Study Desk

I will not punish your daughters when they play the whore, or your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery; because they go aside with whores, and they sacrifice with temple prostitutes, a people that does not understand comes to ruin.

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

Hear this, O priests! Give heed, O house of Israel! Listen, O house of the king! Because the judgment applies to you; because you have been a snare for Mizpah, and a net spread out on Tabor;

I myself know Ephraim, and Israel is not hidden from me; because now you have played the whore, O Ephraim— Israel is defiled.

Their deeds do not permit them to return them to God. Because a spirit of whoredom is in their midst, they do not know Yahweh.

They have dealt faithlessly with Yahweh because they have borne illegitimate children. Now the new moon will devour them with their fields.

Ephraim is oppressed, crushed in judgment, because he was determined to go after filth.

Because I will be like a lion to Ephraim and like a fierce strong lion to the house of Judah. I myself will tear and I will go; I will carry off, and there is no one who delivers.

Come, let us return to Yahweh; because it is he who has torn, and he will heal us; he has struck us down and will bind us up.

Because I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Gilead is a city of evil, a cunning city because of blood.

when I would heal Israel, and the corruption of Ephraim is revealed, and the wicked deeds of Samaria; because they deal in falsehood, the thief breaks in, and the bandit raids the outside.

Because they are kindled like an oven, their heart burns within them; all night their anger smolders, in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire.

Woe to them, because they have strayed from me! Destruction to them, because they have rebelled against me! I myself would redeem them, but they speak lies against me.

They do not cry out to me from their heart, but they wail on their beds; because of grain and new wine they lacerate themselves; they depart from me.

They turn, not to the Most High, like a slack bow; their officials will fall by the sword because of the anger of their tongue. This is their scorn in the land of Egypt.

Put to your lips the trumpet like a vulture over the house of Yahweh, because they have broken my covenant and rebelled against my law.

Because it is from Israel, an artisan made it, it is not a god; for the calf of Samaria will be broken to pieces.

Because they sow the wind, they will reap the whirlwind. The standing grain does not have heads; it will not yield flour. And if it would yield, strangers would devour it.

The days of punishment have come; the days of retribution have come; Israel knows! The prophet is a fool, the man of the spirit is acting like a madman. Because of the greatness of your sin, your hostility is great.