Study Desk

"And in that day, says the LORD, I will answer the heavens and they shall answer the earth;

and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel;

And the LORD said to me, "Go again, love a woman who is beloved of a paramour and is an adulteress; even as the LORD loves the people of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins."

Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the LORD their God, and David their king; and they shall come in fear to the LORD and to his goodness in the latter days.

there is swearing, lying, killing, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds and murder follows murder.

My 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.

They 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.

I 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.

A wind has wrapped them in its wings, and they shall be ashamed because of their altars.

And they have made deep the pit of Shittim; but I will chastise all of them.

Their deeds do not permit them to return to their God. For the spirit of harlotry is within them, and they know not the LORD.

With their flocks and herds they shall go to seek the LORD, but they will not find him; he has withdrawn from them.

I will return again to my place, until they acknowledge their guilt and seek my face, and in their distress they seek me, saying,

when I would heal Israel, the corruption of E'phraim is revealed, and the wicked deeds of Sama'ria; for they deal falsely, the thief breaks in, and the bandits raid without.

By their wickedness they make the king glad, and the princes by their treachery.

All of them are hot as an oven, and they devour their rulers. All their kings have fallen; and none of them calls upon me.

They do not cry to me from the heart, but they wail upon their beds; for grain and wine they gash themselves, they rebel against me.

Although I trained and strengthened their arms, yet they devise evil against me.

Set the trumpet to your lips, for a vulture is over the house of the LORD, because they have broken my covenant, and transgressed my law.

They made kings, but not through me. They set up princes, but without my knowledge. With their silver and gold they made idols for their own destruction.