Ephraim Punished

1 Do not rejoice, O Israel, with exultation like the nations!
          For you have played the harlot, forsaking your God.
          You have loved harlots’ earnings on every threshing floor.

2 Threshing floor and wine press will not feed them,
          And the new wine will fail them.

3 They will not remain in the LORD’S land,
          But Ephraim will return to Egypt,
          And in Assyria they will eat unclean food.

4 They will not pour out drink offerings of wine to the LORD,
          Their sacrifices will not please Him.
          Their bread will be like mourners’ bread;
          All who eat of it will be defiled,
          For their bread will be for themselves alone;
          It will not enter the house of the LORD.

5 What will you do on the day of the appointed festival
          And on the day of the feast of the LORD?

6 For behold, they will go because of destruction;
          Egypt will gather them up, Memphis will bury them.
          Weeds will take over their treasures of silver;
          Thorns will be in their tents.

7 The days of punishment have come,
          The days of retribution have come;
          Let Israel know this!
          The prophet is a fool,
          The inspired man is demented,
          Because of the grossness of your iniquity,
          And because your hostility is so great.

8 Ephraim was a watchman with my God, a prophet;
          Yet the snare of a bird catcher is in all his ways,
          And there is only hostility in the house of his God.

9 They have gone deep in depravity
          As in the days of Gibeah;
          He will remember their iniquity,
          He will punish their sins.

10 I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness;
          I saw your forefathers as the earliest fruit on the fig tree in its first season.
          But they came to Baal-peor and devoted themselves to shame,
          And they became as detestable as that which they loved.

11 As for Ephraim, their glory will fly away like a bird—
          No birth, no pregnancy and no conception!

12 Though they bring up their children,
          Yet I will bereave them until not a man is left.
          Yes, woe to them indeed when I depart from them!

13 Ephraim, as I have seen,
          Is planted in a pleasant meadow like Tyre;
          But Ephraim will bring out his children for slaughter.

14 Give them, O LORD—what will You give?
          Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.

15 All their evil is at Gilgal;
          Indeed, I came to hate them there!
          Because of the wickedness of their deeds
          I will drive them out of My house!
          I will love them no more;
          All their princes are rebels.

16 Ephraim is stricken, their root is dried up,
          They will bear no fruit.
          Even though they bear children,
          I will slay the precious ones of their womb.

17 My God will cast them away
          Because they have not listened to Him;
          And they will be wanderers among the nations.