Israel Reaps the Whirlwind

1Put the trumpet to your [†]mouth!

Like an eagle the enemy comes against the house of Yahweh

Because they have trespassed against My covenant

And transgressed against My law.

2They cry out to Me,

“My God, we of Israel know You!”

3Israel has rejected the good;

The enemy will pursue him.

4They have set up kings, but not by Me;

They have appointed princes, but I did not know it.

With their silver and gold they have made idols for themselves,

That [†]they might be cut off.

5[†]He has rejected your calf, O Samaria, saying,

“My anger burns against them!”

How long will they be incapable of innocence?

6For from Israel is even this!

A craftsman made it, so it is not God;

Surely the calf of Samaria will be smashed to splinters.

7For they sow the wind,

And they reap the whirlwind.

The standing grain has no growth;

It makes no flour.

Should it make anything, strangers would swallow it up.

8Israel is swallowed up;

They are now among the nations

Like a vessel in which no one delights.

9For they have gone up to Assyria

Like a wild donkey all alone;

Ephraim has hired [†]lovers.

10Even though they hire allies among the nations,

Now I will gather them up;

And they will begin to [†]diminish

Because of the burden of the king of princes.

11Since Ephraim has multiplied altars for sin,

They have become altars of sinning for him.

12Though I wrote for him ten thousand precepts of My law,

They are counted as a strange thing.

13As for My sacrificial gifts,

They sacrifice the flesh and eat it,

But Yahweh has not accepted them.

Now He will remember their iniquity

And punish them for their sins;

They will return to Egypt.

14So Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces;

And Judah has multiplied fortified cities,

But I will send a fire on its cities that it may consume its palatial dwellings.