Charles Ellicott Commentary Amos 1:5

"And I will break the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the valley of Aven, and him that holdeth the sceptre from the house of Eden; and the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir, saith Jehovah." — Amos 1:5 (ASV)

I will break ...—The “bar” means the bolt of iron or brass with which the city was defended. But it is possible that it may be used to refer to persons, that is, princes or leaders (Hosea 11:6); and this seems confirmed by the parallelism.

The plain or valley cleft between Libanus and Antilibanus is still called by the Arabs by a name closely resembling the rendering in the margin, “the valley.”

It is probable that the word rendered “vanity” (aven) is simply a Masoretic reading, and not what Amos intended.

It is better to follow the Septuagint and read the word On , the reference being to the Temple of Baalbec, then in ruins, the Syrian Heliopolis .

The site of Beth-eden (house of Eden) cannot be satisfactorily determined.

Kir is the region of the river Cyrus, or perhaps the east of the Upper Euphrates . We see the fulfillment of this doom in 2 Kings 16:9.

On the other hand, the Masoretic reading seems to have been suggested (if not confirmed) by Amos 5:5, where the Septuagint read aven.