Hosea 12

12What Israel does is as useless as chasing the wind;

he chases the east wind all day.

They tell more and more lies

and do more and more violence.

They make agreements with Assyria,

and they send a gift of olive oil to Egypt.

²The Lord also has some things against Judah.

He will punish Israel for what they have done;

he will give them what they deserve.

³Their ancestor Jacob held on to his brother’s heel

while the two of them were being born.

When he grew to be a man,

he wrestled with God.

⁴When Jacob wrestled with the angel and won,

he cried and asked for his blessing.

Later, God met with him at Bethel

and spoke with him there.

⁵It was the Lord God All-Powerful;

the Lord is his great name.

⁶You must return to your God;

love him, do what is just,

and always trust in him as your God.

⁷The merchants use dishonest scales;

they like to cheat people.

⁸Israel said, “I am rich! I am someone with power!”

All their money will do them no good

because of the sins they have done.

⁹“But I am the Lord your God,

who brought you out of Egypt.

I will make you live in tents again

as you used to do on worship days.

¹⁰I spoke to the prophets

and gave them many visions;

through them, I taught my lessons to you.”

¹¹The people of Gilead are evil,

worth nothing.

Though people sacrifice bulls at Gilgal,

their altars will become like piles of stone

in a plowed field.

¹²Your ancestor Jacob fled to Northwest Mesopotamia

where he worked to get a wife;

he tended sheep to pay for her.

¹³Later the Lord used a prophet

to bring Jacob’s descendants out of Egypt;

he used a prophet

to take care of the Israelites.

¹⁴But the Israelites made the Lord angry when they killed other people,

and they deserve to die for their crimes.

The Lord will make them pay

for the disgraceful things they have done.