Amos 6:12 Meaning and Explanation
“Shall horses run upon the rock? will one plow there with oxen? for ye have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock:”
King James Version (KJV)
Read this verse in context with translation switching:
Read Full Chapter →Two absurd images expose how Israel has perverted justice into something bitter and poisonous.
What Does Amos 6:12 Mean?
Amos asks two questions whose answers are obvious. Horses do not gallop across bare cliffs; no one yokes oxen to plow solid rock. Such things violate the order of nature. Yet Israel has done something just as senseless and unnatural in the moral world: they have taken justice, meant to heal and protect, and turned it into "gall" -- something bitter and toxic.
"The fruit of righteousness" should be sweet and nourishing; instead it has become "hemlock," a poison. The law courts and the dealings of daily life, designed to yield life, now yield death. The comparison is sharp: to corrupt justice is as perverse as plowing stone, a labor against the grain of how God made the world. When the very thing that should sustain a community is turned to bitterness, the whole society works against itself.
Amos 6:12 in the Original Language
mishpat (מִשְׁפָּט), 'judgment' -- the fair verdict and right order a society owes to all.
Frequently Asked Questions About Amos 6:12
What does Amos 6:12 mean?
Two absurd images expose how Israel has perverted justice into something bitter and poisonous.