Bible Strands
Amos 6:11
For the LORD gives a command: “The great house will be smashed to pieces, and the small house to rubble.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The prophet Amos delivers Yahweh's decree to a complacent Israelite leadership during a period of impending national collapse. The command pronounces judgment on elite and common structures alike as plague and ruin sweep through the land.
The words — The Hebrew term רְסִיסִים (re.si.Sim) literally means "fragments," describing the shattered state of the buildings. Coupled with מְצַוֶּה (me.tza.Veh), meaning "[is] commanding," it emphasizes that the destruction is a direct, executed divine order.
The thread — This judgment on domestic architecture echoes Amos 3:15, where Yahweh vows to tear down winter and summer houses alongside the great house. The certainty of the decree aligns with Isaiah 55:11, which states that God's spoken word will not return empty but will accomplish its intended purpose, while 2 Kings 25:9 records the historical fulfillment of such royal and civic ruin.
Why it lands — The text declares that divine judgment will dismantle both prominent and ordinary structures without exception. It requires a reader to recognize that moral inversion, as noted in Amos 6:12, triggers a concrete historical consequence that leaves no architectural or social tier untouched.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
For, behold, the Lord commandeth, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
Cross-references
- Amos 3:15 I will tear down the winter house along with the summer house; the houses of ivory will also perish, and the great houses will come to an end,” declares the LORD.
- Isaiah 55:11 so My word that proceeds from My mouth will not return to Me empty, but it will accomplish what I please, and it will prosper where I send it.
- 2 Kings 25:9 He burned down the house of the LORD, the royal palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem—every significant building.
- Amos 6:8 The Lord GOD has sworn by Himself—the LORD, the God of Hosts, has declared: “I abhor Jacob’s pride and detest his citadels, so I will deliver up the city and everything in it.”
- Amos 9:9 “For surely I will give the command, and I will shake the house of Israel among all the nations as grain is sifted in a sieve; but not a pebble will reach the ground.
- Nahum 1:14 The LORD has issued a command concerning you, O Nineveh: “There will be no descendants to carry on your name. I will cut off the carved image and cast idol from the house of your gods; I will prepare your grave, for you are contemptible.”
- Zechariah 14:2 For I will gather all the nations for battle against Jerusalem, and the city will be captured, the houses looted, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be removed from the city.
- Luke 19:44 They will level you to the ground—you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.”
- Psalms 105:16 He called down famine on the land and cut off all their supplies of food.
- Psalms 105:31 He spoke, and insects swarmed—gnats throughout their country.