Hosea 4:2
By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood.
Study Note
Study Note
Hosea's covenant lawsuit (rib) against Israel catalogs five Decalogue violations — swearing, lying, killing, stealing, committing adultery — in sequence that parallels the second table of the Decalogue (Exodus 20:13–16; Deuteronomy 5:17–20) and extends them with 'blood touches blood' — a phrase of accelerating violence where crimes compound upon crimes. The lawsuit genre implies that YHWH is prosecuting Israel for treaty violations in a formal legal proceeding — the covenant is the document, and the community stands as defendant. Jeremiah 7:9 employs nearly identical language, suggesting both prophets drew on a shared covenantal-legal tradition of indictment. The verse is significant for understanding the integration of social ethics and covenant theology in the eighth-century prophets: Decalogue violation is simultaneously a social crime and a theological one.
Other Translations
There is nought but swearing and breaking faith, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery; they break out, and blood toucheth blood.
Swearing, and lying, and murdering, And stealing, and committing adultery--have increased, And blood against blood hath touched.
There is cursing and broken faith, violent death and attacks on property, men are untrue in married life, houses are broken into, and there is blood touching blood.
Cross References
The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the …
Hear ye this, O house of Jacob, which are called by the name of Israel, and are come forth out …
But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that …
The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked …
For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us: for our transgressions are with us; and …
Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the Lord saw it, and it …
Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad …
And though they say, The Lord liveth; surely they swear falsely.
How shall I pardon thee for this? thy children have forsaken me, and sworn by them that are no gods: …
Shall I not visit for these things? saith the Lord: and shall not my soul be avenged on such a …