Christian Standard Bible
Amos 5:18
18Woe to you who long for the day of the Lord! What will the day of the Lord be for you? It will be darkness and not light.
Amos 5:18 in other versions
- King James Version (KJV)Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! to what end is it for you? the day of the Lord is darkness, and not light.
- New International Version (NIV)Woe to you who long for the day of the Lord! Why do you long for the day of the Lord? That day will be darkness, not light.
- English Standard Version (ESV)Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord! Why would you have the day of the Lord? It is darkness, and not light,
- New King James Version (NKJV)Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord! For what good is the day of the Lord to you? It will be darkness, and not light.
Context of Amos 5:18
16Therefore the Lord, the God of Armies, the Lord, says: There will be wailing in all the public squares; they will cry out in anguish in all the streets. The farmer will be called on to mourn, and professional mourners to wail. 17There will be wailing in all the vineyards, for I will pass among you. The Lord has spoken. Woe to you who long for the day of the Lord! What will the day of the Lord be for you? It will be darkness and not light. 19It will be like a man who flees from a lion only to have a bear confront him. He goes home and rests his hand against the wall only to have a snake bite him. 20Won’t the day of the Lord be darkness rather than light, even gloom without any brightness in it?
Read all of Amos 5Amos 5:18 word by word
ה֥וֹי הַמִּתְאַוִּ֖ים אֶת־י֣וֹם יְהוָ֑ה לָמָּה־זֶּ֥ה לָכֶ֛ם י֥וֹם יְהוָ֖ה הוּא־חֹ֥שֶׁךְ וְלֹא־אֽוֹר׃Read the interlinear
Words taken from the KJV.
Cross-references for Amos 5:18
- Isaiah 5:19to those who say, “Let him hurry up and do his work quickly so that we can see it! Let the plan of the Holy One of Israel take place so that we can know it!”
- Isaiah 28:15For you said, “We have made a covenant with Death, and we have an agreement with Sheol; when the overwhelming catastrophe passes through, it will not touch us, because we have made falsehood our refuge and have hidden behind treachery.”
- Jeremiah 17:15Hear how they keep challenging me, “Where is the word of the Lord? Let it come!”
- Ezekiel 12:22“Son of man, what is this proverb you people have about the land of Israel, which goes, ‘The days keep passing by, and every vision fails’?
- Malachi 3:1“See, I am going to send my messenger, and he will clear the way before me. Then the Lord you seek will suddenly come to his temple, the Messenger of the covenant you delight in — see, he is coming,” says the Lord of Armies.
- 2 Peter 3:4saying, “Where is his ‘coming’ that he promised? Ever since our ancestors fell asleep, all things continue as they have been since the beginning of creation.”
- Isaiah 5:30On that day they will roar over it, like the roaring of the sea. When one looks at the land, there will be darkness and distress; light will be obscured by clouds.
- Isaiah 9:19The land is scorched by the wrath of the Lord of Armies, and the people are like fuel for the fire. No one has compassion on his brother.
- Isaiah 24:11In the streets they cry for wine. All joy grows dark; earth’s rejoicing goes into exile.
- Jeremiah 30:7How awful that day will be! There will be no other like it! It will be a time of trouble for Jacob, but he will be saved out of it.
- Joel 1:15Woe because of that day! For the day of the Lord is near and will come as devastation from the Almighty.
- Joel 2:1Blow the ram’s horn in Zion; sound the alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the residents of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming; in fact, it is near —
- Zephaniah 1:14The great day of the Lord is near, near and rapidly approaching. Listen, the day of the Lord — then the warrior’s cry is bitter.
- Malachi 4:1“For look, the day is coming, burning like a furnace, when all the arrogant and everyone who commits wickedness will become stubble. The coming day will consume them,” says the Lord of Armies, “not leaving them root or branches.
- 2 Peter 3:10But the day of the Lord will come like a thief; on that day the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, the elements will burn and be dissolved, and the earth and the works on it will be disclosed.
Commentaries on Amos 5:18
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 18Wo unto you that desire the day of the Lord - The prophet had often denounced the coming of God's day, that is, of a time of judgment; and the unbelievers had said, "Let his day come, that we may see it." Now the prophet tells them that that day would be to them darkness - calamity, and not light - not prosperity.Read the comment
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible · v. 18Woe unto you that desire - for yourselves. The Day of the Lord - There were “mockers in those days” 2 Peter 3:3-4; Jude 1:18, as there are now, and as there shall be in the last. And as the “scoffers in the last days” 2 Peter 3:3-4; Jude 1:18 shall say, “Where is the promise of His coming?” so these said, “let Him make speed and hasten His work, that we way see it, and let the council of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we may know it”…Read the comment
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary · v. 18-27Verses 18-27 Woe unto those that desire the day of the Lord's judgments, that wish for times of war and confusion; as some who long for changes, hoping to rise upon the ruins of their country! but this should be so great a desolation, that nobody could gain by it. The day of the Lord will be a dark, dismal, gloomy day to all impenitent sinners. When God makes a day dark, all the world cannot make it light. Those who are not reformed by the judgments of…Read the comment
- Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 18Amos again challenges the Israelites' mistaken belief about their chosen status (see Amos 3:2). The phrase What will the Day of the LORD be for you indicates despair from a great tragedy. In the Old Testament, the day of the Lord (see Isaiah 13:6, 9) was when God would intervene to fix what was wrong. God's intervention would mean vindication for the righteous and judgment for the wicked. Israel believed that on that day (see also Amos 8:3, 9, 13; 9:11)…Read the comment
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 1818. Woe unto you who do not scruple to say in irony, "We desire that the day of the Lord would come," that is, "Woe to you who treat it as if it were a mere dream of the prophets" (Is 5:19; Jr 17:15; Eze 12:22). to what end is it for you!--Amos taking their ironical words in earnest: for God often takes the blasphemer at his own word, in righteous retribution making the scoffer's jest a terrible reality against himself. Ye have but little reason to desire…Read the comment
Topics related to Amos 5:18
In the dictionaries
Commentaries on Amos 5
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary
- Tyndale Open Study Notes
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary
- Rashi on Tanakh
- Calvin’s Commentaries
- Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
- John Wesley’s Notes
- Darby Translation Notes
- Geneva Bible Translation Notes
- Kingcomments
- Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
- Matthew Henry’s Modern English Commentary
- Scofield Reference Notes, 1917 Edition
- Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
- EGW Writings
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