Hosea 8

Israel’s False Hopes

1Put the horn to your mouth![#Hs 5:8]

One like an eagle comes

against the house of the Lord ,

because they transgress My covenant

and rebel against My law.

2Israel cries out to Me,[#Hs 7:14]

“My God, we know You!”

3Israel has rejected what is good;[#Hs 3:5]

an enemy will pursue him.

4They have installed kings,[#Hs 13:10-11]

but not through Me.

They have appointed leaders,

but without My approval.

They make their silver and gold

into idols for themselves

for their own destruction.

5Your calf-idol is rejected, Samaria.[#Lit calf; #Hs 10:5; 13:2; #1Kg 12:28-29; Hs 7:1]

My anger burns against them.

How long will they be incapable of innocence?

6For this thing is from Israel —

a craftsman made it, and it is not God.

The calf of Samaria will be smashed to bits!

7Indeed, they sow the wind[#Hs 10:13]

and reap the whirlwind.

There is no standing grain;

what sprouts fails to yield flour.

Even if they did,

foreigners would swallow it up.

8Israel is swallowed up![#Jr 51:34]

Now they are among the nations

like discarded pottery.

9For they have gone up to Assyria[#Hs 7:11]

like a wild donkey going off on its own.

Ephraim has paid for love.

10Even though they hire lovers among the nations,

I will now round them up,

and they will begin to decrease in number

under the burden of the king and leaders.

11When Ephraim multiplied his altars for sin,[#Hs 10:1; 12:11]

they became his altars for sinning.

12Though I were to write out for him

ten thousand points of My instruction,

they would be regarded as something strange.

13Though they offer sacrificial gifts[#Hb obscure; #Hs 5:6; 9:4]

and eat the flesh,

the Lord does not accept them.

Now He will remember their guilt

and punish their sins;

they will return to Egypt.

14Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces;[#Hs 2:13; 4:6; 13:6; #Is 9:9-10]

Judah has also multiplied fortified cities.

I will send fire on their cities,

and it will consume their citadels.

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Published by: LifeWay Christian Resources