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Monday, December 1st, 2025
the First Week of Advent
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Read the Bible

Hebrew Names Version

Hosea 4:11

Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Adultery;   Drunkenness;   Minister, Christian;   Sin;   Wine;   Thompson Chain Reference - Drink, Strong;   Intemperance;   New;   Temperance;   Temperance-Intemperance;   Wine;   The Topic Concordance - Drunkenness;   Heart;   Whoredom;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Drunkenness;   Wine;  

Dictionaries:

- Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Grapes;   Prostitution;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Abstain, Abstinence;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Wine;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Hosea;   Wine;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Adultery;   Drink;   High Place;   Hosea;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Wine and Strong Drink;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Wine;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Crime;   Drunkenness;   Wine;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Asmodeus;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
Promiscuity, wine, and new winetake away one’s understanding.
King James Version
Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart.
English Standard Version
whoredom, wine, and new wine, which take away the understanding.
New American Standard Bible
Infidelity, wine, and new wine take away the understanding.
New Century Version
prostitution, to old and new wine, which take away their ability to understand.
Amplified Bible
Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away the mind and the [spiritual] understanding.
Geneva Bible (1587)
Whoredome, and wine, and newe wine take away their heart.
New American Standard Bible (1995)
Harlotry, wine and new wine take away the understanding.
Legacy Standard Bible
Harlotry, wine, and new wine take away a heart of wisdom.
Berean Standard Bible
Promiscuity, wine, and new wine take away understanding.
Contemporary English Version
and have been unfaithful to me, their Lord . My people, you are foolish because of too much pleasure and too much wine.
Complete Jewish Bible
Whoring and wine, both old and new, take away my people's wits.
Darby Translation
Fornication, and wine, and new wine take away the heart.
Easy-to-Read Version
"Sexual sins, strong drink, and new wine ruin a person's ability to think straight.
George Lamsa Translation
And they love whoredom, and wine and drunkenness take away their heart.
Good News Translation
The Lord says, "Wine, both old and new, is robbing my people of their senses!
Lexham English Bible
whoredom. Wine and new wine take away the understanding.
Literal Translation
Fornication and wine and new wine take away the heart.
American Standard Version
Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the understanding.
Bible in Basic English
Loose ways and new wine take away wisdom.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
Harlotry, wine, and new wine take away the heart.
King James Version (1611)
Whoredome, and wine, and newe wine take away the heart.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
Whordome, wine, and newe wine, take the heart away.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
The heart of my people has gladly engaged in fornication and wine and strong drink.
English Revised Version
Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the understanding.
World English Bible
Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Fornycacioun, and wiyn, and drunkenesse doen awei the herte.
Update Bible Version
Prostitution and wine and new wine take away the understanding.
Webster's Bible Translation
Lewdness and wine and new wine take away the heart.
New English Translation
Old and new wine take away the understanding of my people.
New King James Version
"Harlotry, wine, and new wine enslave the heart.
New Living Translation
to worship other gods. "Wine has robbed my people of their understanding.
New Life Bible
"Their sinful ways and both old and new wine take away My people's understanding.
New Revised Standard
whoredom. Wine and new wine take away the understanding.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Unchastity, and wine, and new wine, take away the heart.
Douay-Rheims Bible
Fornication, and wine, and drunkenness, take away the understanding.
Revised Standard Version
Wine and new wine take away the understanding.
Young's Literal Translation
Whoredom, and wine, and new wine, take the heart,
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Whordome, wyne and dronckennesse take the herte awaye.
THE MESSAGE
"Wine and whiskey leave my people in a stupor. They ask questions of a dead tree, expect answers from a sturdy walking stick. Drunk on sex, they can't find their way home. They've replaced their God with their genitals. They worship on the tops of mountains, make a picnic out of religion. Under the oaks and elms on the hills they stretch out and take it easy. Before you know it, your daughters are whores and the wives of your sons are sleeping around. But I'm not going after your whoring daughters or the adulterous wives of your sons. It's the men who pick up the whores that I'm after, the men who worship at the holy whorehouses— a stupid people, ruined by whores!

Contextual Overview

6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, That you may be no Kohen to me. Because you have your God's law, I will also forget your children. 7 As they were multiplied, so they sinned against me. I will change their glory into shame. 8 They feed on the sin of my people, And set their heart on their iniquity. 9 It will be, like people, like Kohen; And I will punish them for their ways, And will repay them for their deeds. 10 They will eat, and not have enough. They will play the prostitute, and will not increase; Because they have abandoned giving to the LORD. 11 Prostitution, wine, and new wine take away understanding.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

take: Hosea 4:12, Proverbs 6:32, Proverbs 20:1, Proverbs 23:27-35, Ecclesiastes 7:7, Isaiah 5:12, Isaiah 28:7, Luke 21:34, Romans 13:11-14

Reciprocal: Genesis 38:18 - gave it her 1 Kings 11:8 - all his strange wives 1 Kings 11:9 - his heart 1 Kings 20:16 - Benhadad Proverbs 5:14 - General Proverbs 5:22 - His Proverbs 17:16 - seeing Proverbs 23:28 - increaseth Proverbs 31:3 - strength Proverbs 31:4 - General Isaiah 28:1 - drunkards Isaiah 56:12 - I will Isaiah 57:5 - Enflaming Hosea 2:8 - wine Hosea 3:1 - love flagons Hosea 6:10 - there Hosea 7:11 - without Amos 2:6 - For three

Cross-References

Genesis 3:14
The LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you above all cattle, and above every animal of the field. On your belly shall you go, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life.
Genesis 4:14
Behold, you have driven me out this day from the surface of the ground. I will be hidden from your face, and I will be a fugitive and a wanderer in the eretz. It will happen that whoever finds me will kill me."
Genesis 4:15
The LORD said to him, "Therefore whoever slays Kayin, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold." the LORD appointed a sign for Kayin, lest any finding him should strike him.
Genesis 4:16
Kayin went out from the LORD's presence, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of `Eden.
Genesis 4:19
Lamekh took two wives: the name of the one was `Adah, and the name of the other Tzillah.
Genesis 4:20
`Adah gave birth to Yaval, who was the father of those who dwell in tents and have cattle.
Genesis 4:21
His brother's name was Yuval, who was the father of all who handle the harp and pipe.
Genesis 4:26
There was also born a son to Shet, and he named him Enosh. Then men began to call on the LORD's name.
Job 16:18
"Eretz, don't cover my blood, Let my cry have no place to rest.
Isaiah 26:21
For, behold, the LORD comes forth out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the eretz for their iniquity: the eretz also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Whoredom and wine, and new wine, take away the heart. Uncleanness and intemperance besot men, deprive them of reason and judgment, and even of common sense, make them downright fools, and so stupid as to do the following things; or they take away the heart from following the Lord, and taking heed to him, and lead to idolatry; or they "occupy" z the heart, and fill it up, and cause it to prefer sensual lusts and pleasures to the fear and love of God: their stupidity brought on hereby is exposed in the next verse; though it seems chiefly to respect the priests, who erred in vision through wine and strong drink, and stumbled in judgment, Isaiah 28:7.

z יקח לב "occupant cor", so some in Calvin and Rivet; "occupavit cor", Schmidt.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart - (Literally, “takes away”). Wine and fleshly sin are pictured as blended in one, to deprive man of his affections and reason and understanding, and to leave him brutish and irrational. In all the relations of life toward God and man, reason and will are guided by the affections. And so, in God’s language, the “heart” stands for the “understanding” as well as the “affections,” because it directs the understanding, and the understanding, bereft of true affections, and under the rule of passion, becomes senseless. Besides the perversion of the understanding, each of these sins blunts and dulls the fineness of the intellect; much more, both combined. The stupid sottishness of the confirmed voluptuary is a whole, of which each act of sensual sin worked its part. The Pagan saw this clearly, although, without the grace of God, they did not act on what they saw to be true and right. This, the sottishness of Israel, destroying their understanding, was the ground of their next folly, that they ascribed to “their stock” the office of God. “Corruption of manners and superstition” (it has often been observed) “go hand in hand.”

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Hosea 4:11. Whoredom and wine — These debaucheries go generally together.

Take away the heart. — Darken the understanding, deprave the judgment, pervert the will, debase all the passions, &c.


 
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