¹Hear this, you priests,

And hearken, O house of Israel,

And give ear, O royal house,

For judgment on you is impending,

Because you were a snare to Mizpah

And a net spread out over Tabor.

²The backsliders had deep designs to slaughter,

While I passed censure on all of them.

³I know Ephraim,

And Israel is not hidden from me,

For now you, Ephraim have committed prostitution,

And Israel has become unclean.

⁴They do not make their works fit for returning to their God,

For a spirit of prostitution is in their midst,

And they do not know the Lord.

⁵And the pride of Israel will testify to its face,

And Israel and Ephraim will stumble in their iniquity,

And Judah will stumble too with them.

⁶They will go and seek the Lord among their sheep and their cattle,

But they will not find him.

He will have withdrawn from them.

⁷They have dealt treacherously with the Lord,

For they have borne sons who are strangers,

And now they will be devoured in a month along with their apportioned regions.

⁸Blow the ramshorn in Gibeah

And the trumpet in Ramah.

Sound the alarm in Beth-Aven.

Look behind you, Benjamin.

⁹Ephraim will become a desolation on the day of rebuke.

Among the tribes of Israel,

I have made it known faithfully.

¹⁰The princes of Judah were like those who moved the boundary.

I will pour out my anger on them like water.

¹¹Ephraim is oppressed,

Justice has been perverted,

For he willingly followed the commandment.

¹²So I will be like the moth to Ephraim

And like rot to the house of Judah.

¹³When Ephraim saw his sickness

And Judah saw his wound,

Ephraim went to Assyria

And sent envoys to King Jareb.

But he was not able to cure you,

And he did not heal your wound.

¹⁴For I will be like a lion to Ephraim

And as a young lion to the house of Judah.

I myself will tear to pieces

And go, and carry off,

And there will be no-one to deliver him.

¹⁵I will go and return to my place

Until they acknowledge their guilt

And seek my face.

When they are in straits,

They will diligently seek me.