Hosea 9
Easy-to-Read Version
The Sadness of Exile
9 Israel, don’t celebrate like the nations do. Don’t be happy. You acted like a prostitute and left your God. You committed your sexual sin[a] on every threshing floor. 2 But the grain from those threshing floors will not provide enough food for Israel. There will not be enough wine for Israel.
3 The Israelites will not stay in the Lord’s land. Ephraim will return to Egypt. In Assyria they will eat food that they should not eat. 4 They will not be able to give offerings of wine to the Lord. None of their sacrifices will please him. What they offer will be like food eaten at a funeral—whoever eats it will become unclean. They can eat that food for their own hunger, but it cannot be taken into the Lord’s Temple. 5 They will not be able to celebrate the Lord’s feasts or festivals.[b]
6 The people of Israel left because the enemy took everything from them. But Egypt will take the people themselves. Memphis[c] will bury them. Weeds will grow over their silver treasures, and thorns will grow where the Israelites lived.
Israel Rejected the True Prophets
7 The prophet says, “Israel, learn this: The time of punishment has come. The time has come for you to pay for the evil things you did.” But the people of Israel say, “The prophet is a fool. This man with God’s Spirit is crazy.” The prophet says, “You will be punished for your terrible sins. You will be punished for your hate.” 8 God and the prophet are like guards watching over Ephraim, but there are many traps along his way. And people hate the prophet, even in the house of his God.
9 The Israelites have gone deep into ruin as in the time of Gibeah. God will remember the Israelites’ sins, and he will punish them.
Israel Is Ruined by Its Worship of Idols
10 “At the time I, the Lord, found Israel, they were like fresh grapes in the desert. They were like the first figs on a fig tree at the beginning of the season. But when they came to Baal Peor,[d] they changed. So I had to cut them off like rotten fruit.[e] They became like the terrible things that they loved.
The Israelites Will Have No Children
11 “Like a bird, Ephraim’s glory will fly away. There will be no more pregnancies, no more births, and no more babies. 12 But even if the Israelites do raise their children, it will not help, because I will take the children away from them. I will leave them, and they will have nothing but troubles.”
13 I can see that Ephraim is leading his children into a trap. Ephraim will lead his children out to the killer. 14 Lord, give them what you will. Give them a womb that loses babies and breasts that cannot give milk.
15 All their evil is in Gilgal;
I began hating them there.
I will force them to leave my house
because of the evil things they do.
I will not love them anymore.
Their leaders are rebels who turned against me.
16 Ephraim will be punished.
Their root is dying.
They will not have any more babies.
They might give birth to babies,
but I will kill the precious babies who come from their bodies.
17 Those people will not listen to my God,
so he will refuse to listen to them.
And they will wander among the nations without a home.
Footnotes
- Hosea 9:1 You committed your sexual sin This means the people were not faithful to God. But it also means the people had sexual relations with temple prostitutes. They believed their false gods would give them many children and good crops.
- Hosea 9:5 Literally, “What will you do for a day of solemn assembly, for the Lord’s festival day?”
- Hosea 9:6 Memphis An important city in Egypt.
- Hosea 9:10 Baal Peor This happened when Moses was still leading the Israelites in the desert. Read Num. 25:1-5.
- Hosea 9:10 they changed … rotten fruit This is a wordplay that can also mean “they dedicated themselves to a shameful idol.”
Hosea 9
King James Version
9 Rejoice not, O Israel, for joy, as other people: for thou hast gone a whoring from thy God, thou hast loved a reward upon every cornfloor.
2 The floor and the winepress shall not feed them, and the new wine shall fail in her.
3 They shall not dwell in the Lord's land; but Ephraim shall return to Egypt, and they shall eat unclean things in Assyria.
4 They shall not offer wine offerings to the Lord, neither shall they be pleasing unto him: their sacrifices shall be unto them as the bread of mourners; all that eat thereof shall be polluted: for their bread for their soul shall not come into the house of the Lord.
5 What will ye do in the solemn day, and in the day of the feast of the Lord?
6 For, lo, they are gone because of destruction: Egypt shall gather them up, Memphis shall bury them: the pleasant places for their silver, nettles shall possess them: thorns shall be in their tabernacles.
7 The days of visitation are come, the days of recompence are come; Israel shall know it: the prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad, for the multitude of thine iniquity, and the great hatred.
8 The watchman of Ephraim was with my God: but the prophet is a snare of a fowler in all his ways, and hatred in the house of his God.
9 They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah: therefore he will remember their iniquity, he will visit their sins.
10 I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness; I saw your fathers as the firstripe in the fig tree at her first time: but they went to Baalpeor, and separated themselves unto that shame; and their abominations were according as they loved.
11 As for Ephraim, their glory shall fly away like a bird, from the birth, and from the womb, and from the conception.
12 Though they bring up their children, yet will I bereave them, that there shall not be a man left: yea, woe also to them when I depart from them!
13 Ephraim, as I saw Tyrus, is planted in a pleasant place: but Ephraim shall bring forth his children to the murderer.
14 Give them, O Lord: what wilt thou give? give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.
15 All their wickedness is in Gilgal: for there I hated them: for the wickedness of their doings I will drive them out of mine house, I will love them no more: all their princes are revolters.
16 Ephraim is smitten, their root is dried up, they shall bear no fruit: yea, though they bring forth, yet will I slay even the beloved fruit of their womb.
17 My God will cast them away, because they did not hearken unto him: and they shall be wanderers among the nations.
Copyright © 2006 by Bible League International