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Unfaithful Israel

If a man divorces his wife

and she goes from him

and becomes another man’s wife,

will he return to her?

Would not such a land be greatly polluted?

You have played the whore with many lovers;

and would you return to me?

says the L ord.

Look up to the bare heights, and see!

Where have you not been lain with?

By the waysides you have sat waiting for lovers,

like a nomad in the wilderness.

You have polluted the land

with your whoring and wickedness.

Therefore the showers have been withheld,

and the spring rain has not come;

yet you have the forehead of a whore,

you refuse to be ashamed.

Have you not just now called to me,

“My Father, you are the friend of my youth—

will he be angry forever,

will he be indignant to the end?”

This is how you have spoken,

but you have done all the evil that you could.

A Call to Repentance

⁶ The L ord said to me in the days of King Josiah: Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and played the whore there? ⁷And I thought, “After she has done all this she will return to me”; but she did not return, and her false sister Judah saw it. ⁸She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce; yet her false sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore. ⁹Because she took her whoredom so lightly, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree. ¹⁰Yet for all this her false sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but only in pretense, says the L ord.

¹¹ Then the L ord said to me: Faithless Israel has shown herself less guilty than false Judah. ¹²Go, and proclaim these words toward the north, and say:

Return, faithless Israel,

says the L ord.

I will not look on you in anger,

for I am merciful,

says the L ord;

I will not be angry forever.

Only acknowledge your guilt,

that you have rebelled against the L ord your God,

and scattered your favors among strangers under every green tree,

and have not obeyed my voice,

says the L ord.

Return, O faithless children,

says the L ord,

for I am your master;

I will take you, one from a city and two from a family,

and I will bring you to Zion.

¹⁵ I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding. ¹⁶And when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says the L ord, they shall no longer say, “The ark of the covenant of the L ord.” It shall not come to mind, or be remembered, or missed; nor shall another one be made. ¹⁷At that time Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the L ord, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of the L ord in Jerusalem, and they shall no longer stubbornly follow their own evil will. ¹⁸In those days the house of Judah shall join the house of Israel, and together they shall come from the land of the north to the land that I gave your ancestors for a heritage.

I thought

how I would set you among my children,

and give you a pleasant land,

the most beautiful heritage of all the nations.

And I thought you would call me, My Father,

and would not turn from following me.

Instead, as a faithless wife leaves her husband,

so you have been faithless to me, O house of Israel,

says the L ord.

A voice on the bare heights is heard,

the plaintive weeping of Israel’s children,

because they have perverted their way,

they have forgotten the L ord their God:

Return, O faithless children,

I will heal your faithlessness.

“Here we come to you;

for you are the L ord our God.

Truly the hills are a delusion,

the orgies on the mountains.

Truly in the L ord our God

is the salvation of Israel.

²⁴ “But from our youth the shameful thing has devoured all for which our ancestors had labored, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters. ²⁵Let us lie down in our shame, and let our dishonor cover us; for we have sinned against the L ord our God, we and our ancestors, from our youth even to this day; and we have not obeyed the voice of the L ord our God.”

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

And in the same sense is to be taken what follows, Surely, deceit is from the hills, and the multitude of mountains, or, from the multitude of mountains, as the letter מ is to be repeated. Here the Prophet more fully expresses the evidence of their repentance, as though he had said, “We have been deceived by the hills and the multitude of mountains; we thought that there would be more defense from a large number of gods than if we worshipped one God: this deception has led to ruin. Let then all these deceits be now discarded; for we shall be content with the only true God.” In short, the Israelites confess, in these words, that they had been drawn into ruin by the worst of errors, while they sought many gods, and did not acquiesce in the one true God.

Then they add, for surely in Jehovah our God is salvation They set here the one true God in opposition to all their idols, as though they had said, that the cause of all their evils was, that they did not continue in the service of the one true God, but wandered after a multitude of Gods. We hence see that these two things cannot possibly be connected, — to worship the true God, — and to seek for ourselves various other gods, and to form vain hopes, as they do, who are not satisfied with the only true God. ⁹⁵⁹⁵     The literal rendering of these two verses is the following:-
   22. Return, ye apostate children, I will heal your apostasies. — Behold us! We come to thee; For thou art Jehovah our God:
   23. Surely, in vain are the hills, The multitude of mountains; Surely, in (or through) Jehovah our God Is the salvation of Israel.
   The word rendered “apostate,” does not mean “rebellious,” but such as turn away, i.e., from God; and the word for “apostasies” means the same, being from the same root. The מ before the word for “hills,” is not a preposition, as it is commonly taken, but a formative: so it appears from all the versions. Blayney conjectures that it belongs to the former word, and makes it לשקרים; but then he does not account for the ל prefixed to it. There is no different reading. The Septuagint is, εἰς ψεῦδος ἧσαν οἱ ζουνοὶ — for a lie were the hills. The Vulgate, Syriac, and Arabic, are materially the same. — Ed It follows —

⁹⁵ The literal rendering of these two verses is the following:- 22. Return, ye apostate children, I will heal your apostasies. — Behold us! We come to thee; For thou art Jehovah our God: 23. Surely, in vain are the hills, The multitude of mountains; Surely, in (or through) Jehovah our God Is the salvation of Israel. The word rendered “apostate,” does not mean “rebellious,” but such as turn away, i.e., from God; and the word for “apostasies” means the same, being from the same root. The מ before the word for “hills,” is not a preposition, as it is commonly taken, but a formative: so it appears from all the versions. Blayney conjectures that it belongs to the former word, and makes it לשקרים; but then he does not account for the ל prefixed to it. There is no different reading. The Septuagint is, εἰς ψεῦδος ἧσαν οἱ ζουνοὶ — for a lie were the hills. The Vulgate, Syriac, and Arabic, are materially the same. — Ed