Amos 2:6

“Many, truly, are the shoes of the sinful soul, by which it is bound and cramped. For each man is cramped by the cords of his own sins. Accordingly, Abraham swears to the king of Sodom, "I will not take of all that is thine, from a thread to a shoe-latchet." On account of these being defiled and polluted on the earth, every kind of wrong and selfishness engrosses life. As the Lord reproves Israel by Amos, saying, "For three iniquities of Israel, yea, for four, I will not turn him back; because they have given away the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes, which tread upon the dust of the ground."”

“He might also have been betrayed by any stranger, did I not find that even here too he fulfilled a psalm: "He who did eat bread with me has lifted up his heel against me." And without a price might he have been betrayed. For what need of a traitor was there in the case of one who offered himself to the people openly and might quite as easily have been captured by force as taken by treachery? This might, no doubt, have been well enough for another Christ but would not have been suitable in one who was accomplishing prophecies. For it was written, "The righteous one did they sell for silver." The very amount and the destination of the money, which on Judas's remorse was recalled "from its first purpose of a fee" and appropriated to the purchase of a potter's field, as narrated in the Gospel of Matthew, were clearly foretold by Jeremiah: "And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him who was valued, and gave them for the potter's field."”

“(Vers. 6 seqq.) Thus says the Lord: For three crimes of Israel, and for four, I will not revoke my word: Because they sell the just man for silver, and the poor man for a pair of sandals. They trample the heads of the weak into the dust of the earth, and they force the lowly off the path. Son and father go to the same prostitute, profaning my holy name. Upon garments taken in pledge, they recline beside every altar; and the wine of those who have been fined, they drink in the house of their God. LXX: Thus says the Lord: For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away from them: because they have sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes. They trample on the dust of the earth and crush the heads of the poor. They turn aside the way of the humble, and a man and his father go in to the same maiden to profane my holy name. They tie themselves to altars with cords and drink wine obtained through fraud in the house of their God. Therefore, he places the last of Israel, that is, the ten tribes, because we have foretold in writing nearly everything that follows in order to include the prophetic discourse of the book under one text. Therefore, first of all, their wickedness or impiety is in three or four crimes, namely, that they sold a man for money, and a just man, who is more admirable in this, that he was not overcome by poverty so as to do anything unjust: and indeed, if they had sold a poor just man compelled by the necessity of hunger for a price, there would be some excuse for the crime; but now they have sold the precious soul of a man for a most worthless thing, for shoes with which they trample on dust and dung. These people, according to the Septuagint, strike the head of the poor; according to the Hebrew, they crush the heads of the poor into the dust of the earth, and they are so filled with pride that they refuse to walk with other men. And so, not satisfied with this wicked deed, both the son and the father have violated together a young girl, in order to desecrate the holy name of God. Therefore, whatever is done shamefully is attributed to an injury against God, who says: Through you my name is blasphemed among the Gentiles (2 Peter 2:2). This is what the Apostle writes to the Corinthians: Indeed, fornication is heard among you, and such fornication as is not even among the Gentiles, so that someone may have his father's wife. And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who has done this deed might be taken away from among you (II Cor. V, 1, 2). It often happens that a father defiles his son's wife, the father-in-law defiles his daughter-in-law, which is prohibited in the Law: You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father, and you shall not uncover the nakedness of your daughter-in-law (Leviticus XVIII, 7). Therefore, the letter also has the greatest usefulness if it is preserved. And because every vice, if it exceeds the boundary of shame, punishes crimes with other crimes, and it always proceeds to worse things, even over the pledged garments, ten tribes slept next to every altar, which the Hebrews interpret as follows: On the garments of those who did not want to go to idols, and they reclined on what they had forcibly taken while feasting in the idol. According to the Septuagint, there was such contempt for God that they would stretch out their garments in which they sleep or commit fornication, with ropes next to the altar, and they would make παραπετάσματα, that is, veils, so that no one could see the fornicators in the Temple. And they would also serve drunkenness and lust, even buying the wine they drank not with their own labor, but with deceit. And they would do this in their god's temple, so that they would defile those whom they thought were gods with filth and debauchery. They speak these things and thus explain, those who follow a simple history. But we, who taught in Hosea, under the name of the Israelites, and Samaria, and Ephraim, and the sons of Joseph (from which tribe Jeroboam was, who separated the people from the kingdom of David and Jerusalem, and the temple of God), are understood to signify heretics: even now, after Judah and Jerusalem, which is interpreted as the Church, let us understand that the prophetic discourse is directed towards heretics, who sell a holy and righteous man, but poor, for money. A poor and just man, he is an ecclesiastic, who does not have knowledge of the Scriptures, but is content with simplicity, and does the commandments that are given, of whom it is written: The poor man does not endure threats (Prov. XIII, 8). And to the Galatians: Only that we should be mindful of the poor (Gal. II, 10). All heretics do these things for wealth, and for the shoes with which they trample on the dust of the earth: for they cannot stand with bare feet on the holy ground (on which Moses and Joshua the son of Nun stood, Exod. III; Josh. V): therefore the apostles are commanded to walk with bare feet (Luke X), so that they have no possessions or skins, which pertain to the flesh), thus they strike the poor on the head. And the Savior commanded his disciples that, if perchance, because they were still in the world, some mortal thing had clung to their actions, they should shake the dust off their feet (Matt. X, Mark V). But the heretics strike the heads of the poor, although this is not written in Hebrew (Let it be read in Greek), because they have turned away from the path of the humble. That path of the humble is the one that says: I am the way, the truth, and the life (John XIV, 6), which urges us to walk in it, and it says: Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest (Matt. XI, 28). But all the leaders of the heretics swell with pride, concerning whom the Apostle also speaks: 'Lest being puffed up he fall into the judgment of the devil' (1 Timothy 3:6), who says: 'I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north' (Isaiah 14). Therefore, God resists the proud heretics, but gives grace to the humble ecclesiastics (James 4). Moreover, the son and the father entered unto a maiden, to violate and defile the holy name of God. We often read that our father is the Jewish people, as Paul says: I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea (I Cor. X, 1, 2). And in another place: Ask your fathers, and they will tell you; your elders, and they will declare to you (Deut. XXXII, 7). And again: For your fathers, sons are born to you (Psal. XLIV, 17). And the Church of the Gentiles speaks: The sons of my mother fought against me (Song of Songs 1:5). Therefore we are sons, and the father is the Jewish people. We sin and commit a crime, when we enter into the observation of the Sabbath and circumcision, abolishing the ceremonies of the law with our parent, to whom the Apostle says: Behold, I Paul say to you, that if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing (Galatians 5:2, 4). And again: Those who are justified by the law have fallen from grace. Whoever enters the Church in such a way that he keeps the law in the gospel, he enters with the father to the virgin and commits fornication, and violates the name of the Lord. Hence those who say that they do not harm the Jews after the advent of Christ, if they believe in the Lord in such a way that they also keep the precepts of the Law, they contaminate the father and the son with one fornication. And they also tie their garments with ropes and make veils next to the altar, pretending the faith of Christ. For as many as have been baptized in Christ, have put on Christ (Galatians 3), and they oppose their garments, which have bound them with the cords of sins, to the eyes of those who see, so that their wicked deeds may not be seen: so that whoever looks at the altar may not suspect immorality. All heretics under the name of Christ do this, fornicating and obscuring the testimonies of the Scriptures with their errors and lies. Therefore, the apostles spread their garments on the colt of an ass, so that the Lord may sit more comfortably (Matthew 21), and he may trample the path adorned with the Law and the Prophets. On the contrary, heretics do not lay down their garments in the footsteps of the Savior; but they bind them next to the altar, and they pretend their sins, in order to drink the wine of deceit, or of the condemned, who, because they have departed from the Church, have been condemned. This wine is the wine of Sodom, the fury of dragons and adders, which whoever drinks it cannot be healed. But they drink the wine not in the house of God, where the temple is and Jerusalem; but in their own house of God, which they have fabricated for themselves with crafty speech.”

“He does not leave him unpunished, but rather subjects to punishments Israel, that is, the tribes in Samaria. And that they themselves, sinning unguardedly, have all but consumed the tranquility owed by God to the weak, the turning away for three and four sins would show, which having suffered they must necessarily be subjected to terrible things, and be in every evil. Therefore, the divine David, fearing this thing, and knowing it to be a cause of destruction, implored, saying, "Do not turn Your face from me, and do not turn away in wrath from Your servant." For wrath always follows, and, as it were, accompanies the turnings away.”

“"They sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals": They did not endure to speak rightly and justly, and to render for each of those being judged the justice that accords with the law. But if it happened that a man was righteous, sober and gentle, modest and unboastful; for such a one would be understood as both righteous and needy, or poor in spirit; being brought to judgment by one of the more powerful, this man is sold to his enemies, although the law clearly proclaimed, "You shall not take person in judgment;" and again, "You shall not slay the innocent and the just." For the one entrusted with judging is certainly established in the order of God, to whom alone judging is proper. "For there is one lawgiver and judge," according to the voice of the saint. Therefore, the one who falsifies the account of justice and shows partiality will certainly insult the divine dignity, and offends God who says, "Execute true judgment, and show mercy and compassion every one to his brother." He accuses them, therefore, of selling the just and the needy to their enemies, and of being accustomed to doing this for the sake of a few and most worthless gains, which would scarcely suffice for those who received them for the purchase of sandals.”