Say unto your brethren Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

And she shall pursue after her lovers, and shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, and shall not find them: and she shall say, I will go and return to my first husband, for then was it better with me than now.

And I will sow her unto me in the land; and I will have mercy upon Lo-ruhamah; and I will say to Lo-ammi, Thou art my people; and they shall say, My God.

And they say not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness: now do their own doings encompass them; they are before my face.

For now they will say, We have no king, for we feared not Jehovah; and a king, what can he do for us?

And the high places of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed: the thorn and the thistle shall come up upon their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us! and to the hills, Fall on us!

And now they sin more and more, and have made them molten images of their silver, idols according to their own understanding, all of it the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let the men that sacrifice kiss the calves.

Take with you words, and turn to Jehovah; say unto him, Forgive all iniquity, and receive us graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips.

Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Thou art our God; because in thee the fatherless findeth mercy.

Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? (I answer him, and I will observe him.) I am like a green fir-tree. From me is thy fruit found.