Old/New Testament

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.

10 Isra’el was a luxuriant vine,
freely putting forth fruit.
As his fruit increased,
he increased his altars;
as his land got better,
he improved his standing-stones.
² Their heart is divided;
now they will bear their guilt.
He will break down their altars
and destroy their standing-stones.
³ For now they will say,
“We have no king,
because we didn’t fear Adonai —
and what could a king do for us, anyway?”
⁴ They mouth words,
swearing falsely, making treaties.
Thus judgment spreads like poisonous weeds
in the furrows of a field.

⁵ The inhabitants of Shomron are frightened
of the calf-gods of Beit-Aven.
Its people mourn over it;
its priests tremble over it,
over its glory, which has left it.
⁶ It will be carried to Ashur
as a present for a warring king.
Efrayim will be put to shame,
and Isra’el be ashamed of his own advice.
⁷ Shomron’s king will perish
like foam on the surface of the water.
⁸ Destruction will come to the high places of Aven,
that is, to the sin of Isra’el.
Thorns and thistles will grow over their altars;
and they will say to the mountains, “Cover us!”
and to the hills, “Fall on us!”

⁹ “Since the days of Giv‘ah you have sinned, Isra’el.
There they took their stand.
For these arrogant people at Giv‘ah,
war was insufficient punishment.
¹⁰ When I wish to, I will discipline them;
and the peoples will be gathered against them
to discipline them for their two crimes.”

¹¹ Efrayim is a well-taught cow —
it loves to tread the grain,
and I have spared her fair neck.
But I will put Efrayim in harness,
Y’hudah will have to plow,
Ya‘akov will harrow his own land.
¹² If you sow righteousness for yourselves,
you will reap according to grace.
Break up unused ground for yourselves,
because it is time to seek Adonai,
till he comes and rains down
righteousness upon you.
¹³ You have plowed wickedness, reaped iniquity
and eaten the fruit of lies.
Because you trusted in your own way,
in your large numbers of warriors,
¹⁴ turmoil will erupt among your peoples,
and all your fortresses will be destroyed;
just as Shalman destroyed Beit-Arbel
on the day of battle,
when mothers were dashed to pieces
right along with their children.
¹⁵ Thus will be done to you, Beit-El,
because of your great wickedness;
at dawn the king of Isra’el
will be completely cut off.

11 “When Isra’el was a child, I loved him;
and out of Egypt I called my son.
² But the more [the prophets] called them,
the farther they went from them.
They sacrificed to the ba‘alim
and offered incense to idols.
³ “Yet it was I who taught Efrayim to walk;
I took them by their arms.
But they did not know that it was I
who was healing them,
⁴ who was guiding them on through human means
with reins made of love.
With them I was like someone removing
the yoke from their jaws,
and I bent down to feed them.
⁵ He will not return to the land of Egypt,
but Ashur will be his king,
because they refused to repent.
⁶ The sword will fall on his cities,
destroying the bars of his gates,
because they follow their own advice.
⁷ My people are hanging in suspense
about returning to me;
and though they call them upwards,
nobody makes a move.
⁸ Efrayim, how can I give you up,
or surrender you, Isra’el?
How could I treat you like Admah
or make you like Tzvoyim?
My heart recoils at the idea,
as compassion warms within me.
⁹ I will not give vent to the fierceness of my rage,
I will not return to destroy Efrayim;
for I am God, not a human being,
the Holy One among you;
so I will not come in fury.
¹⁰ They will go after Adonai,
who will roar like a lion;
for he will roar, and the children will come
trembling from the west.
¹¹ They will tremble like a bird as they come from Egypt,
like a dove as they come from the land of Ashur;
and I will resettle them in their own houses,

says Adonai.