Hosea 9:1-13 ▼

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

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

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

4 They 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.

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

6 For 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.

7 The 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 guilt and hostility.

8 Ephraim’s watchman is with my God. The prophet encounters a fowler’s snare on all his ways. Hostility is in the house of his God!

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

10 I 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 detestable, like the thing they loved.

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

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

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