Hosea 4:17

Many will purify themselves, and make themselves white, and be refined; but the wicked will do wickedly; and none of the wicked will understand; but those who are wise will understand.

But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you shall tell them, ‘This is what the Lord Yahweh says.’ He who hears, let him hear; and he who refuses, let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house.”

Blessed is the man who doesn’t walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand on the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers;

The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.

Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves;

But the path of the righteous is like the dawning light that shines more and more until the perfect day.

But they didn’t listen or turn their ear, but walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.

But evil men and impostors will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.

Yahweh prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.

Yet the righteous will hold to his way. He who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.

The wicked is brought down in his calamity, but in death, the righteous has a refuge.

The houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled, will be as the place of Topheth, even all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the army of the sky and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.” ’ ”

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture!” says Yahweh.

I will visit on her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot me,” says Yahweh.

But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, but no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet.

“Woe to you, you blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obligated.’

The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all people everywhere should repent,

For I am Yahweh your God. Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be holy; for I am holy. You shall not defile yourselves with any kind of creeping thing that moves on the earth.

The man who does presumptuously in not listening to the priest who stands to minister there before Yahweh your God, or to the judge, even that man shall die. You shall put away the evil from Israel.

Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I don’t remember you, if I don’t prefer Jerusalem above my chief joy.

“Woe to the rebellious children”, says Yahweh, “who take counsel, but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin,

They don’t know, neither do they consider: for he has shut their eyes, that they can’t see; and their hearts, that they can’t understand.

“An astonishing and horrible thing has happened in the land.

For my people have forgotten me. They have burned incense to false gods. They have been made to stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up,

Slanderous men have been in you to shed blood. In you they have eaten on the mountains. They have committed lewdness among you.

I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hidden from me; for now, Ephraim, you have played the prostitute. Israel is defiled.

“When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah his wound, Then Ephraim went to Assyria, and sent to king Jareb: but he is not able to heal you, neither will he cure you of your wound.

“Ephraim is like an easily deceived dove, without understanding. They call to Egypt. They go to Assyria.

When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling. He exalted himself in Israel, but when he became guilty in Baal, he died.

Now Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,

Behold, you will be silent and not able to speak until the day that these things will happen, because you didn’t believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their proper time.”

He spoke a parable to them. “Can the blind guide the blind? Won’t they both fall into a pit?

Jesus said therefore again to them, “I am going away, and you will seek me, and you will die in your sins. Where I go, you can’t come.”

Now to him who is able to keep them from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory in great joy,

Woe to you, Moab! You are undone, people of Chemosh! He has given his sons as fugitives, and his daughters into captivity, to Sihon king of the Amorites.

and lest you lift up your eyes to the sky, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the army of the sky, you are drawn away and worship them, and serve them, which Yahweh your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole sky.

If you forsake Yahweh, and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you evil, and consume you, after he has done you good.”

For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.

Yet I reserved seven thousand in Israel, all the knees of which have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth which has not kissed him.”

They abandoned all the commandments of Yahweh their God, and made molten images for themselves, even two calves, and made an Asherah, and worshiped all the army of the sky, and served Baal.

For he built again the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed; and he raised up altars for Baal, and made an Asherah, as Ahab king of Israel did, and worshiped all the army of the sky, and served them.

and he abandoned Yahweh, the God of his fathers, and didn’t walk in the way of Yahweh.

He rescued them many times, but they were rebellious in their counsel, and were brought low in their iniquity.

If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth; and if a tree falls toward the south, or toward the north, in the place where the tree falls, there shall it be.

For those who lead this people lead them astray; and those who are led by them are destroyed.

Some pour out gold from the bag, and weigh silver in the balance. They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god. They fall down— yes, they worship.

“But draw near here, you sons of a sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes.

But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. Therefore he turned and became their enemy, and he himself fought against them.

your own iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together”, says Yahweh, “who have burned incense on the mountains, and blasphemed me on the hills. Therefore I will first measure their work into their bosom.”

They will spread them before the sun, the moon, and all the army of the sky, which they have loved, which they have served, after which they have walked, which they have sought, and which they have worshiped. They will not be gathered or be buried. They will be like dung on the surface of the earth.

They deck it with silver and with gold. They fasten it with nails and with hammers, so that it can’t move.

Therefore Yahweh says: “Ask now among the nations, ‘Who has heard such things?’ The virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing.

“Therefore hear Yahweh’s word, all Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt: ‘Behold, I have sworn by my great name,’ says Yahweh, ‘that my name will no more be named in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, “As the Lord Yahweh lives.”

We have given our hands to the Egyptians, and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.

She gave herself as a prostitute to them, all of them the choicest men of Assyria. She defiled herself with the idols of whoever she lusted after.

In that day your mouth will be opened to him who has escaped, and you will speak, and be no more mute. So you will be a sign to them. Then they will know that I am Yahweh.”

“ ‘ “I will make my holy name known among my people Israel. I won’t allow my holy name to be profaned any more. Then the nations will know that I am Yahweh, the Holy One in Israel.

For she didn’t know that I gave her the grain, the new wine, and the oil, and multiplied to her silver and gold, which they used for Baal.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, that you may be no priest to me. Because you have forgotten your God’s law, I will also forget your children.

As gangs of robbers wait to ambush a man, so the company of priests murder on the path toward Shechem, committing shameful crimes.

They have set up kings, but not by me. They have made princes, and I didn’t approve. Of their silver and their gold they have made themselves idols, that they may be cut off.

I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness. I saw your fathers as the first ripe in the fig tree at its first season; but they came to Baal Peor, and consecrated themselves to the shameful thing, and became abominable like that which they loved.

“Go to Bethel, and sin; to Gilgal, and sin more. Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days,

offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving of that which is leavened, and proclaim free will offerings and brag about them: for this pleases you, you children of Israel,” says the Lord Yahweh.

those who worship the army of the sky on the housetops, those who worship and swear by Yahweh and also swear by Malcam,

Seeing a fig tree by the road, he came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves. He said to it, “Let there be no fruit from you forever!” Immediately the fig tree withered away.

While they went away to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast, and the door was shut.

that he might present the assembly to himself gloriously, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without defect.

Great hailstones, about the weight of a talent, came down out of the sky on people. People blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail, for this plague is exceedingly severe.

They said to them, “May Yahweh look at you and judge, because you have made us a stench to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of his servants, to put a sword in their hand to kill us!”

and has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun, or the moon, or any of the stars of the sky, which I have not commanded,

Ahaziah fell down through the lattice in his upper room that was in Samaria, and was sick. So he sent messengers, and said to them, “Go, inquire of Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I will recover of this sickness.”

So I let them go after the stubbornness of their hearts, that they might walk in their own counsels.

Forty long years I was grieved with that generation, and said, “It is a people that errs in their heart. They have not known my ways.”

You have not brought me any of your sheep for burnt offerings, neither have you honored me with your sacrifices. I have not burdened you with offerings, nor wearied you with frankincense.

Why, when I came, was there no one? When I called, why was there no one to answer? Is my hand shortened at all, that it can’t redeem? Or have I no power to deliver? Behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea. I make the rivers a wilderness. Their fish stink because there is no water, and die of thirst.

Moreover also I gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances in which they should not live.

Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land.

“Yet let no man bring a charge, neither let any man accuse; for your people are like those who bring charges against a priest.

Now they sin more and more, and have made themselves molten images of their silver, even idols according to their own understanding, all of them the work of the craftsmen. They say of them, ‘They offer human sacrifice and kiss the calves.’

Leave them alone. They are blind guides of the blind. If the blind guide the blind, both will fall into a pit.”

This man led them out, having worked wonders and signs in Egypt, in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness for forty years.

But God turned, and gave them up to serve the army of the sky, as it is written in the book of the prophets, ‘Did you offer to me slain animals and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

where your fathers tested me and tried me, and saw my deeds for forty years.

Isn’t this the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, ‘Leave us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians?’ For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

because that they have forsaken me, and have worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of Moab, and Milcom the god of the children of Ammon. They have not walked in my ways, to do that which is right in my eyes, and to keep my statutes and my ordinances, as David his father did.

I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth, that you will be mute, and will not be able to correct them; for they are a rebellious house.

“ ‘As for you, house of Israel, the Lord Yahweh says: “Go, everyone serve his idols, and hereafter also, if you will not listen to me; but you shall no more profane my holy name with your gifts and with your idols.

I will not punish your daughters when they play the prostitute, nor your brides when they commit adultery; because the men consort with prostitutes, and they sacrifice with the shrine prostitutes; so the people without understanding will come to ruin.

In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing. There is prostitution in Ephraim. Israel is defiled.

When I would heal Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim is uncovered, also the wickedness of Samaria; for they commit falsehood, and the thief enters in, and the gang of robbers ravages outside.

They called to them, so they went from them. They sacrificed to the Baals, and burned incense to engraved images.

Ephraim feeds on wind, and chases the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and desolation. They make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt.

An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and there will be no sign given to it, except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” He left them, and departed.

He left them, and again entering into the boat, departed to the other side.

who in the generations gone by allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways.

But if anyone is ignorant, let him be ignorant.

He who acts unjustly, let him act unjustly still. He who is filthy, let him be filthy still. He who is righteous, let him do righteousness still. He who is holy, let him be holy still.”