What Does Amos 2:3 Mean?
And I will cut off the judge from its midst, and will strike down all its princes with him, says the LORD.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And I will cut off the judge from the midst thereof, and will slay all the princes thereof with him, saith the LORD.THE KEY
The Hebrew verb translated “cut off” is also used for “cutting” a covenant: here that decisive cut removes Moab’s judge from its center.
THE MEANING
Judgment reaches into a people’s center: its judge is removed, and its princes are killed with him. The verse holds the violence plainly; the ruling office offers no shelter from the sentence.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that a title or office shields a ruler from judgment dissolves here: the judge and princes are inside the sentence, not outside it.
THE ROOT
וְהִכְרַתִּי
wehikh-ratti
GROWS FROM
כרת
karat
to cut or sever
“cut off” in this verse is wehikh-ratti. The verb comes from כרת (karat), “to cut,” a root also used in the Hebrew idiom כָּרַת בְּרִית (karat berit), “to cut a covenant.” Here the cut severs the judge from the city’s center; the same root can describe a binding covenant or a decisive removal, depending on its use.
ALSO GROWS
karat: cut, cut off, or sever
כָּרַת
This is the verb behind the verse’s “cut off,” making the removal sound like a deliberate severing.
karat berit: cut a covenant
כָּרַת בְּרִית
The covenant idiom uses this same verb, showing how one root can mark a decisive act of binding or separation.
שֹׁפֵט
shofet
GROWS FROM
שפט
shaphat
to judge or govern
“judge” in this verse is shofet. The root שפט (shaphat) includes both judging and governing. The verse therefore names the removal of a public authority at the city’s center, not merely the loss of a person who settles disputes.
ALSO GROWS
shaphat: judge or govern
שָׁפַט
The verb shows the governing function carried by the judge in the verse.
mishpat: judgment, justice, or legal order
מִשְׁפָּט
This related word connects the judge to the order his office is meant to uphold.
THE PATTERN
Judgment dismantles a people’s order by removing its rulers and the supports that hold its life together.
I will break the bar of Damascus, and cut off the one who settles from the valley of Aven, and the one who grips the rod from the house of Eden; and the people of Aram shall be uncovered and led to Kir, says the LORD.For, behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, is turning aside from Jerusalem and from Judah the lean and the staff, the whole of bread, and the whole of waters.Jesus said to them, Do you not see all these things? Truly, I say to you, not one stone here is let go upon another stone that is not loosened.THE THREAD
On that day the LORD cut a covenant with Abram, saying, To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.The Hebrew verb behind “made a covenant” is כָּרַת (karat, “cut”), the same root translated “cut off” in Amos. One root marks both a covenant’s decisive binding and the severing of a ruler from his people.
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