1“When Ephraim speaks tremblingly, He has been lifted up in Israel, When he becomes guilty in Ba‘al he dies.2And now they sin, And make for themselves a molten image of their silver, By their own understanding—idols, A work of artisans—all of it, Of them they say, who [are] sacrificers among men, The calves let them kiss.3Therefore they are as a cloud of the morning, And as dew, rising early, going away, As chaff tossed about out of a floor, And as smoke out of a window.4And I [am] your God YHWH from the land of Egypt, And you do not know a God besides Me, And a Savior—there is none except Me.5I have known you in a wilderness, In a land of droughts.6They are satiated according to their feedings, They have been satiated, And their heart is lifted up, Therefore they have forgotten Me,7And I am to them as a lion, I look out as a leopard by the way.8I meet them as a bereaved bear, And I tear the enclosure of their heart, And I consume them there as a lioness, A beast of the field tears them.9You have destroyed yourself, O Israel, But in Me [is] your help;10Where [is] your king now—And he saves you in all your cities? And your judges of whom you said, Give a king and heads to me?11I give to you a king in My anger, And I take away in My wrath.12Bound up [is] the iniquity of Ephraim, Hidden [is] his sin,13Pangs of a travailing woman come to him, He [is] not a wise son, For he does not remain [at] the time for the breaking forth of sons.14Will I ransom them from the hand of Sheol? Will I redeem them from death? Where [is] your plague, O death? Where your destruction, O Sheol? Comfort is hid from My eyes.15Though he produces fruit among brothers, An east wind comes in, a wind of YHWH, From a wilderness it is coming up, And it dries up his fountain, And his spring becomes dry, It—it spoils a treasure—every desirable vessel.16Samaria becomes desolate, Because she has been rebellious against her God, They fall by sword, Their sucklings are dashed in pieces, And its pregnant ones are ripped up!”
