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Hosea

Chapter 2

2:1 Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass that, instead of that which was said unto them: 'Ye are not My people', it shall be said unto them: 'Ye are the children of the living God.'

2:2 And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint themselves one head, and shall go up out of the land; for great shall be the day of Jezreel.

2:3 Say ye unto your brethren: 'Ammi'; and to your sisters, 'Ruhamah.'

2:4 Plead with your mother, plead; for she is not My wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her harlotries from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

2:5 Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.

2:6 And I will not have compassion upon her children; for they are children of harlotry.

2:7 For their mother hath played the harlot, she that conceived them hath done shamefully; for she said: 'I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.'

2:8 Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and I will make a wall against her, that she shall not find her paths.

2:9 And she shall run after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them, and she shall seek them, but shall not find them; then shall she say: 'I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now.'

2:10 For she did not know that it was I that gave her the corn, and the wine, and the oil, and multiplied unto her silver and gold, which they used for Baal.

2:11 Therefore will I take back My corn in the time thereof, and My wine in the season thereof, and will snatch away My wool and My flax given to cover her nakedness.

2:12 And now will I uncover her shame in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of My hand.

2:13 I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feasts, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her appointed seasons.

2:14 And I will lay waste her vines and her fig-trees, whereof she hath said: 'These are my hire that my lovers have given me'; and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them.

2:15 And I will visit upon her the days of the Baalim, wherein she offered unto them, and decked herself with her ear-rings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot Me, saith the Lord.

2:16 Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly unto her.

2:17 And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she shall respond there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

2:18 And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call Me Ishi, and shalt call Me no more Baali.

2:19 For I will take away the names of the Baalim out of her mouth, and they shall no more be mentioned by their name.

2:20 And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground; and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the land, and will make them to lie down safely.

2:21 And I will betroth thee unto Me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in righteousness, and in justice, and in lovingkindness, and in compassion.

2:22 And I will betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness; and thou shalt know the Lord.

2:23 And it shall come to pass in that day, I will respond, saith the Lord, I will respond to the heavens, and they shall respond to the earth;

2:24 And the earth shall respond to the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall respond to Jezreel.

2:25 And I will sow her unto Me in the land; and I will have compassion upon her that had not obtained compassion; and I will say to them that were not My people: 'Thou art My people'; and they shall say: 'Thou art my God.'


Next: Hosea 3