Amos 7:14-17

14-17. The prophet’s reply. 14, 15. Amos was a prophet not by profession, but by divine call.

I was no prophet Better, throughout Amos 7:14, with margin, “I am.” I am not a professional prophet, guided by mercenary motives.

A prophet’s son This expression is not to be understood in the sense that the father of Amos was not a prophet, but in the sense, “I am not a member of a prophetic guild.” Son is used in that sense of the companies of prophets at Beth-el, Gilgal, and other places (1 Kings 20:35; 2Ki 2:3 ; 2 Kings 2:5; 2 Kings 2:7, etc.). This interpretation is supported also by the use of the word son in the general sense of belonging to in other Semitic languages.

Herdman Literally, tender of cattle (Introduction, p. 192).

Gatherer of sycomore fruit R.V., “dresser of sycomore trees” (Introduction, p. 192).

Jehovah took me… said While he was following his ordinary occupation the divine call came to forsake all and become a prophet of Jehovah to Israel. This call he could not resist (Amos 3:8). Of these verses G.A. Smith says, “It is the protest of a new order of prophecy, the charter of a spiritual religion.” Amos was indeed “the founder and the purest type of the new order of prophecy.”