As they go, I will spread My net over them; I will bring them down like birds of the air. I will chastise them when I hear them flocking together.
Parallel translations
- WEB When they go, I will spread my net on them. I will bring them down like the birds of the sky. I will chastise them, as their congregation has heard.
- KJV When they shall go, I will spread my net upon them; I will bring them down as the fowls of the heaven; I will chastise them, as their congregation hath heard.
- NKJV Wherever they go, I will spread My net on them; I will bring them down like birds of the air; I will chastise them According to what their congregation has heard.
- NASB When they go, I will spread My net over them; I will bring them down like the birds of the sky. I will discipline them in accordance with the proclamation to their assembly.
- NLT But as they fly about, I will throw my net over them and bring them down like a bird from the sky. I will punish them for all the evil they do.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
As they flit to and fro, God will spread His net and bring them down like birds, disciplining them as warned.
Overview
The dove imagery turns to judgment: God Himself will trap the wandering nation as a fowler snares birds. Their efforts to escape into foreign alliances will only deliver them into His chastening hand. This sovereign pursuit shows that no one can flee from God, and that His discipline, though severe, aims to bring His people back.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Ezek 12:13But I will spread My net over him, and he will be caught in My snare. I will bring him to Babylon, the land of the Chaldeans; yet he will not see it, and there he will die.
- Deut 28:15–68If, however, you do not obey the LORD your God by carefully following all His commandments and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:
- Deut 29:22–28Then the generation to come—your sons who follow you and the foreigner who comes from a distant land—will see the plagues of the land and the sicknesses the LORD has inflicted on it.
- 2 Kgs 17:13–18Yet through all His prophets and seers, the LORD warned Israel and Judah, saying, “Turn from your wicked ways and keep My commandments and statutes, according to the entire Law that I commanded your fathers and delivered to you through My servants the prophets.”
- Job 19:6then understand that it is God who has wronged me and drawn His net around me.
- Jer 16:16But for now I will send for many fishermen, declares the LORD, and they will catch them. After that I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them down on every mountain and hill, even from the clefts of the rocks.
- Eccl 9:12For surely no man knows his time: Like fish caught in a cruel net or birds trapped in a snare, so men are ensnared in an evil time that suddenly falls upon them.
- Jer 44:4Yet I sent you all My servants the prophets again and again, saying: ‘Do not do this detestable thing that I hate.’
- Rev 3:19Those I love, I rebuke and discipline. Therefore be earnest and repent.
- Deut 31:16–29And the LORD said to Moses, “You will soon rest with your fathers, and these people will rise up and prostitute themselves with the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake Me and break the covenant I have made with them.
- Ezek 17:20I will spread My net over him and catch him in My snare. I will bring him to Babylon and execute judgment upon him there for the treason he committed against Me.
- Ezek 32:3This is what the Lord GOD says: ‘I will spread My net over you with a company of many peoples, and they will draw you up in My net.
- Deut 32:15–43But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked—becoming fat, bloated, and gorged. He abandoned the God who made him and scorned the Rock of his salvation.
- Lev 26:14–46If, however, you fail to obey Me and to carry out all these commandments,
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Christ at the center
God's relentless love for an unfaithful bride dramatizes the gospel: 'Out of Egypt I called my son' is fulfilled in Jesus, who redeems an adulterous people at his own cost.
How Hosea 7:12 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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