4  ^kHear the word of the Lord, O children of Israel,

for ^lthe Lord has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land.

There is no faithfulness or steadfast love,

and ^mno knowledge of God in the land;

2  ⁿthere is swearing, lying, murder, stealing, and committing adultery;

they break all bounds, and ^obloodshed follows bloodshed.

3  Therefore ^pthe land mourns,

and all who dwell in it languish,

^qand also the beasts of the field

and the birds of the heavens,

^rand even the fish of the sea are taken away.

4  ^sYet let no one contend,

and let none accuse,

for with you is ^tmy contention, O priest.¹

5  You shall stumble by day;

the prophet also shall stumble with you by night;

and I will destroy ^uyour mother.

6  My people are destroyed ^vfor lack of knowledge;

^wbecause you have rejected knowledge,

I reject you ^xfrom being a priest to me.

And since you have forgotten the law of your God,

^yI also will forget your children.

7  ^zThe more they increased,

the more they sinned against me;

^aI will change their glory into shame.

8  ^bThey feed on the sin² of my people;

they are greedy for their iniquity.

9  ^cAnd it shall be like people, like priest;

I will punish them for their ways

and repay them for their deeds.

10  ^dThey shall eat, but not be satisfied;

they shall play the whore, but not multiply,

because they have forsaken the Lord

to cherish 11 whoredom, wine, and new wine,

which ^etake away the understanding.

12  My people ^finquire of a piece of wood,

and their walking staff gives them oracles.

For ^ga spirit of whoredom has led them astray,

and they have left their God to play the whore.

13  ^hThey sacrifice on the tops of the mountains

and burn offerings on the hills,

ⁱunder oak, poplar, and terebinth,

because their shade is good.

Therefore your daughters play the whore,

and your brides commit adultery.

14  I will not punish your daughters when they play the whore,

nor your brides when they commit adultery;

for ^jthe men themselves go aside with prostitutes

and sacrifice with ^kcult prostitutes,

and a people ^lwithout understanding shall come to ruin.

15  Though you play the whore, O ^mIsrael,

let not ^mJudah become guilty.

ⁿEnter not into ^oGilgal,

nor go up to ^pBeth-aven,

and swear not, “As the Lord lives.”

16  Like a stubborn heifer,

Israel is stubborn;

can the Lord now feed them

like a lamb in a broad pasture?

17  ^qEphraim is joined to idols;

^rleave him alone.

18  When their drink is gone, they give themselves to whoring;

^stheir rulers³ dearly love shame.

19  ^tA wind has wrapped them⁴ in its wings,

and they shall ^ube ashamed because of their sacrifices.

5  ^vHear this, O priests!

Pay attention, O house of Israel!

Give ear, O house of the king!

For the judgment is for you;

for ^wyou have been a snare at Mizpah

and a net spread upon ^xTabor.

2  And ^ythe revolters ^zhave gone deep into slaughter,

but ^aI will discipline all of them.

3  ^bI know Ephraim,

and Israel is not hidden from me;

for now, O Ephraim, you have played the whore;

Israel is defiled.

4  ^cTheir deeds do not permit them

to return to their God.

For ^dthe spirit of whoredom is within them,

and they know not the Lord.

5  ^eThe pride of Israel testifies to his face;¹

Israel and ^fEphraim shall stumble in his guilt;

^fJudah also shall stumble with them.

6  ^gWith their flocks and herds they shall go

to seek the Lord,

^gbut they will not find him;

^hhe has withdrawn from them.

7  ⁱThey have dealt faithlessly with the Lord;

for they have borne alien children.

Now the new moon shall devour them with their fields.

8  ^jBlow the horn in ^kGibeah,

the trumpet in ^lRamah.

Sound the alarm at ^mBeth-aven;

we follow you,² O Benjamin!

9  Ephraim shall become a desolation

in the day of punishment;

among the tribes of Israel

I make known what is sure.

10  The princes of Judah have become

like ⁿthose who move the landmark;

upon them I will pour out

my wrath like water.

11  Ephraim is ^ooppressed, crushed in judgment,

because he was determined to go after filth.³

12  But I am ^plike a moth to Ephraim,

and ^plike dry rot to the house of Judah.

13  When Ephraim saw his sickness,

and Judah ^qhis wound,

then Ephraim went ^rto Assyria,

and sent to the great king.⁴

^sBut he is not able to cure you

or heal ^qyour wound.

14  For I will be ^tlike a lion to ^uEphraim,

and like a young lion to the house of ^uJudah.

^vI, even I, will tear and go away;

I will carry off, and no one shall rescue.

15  ^wI will return again to my place,

until they acknowledge their guilt and seek my face,

and ^xin their distress earnestly seek me.

6  “Come, let us ^yreturn to the Lord;

for ^zhe has torn us, that he may heal us;

he has struck us down, and ^ahe will bind us up.

2  After two days ^bhe will revive us;

on the third day he will raise us up,

that we may live before him.

3  ^cLet us know; ^clet us press on to know the Lord;

^dhis going out is sure as the dawn;

he will come to us ^eas the showers,

^fas the spring rains that water the earth.”

4  What shall I do with you, ^gO ^hEphraim?

What shall I do with you, O ^hJudah?

Your love is ⁱlike a morning cloud,

ⁱlike the dew that goes early away.

5  Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets;

I have slain them ^jby the words of my mouth,

and my judgment goes forth as the light.

6  For ^kI desire steadfast love¹ and not sacrifice,

^lthe knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

7  But ^mlike Adam they ⁿtransgressed the covenant;

^othere they dealt faithlessly with me.

8  ^pGilead is a city of evildoers,

^qtracked with blood.

9  As robbers ^rlie in wait for a man,

so the priests band together;

they murder on the way to ^sShechem;

they commit villainy.

10  In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing;

^tEphraim’s whoredom is there; ^uIsrael is defiled.

11  For you also, O ^uJudah, ^va harvest is appointed.

When ^wI restore the fortunes of my people,

7  ^xwhen I would heal Israel,

the iniquity of Ephraim is revealed,

and the evil deeds of ^ySamaria,

for ^zthey deal falsely;

the thief breaks in,

and the bandits raid outside.

2  But they do not consider

that ^aI remember all their evil.

Now ^btheir deeds surround them;

^cthey are before my face.

3  By their evil ^dthey make ^dthe king glad,

and the princes by their treachery.

4  ^eThey are all adulterers;

they are like a heated oven

whose baker ceases to stir the fire,

from the kneading of the dough

until it is leavened.

5  On the day of ^four king, the princes

became sick with the heat of wine;

he stretched out his hand with mockers.

6  For with hearts like an oven ^gthey approach their intrigue;

all night their anger smolders;

in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire.

7  All of them are hot as an oven,

and they devour their rulers.

All ^htheir kings ⁱhave fallen,

and none of them calls upon me.

8  Ephraim ^jmixes himself with the peoples;

Ephraim is a cake not turned.

9  ^kStrangers devour his strength,

and ^lhe knows it not;

gray hairs are sprinkled upon him,

and ^lhe knows it not.

10  ^mThe pride of Israel testifies to his face;¹

ⁿyet they do not return to the Lord their God,

nor seek him, for all this.

11  Ephraim is like a dove,

^osilly and without sense,

calling to ^pEgypt, going to ^qAssyria.

12  As they go, ^rI will spread over them my net;

I will bring them down like birds of the heavens;

^sI will discipline them ^taccording to the report made to their congregation.

13  ^uWoe to them, for they have strayed from me!

Destruction to them, for they have rebelled against me!

^vI would redeem them,

but ^wthey speak lies against me.

14  ^xThey do not cry to me from the heart,

but ^ythey wail upon their beds;

for grain and wine they gash themselves;

they rebel against me.

15  Although ^zI trained and strengthened their arms,

yet they devise evil against me.

16  They ^areturn, but not upward;²

they are ^blike a treacherous bow;

their princes shall fall by the sword

because of ^cthe insolence of their tongue.

This shall be their derision ^din the land of Egypt.