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Though they hire allies among the nations, I will soon gather them up. And they shall cease for a little while from anointing king and princes.

Because E'phraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they have become to him altars for sinning.

Were I to write for him my laws by ten thousands, they would be regarded as a strange thing.

For Israel has forgotten his Maker, and built palaces; and Judah has multiplied fortified cities; but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour his strongholds.

Rejoice not, O Israel! Exult not like the peoples; for you have played the harlot, forsaking your God. You have loved a harlot's hire upon all threshing floors.

They shall not pour libations of wine to the LORD; and they shall not please him with their sacrifices. Their bread 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.

For behold, they are going to Assyria; Egypt shall gather them, Memphis shall bury them. Nettles shall possess their precious things of silver; thorns shall be in their tents.

E'phraim's sons, as I have seen, are destined for a prey; E'phraim must lead forth his sons to slaughter.

For now they will say: "We have no king, for we fear not the LORD, and a king, what could he do for us?"

The inhabitants of Sama'ria tremble for the calf of Beth-a'ven. Its people shall mourn for it, and its idolatrous priests shall wail over it, over its glory which has departed from it.

I will come against the wayward people to chastise them; and nations shall be gathered against them when they are chastised for their double iniquity.

E'phraim was a trained heifer that loved to thresh, and I spared her fair neck; but I will put E'phraim to the yoke, Judah must plow, Jacob must harrow for himself.

Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of steadfast love; break up your fallow ground, for it is the time to seek the LORD, that he may come and rain salvation upon you.

I will not execute my fierce anger, I will not again destroy E'phraim; for I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come to destroy.

"So you, by the help of your God, return, hold fast to love and justice, and wait continually for your God."

E'phraim has said, "Ah, but I am rich, I have gained wealth for myself": but all his riches can never offset the guilt he has incurred.

(Jacob fled to the land of Aram, there Israel did service for a wife, and for a wife he herded sheep.)

And now they sin more and more, and make for themselves molten images, idols skilfully made of their silver, all of them the work of craftsmen. Sacrifice to these, they say. Men kiss calves!

The pangs of childbirth come for him, but he is an unwise son; for now he does not present himself at the mouth of the womb.

Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God, for you have stumbled because of your iniquity.