Hosea 8 — Legacy Standard Bible

Israel Reaps the Whirlwind

8^aPut the trumpet to your ¹mouth!^bLike an eagle the enemy comes ^cagainst the house of YahwehBecause they have ^dtrespassed against My covenantAnd transgressed against My ^elaw.²^aThey cry out to Me,“My God, ^bwe of Israel know You!”³Israel has rejected the good;The enemy will pursue him.⁴^aThey have set up kings, but not by Me;They have appointed princes, but I did not know it.With their ^bsilver and gold they have made idols for themselves,That ¹they might be cut off.⁵¹He has rejected your ^acalf, O Samaria, saying,“My anger burns against them!”How long will they be incapable of ^binnocence?⁶For from Israel is even this!A ^acraftsman made it, so it is not God;Surely the calf of Samaria will be smashed to splinters.⁷For ^athey sow the wind,And they reap the ^bwhirlwind.The standing grain has no growth;It makes ^cno flour.Should it make anything, strangers would swallow it up.⁸Israel is ^aswallowed up;They are now among the nationsLike a ^bvessel in which no one delights.⁹For they have gone up to ^aAssyriaLike ^ba wild donkey all alone;Ephraim has ^chired ¹lovers.¹⁰Even though they hire allies among the nations,Now I will ^agather them up;And they will begin ^bto ¹diminishBecause of the burden of the ^cking of princes.¹¹Since Ephraim has ^amultiplied altars for sin,They have become altars of sinning for him.¹²Though ^aI wrote for him ten thousand precepts of My ^blaw,They are counted as a strange thing.¹³As for My ^asacrificial gifts,They ^bsacrifice the flesh and eat it,But Yahweh has not accepted them.Now He will ^cremember their iniquityAnd ^dpunish them for their sins;They will return to ^eEgypt.¹⁴So Israel has ^aforgotten his Maker and ^bbuilt palaces;And Judah has multiplied fortified cities,But I will send a ^cfire on its cities that it may consume its palatial dwellings.