Hosea 9–10

CHAPTER 9

Days of Punishment Have Come

^1aDo not be glad, O Israel, ¹with rejoicing like the peoples!

For you have ^bplayed the harlot, ²forsaking your God.

You have loved harlots’ earnings on ³every threshing floor.

²Threshing floor and wine press will ^anot feed them,

And the new wine will deceive ¹them.

³They will not remain in ^athe land of Yahweh,

But Ephraim will return to ^bEgypt,

And in ^cAssyria they will eat ^dunclean food.

⁴They will not pour out drink offerings of ^awine to Yahweh;

^bTheir sacrifices will not please Him.

Their bread will ¹be like ²mourners’ bread;

All who eat of it will be ^cdefiled,

For their bread will be for ³themselves alone;

It will not enter the house of Yahweh.

^5aWhat will you do on the day of the appointed festival

And on the day of the ^bfeast of Yahweh?

⁶For behold, they will go because of destruction;

Egypt will gather them up; ^aMemphis will bury them.

Weeds will possess their desirable items of silver;

^bThorns will be in their tents.

⁷The days of ^apunishment have come;

The days of ^brecompense have come;

¹Let Israel know this!

The prophet is an ^cignorant fool,

The ²inspired man has ^dmadness,

Because of the abundance of your ^einiquity

And because your hostility has abounded.

⁸Ephraim was a watchman with my God, a prophet;

Yet the snare of a bird catcher is in all his ways,

And there is only hostility in the house of his God.

⁹They have dug ^adeep ¹in corruption

As in the days of ^bGibeah;

He will ^cremember their iniquity;

He will punish their sins.

Grapes in the Wilderness

¹⁰I found Israel like ^agrapes in the wilderness;

I saw your fathers as the ^bearliest fruit on the fig tree in its first season.

But they came to ^cBaal-peor and devoted themselves to ^1dshame,

And they became as ^edetestable as that which they loved.

¹¹As for Ephraim, their ^aglory will fly away like a bird—

No birth, no pregnancy, and no conception!

¹²Though they bring up their children,

Yet I will bereave them ¹until not a man is left.

Surely, ^awoe to them indeed when I depart from them!

¹³Ephraim, as I have seen,

Is planted in a pasture like ^aTyre;

But Ephraim will bring out his children for killing.

¹⁴Give them, O Yahweh—what will You give?

Give them a ^1amiscarrying womb and dry breasts.

¹⁵All their evil is at ^aGilgal;

Indeed, I came to hate them there!

Because of the ^bevil of their deeds

I will drive them out of My house!

I will love them no more;

All their princes are ^crebels.

^16aEphraim is stricken; their root is dried up;

They will bear ^bno fruit.

Even though they bear children,

I will put to death the ^cdesirable ones of their womb.

¹⁷My God will despise them

Because they have ^anot listened to Him;

And they will be ^bthose who flee among the nations.

CHAPTER 10

You Have Sinned, O Israel

¹Israel is a ¹luxuriant ^avine;

He produces fruit for himself.

The more abundant his fruit,

The more altars he ^babounded;

The better his land,

The better ²he made the sacred ^cpillars.

²Their heart is ^1afaithless;

Now they must bear their ^bguilt.

²Yahweh will ^cbreak down their altars

And destroy their sacred pillars.

³Surely now they will say, “We have ^ano king,

For we do not fear Yahweh.

As for the king, what can he do for us?”

⁴They speak mere words;

¹With ^aworthless oaths they cut covenants;

And ^bjudgment flourishes like gall in the furrows of the field.

⁵The dweller of Samaria will fear

For the ^1acalf of ^bBeth-aven.

Indeed, its people will mourn for it,

And its ^cidolatrous priests ²will cry out over it,

Over its ^dglory, since it has gone into exile from them.

⁶The thing itself will be carried to ^aAssyria

As tribute to ^1bKing Jareb;

Ephraim will ^creceive shame,

And Israel will be ashamed of its ^down counsel.

⁷Samaria will be ^aruined with her king

Like a stick on the surface of the water.

⁸Also the ^ahigh places of Aven, the ^bsin of Israel, will be ¹eradicated;

^cThorn and thistle will grow on their altars;

Then they will ^dsay to the mountains,

“Cover us!” And to the hills, “Fall on us!”

⁹From the days of Gibeah you have sinned, O Israel;

There they stand!

Will not the battle against the sons of injustice overtake them in Gibeah?

¹⁰When it is My ^adesire, I will ^1bchastise them;

And ^cthe peoples will be gathered against them

When they are bound for their double guilt.

The Trained Heifer

¹¹And Ephraim is a trained ^aheifer that loves to thresh,

But I will ^bcome over her fair neck with a yoke;

I will harness Ephraim;

Judah will plow; Jacob will harrow for himself.

^12aSow with a view to righteousness,

Reap in accordance with lovingkindness;

^bBreak up your fallow ground,

Indeed, it is time to ^cseek Yahweh

Until He ^dcomes and ^1erains righteousness on you.

¹³You have ^aplowed wickedness; you have reaped injustice;

You have eaten the fruit of ^bdeception.

Because you have trusted in your way, in your ^cabundant warriors,

¹⁴Therefore a rumbling will arise among your people,

And all your ^afortifications will be destroyed,

As Shalman destroyed Beth-arbel on the day of battle,

When ^bmothers were dashed in pieces with their children.

¹⁵Thus it will be done to you at Bethel because of your evil of evils.

At dawn the king of Israel will be completely ruined.