The Bible

 

Hosea 9

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1 Don't rejoice, Israel, to jubilation like the nations; for you were unfaithful to your God. You love the wages of a prostitute at every grain threshing floor.

2 The threshing floor and the winepress won't feed them, and the new wine will fail her.

3 They won't dwell in Yahweh's land; but Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.

4 They won't pour out wine offerings to Yahweh, neither will they be pleasing to him. Their sacrifices will be to them like the bread of mourners; all who eat of it will be polluted; for their bread will be for their appetite. It will not come into the house of Yahweh.

5 What will you do in the day of solemn assembly, and in the day of the feast of Yahweh?

6 For, behold, they have gone away from destruction. Egypt will gather them up. Memphis will bury them. Nettles will possess their pleasant things of silver. Thorns will be in their tents.

7 The days of visitation have come. The days of reckoning have come. Israel will consider the prophet to be a fool, and the man who is inspired to be insane, because of the abundance of your sins, and because your hostility is great.

8 A prophet watches over Ephraim with my God. A fowler's snare is on all of his paths, and hostility in the house of his God.

9 They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah. He will remember their iniquity. He will punish them for their sins.

10 I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness. I saw your fathers as the first ripe in the fig tree at its first season; but they came to Baal Peor, and consecrated themselves to the shameful thing, and became abominable like that which they loved.

11 As for Ephraim, their glory will fly away like a bird. There will be no birth, none with child, and no conception.

12 Though they bring up their children, yet I will bereave them, so that not a man shall be left. Indeed, woe also to them when I depart from them!

13 I have seen Ephraim, like Tyre, planted in a pleasant place; but Ephraim will bring out his children to the murderer.

14 Give them--Yahweh what will you Give? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.

15 "All their wickedness is in Gilgal; for there I hated them. Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of my house! I will love them no more. All their princes are rebels.

16 Ephraim is struck. Their root has dried up. They will bear no fruit. Even though they bring forth, yet I will kill the beloved ones of their womb."

17 My God will cast them away, because they did not listen to him; and they will be wanderers among the nations.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #1566

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1566. That 'tents' are his worship which was separating itself from the internal man becomes clear from the meaning of 'a tent' as the holiness of worship, 414, and also from the representation of 'Lot' as the external man to which tents, or worship, have reference. That 'tents' in the contrary sense means worship that is not holy also becomes clear from the following places in the Word: In Hosea,

The nettle will inherit those things, the bramble will be in their tents. Hosea 9:6.

In Habakkuk,

I saw the tents of Cushan, the curtains of the land of Midian shook, Jehovah was angry with the rivers. Habakkuk 3:7-8.

In Jeremiah,

Shepherds and their flocks will come against the daughter of Zion; they will pitch their tents against her round about; they will graze, each off his own space. Jeremiah 6:3.

In David.

He smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the beginning of strength in the tents of Ham. Psalms 78:51.

In the same author,

I have chosen to stand by the threshold in the house of my God rather than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. Psalms 84:10.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.