Hosea 2:4
“And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms.”
Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts;
Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.
And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms.
For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.
Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.
Why This Verse Was Tagged
This verse was identified through meaning similarity — its content is mathematically close to known verses in this theme, even without sharing the same vocabulary.
Counter-Arguments
The strongest case that this verse does not belong in this theme.
Cross-References
“The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord.”
“And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And God said unto him, Call her name Lo–ruhamah: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away.”
“Then the angel of the Lord answered and said, O Lord of hosts, how long wilt thou not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, against which thou hast had indignation these threescore and ten years?”
“And I will dash them one against another, even the fathers and the sons together, saith the Lord: I will not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy, but destroy them.”
“But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore.”