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Punishment for Israel’s Sin

9Do not rejoice, O Israel!
   Do not exult^* as other nations do;
for you have played the whore, departing from your God.
   You have loved a prostitute’s pay
   on all threshing-floors.
² Threshing-floor and wine vat shall not feed them,
   and the new wine shall fail them.
³ They shall not remain in the land of the Lord;
   but Ephraim shall return to Egypt,
   and in Assyria they shall eat unclean food.

⁴ They shall not pour drink-offerings of wine to the Lord,
   and their sacrifices shall not please him.
Such sacrifices 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.

⁵ What will you do on the day of appointed festival,
   and on the day of the festival of the Lord?
⁶ For even if they escape destruction,
   Egypt shall gather them,
   Memphis shall bury them.
Nettles shall possess their precious things of silver;^*
   thorns shall be in their tents.

⁷ The days of punishment have come,
   the days of recompense have come;
   Israel cries,^*
‘The prophet is a fool,
   the man of the spirit is mad!’
Because of your great iniquity,
   your hostility is great.
⁸ The prophet is a sentinel for my God over Ephraim,
yet a fowler’s snare is on all his ways,
   and hostility in the house of his God.
⁹ They have deeply corrupted themselves
   as in the days of Gibeah;
he will remember their iniquity,
   he will punish their sins.

¹⁰ Like grapes in the wilderness,
   I found Israel.
Like the first fruit on the fig tree,
   in its first season,
   I saw your ancestors.
But they came to Baal-peor,
   and consecrated themselves to a thing of shame,
   and became detestable like the thing they loved.
¹¹ Ephraim’s glory shall fly away like a bird—
   no birth, no pregnancy, no conception!
¹² Even if they bring up children,
   I will bereave them until no one is left.
Woe to them indeed
   when I depart from them!
¹³ Once I saw Ephraim as a young palm planted in a lovely meadow,^*
   but now Ephraim must lead out his children for slaughter.
¹⁴ Give them, O Lord—
   what will you give?
Give them a miscarrying womb
   and dry breasts.

¹⁵ Every evil of theirs began at Gilgal;
   there I came to hate them.
Because of the wickedness of their deeds
   I will drive them out of my house.
I will love them no more;
   all their officials are rebels.

¹⁶ Ephraim is stricken,
   their root is dried up,
   they shall bear no fruit.
Even though they give birth,
   I will kill the cherished offspring of their womb.
¹⁷ Because they have not listened to him,
   my God will reject them;
   they shall become wanderers among the nations.

Israel’s Sin and Captivity

10Israel is a luxuriant vine
   that yields its fruit.
The more his fruit increased
   the more altars he built;
as his country improved,
   he improved his pillars.
² Their heart is false;
   now they must bear their guilt.
The Lord ^* will break down their altars,
   and destroy their pillars.

³ For now they will say:
   ‘We have no king,
for we do not fear the Lord,
   and a king—what could he do for us?’
⁴ They utter mere words;
   with empty oaths they make covenants;
so litigation springs up like poisonous weeds
   in the furrows of the field.
⁵ The inhabitants of Samaria tremble
   for the calf^* of Beth-aven.
Its people shall mourn for it,
   and its idolatrous priests shall wail^* over it,
   over its glory that has departed from it.
⁶ The thing itself shall be carried to Assyria
   as tribute to the great king.^*
Ephraim shall be put to shame,
   and Israel shall be ashamed of his idol.^*

⁷ Samaria’s king shall perish
   like a splinter on the face of the waters.
⁸ The high places of Aven, the sin of Israel,
   shall be destroyed.
Thorn and thistle shall grow up
   on their altars.
They shall say to the mountains, Cover us,
   and to the hills, Fall on us.

⁹ Since the days of Gibeah you have sinned, O Israel;
   there they have continued.
   Shall not war overtake them in Gibeah?
¹⁰ I will come^* against the wayward people to punish them;
   and nations shall be gathered against them
   when they are punished^* for their double iniquity.

¹¹ Ephraim was a trained heifer
   that loved to thresh,
   and I spared her fair neck;
but I will make Ephraim break the ground;
   Judah must plough;
   Jacob must harrow for himself.
¹² Sow for yourselves righteousness;
   reap steadfast love;
   break up your fallow ground;
for it is time to seek the Lord,
   that he may come and rain righteousness upon you.

¹³ You have ploughed wickedness,
   you have reaped injustice,
   you have eaten the fruit of lies.
Because you have trusted in your power
   and in the multitude of your warriors,
¹⁴ therefore the tumult of war shall rise against your people,
   and all your fortresses shall be destroyed,
as Shalman destroyed Beth-arbel on the day of battle
   when mothers were dashed in pieces with their children.
¹⁵ Thus it shall be done to you, O Bethel,
   because of your great wickedness.
At dawn the king of Israel
   shall be utterly cut off.