The Daily Audio Bible

6 Come, let us return to Adonai;
for he has torn, and he will heal us;
he has struck, and he will bind our wounds.
² After two days, he will revive us;
on the third day, he will raise us up;
and we will live in his presence.
³ Let us know, let us strive to know Adonai.
That he will come is as certain as morning;
he will come to us like the rain,
like the spring rains that water the earth.
⁴ “Efrayim, what should I do to you?
Y’hudah, what should I do to you?
For your ‘faithful love’ is like a morning cloud,
like dew that disappears quickly.
⁵ This is why I have cut them to pieces by the prophets,
slaughtered them with the words from my mouth —
the judgment on you shines out like light.
⁶ For what I desire is mercy, not sacrifices,
knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

⁷ “But they, just like men, have broken the covenant,
they have been faithless in dealing with me.
⁸ Gil‘ad is a city of criminals,
covered with bloody footprints;
⁹ just as bands of robbers wait to ambush someone,
so does a gang of cohanim.
They commit murder on the road to Sh’khem!
Their conduct is an outrage!
¹⁰ In the house of Isra’el
I have seen a horrible thing;
whoring is found there in Efrayim,
Isra’el is defiled.
¹¹ For you, too, Y’hudah,
a harvest will come!

“When I restore the fortunes of my people,
7 when I am ready to heal Isra’el,
the crimes of Efrayim confront me,
along with the wickedness of Shomron.
For they keep practicing deceit;
thieves break in, bands of robbers raid outside.
² They never say to themselves
that I remember all their evil.
Now their own deeds surround them;
they are right in front of me.
³ They make the king glad with their wickedness,
and the leaders with their lies.
⁴ They are all adulterers,
like an oven heated by the baker,
who doesn’t stoke the fire
from kneading time till the dough has risen.

⁵ “On their king’s special day
the leaders inflame him with wine,
and he joins hands with scorners,
⁶ who ready themselves like an oven
while they wait for their chance.
Their baker sleeps through the night;
then in the morning it bursts into flame.
⁷ They are all as hot as an oven,
and they devour their judges.
All their kings have fallen;
not one of them calls out to me.

⁸ “Efrayim mixes himself with the peoples,
Efrayim has become a half-baked cake.
⁹ Foreigners have eaten up his strength,
but he doesn’t know it;
yes, gray hairs appear on him here and there,
but he doesn’t know it.
¹⁰ The pride of Isra’el testifies in his face,
but in spite of all this they haven’t returned
to Adonai their God or sought him.
¹¹ Efrayim behaves like a silly, foolish dove —
going to Egypt, then to Ashur for help.
¹² Even as they go, I will spread my net over them;
I will bring them down like birds from the sky;
I will discipline them, as their assembly was told.
¹³ Woe to them! for they have strayed from me.
Destruction to them! for they have wronged me.
Am I supposed to redeem them,
when they have spoken lies against me?
¹⁴ They have not cried out to me from their hearts,
even though they wail on their beds.
They assemble themselves for grain and wine,
yet turn away from me.
¹⁵ It was I who trained and strengthened their arms,
yet they plot evil against me.
¹⁶ They return, but not upward;
they are like an unreliable bow.
Their leaders will die by the sword
because of their angry talk.
They will become a laughingstock
in the land of Egypt.

8 “Put the shofar to your lips!
Like a vulture [he swoops down] on the house of Adonai,
because they have violated my covenant
and sinned intentionally against my Torah.
² Will they cry out to me,
‘We are Isra’el, God, we know you’?
³ Isra’el has thrown away what is good;
the enemy will pursue him.
⁴ They make kings, but without my authority;
they appoint leaders, but without my knowledge.
With their silver and gold they make themselves idols,
but these can lead only to their own destruction.
⁵ Your calf, Shomron, has been thrown away;
my fury burns against them.
How long will it be until they are able
to make themselves clean?
⁶ Here is what Isra’el produces:
a craftsman makes something — it’s a non-god;
the calf of Shomron will be broken to pieces.
⁷ For they sow the wind,
so they will reap the whirlwind.
The standing grain has no ears,
so it will yield no flour;
and if it does yield any,
foreigners will swallow it up.
⁸ Isra’el is swallowed up;
now they are among the Goyim
like a vessel nobody wants.
⁹ For they have gone up to Ashur;
like a wild donkey, alone by itself,
Efrayim has bargained for lovers.
¹⁰ But even if they bargain among the Goyim,
now I will round them up.
Soon they will start to feel the burden
of these kings and leaders.
¹¹ For Efrayim keeps building altars for sin;
yes, altars are sinful for him.
¹² I write him so many things from my Torah,
yet he considers them foreign.
¹³ They offer me sacrifices of flesh and eat them,
but Adonai does not accept them.
Now he will recall their crimes and punish their sins —
they will return to Egypt.
¹⁴ For Isra’el forgot his maker and built palaces;
and Y’hudah made more fortified cities;
but I will send fire on his cities,
and it will consume their strongholds.”

9 Don’t rejoice, Isra’el!
Don’t enjoy yourselves as other peoples do;
for you have gone whoring away from your God,
you love being hired as a whore on every grain-floor.
² Threshing-floor and winepress won’t feed them,
and new wine will disappoint her.
³ They won’t remain in the land of Adonai;
instead, Efrayim will return to Egypt,
and they will eat unclean food in Ashur.
⁴ They will not pour out wine offerings to Adonai;
they will not be pleasing to him.
Their sacrifices will be for them like mourners’ food —
everyone eating it will be polluted.
For their food will be merely to satisfy their appetite;
it will not come into the house of Adonai.
⁵ What will you do at a designated time,
on a day which is a festival for Adonai?
⁶ For suppose they escape the destruction —
Egypt will round them up,
Memphis will bury them.
And their precious treasures of silver?
Nettles will possess them,
thorns will be in their tents.
⁷ The days of punishment have come,
the days of retribution are here,
and Isra’el knows it.
[Yet they cry,] “The prophet is a fool,
the man of the spirit has gone crazy!”
Because your iniquity is so great,
the hostility [against you] is great.
⁸ The watchman of Efrayim is with my God,
but a prophet has a fowler’s snare set on all his paths
and hostility even in the house of his God.
⁹ They have deeply corrupted themselves,
as in the days of Giv‘ah.
He will remember their guilt,
and he will punish their sins.

¹⁰ “When I found Isra’el, it was like finding
grapes in the desert;
when I saw your ancestors, it was like seeing
a fig tree’s first figs in its first season.
But as soon as they came to Ba‘al-P‘or,
they dedicated themselves to something shameful;
they became as loathsome
as the thing they loved.
¹¹ The glory of Efrayim will fly away like a bird —
no birth, no pregnancy, no conception.
¹² Even if they raise their children,
I will destroy them till none is left —
and woe to them when I leave them, too!”

¹³ Efrayim, as I see it, is like Tzor,
planted in a pleasant place;
but Efrayim will bring out his children
to the slaughterer.
¹⁴ Adonai, give them — what will you give?
Give them wombs that miscarry and dried-up breasts!
¹⁵ “All their wickedness was already there in Gilgal;
that’s where I came to hate them.
Because of the wickedness of their deeds
I will expel them from my house,
I will love them no more;
all their leaders are rebels.
¹⁶ Efrayim has been struck down,
their root has been dried up,
they will bear no fruit.
Even if they do give birth,
I will kill their cherished offspring.”

¹⁷ My God will cast them aside,
because they wouldn’t listen to him,
and they will become wanderers
among the Goyim.

126 ⁽⁰⁾ A song of ascents:

⁽¹⁾ When Adonai restored Tziyon’s fortunes,
we thought we were dreaming.
² Our mouths were full of laughter,
and our tongues shouted for joy.

Among the nations it was said,
“Adonai has done great things for them!”
³ Adonai did do great things with us;
and we are overjoyed.

⁴ Return our people from exile, Adonai,
as streams fill vadis in the Negev.

⁵ Those who sow in tears
will reap with cries of joy.
⁶ He who goes out weeping
as he carries his sack of seed
will come home with cries of joy
as he carries his sheaves of grain.

¹² If a ruler listens to lies,
    all his officials will be wicked.
¹³ The poor and the oppressor have this in common:
    Adonai gives light to the eyes of both.

¹⁴ If a king steadfastly gives justice to the poor,
    his throne will be secure forever.