1 when I would have healed Israel,The guilt of Ephraim was revealed,the wickedness of Samaria:They practiced falsehood.Thieves break in,bandits roam outside.
2 Yet they do not call to mindthat I remember all their wickedness.Now their crimes surround them,present to my sight.
3 With their wickedness they make the king rejoice,the princes too, with their treacherous deeds.
4 They are all adulterers,like a blazing oven,Which the baker quits stoking,after the dough’s kneading until its rising.
5 On the day of our king,they made the princes sick with poisoned wine;he extended his hand to the scoffers.
6 For they draw near in ambushwith their hearts like an oven.All the night their anger sleeps;in the morning it flares like a blazing fire.
7 They are all heated like ovens,and consume their rulers.All their kings have fallen;none of them calls upon me.
8 Ephraim is mixed with the nations,Ephraim is an unturned cake.
9 Strangers have consumed his strength,but he does not know it;Gray hairs are strewn on his head,but he takes no notice of it.
10 The arrogance of Israel bears witness against him;yet they do not return to the Lord, their God,nor seek him, despite all this.
11 Ephraim is like a dove,silly and senseless;They call upon Egypt,they go to Assyria.
12 When they go I will spread my net around them,like birds in the air I will bring them down.I will chastise them when I hear of their assembly.
13 Woe to them, for they have strayed from me!Ruin to them, for they have rebelled against me!Though I wished to redeem them,they spoke lies against me.
14 They have not cried to me from their heartswhen they wailed upon their beds;For wheat and wine they lacerated themselves;they rebelled against me.
15 Though I trained and strengthened their arms,yet they devised evil against me.
16 They have again become useless,they have been like a treacherous bow.Their princes shall fall by the swordbecause of the insolence of their tongues;thus they shall be mocked in the land of Egypt.