Amos Mocks Israels Boast Over the Capture of Lo-debar and Karnaim

Amos 6:13-14 delivers a stinging sarcastic wordplay against the swaggering Israelite court under King Jeroboam II: "Ye which rejoice in a thing of nought, which say, Have we not taken to us horns by our own strength? But, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, saith the Lord the God of hosts; and they shall afflict you from the entering in of Hemath unto the river of the wilderness." The "thing of nought" is Lo-debar ("no thing") and "horns" is Karnaim ("two horns") — two Bashan towns Israel had recently captured. The prophet turns their bragging into a self-condemning epitaph.

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