Charles Ellicott Commentary Amos 7:14

"Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet`s son; but I was a herdsman, and a dresser of sycomore-trees:" — Amos 7:14 (ASV)

I was ...—An interesting biographical touch. Prophecy, like other occupations, tended to form a hereditary guild, but Amos was not by birth a prophet.

The word for “gatherer” is rendered in the Septuagint and Vulgate “nipper,” or “pincher.” There was a custom mentioned in Theophrastus, Hist. Plant., iv. 2, Pliny, Hist. Nat., xiii. 14, of pinching or scratching the mulberry-fig in order to make it ripen. But it is very doubtful whether this is the meaning of the Hebrew word here, which is nowhere else employed.