Hosea 3-9

New International Version - UK

⁴ ‘But let no one bring a charge,
    let no one accuse another,
for your people are like those
    who bring charges against a priest.
⁵ You stumble day and night,
    and the prophets stumble with you.
So I will destroy your mother –
⁶     my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge.

‘Because you have rejected knowledge,
    I also reject you as my priests;
because you have ignored the law of your God,
    I also will ignore your children.
⁷ The more priests there were,
    the more they sinned against me;
    they exchanged their glorious God^[d] for something disgraceful.
⁸ They feed on the sins of my people
    and relish their wickedness.
⁹ And it will be: like people, like priests.
    I will punish both of them for their ways
    and repay them for their deeds.

¹⁰ ‘They will eat but not have enough;
    they will engage in prostitution but not flourish,
because they have deserted the Lord
    to give themselves ¹¹ to prostitution;
old wine and new wine
    take away their understanding.
¹² My people consult a wooden idol,
    and a diviner’s rod speaks to them.
A spirit of prostitution leads them astray;
    they are unfaithful to their God.
¹³ They sacrifice on the mountaintops
    and burn offerings on the hills,
under oak, poplar and terebinth,
    where the shade is pleasant.
Therefore your daughters turn to prostitution
    and your daughters-in-law to adultery.

¹⁴ ‘I will not punish your daughters
    when they turn to prostitution,
nor your daughters-in-law
    when they commit adultery,
because the men themselves consort with harlots
    and sacrifice with shrine-prostitutes –
    a people without understanding will come to ruin!

¹⁵ ‘Though you, Israel, commit adultery,
    do not let Judah become guilty.

‘Do not go to Gilgal;
    do not go up to Beth Aven.^[e]
    And do not swear, “As surely as the Lord lives!”
¹⁶ The Israelites are stubborn,
    like a stubborn heifer.
How then can the Lord pasture them
    like lambs in a meadow?
¹⁷ Ephraim is joined to idols;
    leave him alone!
¹⁸ Even when their drinks are gone,
    they continue their prostitution;
    their rulers dearly love shameful ways.
¹⁹ A whirlwind will sweep them away,
    and their sacrifices will bring them shame.

⁴ ‘Their deeds do not permit them
    to return to their God.
A spirit of prostitution is in their heart;
    they do not acknowledge the Lord.
⁵ Israel’s arrogance testifies against them;
    the Israelites, even Ephraim, stumble in their sin;
    Judah also stumbles with them.
⁶ When they go with their flocks and herds
    to seek the Lord,
they will not find him;
    he has withdrawn himself from them.
⁷ They are unfaithful to the Lord;
    they give birth to illegitimate children.
When they celebrate their New Moon feasts,
    he will devour^[f] their fields.

⁸ ‘Sound the trumpet in Gibeah,
    the horn in Ramah.
Raise the battle cry in Beth Aven^[g];
    lead on, Benjamin.
⁹ Ephraim will be laid waste
    on the day of reckoning.
Among the tribes of Israel
    I proclaim what is certain.
¹⁰ Judah’s leaders are like those
    who move boundary stones.
I will pour out my wrath on them
    like a flood of water.
¹¹ Ephraim is oppressed,
    trampled in judgment,
    intent on pursuing idols.^[h]
12 I am like a moth to Ephraim,
    like rot to the people of Judah.

¹³ ‘When Ephraim saw his sickness,
    and Judah his sores,
then Ephraim turned to Assyria,
    and sent to the great king for help.
But he is not able to cure you,
    not able to heal your sores.
¹⁴ For I will be like a lion to Ephraim,
    like a great lion to Judah.
I will tear them to pieces and go away;
    I will carry them off, with no one to rescue them.
¹⁵ Then I will return to my lair
    until they have borne their guilt
    and seek my face –
in their misery
    they will earnestly seek me.’

⁴ ‘What can I do with you, Ephraim?
    What can I do with you, Judah?
Your love is like the morning mist,
    like the early dew that disappears.
⁵ Therefore I cut you in pieces with my prophets,
    I killed you with the words of my mouth –
    then my judgments go forth like the sun.^[i]
6 For I desire mercy, not sacrifice,
    and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.
⁷ As at Adam,^[j] they have broken the covenant;
    they were unfaithful to me there.
⁸ Gilead is a city of evildoers,
    stained with footprints of blood.
⁹ As marauders lie in ambush for a victim,
    so do bands of priests;
they murder on the road to Shechem,
    carrying out their wicked schemes.
¹⁰ I have seen a horrible thing in Israel:
    there Ephraim is given to prostitution,
    Israel is defiled.

¹¹ ‘Also for you, Judah,
    a harvest is appointed.

‘Whenever I would restore the fortunes of my people,
7 whenever I would heal Israel,
the sins of Ephraim are exposed
    and the crimes of Samaria revealed.
They practise deceit,
    thieves break into houses,
    bandits rob in the streets;
² but they do not realise
    that I remember all their evil deeds.
Their sins engulf them;
    they are always before me.

³ ‘They delight the king with their wickedness,
    the princes with their lies.
⁴ They are all adulterers,
    burning like an oven
whose fire the baker need not stir
    from the kneading of the dough till it rises.
⁵ On the day of the festival of our king
    the princes become inflamed with wine,
    and he joins hands with the mockers.
⁶ Their hearts are like an oven;
    they approach him with intrigue.
Their passion smoulders all night;
    in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire.
⁷ All of them are hot as an oven;
    they devour their rulers.
All their kings fall,
    and none of them calls on me.

⁸ ‘Ephraim mixes with the nations;
    Ephraim is a flat loaf not turned over.
⁹ Foreigners sap his strength,
    but he does not realise it.
His hair is sprinkled with grey,
    but he does not notice.
¹⁰ Israel’s arrogance testifies against him,
    but despite all this
he does not return to the Lord his God
    or search for him.

¹¹ ‘Ephraim is like a dove,
    easily deceived and senseless –
now calling to Egypt,
    now turning to Assyria.
¹² When they go, I will throw my net over them;
    I will pull them down like the birds in the sky.
When I hear them flocking together,
    I will catch them.
¹³ Woe to them,
    because they have strayed from me!
Destruction to them,
    because they have rebelled against me!
I long to redeem them
    but they speak about me falsely.
¹⁴ They do not cry out to me from their hearts
    but wail on their beds.
They slash themselves,^[k] appealing to their gods
    for grain and new wine,
    but they turn away from me.
¹⁵ I trained them and strengthened their arms,
    but they plot evil against me.
¹⁶ They do not turn to the Most High;
    they are like a faulty bow.
Their leaders will fall by the sword
    because of their insolent words.
For this they will be ridiculed
    in the land of Egypt.

⁷ ‘They sow the wind
    and reap the whirlwind.
The stalk has no head;
    it will produce no flour.
Were it to yield grain,
    foreigners would swallow it up.
⁸ Israel is swallowed up;
    now she is among the nations
    like something no one wants.
⁹ For they have gone up to Assyria
    like a wild donkey wandering alone.
    Ephraim has sold herself to lovers.
¹⁰ Although they have sold themselves among the nations,
    I will now gather them together.
They will begin to waste away
    under the oppression of the mighty king.

¹¹ ‘Though Ephraim built many altars for sin offerings,
    these have become altars for sinning.
¹² I wrote for them the many things of my law,
    but they regarded them as something foreign.
¹³ Though they offer sacrifices as gifts to me,
    and though they eat the meat,
    the Lord is not pleased with them.
Now he will remember their wickedness
    and punish their sins:
    they will return to Egypt.
¹⁴ Israel has forgotten his Maker
    and built palaces;
    Judah has fortified many towns.
But I will send fire on their cities
    that will consume their fortresses.’

⁵ What will you do on the day of your appointed festivals,
    on the feast days of the Lord?
⁶ Even if they escape from destruction,
    Egypt will gather them,
    and Memphis will bury them.
Their treasures of silver will be taken over by briers,
    and thorns will overrun their tents.
⁷ The days of punishment are coming,
    the days of reckoning are at hand.
    Let Israel know this.
Because your sins are so many
    and your hostility so great,
the prophet is considered a fool,
    the inspired person a maniac.
⁸ The prophet, along with my God,
    is the watchman over Ephraim,^[l]
yet snares await him on all his paths,
    and hostility in the house of his God.
⁹ They have sunk deep into corruption,
    as in the days of Gibeah.
God will remember their wickedness
    and punish them for their sins.

¹⁰ ‘When I found Israel,
    it was like finding grapes in the desert;
when I saw your ancestors,
    it was like seeing the early fruit on the fig-tree.
But when they came to Baal Peor,
    they consecrated themselves to that shameful idol
    and became as vile as the thing they loved.
¹¹ Ephraim’s glory will fly away like a bird –
    no birth, no pregnancy, no conception.
¹² Even if they bring up children,
    I will bereave them of every one.
Woe to them
    when I turn away from them!
¹³ I have seen Ephraim, like Tyre,
    planted in a pleasant place.
But Ephraim will bring out
    their children to the slayer.’

¹⁴ Give them, Lord –
    what will you give them?
Give them wombs that miscarry
    and breasts that are dry.

¹⁵ ‘Because of all their wickedness in Gilgal,
    I hated them there.
Because of their sinful deeds,
    I will drive them out of my house.
I will no longer love them;
    all their leaders are rebellious.
¹⁶ Ephraim is blighted,
    their root is withered,
    they yield no fruit.
Even if they bear children,
    I will slay their cherished offspring.’

¹⁷ My God will reject them
    because they have not obeyed him;
    they will be wanderers among the nations.