Hosea 5–6

5“Listen to this, you priests! Pay attention, people of Israel! Listen, you that belong to the royal family! You are supposed to judge with justice—so judgement will fall on you! You have become a trap at Mizpah, a net spread on Mount Tabor, ²a deep pit at Acacia City,ⁿ and I will punish all of you. ³I know what Israel is like—she cannot hide from me. She has been unfaithful, and her people are unfit to worship me.”

Hosea Warns against Idolatry

⁴The evil that the people have done prevents them from returning to their God. Idolatry has a powerful hold on them, and they do not acknowledge the Lord. ⁵The arrogance of the people of Israel cries out against them. Their sins make them stumble and fall, and the people of Judah fall with them. ⁶They take their sheep and cattle to offer as sacrifices to the Lord, but it does them no good. They cannot find him, for he has left them. ⁷They have been unfaithful to the Lord; their children do not belong to him. So now they and their lands will soon be destroyed.

War between Judah and Israel

⁸Blow the war trumpets in Gibeah! Sound the alarm in Ramah! Raise the war cry at Bethaven!^o Into battle, men of Benjamin! ⁹The day of punishment is coming, and Israel will be ruined. People of Israel, this will surely happen!

¹⁰The Lord says, “I am angry because the leaders of Judah have invaded Israel and stolen land from her. So I will pour out punishment on them like a flood. ¹¹Israel is suffering oppression; she has lost land that was rightfully hers, because she insisted on going for help to those who had none to give.^{p 12}I will bring destruction on Israel and ruin on the people of Judah.

¹³“When Israel saw how sick she was and when Judah saw her own wounds, then Israel went to Assyria to ask the great emperor for help, but he could not cure them or heal their wounds. ¹⁴I will attack the people of Israel and Judah like a lion. I myself will tear them to pieces and then leave them. When I drag them off, no one will be able to save them.

¹⁵“I will abandon my people until they have suffered enough for their sins and come looking for me. Perhaps in their suffering they will try to find me.”

The People’s Insincere Repentance

6The people say, “Let’s return to the Lord! He has hurt us, but he will be sure to heal us; he has wounded us, but he will bandage our wounds, won’t he? ²In two or three days he will revive us, and we will live in his presence. ³Let us try to know the Lord. He will come to us as surely as the day dawns, as surely as the spring rains that water the earth.”

⁴But the Lord says, “Israel and Judah, what am I going to do with you? Your love for me disappears as quickly as morning mist; it is like dew, that vanishes early in the day. ⁵That is why I have sent my prophets to you with my message of judgement and destruction. What I want from you is plain and clear: ^6*I want your constant love, not your animal sacrifices. I would rather have my people know me than burn offerings to me.

⁷“But as soon as they entered the land at Adam,^q they broke the covenant I had made with them. ⁸Gilead is a city full of evil people and murderers. ⁹The priests are like a gang of robbers who wait in ambush for someone. Even on the road to the holy place at Shechem they commit murder. And they do all this evil deliberately! ¹⁰I have seen a horrible thing in Israel: my people have defiled themselves by worshipping idols.

¹¹“And as for you, people of Judah, I have set a time to punish you also for what you are doing.