Israel’s Unfaithfulness

¹¹ Then the Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals,^{(A) 12} and they abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt; they followed other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were all around them and bowed down to them, and they provoked the Lord to anger.^{(B) 13} They abandoned the Lord and served Baal and the Astartes.^(C)

¹¹ “I regret that I made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not carried out my commands.” Samuel was angry, and he cried out to the Lord all night.^(A)

A Call to Repentance

⁶ The Lord said to me in the days of King Josiah: Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree and prostituted herself there?^{(A) 7} And I thought, “After she has done all this she will return to me,” but she did not return, and her false sister Judah saw it.^{(B) 8} She^[a] saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce, yet her false sister Judah did not fear, but she also went and prostituted herself.^{(C) 9} Because she took her prostitution so lightly, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree.^{(D) 10} Yet for all this her false sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart but only in pretense, says the Lord.^(E)

¹¹ Then the Lord said to me: Faithless Israel has shown herself less guilty than false Judah.^(F)

¹⁰ This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who stubbornly follow their own will and have gone after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be like this loincloth, which is good for nothing.^(A)