God asks rather than commands to expose Israel’s culpable refusal to listen, making their spiritual deafness a matter of willful choice rather than inability and thereby heightening their accountability for ignoring His covenant warnings.

No verbal response is recorded in the text. The question itself implies silence from the audience, which functions rhetorically to highlight Israel’s continued spiritual deafness even when directly challenged.

God’s double question cuts to the heart of Israel’s covenant failure: willful spiritual deafness. The Hebrew azan (give ear) denotes active, deliberate listening rather than passive hearing, exposing that Israel’s deafness is chosen, not imposed. By asking rather than commanding, God transforms their refusal into self-indictment, the silence following His question becomes evidence of the very deafness He condemns. The phrase ‘for the time to come’ adds urgency, indicating that present inattention guarantees future catastrophe. This question carries profound theological weight: God desires responsive relationship, not mechanical compliance, and willful deafness to divine revelation constitutes covenant betrayal deserving judgment.