LEB HOS Chapter 8

Israel Rejects the Good

• 8 Put to your lips the trumpet
• like a vulture over the house of Yahweh,
• because they have broken my covenant[fn]
  • and rebelled against my law.
• 2 They cry out to me,
  • “My God! We, Israel, know you!”
• 3 Israel has spurned the good;
  • the enemy will pursue him.
• 4 They appointed kings, but not through me;
  • they made officials, but without my knowledge.
• With their silver and gold
  • they made idols for themselves
    • for their[fn] own destruction .[fn]
• 5 Your calf is rejected,[fn] O Samaria;
  • my anger burns against them.
• How long[fn] will they be incapable of innocence?
  • 6 Because it is from Israel,
• an artisan made it,
  • it is not a god;
• for the calf of Samaria
  • will be broken to pieces.
• 7 Because they sow the wind,
  • they will reap the whirlwind.
• The standing grain does not have heads;[fn]
  • it will not yield flour.
• And if it would yield,
  • strangers would devour it.
• 8 Israel is swallowed up;
  • now they are among the nations,
    • like an object that no one desires.
• 9 For they have gone up to Assyria,
  • a wild donkey alone to itself;
    • Ephraim has sold itself for lovers.
• 10 Even though they have sold themselves to the nations,
  • now I will gather them.
• They will soon writhe
  • from the burden of kings[fn] and princes.
• 11 When Ephraim multiplied altars
  • to expiate sins,
    • they became to him altars to sin on.
• 12 I write for him myriads of my instruction;[fn]
  • they are regarded as a strange thing.
• 13 They offer sacrifices of my choice[fn]
  • and they eat flesh;
    • Yahweh does not accept them.
• Now he will remember their iniquity
  • and punish their sins;
• they will return to Egypt.
  • 14 Israel has forgotten his maker and built palaces,
• and Judah has multiplied fortified cities;
  • but I will send fire on his cities
  • and it will devour her strongholds.