Albert Barnes Commentary Amos 1:12

"but I will send a fire upon Teman, and it shall devour the palaces of Bozrah." — Amos 1:12 (ASV)

But – (And I, in My turn and as a consequence of these sins) will send a fire upon Teman. “Teman,” said Eusebius and Jerome, “was a country of the princes of Edom, which had its name from Teman son of Eliphaz, son of Esau (Genesis 36:11, Genesis 36:15).”

They continued, “But even to this day there is a village, called Teman, about 5 (Eusebius says 15) miles from Petra, where there is also a Roman garrison, from where Eliphaz, king of the Themanites, was.”

It is, however, probably the district that is meant, of which Bozrah was then the capital.

For Amos, when speaking of cities, uses some word to express this, such as “the palaces of Benhadad, the wall of Gaza, of Tyrus, of Rabbah”; here he simply uses the name Teman, as he does those of Moab and Judah.

Amos does not mention Petra, or Selah, because Amaziah had taken it and called it Joktheel, “which God subdued,” a name it retained for some time (2 Kings 14:7).

Bozrah – (literally, “which cuts off approach”) is mentioned as early as Genesis (Genesis 36:33) as the seat of one of the elective kings who, in times before Moses, reigned over Edom.

It then undoubtedly lay in Idumea itself and is quite distinct from the Bozrah of Hauran or Auranitis, from where Jerome also distinguishes it.

Jerome also states: “There is another Bosor also, a city of Esau, in the mountains of Idumea, of which Isaiah speaks.”

There is still a small village with a similar name (Busaira, “the little Bozrah”) which, it is said, “appears to have been in ancient times a considerable city, if we may judge from the ruins that surround the village.”

It now has “some 50 houses and stands on an elevation, on the summit of which a small castle has been built.”

The name, however, “little Bozrah,” indicates the existence of a “great Bozrah,” with which its name is contrasted, and it is not likely to have been the place itself.

Probably the name was a common one, meaning “the strong place” of its neighborhood. The Bozrah of Edom is either that little village or is wholly blotted out.