"For three transgressions of Gaza,
and for four, I will not revoke the punishment,
because they carried into exile a whole people
to deliver them up to Edom.
In verses 6-8 four of the five cities comprising the Philistine pentapolis are mentioned—Gaza (Guzzeh), Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Ekron. The omission of the fifth, Gath, may be due to its ruined condition at the time of Amos because of the batterings of Hazael in 815 b.c. and Uzziah in 760 b.c. (cf. 2 Kings 12:17; 2 Chron. 26:6; Amos 6:2). The Philistines’ crime against humanity was that they captured whole communities in slave raids and sold them for commercial profit. Defenseless people were treated as mere objects and auctioned off in the slave markets of Edom, from which they were shipped to other parts of the world (cf. Joel 3:4-8).
Gaza, a Philistine city, is condemned for her pitiless slave trading. She will fall to Assyria in 734 bc. Other Philistine strongholds, Ashdod, Ashkelon and Ekron are also sentenced. They will be defeated by successive Assyrian emperors. The southernmost of the five capitals of the five divisions of Philistia, and the key to Palestine on the south: hence put for the whole Philistine nation. Uzziah commenced the fulfilment of this prophecy (see 2Ch 26:6).
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