Amos 9:13-15

13-15. The outward extension of the territory will be followed by internal peace and prosperity. Amos 9:13 promises extreme fertility of the soil (see on Hosea 2:20-21; compare Joel 2:22 ff.; Leviticus 26:5). The translations of A.V. and R.V. are not quite accurate. Literally the verse reads, “Behold, the days are about to come, saith Jehovah, that the plowman and the reaper shall touch each other, as well as the treader of grapes and the sower of seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt.” This rendering leaves it undecided whether the plowman is to overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes the sower, or the reaper the plowman and the sower the treader of grapes. Undoubtedly the latter is the thought. The ground will be so fertile that the plowman has hardly completed the work of plowing and sowing when the grain is ready for harvest, and the vintage will be so plentiful that it will not be completed when the time for plowing comes around again. Ordinarily the plowing in Palestine takes place in October, the sowing in November, the barley and wheat harvest in April and May, the vintage in August and September.

Treader of grapes The grapes were thrown into the winepress, where, in ancient times and even now in some cases they were pressed with the feet (for illustrations see Van Lennep, Bible Lands, p. 118; compare Joel 2:24). For 13b see Joel 3:18.

Melt The vintage will be so bountiful that it will seem as if the hills themselves were being dissolved into streams of wine.