Hosea 5-8
Complete Jewish Bible
5 “Hear this, cohanim!
Pay attention, house of Isra’el!
Listen, house of the king!
For judgment is coming to you.
You have become a snare for Mitzpah
and a net spread on Tavor.
2 The rebels have deepened their slaughter,
and I am rejected by all of them.
3 “I know Efrayim;
Isra’el is not hidden from me;
for now, Efrayim, you are a whore;
Isra’el is defiled.”
4 Their deeds will not allow them
to return to their God,
for the spirit of whoring is in them,
and they don’t know Adonai.
5 Isra’el’s arrogance will testify in his face;
Isra’el and Efrayim will stumble in their crimes;
Y’hudah too will stumble with them.
6 With their flocks and herds
they will go in search of Adonai.
But they won’t find him;
he has withdrawn from them.
7 They have betrayed Adonai,
by fathering foreign children.
Now within the month the invaders
will devour their lands.
8 “Blow the shofar in Giv‘ah,
a trumpet at Ramah;
sound an alarm at Beit-Aven:
‘Behind you, Binyamin!’
9 Efrayim will be laid waste
when the day for punishment comes;
I am announcing to the tribes of Isra’el
what will surely happen.
10 The leaders of Y’hudah are like men
who move boundary stones;
I will pour my fury out
upon them like water.
11 Efrayim is oppressed, crushed by the judgment,
because he deliberately sought out futility.
12 Therefore I am like a moth to Efrayim
and like rottenness to the house of Y’hudah.
13 When Efrayim saw his sickness
and Y’hudah his wound,
Efrayim went to Ashur
and sent envoys to a warring king;
but he can’t heal you
or cure your wound.
14 For to Efrayim I will be like a lion,
and like a young lion to the house of Y’hudah —
I will tear them up and go away;
I will carry them off, and no one will rescue.
15 I will go and return to my place,
till they admit their guilt and search for me,
seeking me eagerly in their distress.”
6 Come, let us return to Adonai;
for he has torn, and he will heal us;
he has struck, and he will bind our wounds.
2 After two days, he will revive us;
on the third day, he will raise us up;
and we will live in his presence.
3 Let us know, let us strive to know Adonai.
That he will come is as certain as morning;
he will come to us like the rain,
like the spring rains that water the earth.
4 “Efrayim, what should I do to you?
Y’hudah, what should I do to you?
For your ‘faithful love’ is like a morning cloud,
like dew that disappears quickly.
5 This is why I have cut them to pieces by the prophets,
slaughtered them with the words from my mouth —
the judgment on you shines out like light.
6 For what I desire is mercy, not sacrifices,
knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
7 “But they, just like men, have broken the covenant,
they have been faithless in dealing with me.
8 Gil‘ad is a city of criminals,
covered with bloody footprints;
9 just as bands of robbers wait to ambush someone,
so does a gang of cohanim.
They commit murder on the road to Sh’khem!
Their conduct is an outrage!
10 In the house of Isra’el
I have seen a horrible thing;
whoring is found there in Efrayim,
Isra’el is defiled.
11 For you, too, Y’hudah,
a harvest will come!
“When I restore the fortunes of my people,
7 when I am ready to heal Isra’el,
the crimes of Efrayim confront me,
along with the wickedness of Shomron.
For they keep practicing deceit;
thieves break in, bands of robbers raid outside.
2 They never say to themselves
that I remember all their evil.
Now their own deeds surround them;
they are right in front of me.
3 They make the king glad with their wickedness,
and the leaders with their lies.
4 They are all adulterers,
like an oven heated by the baker,
who doesn’t stoke the fire
from kneading time till the dough has risen.
5 “On their king’s special day
the leaders inflame him with wine,
and he joins hands with scorners,
6 who ready themselves like an oven
while they wait for their chance.
Their baker sleeps through the night;
then in the morning it bursts into flame.
7 They are all as hot as an oven,
and they devour their judges.
All their kings have fallen;
not one of them calls out to me.
8 “Efrayim mixes himself with the peoples,
Efrayim has become a half-baked cake.
9 Foreigners have eaten up his strength,
but he doesn’t know it;
yes, gray hairs appear on him here and there,
but he doesn’t know it.
10 The pride of Isra’el testifies in his face,
but in spite of all this they haven’t returned
to Adonai their God or sought him.
11 Efrayim behaves like a silly, foolish dove —
going to Egypt, then to Ashur for help.
12 Even as they go, I will spread my net over them;
I will bring them down like birds from the sky;
I will discipline them, as their assembly was told.
13 Woe to them! for they have strayed from me.
Destruction to them! for they have wronged me.
Am I supposed to redeem them,
when they have spoken lies against me?
14 They have not cried out to me from their hearts,
even though they wail on their beds.
They assemble themselves for grain and wine,
yet turn away from me.
15 It was I who trained and strengthened their arms,
yet they plot evil against me.
16 They return, but not upward;
they are like an unreliable bow.
Their leaders will die by the sword
because of their angry talk.
They will become a laughingstock
in the land of Egypt.
8 “Put the shofar to your lips!
Like a vulture [he swoops down] on the house of Adonai,
because they have violated my covenant
and sinned intentionally against my Torah.
2 Will they cry out to me,
‘We are Isra’el, God, we know you’?
3 Isra’el has thrown away what is good;
the enemy will pursue him.
4 They make kings, but without my authority;
they appoint leaders, but without my knowledge.
With their silver and gold they make themselves idols,
but these can lead only to their own destruction.
5 Your calf, Shomron, has been thrown away;
my fury burns against them.
How long will it be until they are able
to make themselves clean?
6 Here is what Isra’el produces:
a craftsman makes something — it’s a non-god;
the calf of Shomron will be broken to pieces.
7 For they sow the wind,
so they will reap the whirlwind.
The standing grain has no ears,
so it will yield no flour;
and if it does yield any,
foreigners will swallow it up.
8 Isra’el is swallowed up;
now they are among the Goyim
like a vessel nobody wants.
9 For they have gone up to Ashur;
like a wild donkey, alone by itself,
Efrayim has bargained for lovers.
10 But even if they bargain among the Goyim,
now I will round them up.
Soon they will start to feel the burden
of these kings and leaders.
11 For Efrayim keeps building altars for sin;
yes, altars are sinful for him.
12 I write him so many things from my Torah,
yet he considers them foreign.
13 They offer me sacrifices of flesh and eat them,
but Adonai does not accept them.
Now he will recall their crimes and punish their sins —
they will return to Egypt.
14 For Isra’el forgot his maker and built palaces;
and Y’hudah made more fortified cities;
but I will send fire on his cities,
and it will consume their strongholds.”
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.
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