Israel's Unfaithfulness Punished

1'Say ye to your brethren -- Ammi, And to your sisters -- Ruhamah.

2Plead ye with your mother -- plead, (For she is not My wife, and I am not her husband,) And she turneth her whoredoms from before her, And her adulteries from between her breasts,

3Lest I strip her naked. And have set her up as in the day of her birth, And have made her as a wilderness, And have set her as a dry land, And have put her to death with thirst.

4And her sons I do not pity, For sons of whoredoms are they,

5For gone a-whoring hath their mother, Acted shamefully hath their conceiver, For she hath said, I go after my lovers, Those giving my bread and my water, My wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.

6Therefore, lo, I am hedging up thy way with thorns, And I have made for her a wall, And her paths she doth not find.

7And she hath pursued her lovers, And she doth not overtake them, And hath sought them, and doth not find, And she hath said: I go, and I turn back unto My first husband, For -- better to me then than now.

8And she knew not that I had given to her, The corn, and the new wine, and the oil. Yea, silver I did multiply to her, And the gold they prepared for Baal.

9Therefore do I turn back, And I have taken My corn in its season, And My new wine in its appointed time, And I have taken away My wool and My flax, covering her nakedness.

10And now do I reveal her dishonour before the eyes of her lovers, And none doth deliver her out of My hand.

11And I have caused to cease all her joy, Her festival, her new moon, and her sabbath, Even all her appointed times,

12And made desolate her vine and her fig-tree, Of which she said, A gift they are to me, That my lovers have given to me, And I have made them for a forest, And consumed them hath a beast of the field.

13And I have charged on her the days of the Baalim, To whom she maketh perfume, And putteth on her ring and her ornament, And goeth after her lovers, And Me forgat -- an affirmation of Jehovah.

God's Mercy to Israel

14Therefore, lo, I am enticing her, And have caused her to go to the wilderness, And I have spoken unto her heart,

15And given to her her vineyards from thence, And the valley of Achor for an opening of hope, And she hath responded there as in the days of her youth, And as in the day of her coming up out of the land of Egypt.

16And it hath come to pass, in that day, An affirmation of Jehovah, Thou dost call Me -- My husband, And dost not call Me any more -- My lord.

17And I have turned aside the names of the lords from her mouth, And they are not remembered any more by their name.

18And I have made to them a covenant in that day, with the beast of the field, And with the fowl of the heavens, And the creeping thing of the ground, And bow, and sword, and war I break from off the land, And have caused them to lie down confidently.

19And I have betrothed thee to Me to the age, And betrothed thee to Me in righteousness, And in judgment, and kindness, and mercies,

20And betrothed thee to Me in faithfulness, And thou hast known Jehovah.

21And it hath come to pass in that day, I answer -- an affirmation of Jehovah, I answer the heavens, and they answer the earth.

22And the earth doth answer the corn, And the new wine, and the oil, And they answer Jezreel.

23And I have sowed her to Me in the land, And I have pitied Lo-Ruhamah, And I have said to Lo-Ammi, My people thou art, and it saith, My God!'