Israel Will Return to God

3 Then the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by a ^(A)lover^[a] and is committing adultery, just like the love of the Lord for the children of Israel, who look to other gods and love the raisin cakes of the pagans.”

Jerusalem’s Harlotry

^15 (A)“But you trusted in your own beauty, ^(B)played the harlot because of your fame, and poured out your harlotry on everyone passing by who would have it. ^16 (C)You took some of your garments and adorned multicolored ^[a]high places for yourself, and played the harlot on them. Such things should not happen, nor be. ¹⁷ You have also taken your beautiful jewelry from My gold and My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images and played the harlot with them. ¹⁸ You took your embroidered garments and covered them, and you set My oil and My incense before them. ¹⁹ Also ^(D)My food which I gave you—the pastry of fine flour, oil, and honey which I fed you—you set it before them as ^[b]sweet incense; and so it was,” says the Lord God.

^20 (E)“Moreover you took your sons and your daughters, whom you bore to Me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your acts of harlotry a small matter, ²¹ that you have slain My children and offered them up to them by causing them to pass through the ^(F)fire? ²² And in all your abominations and acts of harlotry you did not remember the days of your ^(G)youth, ^(H)when you were naked and bare, struggling in your blood.

²³ “Then it was so, after all your wickedness—‘Woe, woe to you!’ says the Lord God— ²⁴ that ^(I)you also built for yourself a shrine, and ^(J)made a ^[c]high place for yourself in every street. ²⁵ You built your high places ^(K)at the head of every road, and made your beauty to be abhorred. You offered yourself to everyone who passed by, and multiplied your acts of harlotry. ²⁶ You also committed harlotry with ^(L)the Egyptians, your very fleshly neighbors, and increased your acts of harlotry to ^(M)provoke Me to anger.

²⁷ “Behold, therefore, I stretched out My hand against you, diminished your ^[d]allotment, and gave you up to the will of those who hate you, ^(N)the daughters of the Philistines, who were ashamed of your lewd behavior. ²⁸ You also played the harlot with the ^(O)Assyrians, because you were insatiable; indeed you played the harlot with them and still were not satisfied. ²⁹ Moreover you multiplied your acts of harlotry as far as the land of the trader, ^(P)Chaldea; and even then you were not satisfied.

³⁰ “How degenerate is your heart!” says the Lord God, “seeing you do all these things, the deeds of a brazen harlot.

Jerusalem’s Adultery

^31 (Q)“You erected your shrine at the head of every road, and built your ^[e]high place in every street. Yet you were not like a harlot, because you scorned ^(R)payment. ³² You are an adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband. ³³ Men make payment to all harlots, but ^(S)you made your payments to all your lovers, and ^[f]hired them to come to you from all around for your harlotry. ³⁴ You are the opposite of other women in your harlotry, because no one solicited you to be a harlot. In that you gave payment but no payment was given you, therefore you are the opposite.”

Jerusalem’s Lovers Will Abuse Her

³⁵ ‘Now then, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord! ³⁶ Thus says the Lord God: “Because your filthiness was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your harlotry with your lovers, and with all your abominable idols, and because of ^(T)the blood of your children which you gave to them, ³⁷ surely, therefore, ^(U)I will gather all your lovers with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved, and all those you hated; I will gather them from all around against you and will uncover your nakedness to them, that they may see all your nakedness. ³⁸ And I will judge you as ^(V)women who break wedlock or ^(W)shed blood are judged; I will bring blood upon you in fury and jealousy. ³⁹ I will also give you into their hand, and they shall throw down your shrines and break down ^(X)your ^[g]high places. ^(Y)They shall also strip you of your clothes, take your beautiful jewelry, and leave you naked and bare.

^40 (Z)“They shall also bring up an assembly against you, ^(AA)and they shall stone you with stones and thrust you through with their swords. ⁴¹ They shall ^(AB)burn your houses with fire, and ^(AC)execute judgments on you in the sight of many women; and I will make you ^(AD)cease playing the harlot, and you shall no longer hire lovers. ⁴² So ^(AE)I will lay to rest My fury toward you, and My jealousy shall depart from you. I will be quiet, and be angry no more. ⁴³ Because ^(AF)you did not remember the days of your youth, but ^[h]agitated Me with all these things, surely ^(AG)I will also recompense your ^[i]deeds on your own head,” says the Lord God. “And you shall not commit lewdness in addition to all your abominations.

More Wicked than Samaria and Sodom

⁴⁴ “Indeed everyone who quotes proverbs will use this proverb against you: ‘Like mother, like daughter!’ ⁴⁵ You are your mother’s daughter, ^[j]loathing husband and children; and you are the ^(AH)sister of your sisters, who loathed their husbands and children; ^(AI)your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.

⁴⁶ “Your elder sister is Samaria, who dwells with her daughters to the north of you; and ^(AJ)your younger sister, who dwells to the south of you, is Sodom and her daughters. ⁴⁷ You did not walk in their ways nor act according to their abominations; but, as if that were too little, ^(AK)you became more corrupt than they in all your ways.

⁴⁸ “As I live,” says the Lord God, “neither ^(AL)your sister Sodom nor her daughters have done as you and your daughters have done. ⁴⁹ Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, ^(AM)fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. ⁵⁰ And they were haughty and ^(AN)committed abomination before Me; therefore ^(AO)I took them away as ^[k]I saw fit.

⁵¹ “Samaria did not commit ^(AP)half of your sins; but you have multiplied your abominations more than they, and ^(AQ)have justified your sisters by all the abominations which you have done. ⁵² You who judged your sisters, bear your own shame also, because the sins which you committed were more abominable than theirs; they are more righteous than you. Yes, be disgraced also, and bear your own shame, because you justified your sisters.

⁸ Then I saw that ^(A)for all the causes for which backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had ^(B)put her away and given her a certificate of divorce; ^(C)yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but went and played the harlot also. ⁹ So it came to pass, through her casual harlotry, that she ^(D)defiled the land and committed adultery with ^(E)stones and trees. ¹⁰ And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah has not turned to Me ^(F)with her whole heart, but in pretense,” says the Lord.