Hosea 12
New Century Version
12 What Israel does is as useless as chasing the wind;
he chases the east wind all day.
They tell more and more lies
and do more and more violence.
They make agreements with Assyria,
and they send a gift of olive oil to Egypt.
2 The Lord also has some things against Judah.
He will punish Israel for what they have done;
he will give them what they deserve.
3 Their ancestor Jacob held on to his brother’s heel
while the two of them were being born.
When he grew to be a man,
he wrestled with God.
4 When Jacob wrestled with the angel and won,
he cried and asked for his blessing.
Later, God met with him at Bethel
and spoke with him there.
5 It was the Lord God All-Powerful;
the Lord is his great name.
6 You must return to your God;
love him, do what is just,
and always trust in him as your God.
7 The merchants use dishonest scales;
they like to cheat people.
8 Israel said, “I am rich! I am someone with power!”
All their money will do them no good
because of the sins they have done.
9 “But I am the Lord your God,
who brought you out of Egypt.
I will make you live in tents again
as you used to do on worship days.
10 I spoke to the prophets
and gave them many visions;
through them, I taught my lessons to you.”
11 The people of Gilead are evil,
worth nothing.
Though people sacrifice bulls at Gilgal,
their altars will become like piles of stone
in a plowed field.
12 Your ancestor Jacob fled to Northwest Mesopotamia
where he worked to get a wife;
he tended sheep to pay for her.
13 Later the Lord used a prophet
to bring Jacob’s descendants out of Egypt;
he used a prophet
to take care of the Israelites.
14 But the Israelites made the Lord angry when they killed other people,
and they deserve to die for their crimes.
The Lord will make them pay
for the disgraceful things they have done.
Hosea 12
King James Version
12 Ephraim feedeth on wind, and followeth after the east wind: he daily increaseth lies and desolation; and they do make a covenant with the Assyrians, and oil is carried into Egypt.
2 The Lord hath also a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; according to his doings will he recompense him.
3 He took his brother by the heel in the womb, and by his strength he had power with God:
4 Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto him: he found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us;
5 Even the Lord God of hosts; the Lord is his memorial.
6 Therefore turn thou to thy God: keep mercy and judgment and wait on thy God continually.
7 He is a merchant, the balances of deceit are in his hand: he loveth to oppress.
8 And Ephraim said, Yet I am become rich, I have found me out substance: in all my labours they shall find none iniquity in me that were sin.
9 And I that am the Lord thy God from the land of Egypt will yet make thee to dwell in tabernacles, as in the days of the solemn feast.
10 I have also spoken by the prophets, and I have multiplied visions, and used similitudes, by the ministry of the prophets.
11 Is there iniquity in Gilead? surely they are vanity: they sacrifice bullocks in Gilgal; yea, their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the fields.
12 And Jacob fled into the country of Syria, and Israel served for a wife, and for a wife he kept sheep.
13 And by a prophet the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt, and by a prophet was he preserved.
14 Ephraim provoked him to anger most bitterly: therefore shall he leave his blood upon him, and his reproach shall his Lord return unto him.
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
