I will commit myself to you forever; I will commit myself to you in righteousness and justice, in steadfast love and tender compassion.

Israel cries out to me, “My God, we acknowledge you!”

I will destroy her vines and fig trees, about which she said, “These are my wages for prostitution that my lovers gave to me!” I will turn her cultivated vines and fig trees into an uncultivated thicket, so that wild animals will devour them.

Ephraim boasts, “I am very rich! I have become wealthy! In all that I have done to gain my wealth, no one can accuse me of any offense that is actually sinful.”

I will commit myself to you in faithfulness; then you will acknowledge the Lord.”

The more the priests increased in numbers, the more they rebelled against me. They have turned their glorious calling into a shameful disgrace!

So I paid fifteen shekels of silver and about seven bushels of barley to purchase her.

“At that time,” declares the Lord, “you will call, ‘My husband’; you will never again call me, ‘My master.’

Then I will plant her as my own in the land. I will have pity on ‘No Pity’ (Lo-Ruhamah). I will say to ‘Not My People’ (Lo-Ammi), ‘You are my people!’ And he will say, ‘You are my God!’”

Then I told her, “You must live with me many days; you must not commit adultery or have sexual intercourse with another man, and I also will wait for you.”

You have destroyed my people by failing to acknowledge me! Because you refuse to acknowledge me, I will reject you as my priests. Because you reject the law of your God, I will reject your descendants.

Where then is your king, that he may save you in all your cities? Where are your rulers for whom you asked, saying, “Give me a king and princes”?

O Ephraim, I do not want to have anything to do with idols anymore! I will answer him and care for him. I am like a luxuriant cypress tree; your fruitfulness comes from me!

Then she will pursue her lovers, but she will not catch them; she will seek them, but she will not find them. Then she will say, “I will go back to my husband, because I was better off then than I am now.”