Hosea 12 - Christian Standard Bible Anglicised

God’s Case against Jacob’s Heirs

¹ Ephraim chases  the wind and pursues the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and violence. He makes a covenant with Assyria, and olive oil is carried to Egypt.

² The Lord also has a dispute with Judah. He is about to punish Jacob according to his conduct; he will repay him based on his actions.

³ In the womb he grasped his brother’s heel, and as an adult he wrestled with God.

⁴ Jacob struggled with the angel and prevailed; he wept and sought his favour. He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with him.  ,

⁵ The Lord is the God of Armies; the Lord is his name.

⁶ But you must return to your God. Maintain love and justice, and always put your hope in God.

⁷ A merchant loves to extort with dishonest scales in his hands.

⁸ But Ephraim thinks, ‘How rich I have become; I made it all myself. In all my earnings, no one can find any iniquity in me that I can be punished for! ’

Judgement on Apostate Israel

⁹ I have been the Lord your God ever since  the land of Egypt. I will make you live in tents again, as in the festival days.

¹⁰ I will speak through the prophets and grant many visions; I will give parables through the prophets.

¹¹ Since Gilead is full of evil, they will certainly come to nothing. They sacrifice bulls in Gilgal; even their altars will be like piles of rocks on the furrows of a field.

Further Indictment of Jacob’s Heirs

¹² Jacob fled to the territory of Aram. Israel worked to earn a wife; he tended flocks for a wife.

¹³ The Lord brought Israel from Egypt by a prophet, and Israel was tended by a prophet.

¹⁴ Ephraim has provoked bitter anger, so his Lord will leave his bloodguilt on him and repay him for his contempt.