Hosea 9

Punishment for Israel’s Sin

Do not rejoice, O Israel!
    Do not exult as other nations do;
for you have played the whore, departing from your God.
    You have loved a prostitute’s pay
    on all threshing floors.
2 Threshing floor and wine vat shall not feed them,
    and the new wine shall fail them.
3 They shall not remain in the land of the Lord;
    but Ephraim shall return to Egypt,
    and in Assyria they shall eat unclean food.

4 They shall not pour drink offerings of wine to the Lord,
    and their sacrifices shall not please him.
Such sacrifices shall be like mourners’ bread;
    all who eat of it shall be defiled;
for their bread shall be for their hunger only;
    it shall not come to the house of the Lord.

5 What will you do on the day of appointed festival,
    and on the day of the festival of the Lord?
6 For even if they escape destruction,
    Egypt shall gather them,
    Memphis shall bury them.
Nettles shall possess their precious things of silver;
    thorns shall be in their tents.

7 The days of punishment have come,
    the days of recompense have come;
    Israel cries,
“The prophet is a fool,
    the man of the spirit is mad!”
Because of your great iniquity,
    your hostility is great.
8 The prophet is a sentinel for my God over Ephraim,
yet a fowler’s snare is on all his ways,
    and hostility in the house of his God.
9 They have deeply corrupted themselves
    as in the days of Gibeah;
he will remember their iniquity,
    he will punish their sins.

10 Like grapes in the wilderness,
    I found Israel.
Like the first fruit on the fig tree,
    in its first season,
    I saw your ancestors.
But they came to Baal-peor,
    and consecrated themselves to a thing of shame,
    and became detestable like the thing they loved.
11 Ephraim’s glory shall fly away like a bird—
    no birth, no pregnancy, no conception!
12 Even if they bring up children,
    I will bereave them until no one is left.
Woe to them indeed
    when I depart from them!
13 Once I saw Ephraim as a young palm planted in a lovely meadow,
    but now Ephraim must lead out his children for slaughter.
14 Give them, O Lord—
    what will you give?
Give them a miscarrying womb
    and dry breasts.

15 Every evil of theirs began at Gilgal;
    there I came to hate them.
Because of the wickedness of their deeds
    I will drive them out of my house.
I will love them no more;
    all their officials are rebels.

16 Ephraim is stricken,
    their root is dried up,
    they shall bear no fruit.
Even though they give birth,
    I will kill the cherished offspring of their womb.
17 Because they have not listened to him,
    my God will reject them;
    they shall become wanderers among the nations.

(1)(9:1) Gk: Heb To exultation
(2)(9:6) Meaning of Heb uncertain
(3)(9:7) Cn Compare Gk: Heb shall know
(4)(9:13) Meaning of Heb uncertain

Hosea: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14