6 She conceived again and bore a daughter. And the Lord said to him, “Call her name No Mercy,1 for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, to forgive them at all. 7 But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the Lord their God. kI will not save them by bow or by sword or by war or by horses or by horsemen.”
The Lord’s Mercy on Israel
14 “Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
and bring her into the wilderness,
and speak tenderly to her.
15 And there I will give her her vineyards
and make the dValley of Achor1 a door of hope.
And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth,
as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.
16 “And in that day, declares the Lord, you will call me e‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ 17 For I will remove the fnames of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. 18 And gI will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will habolish2 the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. 19 And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. 20 I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall iknow the Lord.
21 “And in that day I will answer, declares the Lord,
I will answer the heavens,
and they shall answer the earth,
22 and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil,
and they shall answer jJezreel,3
23 and I will sow her for myself in the land.
kAnd lI will have mercy on mNo Mercy,4
and I will say to nNot My People,5 o‘You are my people’;
and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’”
Hosea Redeems His Wife
1 And the Lord said to me, p“Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord qloves the children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins.” 2 So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a lethech1 of barley. 3 And I said to her, “You must dwell as mine for many days. You shall not play the whore, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you.”
6 With their flocks and herds they shall go
to seek the Lord,
pbut they will not find him;
he has withdrawn from them.
7 They have qdealt faithlessly with the Lord;
for they have borne alien children.
Now the new moon shall devour them with their fields.
8 rBlow the horn in Gibeah,
the trumpet in Ramah.
Sound the alarm at Beth-aven;
we follow you,1 O Benjamin!
9 Ephraim shall become a desolation
in the day of punishment;
among the tribes of Israel
I make known what is sure.
10 The princes of Judah have become
like those who smove the landmark;
upon them I will pour out
my wrath like water.
11 Ephraim is toppressed, crushed in judgment,
because he was determined to go after filth.2
12 But I am like a moth to Ephraim,
and like dry rot to the house of Judah.
13 When Ephraim saw his sickness,
and Judah his wound,
then Ephraim went to Assyria,
But he is not able to cure you
or heal your wound.
14 For I will be like a lion to Ephraim,
and like a young lion to the house of Judah.
I, even I, will tear and go away;
I will carry off, and no one shall rescue.
15 I will return again to my place,
until they acknowledge their guilt and vseek my face,
and in their distress wearnestly seek me.
Israel and Judah Are Unrepentant
1 “Come, xlet us return to the Lord;
for he has ytorn us, that he may heal us;
he has struck us down, and he will zbind us up.
2 After two days he will revive us;
aon the third day he will raise us up,
that we may live before him.
3 Let us know; let us press on to bknow the Lord;
his going out is sure as the dawn;
he will come to us as the showers,
as the spring rains that water the earth.”
8 How can I give you up, O Ephraim?
How can I hand you over, O Israel?
yHow can I make you like Admah?
How can I treat you like Zeboiim?
My heart recoils within me;
my compassion grows warm and tender.
9 I will not execute my burning anger;
I will not again destroy Ephraim;
for zI am God and not a man,
the Holy One in your midst,
and I will not come in wrath.1
10 They shall go after the Lord;
ahe will roar like a lion;
when he roars,
bhis children shall come trembling from the west;
11 they shall come trembling like birds cfrom Egypt,
and like doves from the land of Assyria,
and I will return them to their homes, declares the Lord.
9 I am the Lord your God
from the land of Egypt;
I will again make you dwell in tents,
oas in the days of the appointed feast.
