Thematic Bible: Hoshea


Thematic Bible



Hoshea the son of Elah conspired against Pekah the son of Remaliah, and he attacked and killed him. He reigned in place of him in the twentieth year of Jotham the son of Uzziah.


Therefore, Look! I [am] going to allure her and bring her [into] the desert, and {I will speak tenderly to her}. From there I will give her her vineyards, and the Valley of Achor as a doorway of hope. And there she will respond, as [in] the days of her youth, just as [in] the day of her coming out of the land of Egypt. {And on that day}-- a declaration of Yahweh-- you will call me, "My husband;" you will no longer call me, "My Baal." read more.
I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they will no longer be mentioned by their name. I will make a covenant for them on that day, with the animals of the field, with the birds of the heaven, and [with] the creeping things of the ground; [the] bow, [the] sword, and [the] war I will abolish from the land, and I will let them lie down in safety. And I will take you as my wife forever; I will take you as a wife for myself in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. {I will take you as my wife} in faithfulness, and you will know Yahweh. On that day I will answer, {declares Yahweh}, I will answer the heavens, and they will answer the earth. And the earth will answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they will answer Jezreel. I will sow her for myself in the land; I will have pity on Lo-ruhama; I will say to Lo-ammi, "You are my people," and he himself will say, "[you are] my God."

{I will not execute} {my fierce anger}, I will not again destroy Ephraim; because I [am] God and not a mortal, [the] Holy [One] in your midst; and I will not come in wrath. They will go after Yahweh; he roars like a lion. When he roars, his children will come trembling from [the] sea. They will tremble like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria; and I will let them return to their homes-- a declaration of Yahweh.

The labor pains of childbirth come for him; he [is] an unwise son because [at the] proper time, he does not present himself {at the mouth of the womb}. Should I redeem them from {the power} of Sheol? Should I deliver them from death? Where [are] your plagues, Death? Where [is] your destruction, Sheol? Compassion is hidden from my eyes.

Ephraim, {what have I to do} with idols? I myself have answered and looked after you. I am like a luxuriant cypress; your fruit comes from me.


And there was no Passover like it kept in Israel since the days of Samuel the prophet. And none of the kings of Israel kept a Passover like that which Josiah and the priests and the Levites, and all of Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, kept.

For a majority of the people, many from Ephraim, Manasseh, Issachar, and Zebulun, had not cleansed themselves. But they ate the Passover sacrifice {otherwise than prescribed}, but Hezekiah had prayed for them, saying, "May the good Yahweh make atonement unto everyone whose heart is set to seek God, Yahweh the God of his ancestors, though not according to the cleansing for the sanctuary." And Yahweh listened to Hezekiah, and he healed the people. read more.
And the {Israelites} who were found in Jerusalem kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread seven days with great joy. And the Levites and the priests were offering praise to Yahweh day by day, with powerful instruments to Yahweh. And Hezekiah spoke to the heart of all the Levites {who were skilled at service} to Yahweh. So they ate the feast seven days, offering peace offerings and giving thanks to Yahweh, the God of their ancestors. Then the whole assembly decided to make seven more days [of feasting], so they made seven [more] days with joy, for Hezekiah the king of Judah had {provided} one thousand bulls and seven thousand sheep for the assembly, and the princes {provided} one thousand bulls and ten thousand sheep for the assembly. And many priests consecrated themselves. And the whole assembly of Judah, the priests and the Levites, all the assembly who had come from the land of Israel, and those living in Judah rejoiced. And there was great joy in Jerusalem, for from the days of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel, there was nothing such as this in Jerusalem.

And in the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, Simeon, and as far as Naphtali, in their ruins all around,


"And you, son of man, take for yourself {a piece of wood}, and write on it, 'For Judah and for the {Israelites} his associates,' and take another [piece of] wood, and write on it, 'For Joseph, [the piece of] wood of Ephraim and all of the house of Israel his associates.' And join them one to [the] other with respect to you [as] one [piece of] wood, so that they may become one in your hand. {When} {your people} say to you, {saying}, 'Will you not inform us [as to] what these [actions] mean for you?' read more.
[Then] speak to them, 'Thus says the Lord Yahweh: "Look! I [am] taking [the piece of] wood for Joseph that [is] in the hand of Ephraim and the tribes of Israel its associates, and I will put them on it, [the piece of] wood of Judah, and I will make them into one [piece of] wood, so that they be one in my hand.'" And the [pieces of] wood [on] which you wrote will be in your hand before their eyes. And speak to them, 'Thus says the Lord Yahweh: "Look! I [am] taking the {Israelites} from among {the nations to which they went}, and I will gather them from {everywhere}, and I will bring them to their [own] soil. And I will make them into one nation in the land on the mountains of Israel, and {they will all have one king as their king}, and they will not again be two nations and will not again divide into two kingdoms again.

In those days the house of Judah will walk along with the house of Israel and they will come together from [the] land of [the] north to the land that I gave as an inheritance [to] your ancestors.


It happened after this that Ben-Hadad king of Aram assembled all of his army and marched up and laid siege against Samaria. There was a great famine in Samaria, and behold, a siege [was] against it, until the head of a donkey [went] for eighty shekels of silver, and one fourth of the measure of the dung of doves [went] for five shekels of silver. It happened that the king of Israel [was] crossing over on the wall, and a woman called out to him, saying, "Help, my lord the king!" read more.
He said, "No, let Yahweh help you. {How} can I save you? From the threshing floor or from the wine press?" The king said to her, "{What is the problem}?" Then the woman said, "This woman said to me, 'Give me your son, and let us eat him today, then tomorrow we will eat my son.' So we cooked my son and ate him, and I said to her the next day, 'Give your son that we may eat him.' But she had hidden her son." It happened that when the king heard the words of the woman, he tore his clothes. Now he had been walking on the wall, and the people saw, and behold, sackcloth was over his flesh underneath. Then he said, "May God do to me and thus may he add, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat remains on him today!" Now Elisha [was] sitting in his house and the elders [were] sitting with him, and [the king] dispatched a man from before him, but before the messenger came to him, he said to the elders, "Did you see that this son of a murderer has sent to remove my head? Look, when the messenger comes, close the door; and you must {hold the door closed against him}. [Is] not the sound of the feet of his master behind him?" While he [was] still speaking with them, suddenly the messenger [was] coming down to him, and he said, "Look this trouble [is] from Yahweh. Why should I wait for Yahweh any longer?"


There was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all of their days.

There was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all their days.


It happened many days [later] that the word of Yahweh came to Elijah in the third year, saying, "Go, present yourself to Ahab so that I may give rain on the surface of the earth." So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab. Now the famine [was] severe in Samaria. Ahab summoned Obadiah who [was] over the house. (Now Obadiah was fearing Yahweh greatly. read more.
It had happened that when Jezebel killed the prophets of Yahweh, Obadiah took a hundred prophets and hid them {by fifties} in the cave and sustained them [with] food and water.) Ahab said to Obadiah, "Go through the land to all the springs of water and to all the wadis. Perhaps we may find green grass that we may keep horses and mules alive and that we might not lose any of the animals." So they divided the land for themselves in order to pass through it; Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself.




The king of Aram was fighting with Israel, so he consulted with his officers, saying, "My camp is {at such and such a place}." Then the man of God sent to the king of Israel, saying, "Take care while crossing over to this place, because [the] Arameans [are] descending there." So the king of Israel sent to the place which the man of God said to him and warned him, so he was on guard there {continually}. read more.
Then the heart of the king of Aram was stormy because of this matter, so he called his servants and said to them, "Can you not tell me {who among us sides with the king of Israel}?" Then one of his servants said, "No, my lord the king, but Elisha the prophet who is [in] Israel tells the king of Israel things which you speak {in your own bedchamber}." Then he said, "Go and see where he [is] so that I can send and capture him." Then he was told to him, "Look, [he is] in Dothan." So he sent horses, chariots, and an oppressing army there. They arrived at night and surrounded the town. The attendant of the man of God arose early and went out, and look, the army [was] surrounding the city with horses and chariots. His servant said to him, "Oh no, my master! What shall we do?" And he said, "Don't be afraid, for more [are] with us than are with them." Then Elisha prayed and said, "O Yahweh, please open his eyes that he may see," and Yahweh opened the eyes of the servant, and he saw, and look, the mountain [was] full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. They came down to him, and Elisha prayed to Yahweh and said, "Please strike this people with blindness," so he struck them with blindness as {Elisha had spoken}. Then Elisha said to them, "This [is] not the way and this [is] not the city. Come after me, and I will bring you to the man whom you seek." Then he brought them to Samaria. It happened at the moment they came to Samaria, Elisha said, "O Yahweh, open the eyes of these that they may see," so Yahweh opened their eyes, and they saw, and look, the middle of Samaria! Then the king of Israel said to Elisha when he saw them, "Shall I kill them? Shall I kill, my father?" And he said, "You shall not kill. Would you kill [those] whom you took captive with the sword or with the bow? Put food and water before them that they may eat and drink and then go to their master." So he made a great feast for them, and they ate and drank; then he sent them, and they went to their master. And the bands of the Arameans did not come again into the land of Israel.


There was always war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam.


The king of Assyria brought from Babylonia, from Cush, from Arva, from Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and he settled [them] in the cities of Samaria in place of the {Israelites}, so they took possession of Samaria and lived in her cities.


The remainder of the acts of Abijam and all that he did, are they not written in the scroll of the events of the days of the kings of Judah? There was also war between Abijam and Jeroboam.




In the twelfth year of Ahaz the king of Judah, Hoshea the son of Elah began to reign over Israel in Samaria, [reigning] nine years. He did evil in the eyes of Yahweh, only not as the kings of Israel who were before him. Shalmaneser the king of Assyria came up against him, and Hoshea became his vassal and paid tribute to him. read more.
But the king of Assyria found treachery in Hoshea, for he had sent messengers to So king of Egypt, and he did not offer tribute to the king of Assyria as [he had] year after year; so the king of Assyria arrested him, and confined him [in] a house of imprisonment. So the king of Assyria went up in all the land, then he went up [to] Samaria and besieged it [for] three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and deported Israel to Assyria. He placed them in Halah, in Habor, [in] the river [regions] of Gozan, and [in] the cities of the Medes.