Amos

Hebrew shepherd-prophet from Tekoa who was the first of the 'writing prophets' — whose book of oracles attacks the social injustice of the Northern Kingdom (exploitation of the poor, luxury amid poverty, hollow ritual) and predicts the Assyrian destruction as divine punishment.

Creates prophetic social justice as a biblical category — Amos's insistence that God demands justice for the poor and cares nothing for religious ceremony ('I hate your festivals... Let justice roll down like waters') establishes the prophetic critique of hypocrisy and institutionalized injustice that runs through all subsequent prophetic tradition.