Dual Panel1Put the trumpets to your lips! An eagle circles over the sanctuary of the LORD; they have violated my covenant and rebelled against my instruction.
2Israel cries to me for help: “We acknowledge you as our God.”
3But Israel rejects what is good, and an enemy pursues him.
4They make kings, but not on my authority; they set up rulers, but without my knowledge; from their silver and gold they have made for themselves idols for their own destruction.
5Samaria, your calf-god is loathsome! My anger burns against them! How long must they remain guilty?
6The calf was made in Israel; a craftsman fashioned it and it is no god; it will be reduced to splinters.
7Israel sows the wind and reaps the whirlwind; there are no heads on the standing grain, it yields no flour; and, if it did yield any, strangers would swallow it up.
8Israel is swallowed up; now among the nations they are like a thing of no value.
9Like a wild ass that goes its own way, they have gone up to Assyria. Ephraim has bargained for lovers;
10because they have so bargained among the nations I will now round them up. Soon they will have to abandon the setting up of kings and rulers.
11Ephraim has built altars everywhere and they have become occasions for sin.
12Though I give him many written laws, they are treated as irrelevant;
13though they sacrifice offerings of flesh and eat them, the LORD will not accept them. Their guilt will be remembered and their sins punished. Let them go back to Egypt!
14Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; Judah has many walled cities, but I shall burn his cities, and fire will devour his citadels.