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8. Israel to Reap the Whirlwind

¹ “Put the trumpet to your lips!
   An eagle is over the house of the LORD
because the people have broken my covenant
   and rebelled against my law.
² Israel cries out to me,
   ‘Our God, we acknowledge you!’
³ But Israel has rejected what is good;
   an enemy will pursue him.
⁴ They set up kings without my consent;
   they choose princes without my approval.
With their silver and gold
   they make idols for themselves
   to their own destruction.
⁵ Samaria, throw out your calf-idol!
   My anger burns against them.
How long will they be incapable of purity?
    ⁶ They are from Israel!
This calf—a metalworker has made it;
   it is not God.
It will be broken in pieces,
   that calf of Samaria.

    ⁷ “They sow the wind
   and reap the whirlwind.
The stalk has no head;
   it will produce no flour.
Were it to yield grain,
   foreigners would swallow it up.
⁸ Israel is swallowed up;
   now she is among the nations
   like something no one wants.
⁹ For they have gone up to Assyria
   like a wild donkey wandering alone.
   Ephraim has sold herself to lovers.
¹⁰ Although they have sold themselves among the nations,
   I will now gather them together.
They will begin to waste away
   under the oppression of the mighty king.

    ¹¹ “Though Ephraim built many altars for sin offerings,
   these have become altars for sinning.
¹² I wrote for them the many things of my law,
   but they regarded them as something foreign.
¹³ Though they offer sacrifices as gifts to me,
   and though they eat the meat,
   the LORD is not pleased with them.
Now he will remember their wickedness
   and punish their sins:
   They will return to Egypt.
¹⁴ Israel has forgotten their Maker
   and built palaces;
   Judah has fortified many towns.
But I will send fire on their cities
   that will consume their fortresses.”

The Prophet here shows by another figure how unprofitably the Israelites exercised themselves in their perverted worship, and then how vainly they excused their superstitions. And this reproof is very necessary also in the present day. For we see that hypocrites, a hundred times convicted, will not yet cease to clamour something: in short, they cannot bear to be conquered; even when their conscience reproves them, they will still dare to vomit forth their virulence against God. They will also dare to bring forward vain pretences: hence the Prophet says, that they have sown the wind, and that they shall reap the whirlwind. It is an appropriate metaphor; for they shall receive a harvest suitable to the sowing. The seed is cast on the earth, and afterwards the harvest is gathered: They have sown, he says, the wind, they shall then gather the whirlwind, or, the tempest. To sow the wind is nothing else than to put on some appearance to dazzle the eyes of the simple, and by craft and guise of words to cover their own impiety. When one then casts his hand, he seems to throw seed on the earth, but yet he sows the wind. So also hypocrites have their displays, and set themselves in order, that they may appear wholly like the pious worshipers of God.

We hence see that the design of the Prophet’s metaphor, when he says that they sow the wind, is to show this, that though they differ nothing from the true worshippers of God in outward appearance, they yet sow nothing but wind; for when the Israelites offered their sacrifices in the temple, they no doubt conformed to the rule of the law, but at the same time came short of obedience to God. There was no faith in their services: it was then wind; that is, they had nothing but a windy and an empty show, though the outward aspect of their service differed nothing from the true and legitimate worship of God. They then sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. But we cannot finish to-day.