4:1 Hear this word, you cows of Bashan on Mount Samaria, you women who oppress the poor and crush the needy and say to your husbands, “Bring us some drinks!”
4:2 The Sovereign Lord has sworn by his holiness: “The time will surely come when you will be taken away with hooks, the last of you with fishhooks.* / *Or away in baskets, the last of you in fish baskets
4:3 You will each go straight out through breaches in the wall, and you will be cast out toward Harmon,*” declares the Lord. / *Masoretic Text; with a different word division of the Hebrew (see Septuagint) out, you mountain of oppression
4:4 “Go to Bethel and sin; go to Gilgal and sin yet more. Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three years.* / *Or days
4:5 Burn leavened bread as a thank offering and brag about your freewill offerings - boast about them, you Israelites, for this is what you love to do,” declares the Sovereign Lord.
4:6 “I gave you empty stomachs in every city and lack of bread in every town, yet you have not returned to me,” declares the Lord.
4:7 “I also withheld rain from you when the harvest was still three months away. I sent rain on one town, but withheld it from another.One field had rain; another had none and dried up.
4:8 People staggered from town to town for water but did not get enough to drink, yet you have not returned to me,” declares the Lord.
4:9 “Many times I struck your gardens and vineyards, destroying them with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured your fig and olive trees, yet you have not returned to me,” declares the Lord.
4:10 “I sent plagues among you as I did to Egypt. I killed your young men with the sword, along with your captured horses. I filled your nostrils with the stench of your camps, yet you have not returned to me,” declares the Lord.
4:11 “I overthrew some of you as I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. You were like a burning stick snatched from the fire, yet you have not returned to me,” declares the Lord.
4:12 “Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel, and because I will do this to you, Israel, prepare to meet your God.”
4:13 He who forms the mountains, who creates the wind, and who reveals his thoughts to mankind, who turns dawn to darkness, and treads on the heights of the earth - the Lord God Almighty is his name.