Hosea 5–6

The Priests Are a Snare

5Hear this, O priests!

Give heed, O house of Israel!

Listen, O house of the king!

Because the judgment applies to you;

because you have been a snare for Mizpah,

and a net spread out on Tabor;

²they dug a deep pit^a in Shittim,

but I am a punishment for all of them.

³I myself know Ephraim,

and Israel is not hidden from me;

because now you have played the whore, O Ephraim—

Israel is defiled.

⁴Their deeds do not permit them

to return them to God.

Because a spirit of whoredom is in their midst,

they do not know Yahweh.

⁵The pride of Israel testifies against him,^b

and Israel and Ephraim stumble in their guilt,

and Judah stumbles with them.

⁶With their flocks^c and herds^d they will go

to seek Yahweh, but they will not find him;

he has withdrawn from them.

⁷They have dealt faithlessly with Yahweh

because they have borne illegitimate children.

Now the new moon will devour them with their fields.

⁸Blow the horn^e in Gibeah,

the trumpet in Ramah.

Sound the alarm in Beth-aven;

look behind you, Benjamin.

⁹Ephraim will be a desolation

in the day of punishment;

among the tribes of Israel

I will reveal what is true.

¹⁰The princes of Judah have become

like those who remove a landmark;

on them I will pour out

my wrath like water.

¹¹Ephraim is oppressed,

crushed in judgment,

because he was determined

to go after filth.^f

¹²But I am like a maggot to Ephraim

and like rottenness to the house of Judah.

¹³And when Ephraim saw his illness,

and Judah his wound,

Ephraim went to Assyria,

he sent to the great king.^g

But he was unable to cure you

and heal your wound.

¹⁴Because I will be like a lion to Ephraim

and like a fierce strong lion to the house of Judah.

I myself will tear and I will go;

I will carry off, and there is no one who delivers.

¹⁵I will return again^h to my place

until they acknowledge their guilt

and seek my face;

in their distress they will searchⁱ me.

A Call to Yahweh

6Come, let us return to Yahweh;

because it is he who has torn, and he will heal us;

he has struck us down and will bind us up.

²He will revive us after two days;

on the third day he will raise us up,

that we may live in his presence.^a

³Let us know, let us press on to know Yahweh;

his rising is sure like the dawn.

He will come like the showers to us,

like the spring rain that waters the earth.

⁴What will I do with you, O Ephraim?

What will I do with you, O Judah?

Your love is like a morning cloud,

like the dew that goes away early in the morning.

⁵Therefore, I have hewn them by the prophets;

I have killed them by the words of my mouth,

and my judgment^b goes forth like the light.

⁶Because I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice,

and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

⁷But like Adam, they transgressed the covenant;

there they dealt faithlessly with me.

⁸Gilead is a city of evil,

a cunning city because of blood.^c

⁹Like bandits lying in wait,

so is a band of priests;

they murder on the road to Shechem;

indeed, they commit a monstrous crime.

¹⁰In the house of Israel I have seen something horrible;

Ephraim’s unfaithfulness is there.

Israel is defiled.

Ephraim’s Guilt

¹¹For you also, O Judah, a harvest is appointed,

when I restore the fortunes of my people,