1 Don’t rejoice, Israel!Don’t celebrate as other nations do;for as whores you have gone away from your God.You have loved a prostitute’s payon all threshing floors of grain.
2 Threshing floor and wine vat won’t feed them;the new wine will fail them.
3 They won’t remain in the land of the Lord;but Ephraim will return to Egypt,and in Assyria they will eat unclean food.
4 They won’t pour wine as an offering to the Lord;their sacrifices won’t please him.Such sacrifices will be like food for those who touch the dead;all who eat of it will be unclean;their bread will be for their hunger alone;it will not come to the Lord’s house.
5 What will you do on the day of appointed festival,on the day of the Lord’s festival?
6 Even if they escape destruction,Egypt will gather them,Memphis will bury them.Briars will possess their precious things of silver;thorns will be in their tents.
7 The days of punishment have come;the days of judgment have arrived;Israel cries,"The prophet is a fool,the spiritual man is mad!"Because of your great wickedness,your rejection of me is great.
8 The prophet is God’s watchmanlooking over Ephraim,yet a hunter’s trap is set, covering all his ways,and rejection is in his God’s house.
9 They have corrupted themselves terriblyas in the days of Gibeah;he will remember their wickedness;he will punish their sins.
10 Like grapes in the wilderness,I found Israel.In its first season,like the first fruit on the fig tree,I saw your ancestors.But they came to Baal-peor,and worshipped a thing of shame;they became detestable like the thing they loved.
11 Ephraim’s glory will fly away like a bird—no birth, no pregnancy, no conception!
12 Though they bring up children,I will make them childlessuntil no one is left.Doom to them indeed when I leave them!
13 When I looked toward Tyre, Ephraim was planted in alovely meadow;but now Ephraim must lead out his children for slaughter.
14 Give them, Lord—what will you give them?Give them a womb that miscarriesand breasts that are dried up.
15 Every wickedness of theirs began at Gilgal;there I came to hate them.Because of the wickedness of their deedsI will drive them out of my house.I will love them no more;all their officials are rebels.
16 Ephraim is sick,their root is dried up,they will bear no fruit.Even though they give birth,I will put to death their much-loved little ones.
17 Because they haven’t listened to him,my God will reject them;they will wander among the nations.