1Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your
sisters, Ruhamah.
2Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not
my wife, neither am I
her husband: let her therefore put away her
whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from
between her breasts;
3Lest 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.
4And I will not have mercy upon her children;
for they be the
children of whoredoms.
5For 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.
6Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way
with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not
find her paths.
7And she shall follow 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.
8For she did not know that I gave her corn,
and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and
gold, which they
prepared for Baal.
9Therefore will I return, and take away my
corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season
thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to
cover her nakedness.
10And now will I discover her lewdness in the
sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out
of mine hand.
11I will also cause all her mirth to cease,
her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and
all her solemn feasts.
12And I will destroy her vines and her fig
trees, whereof she hath said, These are my
rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will
make them a forest, and the beasts of the field
shall eat them.
13And I will visit upon her the days of
Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she
decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and
she went after her lovers, and forgat me, saith the
LORD.
14Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and
bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably
unto her.
15And I will give her her vineyards from
thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope:
and she shall sing there, as in the days of her
youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the
land of Egypt.
16And it shall be at that day, saith the
LORD, that thou
shalt call me Ishi; and shalt call me no more Baali.
17For I will take away the names of Baalim
out of her mouth, and they shall no more be
remembered by their name.
18And 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 earth,
and will make them to lie down safely.
19And I will betroth thee unto me for ever;
yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness,
and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in
mercies.
20I will even betroth thee unto me in
faithfulness: and thou shalt know the LORD.
21And it shall come to pass in that day, I
will hear, saith the LORD, I will hear the heavens,
and they shall hear the earth;
22And the earth shall hear the corn, and the
wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel.
23And I will sow her unto me in the earth;
and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained
mercy; and I will say to them
which were not my people, Thou art my
people; and they shall say, Thou
art my God.