Hosea 2:1–10

CallF your brothers: My People

and your sisters: Compassion.

ISRAEL’S ADULTERY REBUKED

2 Rebuke your mother; rebuke her.v

For she is not my wife and I am not her husband.w

Let her remove the promiscuous look from her facex

and her adultery from between her breasts.

3 Otherwise, I will strip her nakedy

and expose her as she was on the day of her birth.

I will make her like a desertz

and like a parched land,

and I will let her die of thirst.aa

4 I will have no compassion on her childrenab

because they are the children of promiscuity.

5 Yes, their mother is promiscuous;

she conceived them and acted shamefully.ac

For she thought, “I will follow my lovers,ad

the men who give me my food and water,

my wool and flax, my oil and drink.”ae

6 Therefore, this is what I will do:

I will block herA wayaf with thorns;ag

I will enclose her with a wall,

so that she cannot find her paths.a

7 She will pursue her lovers but not catch them;b

she will look for them but not find them.

Then she will think,

“I will go back to my former husband,c

for then it was better for me than now.”d

8 She does not recognizee

that it is I who gave her the grain,f

the new wine, and the fresh oil.

I lavished silver and gold on her,

which they used for Baal.

9 Therefore, I will take back my grain in its timeg

and my new wine in its season;

I will take away my wool and linen,

which were to cover her nakedness.

10 Now I will expose her shameh

in the sight of her lovers,

and no one will rescue her from my power.