Hosea 13

¹ When Ephraim spoke, it was an edict. He was lifted up in Israel. Yet he is being guilty with regard to Baal and is dying. ² And now they are continuing to sin. And they are making a molten image for themselves from their silver, according to their model of grief fetishes, the work of artificers, all of them. To them, they are saying, shall be the sacrifices of a human. They shall kiss the calves. ³ Wherefore they shall become as a cloud of the morning, and as the early going night mist; as trash which is being tempest-tossed, and as smoke from a crevice. ⁴ And I am Yahweh, your Elohim, Who establishes the heavens and creates the earth, Whose hands created all the host of the heavens. Yet I did not show them to you that you should go after them, when I brought you up from the land of Egypt. You will not know an elohim except Me, and there is no Saviour, unless it is I. ⁵ I grazed you in the wilderness, in the land of droughts. ⁶ And according to their pasture they were satisfied; they were satisfied, and their heart is exalting; therefore they forgot Me. ⁷ Yet I will become to them as a black lion; as a leopard on the way I will regard them. ⁸ I will encounter them as a bereaved bear, and I will tear the enclosure of their heart, and I will devour them there as a parent lion; the field life shall rend them. ⁹ It ruins you, O Israel! For in Me is your help. ¹⁰ Where is your king? Whereat, that he will save you in all your cities? And your judges to whom you said, Give me a king and chiefs? ¹¹ I am giving you a king in My anger, and I am taking him away in My rage. ¹² The depravity of Ephraim is bundled; his sin is secluded; ¹³ the cramps of a bearing woman shall come to him. He is an unwise son, for in season he will not stand at the breaking forth of sons. ¹⁴ From the hand of the unseen will I ransom them; from death will I redeem them. Where is your plague, O Death? Where is your sting, O Unseen? Regret shall be concealed from My eyes. ¹⁵ Seeing that he is parting between his brothers, an east wind shall come. The wind of Yahweh shall come up from the wilderness, and it will dry up his fountain, and it will drain his spring. He shall rob the treasure of every coveted furnishing. ¹⁶ Samaria is guilty, for she rebels against her Elohim. By the sword they shall fall, and their unweaned children shall be dashed to pieces, and their pregnant women shall be rent.