Hosea 8 :: Christian Standard Bible (CSB)

Israel cries out to me,

“My God, we know you! ”

Israel has rejected what is good;

an enemy will pursue him.

They have installed kings,

but not through me.

They have appointed leaders,

but without my approval.

They make their silver and gold

into idols for themselves

for their own destruction.[fn]

Your calf-idol[fn] is rejected, Samaria.

My anger burns against them.

How long will they be incapable of innocence?

For this thing is from Israel —

a craftsman made it, and it is not God.

The calf of Samaria will be smashed to bits!

Indeed, they sow the wind

and reap the whirlwind.

There is no standing grain;

what sprouts fails to yield flour.

Even if they did,

foreigners would swallow it up.

Israel is swallowed up!

Now they are among the nations

like discarded pottery.

For they have gone up to Assyria

like a wild donkey going off on its own.

Ephraim has paid for love.

Even though they hire lovers among the nations,

I will now round them up,

and they will begin to decrease in number

under the burden of the king and leaders.

When Ephraim multiplied his altars for sin,

they became his altars for sinning.

Though I were to write out for him

ten thousand points of my instruction,

they would be[fn] regarded as something strange.

Though they offer sacrificial gifts[fn]

and eat the flesh,

the LORD does not accept them.

Now he will remember their guilt

and punish their sins;

they will return to Egypt.

Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces;

Judah has also multiplied fortified cities.

I will send fire on their cities,

and it will consume their citadels.