HO-2:1  Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters,

Ruhamah.

HO-2:2  Plead with your mother, plead: for she [is] not my wife,

neither [am]

I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of

her sight, and

her adulteries from between her breasts;

HO-2:3  Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that

she was born,

and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and

slay her with

thirst.

HO-2:4  And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they

[be] the

children of whoredoms.

HO-2:5  For their mother hath played the harlot: she that

conceived them hath

done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that

give [me] my

bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.

HO-2:6  Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns,

and make a

wall, that she shall not find her paths.

HO-2:7  And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not

overtake

them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find [them]: then

shall she say,

I will go and return to my first husband; for then [was it]

better with me

than now.

HO-2:8  For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and

oil, and

multiplied her silver and gold, [which] they prepared for Baal.

HO-2:9  Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the

time thereof,

and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and

my flax

[given] to cover her nakedness.

HO-2:10  And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of

her lovers, and

none shall deliver her out of mine hand.

HO-2:11  I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast

days, her new

moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.

HO-2:12  And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof

she hath

said, These [are] my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I

will make

them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them.

HO-2:13  And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein

she burned

incense to them, and she decked herself with her earrings and

her jewels, and

she went after her lovers, and forgat me, saith the LORD.

HO-2:14  Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her

into the

wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.

HO-2:15  And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the

valley of

Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the

days of her

youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of

Egypt.

HO-2:16  And it shall be at that day, saith the LORD, [that]

thou shalt call

me Ishi; and shalt call me no more Baali.

HO-2:17  For I will take away the names of Baalim out of her

mouth, and they

shall no more be remembered by their name.

HO-2:18  And in that day will I make a covenant for them with

the beasts of

the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and [with] the creeping

things of the

ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle

out of the

earth, and will make them to lie down safely.

HO-2:19  And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will

betroth thee

unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness,

 and in

mercies.

HO-2:20  I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and

thou shalt know

the LORD.

HO-2:21  And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear,

saith the LORD, I

will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth;

HO-2:22  And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and

the oil; and

they shall hear Jezreel.

HO-2:23  And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will

have mercy upon

her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to [them which

were] not my

people, Thou [art] my people; and they shall say, [Thou art] my

God.

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