Hosea 4:5

‘And you will stumble in the day, and the prophet also will stumble with you in the night, and I will destroy your mother.'

The final result of their behaviour will be that God will cause them to stumble, as He metes out His punishment on them, and it will be to such an extent that it will be by both day and night. Furthermore the prophets, whom they approach after work is done (therefore by night), will stumble with them and lead them astray with false prophecies. Thus both people and false prophets will be caught up in the furore. And in the end mother Israel will itself be destroyed. There will be no more Israel. There may be a hint with regard to the prophets stumbling in the night of their being in ‘spiritual darkness'. But the main emphasis is undoubtedly of the continuing nature and inescapability of the punishment.

The use of the term ‘mother' to represent Israel as the mother of ‘the children of Israel' (Hosea 4:1) is of course a repetition of the idea in Chapter s 1-2 where Israel is represented as the mother of the three children who represent the children of Israel.