”34 It is indeed possible that Amos’s response was meant to be ironic, but Viberg’s case is not as strong as he suggests. Viberg’s first point in support of his claim is that these clauses are quoted in Zech 13:5, which appears to be ironic. However, the presentation of a text in citation cannot be used to argue for the interpretation of its original source. When biblical writers alluded to or quoted another text they were free to represent the cited text in any way that met their rhetorical goals, even if that differed from its meaning in the original work.35 While Viberg is correct that irony appears frequently in Amos, this cannot be seen as definitive evidence that irony is employed here.36 Viberg’s proposed interpretation of an ironic statement is possible, but is supported by very little evidence. It is based on the premise that Amos could not possibly actually mean what he appears to be saying. This premise, and Viberg’s proposal, should only be adopted if a stronger case cannot be made for an interpretation of the text in which Amos does actually mean what he appears to be saying. As we will see in the following sections, this is not the case.

6 Negative Declarative (Past) + Negative Declarative (Past)

I was not a prophet. I was not a member of the prophetic group.

In this interpretation, Amos claims that his chosen profession was agricultural, as a worker of animals and trees, and that he only left it when he was told to prophesy to Israel by YHWH.37 When the clauses are read as a reference to

34 Viberg, “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 112. For another slightly different reading of irony in a reader-response approach to this text, see García-Treto, “The Case of Amos 7.10-17,” in The New Literary Criticism and the Hebrew Bible (Sheffield: JSOT, 1993), 114-24. 35 See for example when Exod 20:24 is cited in Deut 12:14-15, the meaning of the lemma ,is drastically changed from ‘every place’ to a single ‘place’, see Bernard M. Levinson מקום Deuteronomy and the Hermeneutics of Legal Innovation (New York: Oxford University, 1997), 35. For more on inner-biblical allusion see Michael Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon, 1985); and Benjamin D. Sommer, A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40-66 (Stanford, Calif: Stanford University, 1998). 36 Viberg identifies irony in Amos 1:3-2:16 (especially 2:6-16), 3:2, 12, 4:1, 4-5, 5:18-20, and 6:1-7, see Viberg, “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 108-10. 37 This has been supported by Rowley, “Was Amos a Nabi’?” in Festschrift Otto Eissfeldt (Halle: Niemeyer, 1947), 191-98; Mays, Amos (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969), 136-38; Bach, “Erwägungen Zu Amos 7,14,” in Die Botschaft Und Die Boten (Neukirchen-Vluyn:

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Amos’s past vocation, they remain silent as to whether he currently sees himself as a prophet or a member of a prophetic community. Mays articulates one of the principal arguments for this interpretation: “Nominal sentences tend to follow the time reference of verbs and adverbs in the immediate context”.38 This principle would designate the finite verb at the beginning of v. 15, which refers to an action that occurred prior ויקחני to Amos’s statement, as the indicator of the past tense of the nominal clauses. However, Mays points out that this rule is not infallible and “it is possible for nominal sentences to refer to the present in contrast to the following inflected verbs,” leading to the conclusion, in agreement with Rowley, that “the problem of tense is not soluble by resort to grammatical analysis.”39 Paul points out that ,in v. 13 תוסיף the tense of the nominal clauses could also rely upon the verb which would suggest a reading in the present, concluding “If an unambigu- ous solution were available, the problem would have been resolved ages ago.”40 The most that can be said for the interpretation of these nominal clauses on the grounds of their connection with the verb in v. 15 is that a past tense reading is possible, but by no means certain. The past tense interpretation of these clauses is specifically challenged by Wolff and by Gass. Wolff claims that this text is an exception to the general rule described above because the three nominal clauses in v. 14 are significant in their own right and need not be dependent upon another grammatical object for their tense value.41 This idea is interesting, but even if it is accepted it does not rule out the possibility of a past tense interpretation.

Neukirchener, 1981), 203-16; Anderson and Freedman, Amos (New York: Doubleday, 1989), 762-90; Jeremias, The Book of Amos (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 135-40. Shalom Paul translates the clauses in the past tense although he seems to indicate that he believes the interpretation cannot be established definitively, see Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 238-47. For a view that subscribes to this principle govern- ing the tense of nominal clauses but which argues that it should not be applied here see Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 312-13. Wolff’s position will be discussed further below. 38 Mays, Amos (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969), 137. 39 Mays, Amos (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969), 137. See Rowley, “Was Amos a Nabi’?” in Festschrift Otto Eissfeldt (Halle: Niemeyer, 1947), 191, “While therefore, the rendering by the past tense is fully permissible … we cannot affirm that this is the only permissible rendering.” Erasmus Gass makes all sorts of arguments for why the text of v. 14 may not necessarily be connected to v. 15, Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 10-11. But he does not attempt to make a case that the two sections of text cannot be associated, leaving the possibility open. 40 Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 244, 247. 41 Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 312-13.

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More definitive would be the argument that the clauses of v. 14 cannot refer to the past because the verse does not employ an imperfect form of the verb For Wolff this requirement is an exception to the general rule discussed .היה above:

We must recognize that in 7:15 an event of the past is referred to solely because it determines the present. Were the purpose of 7:14 neverthe- less to describe a state of affairs antecedent to the event, then one would I was”) in 7:14 (comparable to the use of“) הייתי expect the finite verb -in Gen 1:3). Thus a more comprehen ויאמר in Gen 1:2 preceding היתה sive assessment of the syntax favors a present-tense understanding of Amos 7:14.42

Despite the collective scholarly desire to find a rule which allows for definitive interpretation of nominal or verbless clauses, there is no justification for the claim that nominal clauses cannot independently refer to a past event without I cite here two passages from the Hebrew Bible which .היה a form of the verb or any other verb can היה show that a nominal statement without a form of describe a situation in the past:

Deuteronomy 26:5

וענית ואמרת לפני יהוה אלהיך ארמי אבד אבי וירד מצרימה ויגר שם במתי מעט ויהי שם לגוי גדול עצום ורב

You will respond and you will say before YHWH your God: “My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down to Egypt and dwelt there with a few people and he became there a great nation, mighty and populous.”

42 Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 312-13. Wolff is cited by Gilbert, “Amos’s Prophetic Status,” EgT 28 (1997): 292. Gass makes a similar argument, saying: “Für ein היה präteritales Verständnis der Sätze in V. 14 würde man zudem eine Verbalform von erwarten”, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 12. Viberg also seems to take issue with this assertion in “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 99-108, stating that the standard view that nominal clauses can reflect various possible tenses is “not a very satisfying solution.” He seems generally dissatisfied with the ambiguity, stating on pg. 93 that if a straightforward meaning had been intended it could have been communicated “in a clearer and less ambiguous way than three successive nominal clauses” but not giving any basis for why the less ambiguous interpretation would be preferred.

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This text contains a nominal clause in which the predicate precedes the subject and which appears at the beginning of a quotation and is followed by a verb describing an action in the past, all features which it shares with the clauses clearly describes ,ארמי אבד אבי ,in Amos 7:14. The nominal clause in question a situation in the distant past that can under no circumstances be the present. The patriarch Jacob certainly is not currently wandering during the temporal setting depicted by this text. This is a definitive example of a nominal clause -which depicts a past situation. It is followed immedi היה without any form of appended to a verb depicting a past event, the same ו ately by the conjunction construction as that of the three nominal clauses in Amos 7:14.

2 Chronicles 33:1

בן שתים עשרה שנה מנשה במכלו וחמשים וחמש שנה מלך בירושלם

Manasseh was twelve years old when he began his reign. He reigned twenty- five years in Jerusalem.

This passage introduces a new section of Chronicles that deals with the reign of Manasseh. It begins with a nominal clause that clearly depicts a situation in the past from the perspective of the Chronicler, the beginning of Manasseh’s or any other verb. The predicate is a temporal היה reign, and does not contain -The main clause is fol .מנשה ,phrase which precedes the subject of the clause lowed by a prepositional phrase. This clause is typical of the introduction to the reign of kings described throughout Chronicles, but that does not prevent it from demonstrating the grammatical possibility of nominal clauses repre- senting past events. Gass also asserts on the basis of several comparable examples that the clauses cannot be referring to a state in the past: “Um eine vergangenheitliche Aussage zu treffen, hätte der Autor von Am 7,14 die Konstruktion mit qatal wählen, ein sPP betont voranstellen und die Negation direkt vor das Verbum platzieren können.” But Gass’s comparative examples can only indicate that certain grammatical constructions can be used to describe a present state of affairs and do not in any way rule out the possibility that the nominal clauses may refer to a state in the past.43 Simply, there is no significant evidence that

43 Gass seems to suggest that Exodus 4:10, which also contains nominal clauses which describe a present situation preceding a verbal clause which describes a past action which influenced that present situation, is strong evidence that v. 14 must be interpreted in the same way. But the existence of Exodus 4:10, while illustrative of the possibility

Vetus TestamentumDownloaded from 68 Brill.com09/25/2021(2018) 620-642 05:04:59AM via free access On the Possible Interpretations of Amos 7:14 637 the rules of Hebrew grammar make a simple past tense interpretation of the nominal clauses in v. 14 impossible. A similar reading in which the nominal clauses in v. 14 are contrastive or concessive clauses which are subordinated to the verbal clause in v. 15 and therefore should be interpreted with a similar past tense expression has been proposed by Bach and supported by Jeremias.44 The concessive force of these ,נביא clauses would not say anything about Amos’s past or present status as a pointing out instead that his call came in spite of his occupation: “Ohne daß ich Prophet war oder mich auch nur zu einer Prophetengruppe hielt—ich war vielmehr bloß Rinderhirt und Maulbeerfeigenzüchter, hat Jahwe mich hinter dem Kleinvieh weggenommen …”.45 Both Viberg and Gass argue against this proposal. Gass summarizes the arguments employed by both scholars:

Problematisch ist es auch, die Nominalsätze als Nebensätze zu V. 15 mit kontrastiver oder konzessiver Funktion zu deuten, da solche in der Regel dem Hauptsatz folgen und nicht asyndetisch gefügt werden. steht, die das Prädikat des לא Da in den Nominalsätzen die Negation Satzes und nicht den Satz als Ganzen verneint, liegt auch aufgrund der Frontstellung des verneinten Prädikats eine besondere Emphase auf den Nominalsätzen. Eine Unterordnung unter den entfernten wayyiqtol-Satz von V. 15 ist somit kaum anzunehmen.46

of Gass’s favored interpretation, does not rule out other possibilities. See Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 16-19. 44 Bach, “Erwägungen Zu Amos 7,14,” in Die Botschaft Und Die Boten (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1981), 203-16. See also Jeremias, The Book of Amos (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 135, 139. 45 Bach, “Erwägungen Zu Amos 7,14,” in Die Botschaft Und Die Boten (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1981), 213. Note that Bach says the clause should be introduced with “Ohne daß” to get at the thrust of the concessive/contrastive clause, suggesting something like “Without being a prophet or a member of a guild of prophets …”. Interestingly, when rendering Bach’s proposal into English both Jeremias and Viberg translate somewhat differ- ently: “Although I was not a prophet, or belonged to a group of prophets … YHWH took me …” in Viberg “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 91-114; and “Although I (was) no prophet, nor member of a prophetic guild, but rather a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees, Yahweh took me …” in Jeremias, The Book of Amos (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 135. 46 Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 12. See also Viberg “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 105-106.

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The first argument is that this is unlikely to be a concessive clause because ,However .ו the subordinate clause is normally marked by a conjunction such as several textual examples show that no such conjunction is necessary.47 Their second argument is that the subordinate clause normally follows the main כי נער ישראל ,clause, but this is also unsupported. See for example Hos 11:1 -in which a nominal subordinate clause marked as such by the con ,ואהבהו ”.precedes the main clause: “When Israel was a youth I loved him כי junction This clause aligns with .ויכסהו בבגדים ולא יחם לו ,Another example is in 1 Kgs 1:1 Bach’s proposal of vv. 14-15 in that the concessive clause “Although they cov- ered him with clothes” precedes the main clause “He was not warm”. There is no evidence that the concessive clause must follow the main clause. instead of the לא Viberg and Gass also argue that the use of the particle ,focuses the negative force of the expression upon the predicate אין particle and that this makes it less likely that the clauses in v. 14 are subordinated to does focus לא the verbal clause of v. 15, but their reasoning is unclear. Even if the negation on the predicate rather than the entire clause, this would not make it impossible for the clause to be dependent upon another clause. In conclusion, the textual evidence indicates that a past tense interpretation of the nominal clauses in v. 14 is grammatically possible, either as simple declarative clauses or as concessive clauses.

7 Negative Declarative (Present) + Negative Declarative (Present)

I am not a prophet. I am not a member of a group of prophets.

and then tells of בן נביא and נביא In this interpretation Amos rejects the titles YHWH calling him to prophesy, then prophesies. This requires a reexamina- ,נביא ,חזה tion of the semantics of the terms related to prophecy, including .which appear in this passage ,הנבא and the verb בן נביא The present tense interpretation goes against the interpretation of the LXX, which includes ἤμην, the first-person singular imperfect indicative middle/ passive form of the verb ειμι “to be”. In addition to the regular issues complicat- ing the reliability of the LXX, it must be noted that the ambiguity of this text would have forced the LXX translator to undergo the same process of interpretation as modern commentators. In this case even more than usual the rendering of the LXX should not be seen as definitive but as an interpretative attempt to make sense of an ambiguous foreign-language text.

47 See for example the unmarked subordinate clauses in Gen 12:8; 24:22; Exod 32:15-16, Ps 39:2 (three of which are cited by Viberg himself as exceptions).

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If the tense of nominal clauses is determined by association with a nearby verbal form, it is possible that these clauses describe a situation in the present due to their association with present verbal forms in vv. 12-13.48 But even if this principle is to be rejected, nominal clauses can refer to the present tense without regard for any perceived association with verbs describing the past or any temporal frame, as shown by the following example.

Exodus 6:2-3

וידבר אלהים אל משה ויאמר אליו אני יהוה וארא אל אברהם אל יצחק ואל יעקב באל שדי ושמי יהוה לא נודעתי להם

God spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am YHWH. I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as El Shaddai, but by my name YHWH I did not make my- self known to them.”

Similar to Amos 7:14, this text contains a declarative statement, beginning with a nominal clause, in this case undoubtedly in the present tense due to the semantics of “I am YHWH”, and immediately followed by a verb describing actions that occurred in the past. There is no grammatical reason to assert that the clauses in v. 14 cannot describe a present state. But both Amaziah and Amos describe Amos’s actions leading some to assert that such an interpretation leads ,הנבא using the verb to an incoherent reading of the passage: “Can Amos deny that he is at present if he has accepted and is carrying out Yahweh’s command to (נביא) ’a ‘prophet 49”?(הנבא) ’prophesy‘ suggest that the נב״א Gonçalves’s survey of the verbal forms of the root Chacune des différentes“ ,נביאים is not restricted to הנבא activity of the verb catégories de prophètes que l’on a rencontrées peut etre le sujet. Cela dit, le plus souvent le sujet n’est pas appelé prophète.” Gonçalves goes on to list

48 See Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 312-13; Gilbert, “Amos’s Prophetic Status,” EgT 28 (1997): 292; Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 10-12. Wolff and Gilbert also argue that it is possible that v. 15 only refers to an event in the past because it determines the present situation, making it more likely that the clauses describing that situation in v. 14 are in the present tense. 49 Wolff, Joel and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 313. Several commentators reject the present interpretation on these grounds, see Viberg “Subtle Irony,” TynBul 47 (1996): 102- 103; Paul, Amos (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 249, who says, “The attempt to distinguish here is totally without הנבא in the former verse and the verb נביא between the noun basis.”

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for whom התנבא or הנבא several individuals who are the subject of the verb ;(is unlikely: Saul (1 Sam 10:6, 10, 11, 13; 18:10; 19:23-24 נביא the designation Saul’s messengers (1 Sam 19:20-21); Pashur the Priest (Jer 20:6); the sons and daughters of all Israel (Joel 3:1); and the daughters of Israel who prophesy out נביא of their own hearts (Ezek 13:17).50 None of these people receive the title explicitly, and it would be difficult to justify giving them the title implicitly. In seer” in“ ראה seems to bear some similarity to the title נביא this sense, the title to see” would be called“ ראה that not everyone who is the subject of the verb would be הנבא seer”, and not everyone that is the subject of the verb“ ראה a -There is therefore no semantic conflict between Amos refus 51.נביא called a and the ,הנבא but asserting that YHWH asked him to נביא ing the designation clauses may be interpreted as declarative and describing a present state.52 The analysis of the relevant data shows that the majority of proposed interpretations of v. 14 must be rejected and that the text must be understood clause which כי to be two negative nominal declarative clauses followed by a includes an affirmative nominal declarative sentence. They could be inter to Amos in the בן נביא and נביא preted as rejecting the application of the titles present or in the past, either simply or as concessive clauses.

50 Gonçalves, “Les prophètes” in The World of the Aramaeans I (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2001), 157. see also Klaus-Peter Adam, “ ‘And he behaved like a נבא On the meaning of the verb 51 -hitpael and the com נבא prophet among them.’ (1Sam 10:11b): The depreciative use of parative evidence of ecstatic prophecy,’” WO 39 (2009): 3-57. Adam argues specifically that the hithpael form of the verb can be used to depict “acting in the way of a prophet,” or “pretending to be in the social position that is signified by the root.” 52 This was proposed as early as Morgenstern, “Amos Studies I,” HUCA 11 (1936): 48-51, who says that Amos used this word because there was no other word at his disposal, and that this attestation marks an expansion of meaning outside of the activities of professional prophets to include the activities of all called by YHWH to communicate a message. See also Hoffmann, “Did Amos Regard Himself as a Nābī’,” VT (1977): 209-12, who states like them. Wolff, Joel נביאים that Amos was trying to differentiate from Elijah, Elisha and and Amos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 313, states that Amos distinguished between the office and the act. Stoebe, “Noch Einmal Zu Amos VII 10-17,” VT 39 (1989): 342, agrees with Morgenstern and stresses the distance from institutional prophets. Gass, “Zum Selbstverständnis Des Propheten Amos in Am 7,14,” TZ 68 (2012): 20, argues for a differ- and stresses that ,נב״א ence between the noun (office) and verb (activity) of the root Amos feels that a layperson can partake in the activity normally attributed to professional prophets. Also favoring the interpretation of the present tense are Robert R. Wilson, “Prophecy and Ecstasy” JBL 98 (1979): 269; García-Treto, “The Case of Amos 7.10-17,” in The New Literary Criticism and the Hebrew Bible (Sheffield: JSOT, 1993), 114-24; Tsevat, “Amos 7:14—Present or Preterit?” in The Tablet and the Scroll (Bethesda: CDL, 1993), 258.

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Conclusion

Although this analysis preserves several possible interpretations of Amos 7:14, each of the remaining options would fulfill a similar rhetorical role in Amos’s speech in vv. 14-17. Describing either past or present, these clauses assert that Amos is motivated only by his desire to obey YHWH and not by the interests that Amaziah has associated with him. If the clauses depict the present situation relative to the time of the narrative of the encounter, then Amos claims not to be a prophet but an agricultural laborer. Claiming a vocation other than prophecy suggests that Amos is not motivated by the economic concerns mentioned by Amaziah, and one who is not a prophet would not be prophesying at Bethel simply because it was a convenient place to do so. Rhetorically, this sets up the following verse where Amos informs Amaziah of the actual motivation for his prophetic activity at Bethel: YHWH’s instruction to prophesy to Israel. If the clauses depict the past situation relative to the time of the narrative of the encounter, then Amos is claiming that when he was motivated by the economic concerns Amaziah attributes to him, he did not choose to prophesy but chose to tend trees and cattle. This suggests that now, when Amos is prophesying, he is no longer motivated by economic concerns and thus the issues raised by Amaziah do not affect his decision to prophecy at Bethel. Again, this rhetorically sets up the following verse where Amos informs Amaziah of the actual motivation for his prophetic activity at Bethel: YHWH’s instruction to prophesy to Israel.53 Both readings fit into the beginning of the logical progression of the speech laid out above: 1) I am not a prophet, I am an agricultural worker, OR 1) I was not a prophet, I was an agricultural worker, but 2) YHWH told me to prophesy to Israel; so even though 3) you are telling me not to prophesy to Israel, 4) I am prophesying to Israel. The nominal clauses describing the circumstances of the present or the past make clear that Amos’s decision is not influenced by the factors which Amaziah had assumed, preparing for the revelation of Amos’s true motivation in his prophetic call in the following verse. The clauses of v. 14 have the same rhetorical value when they are interpreted to describe the past and the present. In both cases, these clauses indicate that Amos’s decision to prophesy at Bethel is not affected by the factors assumed

53 This effect is the same if the clauses are concessive. They still highlight rhetorically that when Amos pursued his own economic or other interests, he chose to do so as an agricultural worker, not by prophecy.

Vetus Testamentum 68 (2018) 620-642 Downloaded from Brill.com09/25/2021 05:04:59AM via free access 642 Ridge by Amaziah.54 This sets up the following prophetic call narrative which reveals that YHWH’s specific instructions to Amos were the only deciding factor. In both cases, the logical progression of the speech of Amos leads to the conclusion that Amos will continue prophesying to Israel in accordance with YHWH’s instructions. Amos’s statement about his relationship to the prophetic titles has garnered a great deal of attention in part because of its implications for understanding ancient conceptions of prophecy. All of the possible interpretive possibilities function rhetorically to take the focus of the text away from the titles them- selves. Instead, the text and its characters focus on the prophetic act, including where it takes place, who its audience is, and what factors motivate individuals to begin and continue its practice. Whatever their intended interpretation, the statements of Amos in v. 14 do provide evidence for what aspects of prophecy are most worthy of attention within the community of the text’s creation.

54 These factors include the economic or what might be termed the professional. Thus, in applied either to his past or present, forms ,נביא this context, Amos’s rejection of the term a part of his rejection of professional status or economic motivations. But because the rejection of the term in v. 14 is only the first part of his claim, this attestation cannot does נביא be used as definitive evidence contradicting my earlier claim that the word not carry economic or professional connotations in its definition. There may very well be and receive payment for their services, similar to נביא individuals who are referred to as the payments envisioned by Amaziah, but there are no grounds for arguing that there is a particular definition of the word which by necessity includes this semantic component.

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