Hosea 14:1-9
14 “Do come back, O Israel, to Jehovah your God,+ for you have stumbled in your error.+
2 Take with yourselves words and come back to Jehovah.+ Say to him, all YOU people, ‘May you pardon error;+ and accept what is good, and we will offer in return the young bulls of our lips.*+
3 As·syrʹi·a itself will not save us.+ Upon horses we shall not ride.+ And no more shall we say: “O our God!” to the work of our hands, because it is by you that a fatherless boy is shown mercy.’+
4 “I shall heal their unfaithfulness.+ I shall love them of [my] own free will,+ because my anger has turned back from him.+
5 I shall become* like the dew to Israel.+ He will blossom like the lily, and will strike his roots like Lebʹa·non.
6 His twigs will go forth, and his dignity will become like that of the olive tree,+ and his fragrance will be like that of Lebʹa·non.
7 They will again be dwellers in his shadow.+ They will grow grain, and will bud like the vine.+ His memorial* will be like the wine of Lebʹa·non.
8 “Eʹphra·im [will say], ‘What do I have to do any longer with the idols?’*+
“I myself shall certainly give an answer and I shall keep looking on him.+ I am like a luxuriant juniper tree.+ From me must fruit for you be found.”
9 Who is wise, that he may understand these things?+ Discreet, that he may know them?+ For the ways of Jehovah are upright,+ and the righteous are the ones who will walk in them;+ but the transgressors are the ones who will stumble in them.+
Footnotes
^ “The young bulls of our lips,” MVg; LXX, “the fruit of our lips.”
^ “His memorial.” Or, “The mention of Him.” Heb., zikh·rohʹ.
^ Lit., “What to me yet to the idols?” A Heb. idiom; a repellent question to indicate objection to the idols. See App 7B.
