And though they hide from My sight
There will I command the serpent,
And though they go into captivity
There will I command the sword
And I will set Mine eyes upon them
Are ye not as the Cushites to Me,
Did I not bring up Israel

And the Philistines from Caphtor,
Behold, the eyes of the God Yahweh

at the bottom of the sea, and he shall bite them. before their enemies, and it shall slay them, for evil and not for good. O Israel, saith Yahweh? out of the land of Egypt, and Aram from Kir?

And I will destroy it from the face of the earth.

are upon the sinful kingdom,

POEMS AND APOTHEGMS OF THE PROPHET HOSEA

THE PROLOGUE1

(Ch. i, 2b; ii, 6b, 7a, 4b, 6a; iii, 1-4, 5a, c.)

Now Yahweh said unto Hosea: Go, take thee a wife of whoredoms who will bear you children of whoredoms; for the land is continually committing whoredoms, turning away from Yahweh. So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim; and she conceived and bare him a son. And Yahweh said unto him: Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the House of Jehu, and will cause the house of Israel to cease. And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.

And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And He said unto him: Call her name Lo-Ruhamah; for I will have mercy no longer upon the house of Israel to pardon them in any wise. Now, when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she again conceived and bare a son. And He said: Call his name Lo-ammi; for ye are not My people, and I will not be your God.

[Then Hosea said] They are children of harlotry; she that conceived them hath done shamefully; she is not my wife, nor will I be her husband, and on her children I will have no pity.

Then Yahweh said unto me; Still, go, love a woman who loveth a paramour, and is an adulteress, even as Yahweh loveth the sons of Israel, though they turn unto other gods, and love cakes of raisins. (So I bought her unto me for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer of barley, and a half-homer of barley. And I said unto her: Thou shalt sit solitary for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be any man's wife, nor will I have to do with thee.) Even so, the Israelites shall sit solitary many days without king and without prince and without sacrifice and without pillar and without ephod or teraphim. Afterward shall they come trembling to Yahweh and to His goodness in the end of days.

I. YAHWEH PLEADS WITH HIS PEOPLE

(Ch. ii, 4a, c, 5, 7b-9a, 21-25)

Plead with thy mother, plead!

That she put her harlotries out of her sight,
Her adulteries from between her breasts;

Lest I strip her naked and set her as on the day of her birth,
And make her like a wilderness,

like a land without water,

And discipline her with thirst.

For she saith: I will go

after my lovers who gave me

My bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and wine.

1 Hosea gives some personal experiences in which he sees a similarity to the relations between Yahweh and Israel, His Chosen People. In chapters i and ii, Hosea speaks of himself in the third person. In chap. iii, he uses the first person.

Behold, I will hedge up
And build up a wall about her,
She shall pursue her paramours
She shall seek them

For she did not know
The corn and the wine and oil

And her gold that they used

Therefore I will take back my corn
I will take back my wool and flax
Now will I uncover her shame

And none shall deliver

I will cause her mirth to cease,
Her sabbaths and her
I will lay waste her vines,
These are my hire,

And I will make them a forest,

and my wine in its season;
given to cover her nakedness,
in the sight of her lovers,
her out of My hand.
her feasts and her new moons,

appointed

seasons.

her fig trees whereof she said:
that my lovers have given me;
where beasts of the field shall eat.

I will visit upon her the
Wherein she offered unto them,

days of the Baalim

And decked herself with her ear-rings and jewels,
And went after her lovers,

Therefore I will allure her,
I will speak kindly to her,
And the valley of Achor
And she shall respond there
As in the day when she came

And it shall be in that day

and forgat Me, saith Yahweh.

and bring her into the desert;
and will give her vineyards
for a door of hope.

up out of the land of Egypt.
as in the days of her youth,

And shall call no more on the Baalim;
that she shall call to her lord
And I will take the names of the Baalim out of her mouth,
And they shall be mentioned
And I will betroth her to Me forever,
no more by their names,
Yea, I will plight her to Me in righteousness
In justice and loving-kindness, in mercy, yea, in fidelity,
And she shall know Yahweh, saith Yahweh.

And it shall come to pass that day,

I will speak to the heavens,
The earth shall speak to the corn,
And they shall speak to Jezreel,
And I will have mercy on her

And I will say to Lo-Ammi,
And they shall say to Me,

that I will speak, saith Yahweh, to the wine and to the oil, and they shall speak to earth;

I will sow her to Me in the land. that had not obtained mercy; Thou art My people;

Thou art my God.

II.

THE CHARGE AGAINST THE PEOPLE OF ISRAEL
THAT THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN YAHWEH

(Ch. iv, 1-14, 16-19)

Hear the word of Yahweh, O Israel!

for Yahweh hath a charge

Against the inhabitants of the land;

For therein is neither truth, mercy nor knowledge of God.

But perjury, lying and murder

They break all bounds,

Therefore the land mourneth,
With the beasts of the field
Yea, the fish of the sea

stealing and adultery.

and blood answereth for blood.
all its inhabitants languish
and the fowls of heaven,
also are swept away.

Yet, let no man bring charges,
For My people are neither worse
So thou shalt stumble by day,

And I will destroy thy

My people are destroyed

let none reprove another,
nor better than the priests.
the priest will fall by night,
mother.

for lack of knowledge;

Because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee,
That thou shalt be no priest to Me.

Since thou forgettest the law of thy youth,

I will also forget thy children.

The more they increased, the more they sinned against Me.
I will change their glory to shame; they feed on My people's sin;
It is like priest, like people; they have set their heart on evil.
But I will punish them both for their ways,
And I will reward them their doings.

They shall eat and not be satisfied shall commit whoredom and find no

Because they have ceased to heed Yahweh.

Whoredom and wine and new wine
My people ask counsel of a stock,
For the spirit of harlotry

And they have gone a-whoring
They sacrifice on mountaintops
Under oaks and poplars and holms
Therefore your daughters are harlots,

I will not punish your daughters

[delight,

becloud the understanding.

and their staff speaketh wisdom.
hath caused them to err,
not following their God.
and burn incense on the hills,
because their shade is good.
and your brides adulterous.

when they play the harlot

Nor your wives when they commit adultery;
For they have consorted with lewd women,
They have sacrificed with the sacred prostitutes,
Thus were they
For Israel hath been stubborn
Will Yahweh now feed them

Ephraim is joined to his idols,
When their carouse is over

misled.

like a stubborn heifer.
as a lamb in a broad pasture?

let him alone!

they betake them to harlotry.
Their rulers shamefully hold out the hand: Give ye!
The wind shall bind them up in her wings, and they
Shall be shamed because of their sacrifices.

III. AGAINST PRIESTS AND RULERS

Hear this, O ye Priests!

(Ch. v, 1-14)

And give ear, O house of the king,

and attend, O House of Israel! for to you pertaineth judgment. A snare have ye been at Mizpah, and a net spread out on Tabor. The apostates have plunged deep in slaughter,

And I am rejected of them all.

I know Ephraim well indeed,

For thou, O Ephraim,

Israel is defiled.

Their deeds do not suffer them

and Israel is not hid from Me, hast played the harlot;

to return unto their God.

The spirit of harlotry is in them, and they know not Yahweh.
For the pride of Israel will testify before Him,

And Ephraim and Israel shall stumble in their guilt.

With flocks will they seek Yahweh, but they shall not find Him,
For they have been faithless to Yahweh, and begotten strange children.
Now shall the new moon devour them and their portions.

Blow ye the trumpet in Gibeah,

Raise an alarm in Bethel,
Ephraim shall be a desolation

sound the horn in Ramah!

making Benjamin tremble!
in the day of visitation;

Among the tribes of Israel do I unfold what shall surely be.

The princes of Jacob have become like those who remove landmarks. I will pour out My wrath upon them like water.

Oppressed is Ephraim, crushed in his right, because he steadfastly

pursued evil.

Therefore am I to Ephraim like a moth
Like rottenness to the House of Jacob.

When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Israel his wound,

Ephraim went to Assyria,

Israel to one who could not heal

Nor cure him of his wound.

But I will be like a lion to Ephraim, like a young lion to Israel.
I, even I will rend and go My way, I will carry away

And there shall be none to deliver.

IV. YAHWEH LAMENTS THE FICKLENESS OF ISRAEL

(Ch. v, 15; vi, 1-10; vii, 1-7)

I will go and return to My place until they confess their guilt,
And seek My presence.

In their affliction they will seek Me, saying:
Come, let us return to Yahweh!

He hath smitten, He will heal us; after two days He will raise us.
And we shall live in His presence.

Yea, let us know, let us eagerly seek to know Yahweh.

His coming is as sure as morning; He will come to us as the rain, As the spring rain that gently waters the earth.

O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee?
O Israel, what shall I do unto thee?
For your goodness is like a morning cloud,
And as the early dew it passeth away.

I have hewed them by the prophets,

I have slain them

By the words of My mouth,

That their judgments might be as the light when it goeth forth.
For I desired mercy and not sacrifice,

The knowledge of God more than burnt-offerings.
But they, like men, have broken the covenant,
They have been faithless to Me.

Gilead is a city of evil-doers, it is polluted with blood;
And as bandits lie in wait for a man, so doth a band of priests
Murder on the way to Schechem;

They commit deliberate crimes.

In Bethel have I seen a horrible thing;

There doth Ephraim commit whoredom, there is Israel defiled.
When I would have healed Israel, then is the guilt of Ephraim revealed.
And the thief entereth in, while bandits make a raid without.
Let them not say in their heart that I store up all their guilt,
For their continuous deeds which are ever in My sight betray them.