Bible Strands
Hosea 9:6
For even if they flee destruction, Egypt will gather them and Memphis will bury them. Their precious silver will be taken over by thistles, and thorns will overrun their tents.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The prophet Hosea addresses Israel during a period of national crisis, contrasting their planned religious observance with impending judgment. He speaks just before declaring that the days of punishment and retribution have arrived.
The words — The text uses מִצְרַ֥יִם (Mitzrayim) for Egypt and מֹ֣ף (Mof) for Memphis to name the locations of forced exile and death. The verb תְּקַבְּרֵ֑ם (tekarrem) literally means "it will bury them," stating that a foreign power will handle their remains.
The thread — The imagery of thorns and thistles overrunning human structures appears in Hosea 10:8 regarding defiled altars and Isaiah 5:6 and Isaiah 7:23 where judgment turns cultivated land into wilderness. These passages share Hosea 9:6's pattern of divine action rendering human wealth and shelter useless.
Why it lands — The verse demands acknowledgment that physical flight cannot escape judgment or preserve national assets. It requires readers to accept that ritual observance cannot override the concrete consequences of sustained rebellion.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
For, lo, they are gone because of destruction: Egypt shall gather them up, Memphis shall bury them: the pleasant places for their silver, nettles shall possess them: thorns shall be in their tabernacles.
Cross-references
- Hosea 10:8 The high places of Aven will be destroyed—it is the sin of Israel; thorns and thistles will overgrow their altars. Then they will say to the mountains, “Cover us!” and to the hills, “Fall on us!”
- Isaiah 5:6 I will make it a wasteland, neither pruned nor cultivated, and thorns and briers will grow up. I will command the clouds that rain shall not fall on it.”
- Isaiah 7:23 And on that day, in every place that had a thousand vines worth a thousand shekels of silver, only briers and thorns will be found.
- Hosea 7:16 They turn, but not to the Most High; they are like a faulty bow. Their leaders will fall by the sword for the cursing of their tongue; for this they will be ridiculed in the land of Egypt.
- Hosea 8:13 Though they offer sacrifices as gifts to Me, and though they eat the meat, the LORD does not accept them. Now He will remember their iniquity and punish their sins: They will return to Egypt.
- Hosea 9:3 They will not remain in the land of the LORD; Ephraim will return to Egypt and eat unclean food in Assyria.
- Deuteronomy 28:63 Just as it pleased the LORD to make you prosper and multiply, so also it will please Him to annihilate you and destroy you. And you will be uprooted from the land you are entering to possess.
- 1 Samuel 13:6 Seeing that they were in danger because their troops were hard-pressed, the men of Israel hid in caves and thickets, among the rocks, and in cellars and cisterns.
- 2 Kings 13:7 Jehoahaz had no army left, except fifty horsemen, ten chariots, and ten thousand foot soldiers, because the king of Aram had destroyed them and made them like the dust at threshing.
- Psalms 107:34 and fruitful land into fields of salt, because of the wickedness of its dwellers.