Chronological Plan

¹Put the horn to your mouth! One like an eagle comes against the house of the LORD, because they transgress my covenant and rebel against my law.

²Israel cries out to me, “My God, we know you!”

³Israel has rejected what is good; an enemy will pursue him.

⁴They have installed kings, but not through me. They have appointed leaders, but without my approval. They make their silver and gold into idols for themselves for their own destruction.

⁵Your calf-idol is rejected, Samaria. My anger burns against them. How long will they be incapable of innocence?

⁶For this thing is from Israel — a craftsman made it, and it is not God. The calf of Samaria will be smashed to bits!

⁷Indeed, they sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. There is no standing grain; what sprouts fails to yield flour. Even if they did, foreigners would swallow it up.

⁸Israel is swallowed up! Now they are among the nations like discarded pottery.

⁹For they have gone up to Assyria like a wild donkey going off on its own. Ephraim has paid for love.

¹⁰Even though they hire lovers among the nations, I will now round them up, and they will begin to decrease in number under the burden of the king and leaders.

¹¹When Ephraim multiplied his altars for sin, they became his altars for sinning.

¹²Though I were to write out for him ten thousand points of my instruction, they would be regarded as something strange.

¹³Though they offer sacrificial gifts and eat the flesh, the LORD does not accept them. Now he will remember their guilt and punish their sins; they will return to Egypt.

¹⁴Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; Judah has also multiplied fortified cities. I will send fire on their cities, and it will consume their citadels.

¹Israel, do not rejoice jubilantly as the nations do, for you have acted promiscuously, leaving your God. You love the wages of a prostitute on every grain-threshing floor.

²Threshing floor and wine vat will not sustain them, and the new wine will fail them.

³They will not stay in the land of the LORD. Instead, Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

⁴They will not pour out their wine offerings to the LORD, and their sacrifices will not please him. Their food will be like the bread of mourners; all who eat it become defiled. For their bread will be for their appetites alone; it will not enter the house of the LORD.

⁵What will you do on a festival day, on the day of the LORD’s feast?

⁶For even if they flee from devastation, Egypt will gather them, and Memphis will bury them. Thistles will take possession of their precious silver; thorns will invade their tents.

⁷The days of punishment have come; the days of retribution have come. Let Israel recognize it! The prophet is a fool, and the inspired man is insane, because of the magnitude of your iniquity and hostility.

⁸Ephraim’s watchman is with my God. Yet the prophet encounters a bird trap on all his pathways. Hostility is in the house of his God!

⁹They have deeply corrupted themselves as in the days of Gibeah. He will remember their iniquity; he will punish their sins.

¹⁰I discovered Israel like grapes in the wilderness. I saw your fathers like the first fruit of the fig tree in its first season. But they went to Baal-peor, consecrated themselves to Shame, and became abhorrent, like the thing they loved.

¹¹Ephraim’s glory will fly away like a bird: no birth, no pregnancy, no conception.

¹²Even if they raise children, I will bereave them of each one. Yes, woe to them when I depart from them!

¹³I have seen Ephraim like Tyre, planted in a meadow, so Ephraim will bring out his children to the executioner.

¹⁴Give them, LORD  — What should you give? Give them a womb that miscarries and breasts that are dry!

¹⁵All their evil appears at Gilgal, for there I began to hate them. I will drive them from my house because of their evil, wicked actions. I will no longer love them; all their leaders are rebellious.

¹⁶Ephraim is struck down; their roots are withered; they cannot bear fruit. Even if they bear children, I will kill the precious offspring of their wombs.

¹⁷My God will reject them because they have not listened to him; they will become wanderers among the nations.

¹Israel is a lush vine; it yields fruit for itself. The more his fruit increased, the more he increased the altars. The better his land produced, the better they made the sacred pillars.

²Their hearts are devious; now they must bear their guilt. The LORD will break down their altars and demolish their sacred pillars.

³In fact, they are now saying, “We have no king! For we do not fear the LORD. What can a king do for us?”

⁴They speak mere words, taking false oaths while making covenants. So lawsuits break out like poisonous weeds in the furrows of a field.

⁵The residents of Samaria will have anxiety over the calf of Beth-aven. Indeed, its idolatrous priests rejoiced over it; the people will mourn over it, over its glory. It will certainly go into exile.

⁶The calf itself will be taken to Assyria as an offering to the great king. Ephraim will experience shame; Israel will be ashamed of its counsel.

⁷Samaria’s king will disappear like foam on the surface of the water.

⁸The high places of Aven, the sin of Israel, will be destroyed; thorns and thistles will grow over their altars. They will say to the mountains, “Cover us!” and to the hills, “Fall on us!”

⁹Israel, you have sinned since the days of Gibeah; they have taken their stand there. Will not war against the unjust overtake them in Gibeah?

¹⁰I will discipline them at my discretion; nations will be gathered against them to put them in bondage for their double iniquity.

¹¹Ephraim is a well-trained calf that loves to thresh, but I will place a yoke on her fine neck. I will harness Ephraim; Judah will plow; Jacob will do the final plowing.

¹²Sow righteousness for yourselves and reap faithful love; break up your unplowed ground. It is time to seek the LORD until he comes and sends righteousness on you like the rain.

¹³You have plowed wickedness and reaped injustice; you have eaten the fruit of lies. Because you have trusted in your own way and in your large number of soldiers,

¹⁴the roar of battle will rise against your people, and all your fortifications will be demolished in a day of war, like Shalman’s destruction of Beth-arbel. Mothers will be dashed to pieces along with their children.

¹⁵So it will be done to you, Bethel, because of your extreme evil. At dawn the king of Israel will be totally destroyed.

¹When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.

²Israel called to the Egyptians even as Israel was leaving them. They kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols.

³It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the hand, but they never knew that I healed them.

⁴I led them with human cords, with ropes of love. To them I was like one who eases the yoke from their jaws; I bent down to give them food.

⁵Israel will not return to the land of Egypt and Assyria will be his king, because they refused to repent.

⁶A sword will whirl through his cities; it will destroy and devour the bars of his gates, because of their schemes.

⁷My people are bent on turning from me. Though they call to him on high, he will not exalt them at all.

⁸How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I surrender you, Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? I have had a change of heart; my compassion is stirred!

⁹I will not vent the full fury of my anger; I will not turn back to destroy Ephraim. For I am God and not man, the Holy One among you; I will not come in rage.

¹⁰They will follow the LORD; he will roar like a lion. When he roars, his children will come trembling from the west.

¹¹They will be roused like birds from Egypt and like doves from the land of Assyria. Then I will settle them in their homes. This is the LORD’s declaration.

¹²Ephraim surrounds me with lies, the house of Israel, with deceit. Judah still wanders with God and is faithful to the holy ones.

¹Ephraim chases the wind and pursues the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and violence. He makes a covenant with Assyria, and olive oil is carried to Egypt.

²The LORD also has a dispute with Judah. He is about to punish Jacob according to his conduct; he will repay him based on his actions.

³In the womb he grasped his brother’s heel, and as an adult he wrestled with God.

⁴Jacob struggled with the angel and prevailed; he wept and sought his favor. He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with him.

⁵The LORD is the God of Armies; the LORD is his name.

⁶But you must return to your God. Maintain love and justice, and always put your hope in God.

⁷A merchant loves to extort with dishonest scales in his hands.

⁸But Ephraim thinks, “How rich I have become; I made it all myself. In all my earnings, no one can find any iniquity in me that I can be punished for!”

⁹I have been the LORD your God ever since the land of Egypt. I will make you live in tents again, as in the festival days.

¹⁰I will speak through the prophets and grant many visions; I will give parables through the prophets.

¹¹Since Gilead is full of evil, they will certainly come to nothing. They sacrifice bulls in Gilgal; even their altars will be like piles of rocks on the furrows of a field.

¹²Jacob fled to the territory of Aram. Israel worked to earn a wife; he tended flocks for a wife.

¹³The LORD brought Israel from Egypt by a prophet, and Israel was tended by a prophet.

¹⁴Ephraim has provoked bitter anger, so his Lord will leave his bloodguilt on him and repay him for his contempt.

¹When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling; he was exalted in Israel. But he incurred guilt through Baal and died.

²Now they continue to sin and make themselves a cast image, idols skillfully made from their silver, all of them the work of craftsmen. People say about them, “Let the men who sacrifice kiss the calves.”

³Therefore, they will be like the morning mist, like the early dew that vanishes, like chaff blown from a threshing floor, or like smoke from a window.

⁴I have been the LORD your God ever since the land of Egypt; you know no God but me, and no Savior exists besides me.

⁵I knew you in the wilderness, in the land of drought.

⁶When they had pasture, they became satisfied; they were satisfied, and their hearts became proud. Therefore they forgot me.

⁷So I will be like a lion to them; I will lurk like a leopard on the path.

⁸I will attack them like a bear robbed of her cubs and tear open the rib cage over their hearts. I will devour them there like a lioness, like a wild beast that would rip them open.

⁹I will destroy you, Israel; you have no help but me.

¹⁰Where now is your king, that he may save you in all your cities, and the rulers you demanded, saying, “Give me a king and leaders”?

¹¹I give you a king in my anger and take away a king in my wrath.

¹²Ephraim’s guilt is preserved; his sin is stored up.

¹³Labor pains come on him. He is not a wise son; when the time comes, he will not be born.

¹⁴I will ransom them from the power of Sheol. I will redeem them from death. Death, where are your barbs? Sheol, where is your sting? Compassion is hidden from my eyes.

¹⁵Although he flourishes among his brothers, an east wind will come, a wind from the LORD rising up from the desert. His water source will fail, and his spring will run dry. The wind will plunder the treasury of every precious item.

¹⁶Samaria will bear her guilt because she has rebelled against her God. They will fall by the sword; their children will be dashed to pieces, and their pregnant women ripped open.

¹Israel, return to the LORD your God, for you have stumbled in your iniquity.

²Take words of repentance with you and return to the LORD. Say to him: “Forgive all our iniquity and accept what is good, so that we may repay you with praise from our lips.

³Assyria will not save us, we will not ride on horses, and we will no longer proclaim, ‘Our gods! ’ to the work of our hands. For the fatherless receives compassion in you.”

⁴I will heal their apostasy; I will freely love them, for my anger will have turned from him.

⁵I will be like the dew to Israel; he will blossom like the lily and take root like the cedars of Lebanon.

⁶His new branches will spread, and his splendor will be like the olive tree, his fragrance, like the forest of Lebanon.

⁷The people will return and live beneath his shade. They will grow grain and blossom like the vine. His renown will be like the wine of Lebanon.

⁸Ephraim, why should I have anything more to do with idols? It is I who answer and watch over him. I am like a flourishing pine tree; your fruit comes from me.

⁹Let whoever is wise understand these things, and whoever is insightful recognize them. For the ways of the LORD are right, and the righteous walk in them, but the rebellious stumble in them.