4. Later, Hoshea sent messengers to the king of Egypt to ask for help. That king’s name was So. That year Hoshea did not pay tribute to the king of Assyria as he did every other year. The king of Assyria learned that Hoshea had made plans against him. So he arrested Hoshea and put him in jail.
5. The king of Assyria attacked many places in Israel. Then he came to Samaria and fought against it for three years.
6. The king of Assyria took Samaria during the ninth year that Hoshea was king of Israel. He captured many Israelites and took them as prisoners to Assyria. He made them live in Halah by the Habor River at Gozan and in other cities of the Medes.
7. These things happened because the Israelites had sinned against the Lord their God. And it was the Lord who brought the Israelites out of the land of Egypt! He saved them from the power of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. But the Israelites began worshiping other gods.
8. They began doing the same things that other people did. And the Lord had forced those people to leave their land when the Israelites came. The Israelites also chose to be ruled by kings.
9. The Israelites secretly did things against the Lord their God, and those things were wrong! The Israelites built high places in all their cities—from the smallest town to the largest city.
10. They put up memorial stones and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.
11. They burned incense there in all those places for worship. They did these things like the nations that the Lord forced out of the land before them. The Israelites did evil things that made the Lord angry.
12. They served idols, and the Lord had said to them, “You must not do this.”
13. The Lord used every prophet and every seer to warn Israel and Judah. He said, “Turn away from the evil things you do. Obey my commands and laws. Follow all the law that I gave to your ancestors. I used my servants the prophets to give this law to you.”
14. But the people would not listen. They were very stubborn like their ancestors. Their ancestors did not believe the Lord their God.
15. They refused to follow his laws and the agreement he made with their ancestors. They would not listen to his warnings. They worshiped idols that were worth nothing and they themselves became worth nothing. The Lord had warned them not to do the evil things that the people in the nations around them did. But they lived the same way those people lived.
16. The people stopped following the commands of the Lord their God. They made two gold statues of calves. They made Asherah poles. They worshiped all the stars of heaven and served Baal.
17. They sacrificed their sons and daughters in the fire. They used magic and witchcraft to try to learn the future. They sold themselves to do what the Lord said was evil. They did this to make him angry.