In chapter 4 of the Book of Amos, verses 1-3 are talking about people who pervert the truths of the church. They will fall into falsities in outermost things.

In the Bible, fish represent "lower" things than mammals, so we can interpret the fishhooks in verse 2 as meaning being caught and held fast in natural or lower things.

Verses 4-6 are about acts of worship such as tithes and sacrifices. These look similar to genuine worship, but are only external sorts of things. We can tell because ‘teeth’ (in verse 6) represent ultimates or outermost things (see Secrets of Heaven 6380). It follows that “cleanness of teeth” would mean outermost things that look good but only imitate genuine worship. The Lord exhorts, “Yet you have not returned to me.”

Verses 7-8. Some things true will remain, when where there are too many false ideas, the truths don't get through. This can be seen where the Lord says, “I made it rain on one city; I withheld rain from another city... where it did not rain the part withered.” Again the Lord exhorts, “Yet you have not returned to me.”

Verse 9. Afterward all things of the church are falsified, shown by blight attacking the gardens, vineyards, fig tree and olive trees. The last three represent spiritual, natural and celestial things, or all the things of spiritual life. “Yet you have not returned to me,” says the Lord.

Verses 10-11. The Lord explains the devastating things he allowed to happen: plague in Egypt, death of young men by swords, stench in the camps, Sodom and Gomorrah. This is because they are profaned by sensual knowledges. Profanation means the mixing of good and evil together. (See Secrets of Heaven 1001[2]).

This extends to all things of the church, with the church being the Lord’s kingdom on earth (Secrets of Heaven 768[3]).

With profanation “as soon as any idea of what is holy arises, the idea of what is profane joins immediately to it,” (Secrets of Heaven 301).

Now there is hardly anything left. “Yet you have not returned to Me,” says the Lord again.

Verses 12-13: Because people adamantly remain in their profane ways, they are warned, “Prepare to meet your God!”. This is the God powerful and mighty, “who forms mountains, and creates the wind,” and even more close to home, “Who declares to man what his thought is.” As intimately a knowing as that is, the Lord’s love for all humanity is contained in His exhortations for them to turn themselves to Him.

See, for example, Luke 6:44-45, and True Christian Religion 373.

5118. 'And Pharaoh's cup was in my hand' means an influx of the interior natural into the exterior natural, and the beginning of reception. This is clear from the representation of 'Pharaoh' as the interior natural, dealt with above in 5080, 5095; from the representation of 'the cupbearer' as the exterior natural, dealt with in 5077, 5082 - 'my hand' being the cupbearer's; from the meaning of 'cup' as that which contains, and also at the same time that which is contained in it, dealt with below in 5120. From these meanings and from the train of thought in the internal sense 'Pharaoh's cup was in my hand' means the influx of the interior natural into the exterior natural, and the beginning of reception there. What the interior natural and the exterior natural are has been stated already - the interior natural is that which communicates with the rational and into which the rational enters, while the exterior natural is that which communicates with the senses, that is, through the senses with the world, and so that which the world flows into.

[2] As regards influx, this begins with the Lord and extends continuously through the rational into the interior natural and then through this into the exterior natural; but what flows through undergoes change and is converted according to the way it is received. With those who are not regenerate all good is converted there into evil, and all truth into falsity; but with those who are regenerate all good and truth presents itself there as in a mirror. For the natural is nothing else than a face so to speak that is representative of spiritual characteristics of the internal man; and the face becomes representative when exteriors correspond to interiors. From this one may gain some idea of what is meant by an influx of the interior natural into the exterior natural, and the beginning of reception there.