Hosea 4–5

Chapter 4

¹Hear the word of the Lord, O people of Israel;

for the Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land.

There is no faithfulness or kindness,

and no knowledge of God in the land;

²there is swearing, lying, killing, stealing, and committing adultery;

they break all bounds and murder follows murder.

³Therefore the land mourns,

and all who dwell in it languish,

and also the beasts of the field,

and the birds of the air;

and even the fish of the sea are taken away.

⁴Yet let no one contend,

and let none accuse,

for with you is my contention, O priest.^k

⁵You shall stumble by day,

the prophet also shall stumble with you by night;

and I will destroy your mother.

⁶My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge;

because you have rejected knowledge,

I reject you from being a priest to me.

And since you have forgotten the law of your God,

I also will forget your children.

⁷The more they increased,

the more they sinned against me;

I will change their glory into shame.

⁸They feed on the sin of my people;

they are greedy for their iniquity.

⁹And it shall be like people, like priest;

I will punish them for their ways,

and requite them for their deeds.

¹⁰They shall eat, but not be satisfied;

they shall play the harlot, but not multiply;

because they have forsaken the Lord

to cherish harlotry.

¹¹Wine and new wine

take away the understanding.

¹²My people inquire of a thing of wood,

and their staff gives them oracles.

For a spirit of harlotry has led them astray,

and they have left their God to play the harlot.

¹³They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains,

and make offerings upon the hills,

under oak, poplar, and terebinth,

because their shade is good.

Therefore your daughters play the harlot,

and your brides commit adultery.

¹⁴I will not punish your daughters when they play the harlot,

nor your brides when they commit adultery;

for the men themselves go aside with harlots,

and sacrifice with cult prostitutes,

and a people without understanding shall come to ruin.

¹⁵Though you play the harlot, O Israel,

let not Judah become guilty.

Enter not into Gilgal,

nor go up to Beth-aven,

and swear not, “As the Lord lives.”

¹⁶Like a stubborn heifer,

Israel is stubborn;

can the Lord now feed them

like a lamb in a broad pasture?

¹⁷Ephraim is joined to idols,

let him alone.

¹⁸A band^l of drunkards, they give themselves to harlotry;

they love shame more than their glory.^m

¹⁹A wind has wrapped themⁿ in its wings,

and they shall be ashamed because of their altars.^o

Chapter 5

¹Hear this, O priests!

Give heed, O house of Israel!

Hearken, O house of the king!

For the judgment pertains to you;

for you have been a snare at Mizpah,

and a net spread upon Tabor.

²And they have made deep the pit of Shittim;^p

but I will chastise all of them.

³I know Ephraim,

and Israel is not hid from me;

for now, O Ephraim, you have played the harlot,

Israel is defiled.

⁴Their deeds do not permit them

to return to their God.

For the spirit of harlotry is within them,

and they know not the Lord.

⁵The pride of Israel testifies to his face;

Ephraim^q shall stumble in his guilt;

Judah also shall stumble with them.

⁶With their flocks and herds they shall go

to seek the Lord,

but they will not find him;

he has withdrawn from them.

⁷They have dealt faithlessly with the Lord;

for they have borne alien children.

Now the new moon shall devour them with their fields.

⁸Blow the horn in Gibe-ah,

the trumpet in Ramah.

Sound the alarm at Beth-aven;

tremble,^r O Benjamin!

⁹Ephraim shall become a desolation

in the day of punishment;

among the tribes of Israel

I declare what is sure.

¹⁰The princes of Judah have become

like those who remove the landmark;

upon them I will pour out

my wrath like water.

¹¹Ephraim is oppressed, crushed in judgment,

because he was determined to go after vanity.^s

¹²Therefore I am like a moth to Ephraim,

and like dry rot to the house of Judah.

¹³When Ephraim saw his sickness,

and Judah his wound,

then Ephraim went to Assyria,

and sent to the great king.^t

But he is not able to cure you

or heal your wound.

¹⁴For I will be like a lion to Ephraim,

and like a young lion to the house of Judah.

I, even I, will rend and go away,

I will carry off, and none shall rescue.

¹⁵I will return again to my place,

until they acknowledge their guilt and seek my face,

and in their distress they seek me, saying,