Gaza and Tyre: Captives Sold and Covenants Broken

Gaza and Tyre are accused of turning human beings into commodities. Entire communities were carried away and handed over to Edom. Tyre adds another charge: it did not remember the “brotherly covenant,” language that makes betrayal part of the indictment. Amos therefore joins trafficking, political treachery, and violence in one moral field. Joel later condemns Philistia and Phoenician cities for selling Judeans, creating a strong prophetic echo across the Book of the Twelve. The point is not that Amos gives us a complete history of a particular slave raid; he does not identify one. The point is that the LORD sees captive people whom empires and merchants treat as transferable goods.