Israel’s unfaithfulness, God’s anger on them
13
📚When Ephraim spoke,trembling 📖,
he exalted himself in Israel;
but when he offended
through Baal 📖, he died 📖.
13:1 In this verse “Ephraim” means one of the twelve tribes and “Israel” means all the twelve tribes.⚜
2 📚And now they sin more
and more 📖, and have made
for themselves cast metal images
with their silver,
and idols according to their
own understanding,
all of it the work of the craftsmen 📖.
They say of them,
“Let the men who sacrifice kiss
the calves”.
3 📚Therefore they will be like
the morning cloud,
and like the early dew
that passes away,
like the chaff that is driven
by the whirlwind out
of the threshing floor,
and like the smoke out of the chimney.
4 📚“Yet I am the LORD
your God since the land of Egypt,
and you shall know
no God but me;
for there is no saviour
except me.
5 📚I knew you in the wilderness,
in the land of great drought.
6 📚When their pasture was rich,
they became satisfied.
They were satisfied,
and their heart was exalted,
therefore they forgot me.
7 📚Therefore I will be to them
like a lion.
I will watch like a leopard
by the wayside.
8 📚I will meet them like a bear robbed
of her cubs, and will tear
the flesh from their heart,
and there I will devour them
like a lion.
A wild beast will tear them apart.
9 📚“O Israel, you have destroyed
yourself,
but your help is in me.
13:9 Hos 9:7. What real help is there for those who reject their true Helper? But this is something we see on every hand. People oppose the one true God and then wonder that their lives are filled with trouble and there seems no help for them anywhere.⚜
10 📚I will be your king.
Where is any other to save you
in all your cities?
And where are your judges
to whom you said,
‘Give me a king and princes?’
11 📚I gave you a king in my anger,
and took him away
in my wrath.
12 📚The wickedness of Ephraim
is bound up.
His sin is stored up 📖.
13 📚Pains as a woman in childbirth
will come on him.
He is an unwise son,
for he should not stay
long in the place where
children are born.
14 📚“I will ransom 📖 them from the power
of the grave 📖;
I will redeem them from death 📖.
O death,
I will be your plagues! O grave,
I will be your destruction 📖!
Compassion will be hidden
from my eyes.
13:14 In the midst of warnings and disaster God gives this great promise to Israel (compare Hos 1:10-11; 2:14-23).⚜
15 📚Though he is fruitful among
his brethren,
an east wind 📖 will come.
The wind of the LORD will come up
from the desert,
and his spring will become dry,
and his fountain will dry up.
It will plunder the treasury
of every valuable article.
13:15 The redemption God promises in v 14 was in the future. God would first punish the nation as He said He would.⚜
16 📚Samaria will become desolate,
for she has rebelled against her God.
They will fall by the sword.
Their infants will be dashed
in pieces,
and their pregnant women
will be ripped up”.