HOSEA – CHAPTER 2

Verses 1-13:

Adulterous Israel Chastized

Israel was Jehovah God’s earthly wife, v 23; Jer 3:6-14; Jer 3:20. But she betrayed His trust, became a moral, ethical, and spiritual adulteress, committing whoredom in consorting with idolatrous worshipping with the Gentiles about her. And God was abandoning her to the suffering of the Assyrian and Babylonian captivity.

Verses 1, 2 Jehovah God appeals to individual Israelites, to protest their national conduct, their mother’s behavior. Individual Israelites were charged to protest the evil that their nation had embraced, and say to Ammi, “my people”, and to Ruhamah, “those having obtained pity” or compassion, their racial brethren and sisters, as orphans in Israel, that their peoples idolatrous behavior was an offense to God. For God had made known to Hosea that Israel, their mother, had forfeited her right to His protection, feeding, clothing, and sheltering her in the land of Israel. And as His wife she was being abandoned to punishment, Isa 54:5.

Israel was to put her shameful conduct away in penitence, turn from it, abandon it or go into captivity; For God would no longer tolerate her conduct, Jer 3:8; Jer 6:15-16.

Verse 3 warns that Israel will be stripped naked (made nude), an ancient form of public punishment for an adulteress, and set as a gazing stock in misery and shame, if she did not turn to God in repentance; See Eze 16:37-41; Jer 13:22; Jer 13:26. To be set in a “dry land” and a “wilderness” indicates a state of outward want and inward distress, Jer 2:6.

Verses 4, 5 declare God’s withheld blessing on all Israel, all her orphan children, because of their mother’s adulterous conduct. As children often suffer from diseases, contracted by immoral behavior of their mother or father, so do individuals suffer from the persistent evil course of a nation. Verse 5 indicates that Israel, in worship, had conceived her children in a “state of shame,” having gone after “other gods.” Idols and idolatrous nations whom she had courted, and to whom she had ascribed gifts of life, bread, and water, had brought a reproach on her sons and daughters and certain coming judgment upon her as a nation, Jer 44:17-23. False gods could not give flax, wool, oil, bread, and water to Israel; God’s abandoned wife, typified by Hosea’s unfaithful, flirtatious, adulterous wife, as forewarned by David, Psa 115:1-9.

Verses 6, 7 describe God’s placing a hedge between Israel, His adulteress, abandoned wife, to separate her from her whoremonger lovers, with whom she had consorted for imagined temporary favors. For she was still His wife, and He loved and cared for her, even in her exile from Him; even as He loved Job in his afflictions,

Job 3:23; Job 19:8-21; Lam 3:7-9. Thorn hedges were used as fences in Bible lands to protect their fields from destruction by cattle. Even so God purposed to fence Israel off and separate her from her adulterous tempters for her good and His eventual glory. Verse 7 describes the lonely and forlorn efforts of Israel, God’s abandoned wife, to pursue her former adulterous lovers in vain, where they could not be found. She then, fenced or shut away in exile from her prostituting adulterous lovers, like the prodigal son, resolved to return to her first lover, to the true God, where she would find forgiveness and acceptance, Luk 15:17; 2Ch 7:14; 1Jn 1:8-9.

Divine Judgment Announced

Verses 8-13 describe pending captivity upon Gomer, Hosea’s abandoned wife, typifying Israel in her moral, ethical, and spiritual rebellion against her God. Verse 8 affirms that God had fed Israel corn, oil, and wine and provided her silver and gold in her wilderness experience, though she turned at Sinai and built a golden calf, in prostitution of His goodness and glory, manifesting ingratitude to Him, as her deliverer and provider, Ex 32:1-14.

Verse 9 by withholding his bounties toward sinning, adulterous Israel, God resolved to send unfruitful seasons, death, vermin, etc., so that she would go hungry, naked, and in shame until she came to repentance.

Verse 10 affirms that Jehovah God would uncover her shame to her enemy nations. Sin’s arrays of glory-colors and showy-masks are to be stripped away in judgment and the prostituting religious character of Israel revealed in shame. For sins do “find one out”, as an individual, and as a nation: and none can escape it, Ecc 12:14; Gal 6:7-8; Num 32:23.

Verse 11 describes four areas of joy, gladness, and festivity that were to cease in Israel’s captivity-abandonment: 1) Her feast days, 2) Her new moons, 3) Her sabbaths, and 4) Her solemn feasts. They were to cease because they had been abused, perverted, and misused.

Verse 12 announces divine judgment upon the fields of vines and figs because Israel had attributed their productivity to her falsegod-lovers. She had considered them as rewards of her prostitution rather than divine favors. They were to become as a wilderness, destroyed by beasts of the field, Deu 28:1-33.

Verse 13 recounts Israel’s days of flagrant disobedience to God’s “no gods before me” commandment, Exo 20:3-5, and His coming visitation of Assyrian captivity-judgment because of her conduct as an whore, a prostitute, or a profligate wife, while He had loved and cared for her for so long.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

The Prophet having spoken of the people’s restoration, and promised that God would some time receive into favour those whom he had before rejected, now exhorts the faithful mutually to stir up one another to receive this favour. He had previously mentioned a public proclamation; for it is not in the power of men to make themselves the children of God, but God himself freely adopts them. But now the mutual exhortation of which the Prophet speaks follows the proclamation; for God at the same time invites us to himself. After we are taught in common, it remains then that each one should extend his hand to his brethren, that we may thus with one consent be brought together to the Lord.

This then is what the Prophet means by saying, Say ye to your brethren, עמי omi, and to your sisters רוחמה ruchamah; that is, since I have promised to be propitious to you, you can now safely testify this to one another. We then see that this discourse is addressed to each of the faithful, that they may mutually confirm themselves in the faith, after the Lord shall offer them favour and reconciliation. Let us now proceed —

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

HOSEAOR GODS AFFECTION FOR AN UNFAITHFUL PEOPLE

Hos 1:1 to Hos 14:9.

IT is our purpose in this series of articles on the Minor Prophets to throw such light upon these twelve Books as to make them meaningful and profitable to our readers. I suppose it may be safely said that the average Christian leaves these Books unstudied, and some of them unreada circumstance due to certain natural difficulties in their interpretation; but in greater measure still, to the poor work of present-day preaching. The custom of taking a text has wrought havoc in Bible study. Our fathers in the ministry were Bible expositors; their successors are textual preachers. The result is described in one of the minor Prophets:

Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the Words of the Lord:

And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the Word of the Lord, and shall not find it (Amo 8:11-12).

There are some simple and yet fundamental facts regarding the prophecy of Hosea that are essential to its proper understanding. It was doubtless written by the man whose name it wears. It refers, unquestionably, to the time of Jeroboam the Second, when Elisha, the Prophet of God, was living, and Isaiah, that great Evangel of the Old Testament, was a babe; and when those kings of Judah Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiahwere successively occupying the throne. The date is supposed to be 790 to 725 B. C.

Hosea was the great Evangel of his time. While he was an Elijah the Tishbite, in his stern denunciation of sin, he was a John the Apostle in his sense of Divine love and his eloquent call to repentance.

Some of the Books of the Bible break easily into divisions, and some of the students of Hosea have seen fit to divide it into two such. But our research does not justify the method. To us it is one grand whole, with not a break in thought from first to last. It is a recital of Israels history in her unfaithfulness, and an illustration of Gods goodness to His own people.

For our convenience, however, we divide it into four sections.

THE SYMBOLISM OF GOMERS SIN

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.

So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim (Hos 8:2-3).

These opening sentences of Hosea have given no small trouble to students. Some have received it historically; while others have insisted that God could not send the Prophet on any such mission, without Himself being a party to sin; and so have attempted to interpret it as a dream or vision. Following the custom which we have found alone to be safe, we believe with those who accept the Book at what it says. And yet we have not found the question involved so difficult of solution as some. When it is remembered that the whole people of Israel had already turned to idolatry, we can understand that any daughter selected from them could be spoken of in this language, since the charge of whoredom, with the false gods of the land, lay against every son and daughter of Israel. And even when the narrative seems to specifically charge this woman with this sin, it does not necessitate Gods participation in evil because He sends Hosea to wed her. You will see, ere the history ends, she is won to a righteous life again. So the Prophet is to her what he has become to all IsraelGods agent of salvation. But her sin is symbolical.

It was a sin against law and love. The seventh commandment antedated Hosea and stood as a protest against the violation of that relation which husband and wife sustain to one another, as the whole decalogue stands as Gods protest against the violation of the relation which He and His people sustain to each other. When, therefore, Gomer forgets the law and despises the love of Hosea, she fitly represents the conduct of the whole kingdom in forgetting Gods Law and despising the Divine love. The man who, today, living under the reign of grace, disregards the moral Law and tramples it beneath his feet with impunity, is guilty of a crime of the first magnitude. But the man who adds to that an equal disregard of the Divine love takes the last step needful in the contemplation of his folly and the sealing of his fate.

Paul wrote to the Hebrews:

If we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the Truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,

But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.

He that despised Moses Law died without mercy under two or three witnesses;

Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the Blood of the covenant, wherewith he wets sanctified, an holy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?

For we know Him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto Me, I wilt recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge His people (Heb 10:26-30).

This sin was again symbolical in that it was against good society.

The moment the foundations of domestic life are undermined the whole fabric of society is endangered. When lust assaults the home it strikes the essential pillar of the State. And when it overrides the law and love of domestic relation, it leaves desolation in its track and brings in a dark day for the people. When such a sin as this can be found in the first houses the very nation has fallen. Dr. Talmage said truly enough that where there is no pure home there are the Vandals and the Goths of Europe; the Numidians of Africa, and the Nomads of Asia. No home, no school; no household, no republic; no family, no church.

But Gomers sin became more significant still, God made it to be a sorrowful instruction! Strange as it seems, it is yet probably according to the natural law in the spiritual world that Gods spokesmen must be sufferers. It was only after the iron had entered Moses soul as he watched the oppression of his own people from his position in the palace, and by his enforced exile spent forty years on the back side of the desert that he was eloquent as Israels leader. Joshua was fitted by forty years of wilderness wandering for his great work of commanding Israel and conquering Canaan.

But no man could read this Book of Hosea without feeling that its authorour Prophethad suffered probably as much as either of these great predecessors. Joseph Parker says, Hoseas sorrow was of the deepest kind. The daughter of Diblaim was the daughter of the devil. He had no peace, no rest, no singing joy within the four corners of his own house. He lived in clouds; his life was a continual passage through a sea deeper than the Red Sea. If we may vary the figure, his wandering was in the wilderness, unblessed; cursed by the very spirit of desolation.

And yet we do believe that strong natures have the very power to transmute their sorrows into eloquent appeals for righteousness; that the very intensity of their suffering adds solidity to their thought and eloquence to its utterance. We seriously doubt if Hoseas wife had not been a scarlet woman, as she was, whether he could ever have properly sympathized with God, the Father, in that Israel turned from Him to moral infidelity, by worshiping at false shrines and living wicked, sensual lives.

John Bright, that marvelous leader of thought in England, started on his career of splendid service in consequence of an unspeakable sorrow. His young wife, to whom he was devoted, lay dead when Richard Cobden called on him. Having expressed, as best he could, sympathy and condolence, Cobden looked up and said, Bright, there are thousands and thousands of homes in England, at this moment, where wives and mothers and children are dying of hunger. Now when the first paroxysm of your grief has passed, I would advise you to come with me and we will never rest until the corn-laws are repealed.

Cobden showed himself a philosopher that day. He knew full well that one way to recover from a personal pain was to take into ones heart as an antidote, the pain of the people.

You will remember what had more to do, perhaps, with the declaration of war with Spain than any other single thing, the destruction of the Maine excepted. It was Senator Thurstons speech. And how did it happen that this Nebraskan, who had never before been eloquent, spoke before the Senate of the United States with such an appeal as to move even opponents to agree with him? That speech opened in these words,

Mr. President: I am here by command of silent lips to speak once and for all upon the Cuban situation, and trust that no one has expected anything sensational from me. God forbid that the bitterness of a personal loss should induce me to color, in the slightest degree, the statements that I feel it my duty to make. I shall endeavor to be honest, conservative and just. Then he proceeded with such an oration as American law-makers of any decade seldom, if ever, heard. Concluding with these words, Mr. President, in the cable that moored me to life and hope the strongest strands are broken. I have but little left to offer at the altar of freedoms shrine. But all I have I am glad to give. I am ready to serve my country as best I can in the Senate or in the field. My dearest hope, my most earnest prayer to God is this, that when death comes to end all I may meet it calmly and fearlessly, as did my Beloved, in the cause of humanity, and under the American flag.

There is but one explanation of such an address as that. The eloquence of it was born of the sorrow of burying a beloved wife in Cuban soil, and feeling in his heart that the pain of the oppressed people of that land had been already the occasion of her death; and to relieve it, was worthy the laying down of his life.

The Psalmist said, I was dumb with silence, I held my peace, even from good, and my sorrow was stirred. My heart was hot within me, while I was musing the fire burned: then spake I with my tongue.

It was sorrow. It was that suffering that only a righteous man can feel when sinned against by her whom he loves most, that made Hosea understand the Divine Ones suffering in Israels sin, and adequate to its expression.

PHASES OF ISRAELS INFIDELITY

It found first expression in unwarranted forms. There seems to be a general agreement between students of Hosea that the groves and altars, when first chosen and erected, were unto the Lord. But it does not take long for them to go from unwarranted forms to open infidelity. God did not command any of these at their hands. Her feast days, her new moons, and her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts, became occasions of Baal-worship. Instead of saying any longer, Ishimy husband, they turned to say, Baalimy lord. It is the history of unwarranted forms in all ages.

When Christ came into the world He found the Church of the Old Testament cold in death, slain by the hands of ceremonialists,the Scribes and Pharisees of His time,who, with their hollow ritualism and hypocrisies, had driven many men to the infidelity of Sadduceeism; so that they said, There is neither angel nor spirit. Truly, as Frederick Robertson said,

No self-righteous formalism will ever satisfy the Conscience of man; neither will infidelity give rise to a devoted spirit. Formalism in religion and infidelity in conduct often go hand in hand.

Charles Dudley Warner tells us that after having traveled around the world he came back to Brindisi, Italy, a so-called Christian country, and entered a so-called Christian Church to see a figure of Christ, the Crucified One, set off in a dark corner with dust gathered on it, while a representation of Mary, the mother, clad with the latest mode of French millinery, flamed before an altar, and their knees bowed there.

It was little better than the Baal-worship of Hoseas time. And if Jesus should come to that church He would have occasion to utter the words which He once addressed to Scribes and Pharisees.

Thus have ye made the Commandment of God of none effect by your tradition.

Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying,

This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoureth Me with their lips; but their heart is far from Me.

But in vain they do worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

This degenerate worship was popularized by priest and prince. By reading fourteen verses of the fifth chapter you will see they were its chief patrons. The Prophet of God addressed them Hear ye this, O priests; and hearken, ye House of Israel. Then, after describing their participation in these false and foul ceremonies, he voices God as saying: I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the House of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away: I will take away; and none shall rescue him.

It is a sad day for the Church when the prince, or the man in the place of power, is putrid. It is a darker day when the priest, or the leader in the Church of God, is correspondingly corrupt. When the time came that Tetzel could sell indulgences, with the consent of the priesthood of Rome, the very moral rottenness existing in the Name of Jesus, compelled the Reformation, and gave rise to Luthers opinions, and victory to his appeal. And when, at the present time, a Pastor, either by evil practices, leads his people into iniquity, or by his silence concerning the commercial and other sins of those who contribute to his salary, connives at iniquity, the condition becomes akin to that which Hosea was raised up to rebuke nearly three thousand years ago. And the result for the present day will be the very same as that which came to the Israel of Hoseas time.

It produced the grossest idolatry and immorality.

There is not time to read to you these chapters,4 to 13,but if there were, the reading would only profit you by giving you pain as you looked upon Israels open sore.

It was this principle that Hosea saw and clearly stated so many, many centuries ago,namely, when men become lawless, and are libertines, they cannot hope to keep women upon a plane of chastity and holiness. God distinctly declares that He would not punish their daughters for their sins, in view of the conditions of society, for which priest, prince and peasant were responsible.

George Adam Smith reminds us that history in many periods has confirmed the justice of Hoseas observations, and by one strong voice after another, enforced his terrible warnings. The experience of ancient Persia and Egypt, the languor of the Greek cities, the deep weariness and sated lust which in Imperial Rome made human life a hell. It is only another illustration of the Apostle James words,When lust hath conceived, it bring eth forth sin; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death (Joe 1:15).

THE FOLLY WHICH INFIDELITY EFFECTS

There can be traced in this volume a striking parallelism between the conduct of the individual and of the nation. Gomers treatment of Hosea was Israels treatment of God.

There is a supreme insensibility to undeserved favor. The Prophet says, She did not know that I gave her corn, etc.

Insensibility to Divine favor has often marked the conduct of man. We easily forget that every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of Lights. We quickly attribute our blessings to our own ingenuity, to the bounty of nature, or to luck, and just as easily forget Godthe Giver of all. Strange isnt it that the one creature made in His image, endowed with the highest faculties, blessed of Him thousands of times beyond all other works of His hands, should be insensible to what he had received, and to what he is receiving, and know not God gave corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied * * silver and gold.

If this spirit were all in the world it were not so bad; but Gomer is the Prophets wife, and Israel is espoused of God; and this insensibility to Divine favor has smitten the Church, and her children forget Me, saith the Lord. Sam Jones had a man come to him who said, Jones, the church is putting my assessment too high. How much do you pay? asked Jones. Five dollars a year, was the reply. Well, said Jones, how long have you been converted? About four years. What did you do before you were converted? I was a drunkard. How much were you worth? I rented land, and was plowing with a steer. What have you got now? I have a good plantation and a pair of horses. Well, said Jones, you paid the devil two hundred and fifty dollars a year for the privilege of plowing a steer on rented land, and now you dont want to give the God who saved you five dollars a year for the privilege of plowing your own horses on your own plantation. Insensibility to Divine favor! Moses had occasion for that passage in his song, They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children: they are a perverse and crooked generation. Do ye thus requite the Lord, O foolish people and unwise? is not He thy Father that hath bought thee? hath He not made thee, and established thee? (Deu 32:5-6).

They were slow to realize the Divine intent of judgment. After announcing His purpose in judgment, I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the House of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him (Hos 5:14). The Lord reveals His reasons by adding, I will go and return to My place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek My face: in their affliction they will seek Me early (Hos 5:15). Deliverance is always the Divine purpose in Gods judgments against His people. The Psalmist said, Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I kept Thy Word. And it was only after the Lord had visited them with judgment that Israel could say, Come, and let us return unto the Lord: for He hath torn, and He will heal us; He hath smitten, and He will bind us up (Hos 6:1).

But, like sinners of all ages, Ephraim must be smitten, her root dried up, so that they shall bear no fruit, and they realize themselves utterly cast away because they did not hearken unto the Lord. It is only after Israel hath destroyed herself that she realizes the source of life in God.

How strikingly this experience parallels that of weak men in all ages! Only when the prodigal, clothed in rags, starved to the point of sustenance on the honeysuckle, and sitting with the swine, does he come to himself. As a rule, the man that follows the lusts of the flesh, and goes the way of the libertine, or the drunkard, never sees the meaning of the Divine judgment until his sins have slain his manhood, wrecked his business, scattered his family, consumed his flesh, and left him as perfectly stranded as was ever a vessel when driven high upon the ragged rocks. It is amazing to study the folly of men who have departed from the Lord! Almost universally they are conceited up to the very day when they are undone. They think that they are going to recover themselves. Like Ephraim, strangers have devoured their strength, and they know it not: gray hairs are here and there upon them, and yet they know it not. They feed on the wind and follow after the east wind, and daily increase in desolation. They make a covenant with the Assyrians and boast their righteousness as Ephraim did, saying, In all my labours they shall find none iniquity in me that were sin.

God can do nothing else with such men than to bring them low; nothing else than to whelm them with sorrow; nothing else than to strike them to the very earth with judgment; for they must be made to see that their condition is not due to circumstances, but to an evil spirit.

Dr. Chapman tells the story of a woman who was seated in Central Park, New York, with her little child playing about her. Suddenly the child was startled by the barking of a dog. In her frightened state she ran into her mothers arms. When the dog ceased his barking she said, Why are you frightened, dear; he is quiet? Oh, yes, I know, mamma; but the bark is still in him.

One thing always being said by unregenerate men is, If I could only remove to a new location; settle myself with new associates, and in new business employment, I would be all right. All right! And yet evil still in you! Better turn over to Gal 5:19-21, and read, Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like What one needs is not a change of location, but a change of nature, so that the incoming of the Holy Spirit shall give you the fruits of the Spirit which are love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.

Such folly is followed only by shame and degradation. The tenth chapter of Hosea illustrates the consequences of Israels conduct.

Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images.

Their heart is divided: now shall they be found faulty: he shall break down their altars, he shall spoil their images.

For now they shall say, We have no king, because we feared not the Lord; what then should a king do to us?

They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant: thus judgment springeth up as hemlock in the furrows of the field.

The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shalt mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.

It shall be also carried into Assyria for a present to King Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.

As for Samaria, her king is cut off as the foam upon the water.

The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed: the thorn and the thistle shall come up on their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us.

O Israel, thou hast sinned from the days of Gibeah: there they stood: the battle in Gibeah against the children of iniquity did not overtake them.

It is in My desire that I should chastise them; and the people shall be gathered against them, when they shall bind themselves in their two furrows.

And Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn; but I passed over upon her fair neck: I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods.

Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till He come and rain righteousness upon you.

Ye have plowed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity; ye have eaten the fruit of lies: because thou didst trust in thy way, in the multitude of thy mighty men.

Therefore shall a tumult arise among thy people, and all thy fortresses shall be spoiled, as Shahnan spoiled Betharbel in the day of battle: the mother was dashed in pieces upon her children.

So shall Beth-el do unto you because of your great wickedness; in a morning shall the king of Israel utterly be cut off.

In conclusion we pass to

GODS AFFECTION FOR AN UNFAITHFUL PEOPLE

That affection was expressed in undeserved words and acts. God bares His heart here as He has often done before, crying,

O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee? O Judah, what shall I do unto thee? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away (Hos 6:4),

When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called My son out of Egypt,

I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them.

I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love: and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them (Hos 11:1; Hos 11:3-4).

How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? Mine heart is turned within Me, My repentings are kindled together.

I will not execute the fierceness of Mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not enter into the city (Hos 11:8-9).

Beloved, one lesson that it seems difficult to learn is thisto remember the goodness of God. One should adopt the custom of thinking upon Divine favor. It is only as we forget the source of our blessings, of every good and perfect gift that we grow indifferent to the grace of our God.

Dr. Torrey says, I was talking one night to one who was apparently most indifferent and hardened. She told me the story of her sin, with seemingly very little sense of shame, and when I urged her to accept Christ, she simply refused. I put a Bible in her hands and asked her to read this verse. She began to read, God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, and before she had finished reading the verse she had broken into tears, softened by the thought of Gods wondrous love to her.

It is a strange thing that more people dont answer temptation as did Joseph,How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?

When God executes judgment it is commonly for the purpose of correction. Take the reference in this volume,

Therefore will I return, and take away My com in the time thereof, and My wine in the season thereof, and will recover My wool and My flax given to cover her nakedness,

And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of Mine hand,

I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts, And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them,

And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and for gat Me, saith the Lord (Hos 2:9-13).

What is the purpose? He immediately proceeds to tell us, Therefore(God never employs that word without occasionit is the great conjunction with Him.)

Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her,

And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt (Hos 2:14-15).

Beloved, there is a beneficent purpose when the fiery trial is on. The very whips with which He makes Israels back to bleed are not the expressions of His wrath; but, rather, of His love.

Henry Ward Beecher declares that his father used to make him believe that the end of the rod that he held in his hand was a great deal more painful than the end which he applied to Henry. And the great preacher says, It was a strange mystery to me; but I did believe it, and it seemed a great deal worse to me to be whipped on that account.

It ought to be so with the children of God. I once had in my church a woman who punished her children by vicarious suffering. When they misbehaved at the table she denied herself a meal, and she told me that it broke their hearts.

Would to God that we were as sensitive to the suffering which our sin imposes upon the Heavenly Father, and as sensible concerning the purpose which He has in visiting correction against our sins.

But, after all, God gave best evidence of His affection by,

Keeping for His people an open heart. I like to dwell on the last chapter of this Book,

O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; * *

Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto Him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously (Hos 14:1-2).

And I like to listen to Gods answer to this cry which He Himself seeks to put into their lips,

I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for Mine anger is turned away from him.

I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.

His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.

Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? (Hos 14:4-6; Hos 14:8).

It is a beautiful picture! It ought to encourage the children whose hearts have departed from the plain paths of privilege in Christ; it ought to incite hope in the heart of the individual who has played the prodigal and paid the penalty.

I like to reflect upon the words of that sweet-spirited man, F. B. Meyer, as he speaks of Gods attitude toward those who turn again to Him, saying,

Be sure that God will give you a hearty welcome. He has not given you up or ceased to love you. He longs for you. Read the last chapter of the Book of Hosea, which may be well called the backsliders gospel. Read the third chapter of Jeremiah, and let the plaintive pleadings to return soak into your spirit. Read the story of Peters fall and restoration, and let your tears fall thick and fast on John 21: as you learn how delicately the Lord forgave, and how generously He entrusted the backslider with His sheep and with His lambs. Be sure that though your repeated failures and sins have worn out every one else, they have not exhausted the infinite love of God. He tells us to forgive our offending brother unto four hundred and ninety times; how much oftener will He not forgive us? According to the height of heaven above the earth, so great is His mercy.

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.

Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley

CRITICAL NOTES.

Hos. 2:2. Plead] Jehovah makes the demand, urges individual Israelites to reason with the mother, i.e. the nation viewed as one. The children were seduced, in danger of punishment, and as penitents must protest against her conduct. Wife] Forfeited all claims to my protection. Sight] Lit. from her face, the seat of modesty and shame (Jer. 3:8; Jer. 6:15). The eyes are windows through which death, i.e. lawless desire, enters into the soul, and takes it captive [Pusey].

Hos. 2:3. Strip] Nudity, the ancient punishment of an adulteress (Eze. 16:37). Set] Lit. fix her as a gazing-stock, in a state of helplessness and misery. Wilderness] Reduced to want; an outward type of inward distress (Jer. 2:6).

Hos. 2:4. Children] inherit the nature, and exposed to the judgment, of their mother. Many imagine because free from the guilt and stain of sin they will not share its punishment.

Hos. 2:5. Done shamefully] Heb. to practise shame (2Sa. 19:5). She made shameful everything which she could make shamefulher acts, her children, and herself [Pusey]. The reproach of the mother should rouse the sons from spiritual apathy. Lovers] Idols and idolatrous nations whose alliance they courted, and to whom they ascribed the gifts of life, bread and water (Jer. 44:17); a picture of life estranged from God.

HOMILETICS

FILIAL EXPOSTULATION.Hos. 2:1-5

The mother is the representative of the nation, of the ungodly in all nations and families. The sons must plead with them. They are involved in judgments, left orphans, and without protection, by the conduct of their mother.

I. Charge her with dissolution of the Marriage Contract. She is not my wife. A spiritual union was formed between God and his people, under terms of great endearment and oneness. But she was no longer united to God by faith and love, and God would own her no longer. Churches and individuals who give themselves to God must not decline in love. This will forfeit the honour, the protection of God, and his covenant relation; provoke him to anger, and lead to divorcement. How touching is the rebuke uttered by the complaint, Thou no longer lovest me! She is not my wife, I am not her husband! The history of the Church is a sad commentary upon these words. The Church at Ephesus was not wanting in purity of doctrine, nor in severity of discipline. The Lord disclosed the heart and published the fault. Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.

II. Urge her to put away Sin. The idolatry is described as whoredom and adultery; a breach of fidelity which Israel owed to God; an act of apostasy from God; more culpable than heathenish idolatry and superstitions.

1. A public sin. Israel, like a barefaced harlot, displayed her sins in public before men. Publicity tempts the weak, taints the innocent, and leads to ruin. Wickedness like this is the most dissolute, and its woe will be the most intense. Some sin secretly, but others proclaim their sin to the worldthey glory in their shame.

2. A shameful sin. The face and the breasts are those parts of the body which display want of chastity, and depict boldness and shamelessness. Many neither shame nor blush at their vice. Boldness without confession of wrong, wickedness done with desire of recognition, impudence in sin, will lead to hardness of heart. Those who will not blush will soon be unable to blush. Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore they shall fall among them that fall.

III. Warn her of Danger. Sin always involves risk, and brings its consequences upon ourselves and others. Every one is in duty bound, in his house, among his friends and relations, and in his country, to labour for the happiness and good of all, to check the wickedness and ward off the dangers by which he is surrounded.

1. She will expose herself. Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, &c. (a) Expose herself to nakedness and helplessness. Israel taken when weak and few in number; trained, fed, and clothed by God like a little child; married to God, and adorned as a bride; should now be stripped, deprived of every ornament, as an adulterous wife; of all temporal and spiritual blessings as a people; and left naked and helpless, a gazing-stock to others. When God ceases to care and provide for a people, withholds the gifts of nature and of grace, they will become defiled by sin, cast out and loathsome. Like Adam and Eve, they will lose their innocence, and learn their nakedness. Divine judgments strip men of natural defence, family honour, and leave them naked unto their shame amongst their enemies (Exo. 22:25). (b) Expose herself to want and distress. Make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land. Incursions and hostilities of the enemy could lay her waste as a wilderness; or put her in great straits and distress, as in the desert when they came out of Egypt. Idolatry desolates the land and brings the devouring sword. She would be like a dry land, destitute of food and the maintenance of life. Well-watered gardens become deserts through sin. The outward is a type of the inward. Mind hath its deserts no less than Region, says Bacon. Everything that I love, said Napoleon, everything that belongs to me, is stricken. Heaven and mankind unite to afflict me. The soul of the sinner is desolate and unfruitful in the ways and works of God; devoid of Gods presence and blessing; unrelieved by green pastures and living rills. Your house is left unto you desolate, are words which describe the doom of all without Christ. Hungry and thirsty, they are not satisfied, but perish like a traveller in want. Slay her with thirst.

2. She would endanger her children. I will not have mercy upon her childrenchildren of whoredom inheriting the nature and suffering from the conduct of their mother. There is no security in sin. The rising generation do not escape. Parents entail a curse upon their offspring, and individuals are involved in national calamities. As good is diffused on every hand, so evil has its consequences; consequences which have their influences, results themselves pregnant with other results, in endless succession. Our endeavour should be to guard ourselves from the evil of others, and guard against detriment from our own acts. This man perished not alone in his iniquity.

IV. Reprove her for Folly. She had acted shamefully in word and deed, towards herself and her children. The course of sin is a course of shame. The sinner forgets his best friend, and forsakes his own mercy. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? The conduct of Israel was an affront to God and a reproach to man. To fall down to any image, ancient or modern, is to turn our glory into shame. This was

1. An ungrateful sin. God set before them his law and judgments, promised blessings for obedience, and had given them the necessities and the luxuries of life; more than corn, wine, and oil (Psa. 4:7); but they claimed these gifts as their own; my bread and my water; or ascribed them to the lovers they followed. Men care for the things of time and sense, lands, houses, and life, and forget the claims, the prior right of God. These things are only lent us, must not be held upon wrong tenure and made our gods. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

2. An aggravated sin. Amid Divine chastisement Israel encouraged herself in idolatry. She called the objects of her choice lovers, and drew others to follow her in pursuit. She waits not for invitation and allurement, but eager and unbidden, contrary to natural feeling and covenant pledge, she cries, I will go, She was obstinate in pursuit, and avowed her determination. Abuse is added to ingratitude; God is forsaken for the pleasures of life, and men attribute present happiness and prosperity to sin, rather than to his goodness and forbearance. Take heed lest ye be fattened and fitted for slaughter. Aggravated sin ripens for judgment. He that despises Gods reproof shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.

3. A delusive sin. Idols do not give the necessities and enjoyments of life. God alone can fill mens hearts with food and gladness (Act. 14:17). The heathens had a goddess of corn and gods of wine from whom they expected these gifts; so men now make their gods, and fancy that these gods will help them. They delude themselves by error and folly; make things outside of God their lovers; and deify their talents or the laws of nature. We belong to God, and all things are at his disposal. If we do not trust in him, we observe lying vanities. Man must have a god, and if he will not love and serve the true and living God, he makes a fool of himself, and pays homage to a lie and a delusion. As they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind.

HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES

Hos. 2:1 may be taken as (in last chapter),

1. A declaration of joy. Wrath passed away and mercy remembered.

2. A declaration of Christian experience. (a) To encourage others. (b) To glorify God. Gods grace is magnified; Gods word is proved to be faithful; Gods name made known, and others are induced to repent and trust in him. Say ye to your brethren, Ammi.

3. An exhortation to the converted to plead with the unconverted. The few faithful in faithless Israel must plead with others. Those who know God must expostulate with those who do not know him; children with parents; relatives with relatives. (a) This a natural order. We naturally feel for friends and relatives. We may not forget others, but we begin at home. Andrew was acquainted with Jesus and related to Peter. He first findeth his own brother Simon. Paul could wish himself accursed for his kindred in the flesh (Rom. 9:3). (b) This a Divine order. Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee (Mar. 5:19). Let them (children) learn first to show piety at home (1Ti. 5:4). (c) This the most successful order. We have greater sympathy for friends, more love to our own, than others. They are more likely to be influenced and persuaded by us than others. Plead with your mother, plead earnestly, faithfully, and continually.

Hos. 2:3. The folly of sin.

1. It strips men of blessings.
2. Exposes them to shame and danger.
3. Leaves them helpless and distressed. The sinner is naked; bereft of grace, love, and protection; and exposed to famine and peril. A Christian Church which throws off the ornaments of Divine grace and Divine ordinances will be stripped of outward privilegesspiritual gifts despised will lead to withdrawal of temporal gifts.[1]

[1] Sin is a wasting plague to souls, countries, and enjoyments, for so is imported in the words, and make her as a wilderness, &c. [Hutcheson].

Hos. 2:4. Mercy withheld from children, churches, or nations, is a sad addition to their trouble. There is nothing to moderate, prevent, or remove their sorrow.

Hos. 2:5. I will go. The infatuation of the sinner, who hardens, emboldens himself in sin, and rushes, heedless of warnings and judgments, to shame and destruction. Steps in apostasy from God.

1. Renouncing obedience.
2. Loving idols.
3. Ascribing Gods gifts to idols.
4. Justifying this course from benefits received. We too have our idols, which our natural hearts madly run after, turning away from God. Whatever we make our chief good, outside of God, is an idol. How apt, moreover, we are to take Gods gifts, our food, clothing, comforts, and luxuries, as if they were our own by some peculiar right; calling them my bread, my water, my wool, my flax, and to attribute our possession of them to our gold, our industry, and our talents, making these our gods [Fausset s Com.]. God is the real giver of all temporal and spiritual blessings. If, therefore, thou hast any want, seek its supply from God [Lange].[2]

[2] As it is a great sin to depart from God and his true worship, so especially is it a shameful way of departing from him when mens ends are so low and base that they will follow any way of religion for interest and advantage, and account the thriving way best. Israel thought she throve best in and because of her idolatry. they give me my bread, &c. [Hutcheson].

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 2

Hos. 2:1-5. Mothers and children. When a mother once asked a clergyman when she should begin the education of her child, then four years old, he replied, Madam, if you have not begun already, you have lost those four years. From the first smile that gleams upon an infants cheek your opportunity begins. The mother lives again in her children. They unconsciously mould themselves after her manner, her speech, her conduct, and her method of life. Her habits become theirs, and her character is visibly repeated in them [Smiles]. Children may be strangled, but deeds never: they have an indestructible life, both in and out of our consciousness [George Eliot].

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

ISRAELS INGRATITUDESPIRIT OF HARLOTRY

TEXT: Hos. 2:1-5

1

Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

2

Contend with your mother, contend; for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her whoredoms from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

3

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.

4

Yea, upon her children will I have no mercy; for they are children of whoredom;

5

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.

QUERIES

a.

What is the meaning of Ammi and Ruhamah?

b.

How were her children, the children of whoredom?

c.

Who were her lovers?

PARAPHRASE

Oh Jezreel, rename your brother and sister. Call your brother Now You Are Mine (Ammi); name your sister Beloved (Ruhamah), for now God will have mercy upon her. Plead with your mother (Israel); for she has committed spiritual adultery and married another; I am no longer her husband; she is no longer my wife. Reason with her to stop her spiritual adultery, to quit giving herself to other gods. If she doesnt, I will strip her naked of all that she calls her own; everything will be taken from her and she will be like she was when she was first born as a nation in Egypt; I will also make her desolate like a wilderness, arid like a dry land, and she will die because I shall withhold the life-giving water. Furthermore, I will take away the special favors from the people of Israel for in worshiping idols they show that they are her children. Israel, their mother, has committed spiritual adultery. She did a shameful thing when she said, I am determined to go and join myself to and consort with other gods for they are the ones who supply me with things I enjoy.

SUMMARY

Israels apostacy is portrayed here under the figure of a wife leaving her husband for paramours. The Prophet pleads with the people to reason with one another and repent of the spirit of religious harlotry (idolatry) in their hearts.

COMMENT

Hos. 2:1 SAY . . . UNTO YOUR BRETHREN, AMMI; AND TO YOUR SISTERS, RUHAMAH. The Hebrew text of the O.T. makes Hos. 1:10-11 to become Hos. 2:1-2 and thus as we have it here in the English version would be Hos. 2:3 of the Hebrew text. This preserves the continuity of context and is to be preferred above our present English version. In other words Hos. 2:1 as we have it in the English version, belongs contextually to Hos. 1:10-11. Our present Hos. 2:2 begins another context and so the division in the English version leaves much to be desired. The English version has followed the arrangement of the Septuagint (LXX) and the Latin Vulgate in dividing the context as it has.

Ammi, means My people. Ruhamah, means Pited or Beloved. The victory which is accomplished (Hos. 1:10-11) at the fulfillment of the covenant and when all Israel (spiritual Israel) is gathered together under one head will so change mans relationship to God and Gods relationship to man that redeemed man would thereafter be called Gods people, and God would thereafter have pity upon them. So this is the conclusion of that which would be accomplished according to Hos. 1:10-11 and rightfully belongs to that context.

Hos. 2:2-3 CONTEND WITH YOUR MOTHER . . . LET HER PUT AWAY HER WHOREDOMS . . . LEST I STRIP HER NAKED . . . The word contend would be better translated, reason, persuade, plead or beg. The mother is Israel the nation. The children are the individual Israelites. This is simply a rhetorical mode of expression. Although the nation, regarded as a whole, had fallen into idolatry, a very few faithful formed a remnant and to these the Prophet pleads. They are the last hope for the nation. They must persuade the nation to put away its whoredoms.

Whoredom here probably refers to the idolatry practiced by the nation. Israel had entered into the covenant with Jehovah its God; Israel had joined itself to God as a woman joins herself to a husband. When it went after other gods its idolatry became a breach of the faithfulness which it owed to its God. Its idolatry was even more deplorable than that of the heathen for the idolatry of Israel constituted rebellion and ingratitude against greater privilege, more blessed circumstances, and greater revelation. Idolatry is referred to as whoredom (cf. Exo. 34:14-15; Lev. 17:7; Lev. 20:5-6; Num. 14:33; Num. 15:39; Deu. 31:16; Deu. 32:16; Deu. 32:21).

Actually, this section (Hos. 2:2-5) would better fit our outline under I. B. 2., Israels Ingratitude, Love of Sin. But that would place it out of its textual order and since we wish to deal with the text in the order it is given, the outline must become secondary.

The face can mirror or display either modesty or immodesty, shamelessness or shame (cf. Jer. 6:15; Jer. 8:6; Jer. 9:21). It was customary even in that day for the harlot to paint her face with cosmetics to attract and allure lovers. Nationally speaking, Israel was in some way displaying outwardly the face of a spiritual harlot. The harlot also adorned and exposed her breasts in order to allure. We have here a synonymous parallelism; an exhortation that Israel should correct the outward display of idolatrous practices for they exhibit the spirit of harlotry and rebellion that is within her national heart.

Israel is warned that if she continues in idolatry, God will strip her naked . . . like she was the day she was born. When Israel was born as a nation, she came from a disorganized, penniless, mass of slaves then serving the Egyptian pharoah. She had no worldly goods, no worldly position or nationhood and no land she could call her own, (cf. Ezekiel 16). God took her from Egypt, gave her a land, blessed her with material abundance, gave her national prominence and influence. But now that she has been unfaithful, God is going to disinherit her and cast her off and take away from her all that He has given. She will once again become the slave of a foreign nation; once again she will be without nationality and without material abundance. Israel as a nation will be like a land that has become arid, desolate, As a nation she will become worthless, cease to produce and die,

Hos. 2:4-5 . . . UPON HER CHILDREN WILL I HAVE NO MERCY . . . THEIR MOTHER HATH PLAYED THE HARLOT . . . SHE SAID, I WILL GO AFTER MY LOVERS, THAT GIVE ME MY BREAD . . . We like the statement of K & D, The fact that the children are specially mentioned after and along with the mother, when in reality mother and children are one, serves to give greater keenness to the threat, and guards against that carnal security, in which individuals imagine that, inasmuch as they are free from the sin and guilt of the nation as a whole, they will also be exempted from the threatened punishment. The nation and its leadership (civil and religious) played the harlot by becoming idolaters and they led the people into the same sin. The children were not forced into whoredom. They loved to have it so, and willingly followed the leading of the nation.

The mother, however proud and vain she might represent herself, did a shameful thing when she was unfaithful to her God. I will go after could be literally translated, Let me go, or, I would go after. She does not wait to be enticed or allured or seduced. She brazenly goes, uninvited, unsought and contrary to the instinctive feelings of woman, after those who make no overtures to draw her and away from her Husband (God) who has loved her and beckoned her. Enviously she regarded the surrounding nations (Phoenicia, Egypt, Assyria) who did not worship Jehovah, yet possessed far greater political power and prestige, worldwide commerce, huge riches, marvelous luxuries, and far greater freedom from moral restraints than Gods people. The spirit of worldliness made Israel think of her God as a cruel and unloving taskmaster and of His law as an unbearable yoke. She began to worship idols. Then as her prosperity and political prestige grew she rationalized that her lovers had supplied all these things she so greedily wanted. In the days of Jeroboam II idolatrous Israel suddenly gained power and riches rivaling those of David and Solomon. It seemed that idolatry paid better wages than service to Jehovah. God had warned them against such pride and ingratitude and idolatry in plain words (Deu. 8:1 ff). It is interesting to note that the people of Judah said the same thing of their idols (Jer. 44:15-18); they attributed their prosperity to the heathen gods they worshipped rather than Jehovah. It is frighteningly true that people in so-called Christian America (and other Christianized nations) have not learned much from Israel and Judah. A great number of people today attribute the material and political affluence and prestige to their idols of science, man, sex or some other philosophy. This is just as brazen and shameful and just as much spiritual whoredom as Baalism was in the days of Hosea. Let us take the exhortation of Hosea to heart and plead with our mother that she put away her whoredom from her face.

QUIZ

1.

What is the proper division of chapters 1 and 2? Where should Hos. 2:1 go?

2.

Who is the mother and who are the children? What literary form is being used here?

3.

What is the whoredom of which both mother and children are guilty?

4.

How will God strip Israel naked?

5.

What makes Israels going after other gods so shameful?

6.

Why did Israel think her heathen gods supplied the things she wanted?

7.

How do nations act the same way today as Israel acted then?

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

1. With this triumph a new era opens, an era of prosperity and felicity. This transformation warrants the change of the names of ill omen into their direct opposites.

Say ye The members of the nation nearest the prophet are to spread the good news to their fellow countrymen.

Ammi My people.

Ruhamah She is loved, or pitied. As the three names in Hos 1:4; Hos 1:6; Hos 1:9, symbolize the utter rejection of Israel, so the names of Hos 1:11; Hos 2:1, symbolize the complete restoration of the people.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

PROMISE OF A GLORIOUS RESTORATION, Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1.

With Hos 1:9 chapter 1 closes in the common editions of the Hebrew Bible. The division of the English Bible found also in some Hebrew texts, in LXX., Luther, Calvin, etc. is certainly unfortunate, for Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1, belong close together. But scholars have long disagreed as to the exact relation of these verses to Hos 1:2-9, and Hos 2:2 ff., since the transition from Hos 1:9-10, and also from Hos 2:1-2, is exceedingly abrupt. Some make Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1, the continuation of Hos 1:2-9, regarding Hos 2:1, as the close of the first section; others feeling that the promises of Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1, following immediately upon the threats in Hos 1:2-9, would take from the latter much of their force, regard the verses as the beginning of the second oracle, which would then begin with a promise (compare Isa 2:2-4, a promise followed by threats in Hos 2:5 ff.). But this does not relieve the situation, for the transition from Hos 2:1-2, is at least equally abrupt. As a result, some scholars, seeing in the verses nothing that would militate against the authorship of Hosea and yet recognizing their loose connection with the context, think that the verses have been misplaced. Steiner, Cheyne, and others would place them after Hos 2:23, A.B. Davidson after Hos 3:5. The former find some support in Rom 9:25-26, where part of Hos 1:10, is quoted immediately after Hos 2:23. This, however, is not conclusive, since Paul might quote verses in any order he chose. The objections to the transposition theory, raised by Nowack, Marti, and others, rest, in part at least, upon misinterpretation of Hos 1:10-11, and are of little weight. The transition from Hos 2:23, or Hos 3:5, would undoubtedly be smoother; but, if the verses were transposed, how, why, and when did it happen? The reply that a later age sought to break the sting of the prophetic denunciations by rearranging the prophecies so that each would end with a promise of a brighter future rests upon mere assumption, and cannot be considered satisfactory. The most recent commentators, Wellhausen, Nowack, Marti, and Harper, take Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1, to be a later exilic or postexilic addition, made for the purpose just suggested. If so, the later writer must have followed and imitated Hosea very closely, for the verses are clearly dependent in thought and mode of expression on Hos 1:2-9. All one can do is to state the case and the views held; which is the correct one it is impossible to say with any degree of certainty, since the data, indecisive themselves, will appeal with varying force to different readers. So far as the contents are concerned, Hosea might be the author; abrupt transitions are not infrequent in the book; indeed, they are one of its chief characteristics. On the other hand, we know very little about the collection of prophetic oracles into books, and it is not unlikely that later additions were made to separate oracles, as well as to whole books, though one may not be ready to go in this matter to the extent to which some modern commentators are inclined.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

“Say you to your brothers, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.”

Note how the names of the three children have been repeated, combining Hos 1:11, with its mention of Jezreel, and this verse with the mention of Ammi and Ruhama. The positive note brought out here would serve to confirm that ‘Jezreel’ in Hos 1:11 is connected with restoration. And the consequence of ‘the day of Jezreel’ will be that Jezreel will be able to say to all his brothers, ‘My People’ and to all his sisters, ‘Beloved’. The names of the children of portent will be changed by dropping the negative, and the new names will be given to the whole family as representing the whole nation, because God’s attitude towards His people will have changed. They will again be His people and beloved.

Alternately the speaker may be seen as the prophet Hosea, but it makes little difference to the sense.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Hosea’s Wife And Children Are To Be A Sign Of The Unfaithfulness Of Israel ( Hos 1:2 to Hos 2:5 a).

There is no reason in chapter 1 for seeing Gomer’s ‘whoredom’ as being anything other than spiritual whoredom, (even though some do choose to see it differently). But whatever view might be taken about that, there can be no doubt that the main thought behind the presentation is certainly that Gomer and her children are to be seen as a part of the land which commits great whoredom (Hos 1:2), that is, has deserted YHWH and His covenant and is both following false religion and rejecting the requirements of His Law. And that was what Israel as a whole were seen as doing. Thus the whole land was ‘a land of whoredom’ (seeking other lords than YHWH). Consequently any wife whom Hosea selected could have been described as a ‘wife of whoredom’, however pure she was. With regard to this it should be noted that it was not the name of Gomer, Hosea’s wife, that was to be a sign to Israel, but the names of his children. We are therefore probably doing Gomer an injustice to suggest that she was initially a prostitute, or even a fallen woman, (whatever may have happened to her later).

But the chapter is undoubtedly intended to bring out the horror of Israel’s situation in God’s eyes. Here was the land of God’s inheritance, the land that God had given to His people, and it had become prostituted to Baalism. For although Jeroboam, following the example of Jehu, had eschewed the Phoenician Baal of the house of Ahab, he had continued the worship of the golden calves at Bethel and Dan, together with their Canaanite accompaniments, which included features of local Baalism carried out both in the sanctuaries of Bethel and Gilgal, and on the hills of Israel. And it was based on a false priesthood, and would appear very much to have included the utilisation of cult prostitutes (Hos 4:13-14). The consequence was that there was an open breach of God’s commandments (Hos 4:2). God’s ‘wife’ (Israel) had become unfaithful to Him.

Of course, we today would not behave in such a way. Instead our gods are sports stars, film stars, musicians and singers, or even celebrity chefs. But they nevertheless similarly entice us or encourage us into breaches of God’s commandments. And where that is so they must be put away, otherwise we too are guilty of spiritual adultery.

The consequence of all this is brought out in the naming of Hosea’s children. The name ‘Jezreel’ indicated that the sin of Jezreel would be expurgated by judgment on both the royal house and the land, the name ‘Lo-Ruhamah’ indicated that Israel would become ‘not pitied’ and the name ‘Lo-ammi’ indicated that they would be ‘not My people’, (although it will turn out that, in the mercy of God, that will not be the end, for there is to be a final restoration). That is why the children must wrestle with their ‘mother’ (Israel) about her behaviour. It is because she is breeding sin.

Analysis of Hos 1:2 to Hos 2:5 a.

a When YHWH spoke at the first by Hosea, YHWH said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom (unfaithfulness) and children of whoredom (unfaithfulness), for the land does commit great whoredom (unfaithfulness), departing from YHWH (Hos 1:2).

b So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived, and bore him a son (Hos 1:3).

c And YHWH said to him, “Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the bloodshed of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause the kingdom of the house of Israel to cease. And it will come about at that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel” (Hos 1:4-5).

d And she conceived again, and bore a daughter. And YHWH said to him, “Call her name Lo-ruhamah; for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel, that I should in any way pardon them, but I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and will save them by YHWH their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen” (Hos 1:6-7).

e Now when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived, and bore a son. And YHWH said, “Call his name Lo-ammi, for you are not my people, and I will not be your God” (Hos 1:8-9).

f Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered (Hos 1:10 a).

e And it will come about that, in the place where it was said to them, “You are not my people”, it will be said to them, “You are the sons of the living God.”

d And the children of Judah and the children of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint themselves one head (Hos 1:11 a).

c And they will go up from the land, for great will be the day of Jezreel” (Hos 1:11 b).

b “Say you to your brothers, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah, ‘Contend with your mother, contend, for she is not my wife, nor am I her husband’ (Hos 2:1-2 a).

a “And let her put away her whoredoms from her face, 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. Yes, upon her children will I have no mercy, for they are children of whoredom; because their mother has played the harlot; she who conceived them has done shamefully” (Hos 2:2-5 a).

Note that in ‘a’ Hosea has to take a wife of whoredom and children of whoredom, because the land is a land of whoredom, and in the parallel the wife is to cease her whoredom, and if she does not her children will suffer for her whoredom. In ‘b’ Gomer conceives and bears a son (who is to be a warning to Israel), and in the parallel that son has to advise his brothers and sisters to contend with their mother (Israel) because of what she has done. In ‘c’ the son is called Jezreel as a sign of what is to happen to the house of Jehu (and of Jeroboam) and to Israel, and in the parallel the day of Jezreel is to be the sign of restoration for Israel of the true dynasty. In ‘d’ Judah is to experience deliverance, and in the parallel it will lead to Israel and Judah being united under one head. In ‘e’ Israel are to be called ‘not My people’, and in the parallel in the place where it was said to them ‘you are not My people’ they will be called the children of the living God. In ‘f’ we have the renewal of the promise made to Jacob/Israel, that the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea (Gen 32:12).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

YHWH’S STEADFAST LOVE FOR ISRAEL AND HER UNFAITHFULNESS TO HIM IS EXPRESSED IN TERMS OF THE MARRIAGE RELATIONSHIP WITH AN ASSURANCE THAT ONE DAY THERE WILL BE FULL RESTORATION ( Hos 1:2 to Hos 3:5 ).

There is nothing more poignant than this beautiful picture of God in His love seeing Israel as His wife, even though she has been unfaithful to Him, and determining that once she has learned her lesson He will woo her back to Himself. But the picture comes first as a stark warning to the current Israel, by means of three children of Hosea, of what will happen to them if they do not turn back to Him.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Hos 2:1 Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

Hos 2:1 Comments – God is calling the children of Israel by the symbolic names of “Ammi” and “Ruhamah,” both of which refer to His covenant with Abraham and his descendents.

Hos 2:2 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;

Hos 2:3 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.

Hos 2:3 Comments – We see a description of the day of Israel’s birth in Eze 16:1-7.

Eze 16:1-7, “Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD unto Jerusalem; Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite. And as for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee; thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to the lothing of thy person, in the day that thou wast born. And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live; yea, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live. I have caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou hast increased and waxen great, and thou art come to excellent ornaments: thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown, whereas thou wast naked and bare.”

Hos 2:4  And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms.

Hos 2:4 “I will not have mercy upon her children” – Comments – Therefore, Hosea named his daughter “Loruhamah” (not having obtained mercy).

Hos 2:4 “for they be the children of whoredoms” Comments – Thus, the name “Loammi” (not my people).

Hos 2:23  And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God.

Hos 2:23 Comments – Rom 9:25 quotes this verse as referring to the acceptance also of Gentiles for salvation.

Rom 9:25, “As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.”

We also find Peter referring to Hos 2:23.

1Pe 2:10, “Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.”

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

v. 1. Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi (“My people”); and to your sisters, Ruhamah (“having obtained mercy”). The original names of the children were thus changed to indicate their changed relationship toward God and their Savior. No matter how far a person has fallen away from the truth of God’s Word, there is always mercy for Him through the redemption of Christ, if he but returns in true sorrow over his sins and accepts the offered deliverance.

A Threat of Punishment

v. 2. Plead with your mother, the members of Israel, as the children of an adulterous wife, being addressed, plead; for she is not My wife, she was no longer Jehovah’s bride, neither am I her Husband, for He had been obliged to reject her on account of her adultery; let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, namely, the shameless idolatry which was practiced throughout Israel at the time, and her adulteries from between her breasts, for Israel, in her shamelessness, was like a public harlot, who displays her profession in her bared breasts,

v. 3. lest I strip her naked, as a punishment for her shameless exposure of herself in the practice of her spiritual wantonness, and set her as in the day that she was born, Cf Exo 16:4, when she was without covering, and make her as a wilderness and set her like a dry land, altogether desert in every way, and slay her with thirst, thus depriving her of all the wonderful blessings which He had given her in the past, for the Lord had had mercy on His people in Egypt, He had led them out of the house of bondage, and He had made a covenant with them. The desert is a picture of the various tribulations and sufferings of the exile.

v. 4. And I will not have mercy upon her children, all the members of the nation being included in His punishment; for they be the children of whoredoms, all of them being guilty of the same shameless idolatry.

v. 5. For their mother hath played the harlot, the whole nation, as the various prophets show, being guilty of the same idolatrous behavior; she that conceived them hath done shamefully, openly committing her shameless acts, making no attempt to hide her bold practices; 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, food, clothing, and the enjoyments of life; for Israel’s commercial enterprise was stimulated by the riches and power of the nations round about, and it was with the idea of getting and holding their friendship that the Israelites began to practice idolatry.

v. 6. Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, setting insurmountable obstacles to keep Israel away from the heathen nations with their allurements and temptations, and make a wall that she shall not find her paths, namely, to the temples and altars of the idols. The Lord undoubtedly refers to the oppression and affliction of the exile, which opened the eyes of the children of Israel to the vanity and helplessness of the idols.

v. 7. And she shall follow after her lovers, determined, at first, to cling to the false gods whom she had accepted, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them, for she would be reduced to such straits as would show her how vain was her hope in these idols and their assistance. Then shall she say, I will go and return to my first Husband, having learned, by bitter experience, that He is the only true God, for then, at the time when Israel followed Him alone, was it better with me than now.

v. 8. For she did not know, she did not realize at that time, that I gave her corn and wine and oil and multiplied her silver and gold, giving her all these temporal blessings in rich measure, which they prepared for Baal, using it for his cult and worship, in open idolatry. Many a person serves a false god, not knowing that the very gifts which he brings are the blessings of God’s goodness upon him.

v. 9. Therefore will I return and take away My corn in the time thereof, namely, at the very time of the harvest, when men would expect a full supply, and My wine in the season thereof and will recover My wool and My flax, all these being gifts of His bounty, and therefore rightly belonging to Him, given to cover her nakedness. If God takes the gifts suddenly and at the very time of the harvest, the punishment would be more severe than if He had taken them after the outlook already was poor.

v. 10. And now will I discover her lewdness, uncover her nakedness and shame to her disgrace, in the sight of her lovers, Cf Eze 16:37, and none shall deliver her out of Mine hand. Cf Jer 13:26; Nah 3:5. While the nations round about were looking on, partly in helpless idleness and partly in malicious joy, Israel was delivered to her punishment.

v. 11. I will also cause all her mirth to cease, the hypocritical evidence of a joy which was no longer real among the people, her feast-days, especially the three highest festivals, Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles, her new moons, and her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts, whatever days were observed in the course of the year.

v. 12. And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, representative of the wealth of the country in farm products. whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me, thus blasphemously taking the honor from the Lord; and I will make them, the fine orchards and vineyards, a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. Cf Isa 7:23 ff. ; Mic 3:12.

v. 13. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, punishing her for devoting the great festival days of the Jewish church-year to the service of heathen idols, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, decorating herself for the purpose of making an impression upon those whom she had permitted to seduce her, and she went after her lovers and forgat Me, saith the Lord. That is the outstanding, reprehensible feature of unbelief and idolatry: the rejection of the true God, for He wants no other gods beside Himself.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

Hos 2:2

Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not thy wife, neither am I her husband. In this second chapter the same cycle of events recurs as in the first, with this difference, that what is expressed by symbol in the one is simply narrated in the other. The cycle is the common one of sin: its usual consequences of suffering and sorrow; then succor and sympathy in case of repentance. The persons addressed in the verse before us are those individuals in Israel who had still retained their integrity, and who, notwithstanding surrounding defection and abounding ungodliness, had continued steadfast in their loyalty and love to the Lord. They might be few in number, widely scattered, perhaps unknown to each other, and of comparatively little note; yet they are here called on to raise their voice in solemn warning and earnest protest against the national defection and wickedness. “The congregation in its totality, or whole people taken conjointly, is compared to the mother, but individual members to the children, and the sense is that they are to plead with each other to bring them back to the way of goodness” (Kimchi). The nation as such, and in its impiety, is the mother; the pious persons still found in it are here required to testify for God both by exhortation and example. “The congregation of Israel is compared to an adulteress, and the children of the different generations to the children of whoredoms. Before them the prophet says, ‘Plead with your mother'” (Kimchi). Adultery per se is a virtual dissolution of the marriage-tie; idolatry is spiritual adultery; the close and tender relationship into which God has graciously condescended to take Israel is rendered null and void, and that through Israel’s own fault. God threatens the renunciation of it, unless perchance the pleading of the still faithful children might recall the erring mother to penitence and purity. A case the converse of this is that presented in Isa 1:1, where the mother’s divorce is attributed to the unfaithfulness of the children. “Where,” asks the Lord in that passage, “is the bill of your mother’s divorcement, whom I have put away? for your transgressions is your mother put away.” Ki before the second clause is either recitative, introducing the words of pleading, or assigns a reason; the latter seems preferable. Let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts. The word mippaneyha is rather to be rendered “from her face” than “out of her sight.” The expression is to be taken literally, as the word “breasts” in the parallel clause proves. Thus Kimchi rightly explains it, saying, “Since he compares her to harlot, he attributes to her the ways of harlots; for the harlot’s way is to adorn her face with various kinds of colors, that she may appear fair in the eyes of her paramours.” But in addition to ornamenteth as earrings or nose-rings, and other ways of decking herself, as by painting, the expression may imply lascivious looks and wanton expressions of countenance; while the mention of breasts may indicate the making of them bare for the purpose of meretricious blandishments, or as indicating the place of the adulterer (comp. Eze 23:3 and So Eze 1:13). The Jewish commentators adopt the latter sense. Aben Ezra comments on the grammatical form of the words zenuncha and naaphupheha (the former by duplication of the second radical, and the latter by that of the third) as intensive; while Rashi and Kimchi refer to the pressure of the breasts. But others understand them figuratively, the countenance indicating boldness, and the breasts shamelessness. Thus Horace speaks of the brilliant beauty (nixor) and coquettishness (protervitas) of Glyeera.

Hos 2:3

Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born. The Lord, by his servant the prophet, enforces the preceding exhortation by a stern denunciation, and the threat of further severities unless averted by repentance; as an injured husband withdraws from a faithless wife all the gifts and presents he had made for her adornment, leaving her poor and bare. Not only the removal of her garments by way of degradation and disgrace, but exposure in that position to insult and ignominy would ensue. In other words, the nation is threatened with deprivation of all the blessings previously lavished upon themproperty, prosperity, population, and privileges; while dishonor of the deepest dye would aggravate the misery. The day of the nation’s birth denotes the weakness and wretchedness of their infant state. To this corresponded their servile, suffering condition during their bondage and oppression in Egypt. Rashi thus explains it; Kimchi says, “The figure of birth is the time they are slaves in Egypt;” so also Theodoret,the latter calls the day of her birth the sojourn in Egypt. The Prophet Ezekiel (Eze 16:4) expands the idea, occasionally employing, as Rosenmller remarks, the very words of Hosea. And make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and clay her with thirst. This part of the verse is susceptible of two explanations. The faithless female, under which character the northern kingdom is personified, may be compared to a wilderness, that is, according to Cyril, fruitless, parched, and productive only of thorns, thirsty and waterless. This comparison of a woman to a desert is wanting in suitability, and seems in some degree awkward in itself, beside being out of harmony with the closing clause; for to “slay with thirst,” however applicable to a person, cannot with any propriety be said of a place, whether desert or otherwise. No doubt the wilderness may stand for those dwelling in it. We prefer, therefore, the alternative rendering, “make her as in a wilderness, and set her as in a dry land.” Rashi aptly explains the threat to mean, “Lest I pronounce against them such a sentence as of old in this desert (Num 14:35), ‘In this wilderness they shall be consumed, and there they shall die.'” There is, moreover, a natural connection of ideas between a wilderness, a dry land, and thirst. The nation’s birth, represented by or compared to their sojourn in Egypt, naturally suggests the idea of their wandering in the wilderness after their exodus from that country; a wilderness, again, suggests what is an ordinary feature of such a district, namely, a dry land; while a region thus without water is suggestive as well as provocative of thirst. The former explanation, however, is given by Kimehi: “I will make thee like the wilderness which is open to every one, and in which, moreover, one finds no means of subsistence, nor anything that man needs; so I’ll withdraw my goodness from them, and they shall be surrendered as a prey to every one.”

Hos 2:4

And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms. The connection of this verse is carried on from the preceding, viz. and lest I will not have mercy upon her children. An exceedingly apt illustration of this verse is given by Jerome. It is to this effect: When the children of Israel were brought out of Egypt, the parents perished in the wilderness; but the children of those who had thus perished, and whose caresses had thus fallen in the wilderness, were spared and permitted to enter the land of promise. Now, however, the case is different, and the punishment aggravated. The adulterous parent perishes, and the children of that parent perish also. Further, the reason is assigned in the concluding clause. The children proved themselves no better than the mother that bore them; they were the worthless progeny of a worthless parent.

Hos 2:5

Nor their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath dons shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers. The charge of idolatry under the figure of harlotry, spiritual harlotry, is reiterated. “Mother” is repeated in and emphasized by the parallel words, “she that conceived them.” A somewhat similar form of expression is that in Psa 58:3, “The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.” To bosh, to be ashamed, belong the Hiphil forms, hebhish and hobhish (the latter formed from zabhish), properly “to put to shame,” but also “to practice shame or do shameful things.” The nature of her shameful conduct is more definitely and distinctly expressed in the clauses which follow; and consisted of several particulars. There is the persistent pursuit of her lovers; then the unblushing boldness with which she avows her determination to continue that course; and next come her expectations from them. That give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink (margin, drinks). The original word here rendered “lovers” is the Piel participle, which may have either its usual intensive sense or its occasional causative sense in which it is taken by Rosenmller, who has “a-mare me facientes,” equivalent to “wooers.” It matters little which way we understand it. The more important point is to determine who or what are here meant by lovers. Most commentators understand them to be those nations whose friendship Israel set such store bythe Assyrians and the Egyptians. Thus Grotius and Jerome,the latter explains them of the Assyrians and Egyptians and other nations, with whose idols Israel committed fornication, and from which in distress they vainly hoped for help; so also Kimchi, in the following comment: “By ‘friends ‘ he implies the Assyrians and Egyptians joined in alliance to the Israelites, who delivered them from their enemies, so that they lived safely, in return for the gifts (tribute) which they (the Israelites) were in the habit of giving them. And as they lived in tranquility in virtue of the compact entered into with them, the prophet represents it as if they supplied them with all the necessaries of life. For with their help they tilled their land without fear and in safety traded from country to country.” Kimchi quotes at the same time his father’s (Joseph Kimchi) interpretation: “But my lord my father of blessed memory explained ‘after her lovers’ of the sun and moon and stars, which they worshipped; while their intention was that they gave them their food and their sufficiency, as they said, ‘But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.'” This exposition of Joseph Kimchi is much nearer the truth than that of his son David; it is, however, too restricted. The “lovers” were the idols on which the people of the northern kingdom so dented, and on which they placed so much dependence. The blessings which they vainly expected from these idols are enumerated: they werefood and raiment and luxuries; the bread and water were the articles of food as it is written elsewhere. “Bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure;” the wool and flax were the materials for clothing; while the oil and drinks were, the former for ornament, the latter for refresh-merit, and so included all luxuries; thus in Psa 23:5, “Thou anointest my head with oil;” and in Psa 102:9, “And mingled my drink [literally, ‘drinks,’ the same word, shigguyar] with weeping;” also in Psa 104:15 we read of “wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his face to shine, and bread which strengthened man’s heart.”

Hos 2:6

Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths. The sudden change of person from the third to the second is very observable. This directness of address is, in this instance, expressive of deep indignation. She had avowed her determination to pursue her evil courses shamefully and sinfully, as if in despite and defiance of the Almighty. In deep and undisguised displeasure, and with a suddenness springing from indignation, he affirms his determination to thwart her course of sin and shame; as though addressing her personally and promptly, he said, “Then thou shalt not be able to carry out thy plan or accomplish thy purpose; I will see to that.” The hedge and wall are elsewhere, as in Job 1:10 and Isa 5:5, used for protection and defense, here for prevention and obstruction, and similarly in Job 19:8, “He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths;” and in Lam 3:7, “He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out,” and Lam 3:9, “He hath enclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.” Thus Kimchi: “I will hedge thy way with thorns, so that they cannot go out of the city because of the devastation; and her lovers shall not be able to help her, and they are Assyria and Egypt.” After quoting his father’s explanation of lovers, he pro-coeds: “So their way is as if there were in it a thorn hedge, and thorns that she could not pass through it, and could not find her paths in which she walked.” The fence here is double one a hedge of thorns, sharp, prickly, and piercing, such as forbid her forcing a way through: the other a wall of stone that cannot be climbed, or leaped, or otherwise got over. We need not try to specify the particular circumstances that thus hedged in and walled about the adulteresswhether fightings within or foes beleaguering without, whether straitened means or stress of circumstances raising an impassable barrier against the practice of idolatry, or an enforced conviction of its futility. “If,” says Kimchi, “she seek to Assyria and Egypt, they will not give her their friendship and their help.”

Hos 2:7

And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them. This portion of the verse expresses the consequence of the preceding. However eagerly she follows after themand the form of the verb (Piel conjugation) expresses that eagernessshe shall only experience the ineffectual nature of her efforts, and feel the impossibility of overtaking the darling objects of her pursuit. However earnestly she seeks them (here the Piel is used again), she shall find every passage barred and every outlet obstructed, so that, unable to find them, she shall be forced to abandon her search as utterly vain and impossible. Then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now. The difficulties of her position, the distress in which she found herself, stimulated her to increased eagerness in pursuit of her lovers; but it was only for a brief space, and the efforts were unsuccessful; the means as well as opportunity for the sacrifices and services of idol-worship failed, the obstacles placed in her way were insurmountable. Or, rather, the disappointment was so great and grievous, when all the fondly cherished hopes of help, or succor, or support from those idols were frustrated and found entirely vain, that heartsick and chagrined by unsuccess, she resolves on a change of course. With mingled feelings of remorse and penitence she makes up her mind to retrace her steps. She recalls the better days, the happier time, the more prosperous circumstances, of fidelity to her first and rightful husband and head; and now she is just ready to return to him. She is just now at that stage at which the prodigal in the parable had arrived “when He came to himself,” and when he said, “How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father.” Kimchi remarks,” She will not say this until she has borne the captivity a considerable time.”

Hos 2:8

For she din not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. From Hos 2:6 to 13 inclusive, the suffering and sorrow consequent on, and occasioned by, her sins are enumerated; yet now and again certain aggravations of her guilt crop up. Here we have an account of her ignorance of, and ingratitude to, the true and or of her mercies, together with her sinful misuse and sad abuse of those mercies. The products of the earth which God bestowed on her were corn and wine and oilall that was needed for food, refreshment, and even luxury; the prosperity in trade or commerce with which he favored her resulted in the multiplied increase of silver and gold. The perversion of these blessings consisted in her employment of them in the service of Baal or of idolatry in general. The sin of refusing to acknowledge the Author of such manifold mercies was grievously augmented by this gross abuse of them. The last clause is a relative one, asher, as frequently being understood; while the words asu labbaal do not signify that they made those metals into images of Baal, as implied in the Authorized Version; nor vet that they offered them to Baal according to Gesenius; but that they prepared or employed them in the worship of that idol and the service of idolatry in general. , rad. , to cover, multiply, i.e. multitude and plenty covering ever everything; comp. tego, , rad. , take possession of the brain in intoxicating: , rad. , to shine. Kimchi remarks as follows: “All the goodness in the possession of which she was, she had not except from me; because I sent my blessing on the corn and wine and oil, and sent my blessing upon the work of their hands, so that they had abundance of silver and gold; but Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked.”

Hos 2:9

Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness. The abuse of the Divine bounties mentioned in the preceding verse fully justifies the series of punishments that follow. God thus vindicates those penal inflictions. Accordingly he threatens them in this ninth verse with the deprivation of the bounties which they had misused as the means of idolatry and sin; in Hos 2:10 with disgrace; in Hos 2:11 with the departure of all her merry-makings; in Hos 2:12 with the destruction of the sources whence the means of idolatrous worship were supplied; and in Hos 2:13 with days of visitation proportionate to the time of declension and apostasy. The first clause of the verse under consideration is better rendered

(1) according to the common Hebrew idiom, which employs two verbs to express one idea in a modified sense, the first denoting the manner, and so equivalent to an adverb with us, and the second signifying the matter; and it is thus translated by Keil: “Therefore will I take back my corn.”

(2) We admit the vav consecutive is opposed to this; and the LXX. has : and Jerome, “reverter et sumam.” The manner of the dispossession intensifies the punishment, just as their abuse of those possessions had augmented their guilt. The food, refreshment, and raiment are to be taken away this certainly would be bad enough by itself, but the suddenness of the stroke adds poignancy to the infliction. The prospect of an indifferent harvest and of a bad vintage for weeks previously might have prepared them in some sort for the disaster. But when the time of harvest has already come and the season of vintage just arrived, by some sudden, unexpected calamity, whether tempest or hostile invasion, the bread-corn perishes and the wine-grapes are destroyed. The food is thus snatched, as it were, from their month, and the cup dashed from their lips; the sadness of the catastrophe is immensely increased by the sudden rudeness of the stroke by which it comes. Nor is this all. In the case of the raiment, or rather the material, the wool and the flax out of which it is formed, its removal reduces the intended wearer to perfect nudity, or, if we understand it as figure, to abject poverty and absolute penury. Aben Ezra attributes this disaster (verse 9) to hostile invasion: “At its season when I shall bring the enemies, to take away the corn and the wine;” Kimchi, on the other hand, sees in it a misgrowth: “I will return and take away my corn in its season, and my wine in its appointed time, because I will send a curse upon them in the time of harvest and at the season of vintage, instead of the blessing I used to send upon them. And so on all the work of their hands I shall send a curse, and all their gain shall be put into a bag with holes; and they shall not have bread to eat nor raiment to wear.”

Hos 2:10

And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of mine hand. Deprivation is followed by disgrace, dispossession by dishonor. The figure of a faithless female being continued, the calamities of Israel are pictured in the extreme deplorableness of her condition. The word navluth does not elsewhere occur, but its meaning is not difficult to ascertain. It denotes literally, “slackness,” “laxness,” or a withered state, from navel, to be withered, and may be translated either “her shame” or “her turpitude.” The LXX. has , while Jerome renders it stultitiam. Thus she is exposed to the derision and disgust of her former admirers and paramours; while deliverance is out of the question. Her lovers are the idols, or, according to Kimchi,” Egypt and Assyria, which cannot deliver her.” She who once was the object of delight is become the object of disdain and contempt; nor is there any of her quondam lovers desirous of or able to deliver her out of the hand of him who administers the justly deserved punishment.

Hos 2:11

I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. The enumeration is complete, “Her feast days” were the three annual festivals of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. “Her new moons” were the monthly celebrations at the commencement of each month. “Her sabbaths” were the weekly solemnities of one day in seven, dedicated to the Lord. Then there is a general summing up of the whole by the addition of “all her solemn feasts,”all her festal days and seasons, including, besides those named, the beginning of the years, the solemn assembly or holy convocation on the seventh day of the Passover and on the eighth day of Tabernacles. Preceding the enumeration is the general characteristic of all Israel’s festivities. They were times of joy, as we read in Num 10:10, “In the day of your gladness, and in your solemn days, and in the beginnings of your months, ye shall blow with the trumpets;” and in Dent. Num 12:12 it is expressly declared, “Ye shall rejoice before the Lord… ye, and your sons, and your daughters, and your menservants, and your maidservants, and the Levite that is within your gates.” All this was to cease; the coming captivity would render all such celebrations impossible. Kimchi remarks on this (Num 12:11): “For in the distress there is no new moon and no sabbath; and the beginnings of months and sabbaths on which offerings were presented were days of joy. And so with respect to the feast days and solemn assemblies, which were days of rest and quiet joy, they shall not have in them any joy in consequence of the greatness of their distresses.” He subsequently adds, “There is a chag which is not a moed, but joy wherewith men rejoice and eat and drink; and it is called chag,” referring to Solomon’s feast of dedication; “and there is also a moed which is not a chag, as for signs and for seasons (moedim), and at the appointed time I will return unto thee” (moed, from , to appoint as time and place).

Hos 2:12

And I will destroy (make desolate) her vines and her fig trees, whereof she said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me. God had already threatened to deprive Israel of the means of supportthe corn, wine, wool, and flax; he now threatens the removal of the very sources whence that support was derived. The vine and fig tree are usually conjoined, and by a common synecdoche convey the idea of all those sources that combine to support life and supply its luxuries. When the united kingdom of Judah and Israel, before the disruption, had obtained the zenith of prosperity in the reign of Solomon, it is thus expressed: Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.” Yet Israel knew not the time of her merciful visitation, and not only turned aside to idols, but most stupidly and most inexcusably attributed the many mercies she enjoyed to the idols which she worshipped. Like a foul adulteress despising the tokens of her husband’s affection and delighting in the rewards of lewdness received from licentious paramours, Israel forfeited all her privileges, and forced the Lord to withdraw his bounties and destroy their very source. , rad. , equivalent to , to be bent, from the arch made by its drooping boughs, , rad. , equivalent to , to extend from its length. And I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. The places where fig trees flourished and vines abounded shall be stripped of those trees, with their pleasant fruitsshall become a forest. The vineyards being no longer hedged or fenced, no longer cultivated or cared for, the beasts of the field shall, in consequence, find free ingress and roam there at large, devouring and devastating at pleasure. The Septuagint translates the first part of the above sentence by , “and I will make them a testimony,” thus reading, according to Jerome, , instead of ; while Cyril comments on the words so read as follows: “For these things being taken away shall testify as it were against Israel’s depravity, and render their punishment more signal, and make the wrath conspicuous.” The context, however, militates against the reading in question, for in time of war or general devastation places, through neglect, grow trees and brushwood, where wild beasts lair and lay waste. The explanation of the verse is well given by Kimchi in his commentary: “Because she said, ‘These are the hire of my harlotry;’ because she said that from the hand of her lovers came the corn and must and oil and all good things;I will make them a desolation, that she may know whether she had those good things from me or from them. , because he has compared her to a harlot, he calls those good things , equivalent to ; while their signification is identical with , and their root, [extend, reach, give], the aleph being prosthetic. But Jonathan renders by , precious things. And he mentions the vine and the fig tree because grapes and figs are the best part of the food of man after the produce of the earth (i.e. corn); and already he had said, ‘I will also take away my corn in its season.'”

Hos 2:13

And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her ear-rings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and forget me, saith the Lord. The name of Baalim, that is, Baals in the plural, has respect to the various forms of the Baal-idolatry,or modification of the Baal-worship; for example, Baal-peor, Baal-be-rith, Baal-zebub, Baal-perazim, Baal-zephon, Baal-zamar, Baal-shalishu. The name of Baal came to be used generally as the designation of any idol or false god. The days of the Baals were the days consecrated to Baal, and on which the worship of the true God was transferred to that idol. It matters little whether we render “wherein” or “to whom,” referring to , in which case, however, we should expect , though the latter answers better to the meaning of the preposition le in . After mentioning the object of their idolatrous worship, he specifies the manner of it, which was the burning of incense, the part of the process being employed by synecdoche for the whole. Every mincha, or meat offering, which was presented by itself as a free-will offering was accompanied with frankincense; every day, morning and evening, incense was burnt in the holy place; while on the great Day of Atone-meat the high priest carried a censer of coals from the golden altar into the holiest of all and there burnt incense before the mercy-seat. But the word has often a wider sense than that of burning incense, and is applied to the offering of any sacrifice whatever. Just as the festivals of Jehovah were transferred to Baal, so his service was turned into that of Baal. Titus Israel prostituted herself and acted the part of a spiritual adulteress by her worship of idols. The same unsavory figure is resumed; and her assiduous efforts to worship the idol acceptably and propitiate his favor is presented under the figure of a whorish woman decking herself with meretricious ornamentsnose-rings and jewels, thus making up by artificial means for the lack of natural beautyto attract the attention and gain the admiration of her lovers. Thus Aben Ezra: “The meaning of is metaphorical in allusion to a whorish woman who puts a nose-ring in her nose and a necklace on her neck to make herself beautiful, in order to find favor in the eves of the adulterer.” The word has for its verbal root , to overstep the boundary, transgress, plunder, draw to one’s self, put on; while , (masculine ) is from , to rub, polish, be smooth. But when all fails to draw lovers unto her, she casts aside the last remaining fragment of female delicacy, and goes in pursuit of lovers. Thus did Israel. She put Baal or other idols in place of Jehovah; she made a transfer of Jehovah’s festivals to Baal; she burnt incense or offered sacrifice to her idol instead of the true God; she went to great pains to secure the acceptance of her false deities; “and me,“ says Jehovah very emphatically,” she forgat;” that is, me the true God, her bountiful Benefactor, her gracious Lord. and loving Husband, she forgot. The visitation expressed by with accusative of the thing, and before the person, is commented by Kimchi as follows: “For the transgressions of her (Israel’s) iniquity in the exile I will visit upon her the time that she served Baalim; and I will let them remain long in exile for punishment, because they have left my service and served other gods. And even upon children’s children shall come this punishment, although they do not serve strange gods in exile; thus is the sentence [literally, ‘judgment’] of their punishment, because their children’s children shall not be perfect in the service of God and in his commandments in exile, therefore thus shall the iniquity of their fathers who served strange gods unite with their own punishment.”

Hos 2:14

Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. As in Hos 2:2-5 we have an exposure of Israel’s sin, and in Hos 2:6-13 an enumeration of her sufferings by penal inflictions; so Hos 2:14-23 contain a touching exhibition of Divine succor and support. The transition is abrupt. Hos 2:14-17 exhibit the gradual change wrought in Israel through the progressive means of improvement employed by Jehovah. Israel’s future is here reflected in the mirror of her past history. The events of that history are elegantly employed to represent as by type or symbol the mercies in store for Israel, wayward and rebellious though she had proved herself to be. Laken (from le causal, and ken, so, equivalent to “because it is so”) at the beginning of this verse (14) is rendered by some,

(1) “but” or “yet;” but its natural signification is

(2) “therefore.”

It is like the Greek (from , Ionic , neuter , contracted ); it being so, therefore, and similar to the Latin phrase, quae cum ita slut, “therefore” implies because Israel can only be turned from her foolish idolatry by the penal measures named. Aben Ezra also understands it here, as elsewhere, in its literal sense; thus: “After she [the unchaste wife representative of Israel] shall know that all this evil has come upon her because that she had forgotten me, and had not known at the beginning that I dealt kindly with her; and when she will say, ‘Yet will I go and return to my former husband;’ then will I allure her with words.” is from the root cognate with the Arabic in the sense of “dividing,” “being open,” “standing open;” thence it signifies “to be susceptible of outward impressions,” “allow access and entrance;” in Piel, “to make one open be susceptible or inclined,” “induce by words.” The word laken, “therefore,” has somewhat puzzled commentators, because the connection between the judgments threatened in the preceding verses and the mercies proffered in what follows is not to a superficial view at once apparent. Yet it is mercy and truth meeting together, righteousness and peace kissing each other. It is

(3) the connecting link between the enormity of our sins and the greatness of the Divine mercy; between the vileness of our iniquities and the riches of Divine grace. In like manner the psalmist prays, “Pardon mine iniquity, for it is great;” and God promises by the prophet, “For the iniquity of his covetousness was I wroth, and smote him: I hid me, and was wroth, and he went on frowardly in the way of his heart. I have seen his ways, and will heal him; I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to his mourners.” Long previously God had said, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth.” The secret of such striking contrasts is that where sin abounded grace did much more abound. Egypt having been to Israel the house of bondage, the exodus from that land represents deliverance out of a servile, suffering condition.

(1) The wilderness or Arabian desert into which they were brought on leaving that country was a place of freedom. They were emancipated, and breathed the free air of the wilderness; they were exercised with salutary discipline after their emancipation; as they traversed the wilderness they were trained and tried. The allurement which prefaces their deliverance refers to the persuasion of Moses and Aaron, who found it necessary to persuade and even coax their countrymen to turn their back on their bondage and follow the leaders whom God had sent them. The “comfortable words” mentioned in the clone of the verse were addressed to them at a subsequent period, when, allured out of the strange land where they had sojourned so long, they were led forth into the wilderness. The “comfortable words” comprehended both temporal and spiritual merciesrelief in every time of emergency, deliverance in danger and distress, a plentiful supply of their necessities, with pardon of their sins, assurances of grace, and renewed tokens of God’s favor on repentance. A difficulty has been found in the words, “and bring her into the wilderness,” being interposed between the alluring and the speaking comfortably. The difficulty is removed

(2) by translating vav, not by “and,” but by “after,” as if equivalent to acher; thus: “After I shall have brought her into the wilderness I wilt allure and comfort her.” Then the meaning would be, “After I have humbled them thoroughly as I did their forefathers in the wilderness, then will I speak comfortably unto them.” God humbled their forefathers in Egypt, yet that did not suffice; he humbled them afterwards in the wilderness, and then brought them into Canaan. Many times God sends successive afflictions upon his own people, to break their hearts, to humble them thoroughly, and at last “he speaks comfortably unto them.” But

(3) the wilderness may be viewed in another light. Besides the distresses experienced in the wilderness, there were deliverances enjoyed. The reference here may be to the latter, and all the more as this part of the chapter deals with merciful providences. The particle vav and other words of the verse then retain their natural sense; and, instead of a denunciation of further afflictions, God declares to Israel that he will perform on their behalf such works of power, wisdom, and goodness, at once great and glorious, merciful and wonderful, as he had wrought for their forefathers in the wilderness after their deliverance from Egypt. Thus the Chaldee: “I will work miracles and great works of wonder for them, such as I wrought in the desert;” as though he said, “Whatever the condition may be into which you shall be brought, vet you shall have me working in as glorious a way for your good and comfort as ever I did for your forefathers when they were in the wilderness.” The explanation of “wilderness” under number

(1) above, combining, as it does, deliverance yet discipline, care yet chastisement, deserves the preference; it is neither to be explained with Keil exclusively in the sense of promise, nor, on the other hand, exclusively in the sense of punishment with Rashi, who comments as follows: “I will lead her into the wilderness, which for her is like a wilderness and a dry parched land; and there she shall lay it to heart that it was better with her when she did my will than when she rebelled against me.”

Hos 2:15

And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt. The consolations of God are not confined to words; they comprise works as well as words. Friendly doings as well as sayings are embraced in the Divine goodness, and manifest the Divine mercy. On emerging from the wilderness, fruitful vineyards, such as Sibmah, Heshbon, and Elealeh, east of Jordan. and fertile valleys, like that of Achor near Jericho, to the west of Jordan, as coon as they have crossed the river, shall be given them. These vineyards and valleys would thus be the first installments of God’s promise, and a prelude to the possession of the whole, so that the door of hopeful expectation and of joyful anticipation would be thrown wide open to them. The verb has three meanings”humble one’s self answer,” “sing.” Hence the LXX. and older interpreters adopt : Calvin, “respondent;” and Aben Ezra and Kimchi, “she shall sing and play.” The last deserves the preference. No wonder if’, under such circumstances, Israel responded with songs of praise and thanksgiving, as in that early day of the nation’s youth, when, coming up out of Egypt, they sang the song of Moses by the Red Sea’s margin, while Miriam and the maidens of Israel in full chorus completed the harmony. Now, all these experiences of the past were to repeat themselves in the future history of Israel. Their past captivity or dispersion was obviously implied in this promised deliverance and God’s gracious dealings with them in the future. There is a different explanation of one expression in this verse, which deserves careful considerationan explanation which turns on what once transpired in that valley, and the meaning of the name of it, troubling, derived flora that transaction; we refer, of course, to the affair of Achan. The punishment of the transgressor in that case, and the putting away of sin in connection with penitence and prayer, reopened, after defeat, the door of hope, and restored the enjoyment of Divine help. The discomfiture that so troubled the host of Israel was immediately followed by the victory at At, which inspired them with the hope of soon possessing the whole land. So with Israel after the captivitya dreary night of weeping was followed by a bright and blessed morning. So, too, in time to come, when, after a long and sorrowful expectation, Israel shall return from the lands of their exile to their fatherland, or by faith and repentance to the paternal God, the light of better and more hopeful days shall (lawn upon them. To the idea of troubling Kimchi attaches the notion of purification, quoting with approval Rashi and Aben Ezra to the same purpose. His comment is: “Because at the beginning, when they went into the land in the days of Joshua, this misadventure befell them, namely, the matter of Achan, he gave them confidence that they should not fear when they assembled in the land, and that no misadventure would occur to them, as they would all be refined and purified because, in the wilderness of the peoples, they would be purified. And that valley of Achor shall no more be called so, for its name is for depreciation; but a name of honor shall be given to it, and it is a door of hope. And inasmuch as he says ‘door,’ and not ‘valley,’ as it should be, it is because it shall be to them as a door, since from there they shall enter into the land as they did at the first, and it shall be to them hope and the aim of what is good; consequently they call it the door of hope. And the sage Rabbi Abraham explains the valley of Achor to be the valley of Jezreel, viz.’ because I [Jehovah] troubled her there, it will turn to a door of hope.’ And R.S.I. (Rashi) of blessed memory explains it as the depth of the exile, where they were troubled; so ‘I will give her a door of hope, the beginning of hope, that out of the midst of those troubles I will give her a heart to return to me.'” To the same purpose he quotes a brief comment of Saadia Gaon. , cognate with Arabic karma, to be noble, equivalent to “the more fruitful and productive.” The word mishsham is, according to some,

(1) an expression of time, equivalent to “from the time of their departure from the desert,”so Keil; others explain it as

(2) “thereout,” i.e. “I will make their vineyards out of it,”so Simson; and ethers, again, explain it “from there or thence.” It is taken in the last-mentioned sense by Kimchi, as follows: “From the wilderness I will give the whole land, which she formerly possessed, as if he said, ‘I will constitute her there in the wilderness to do good to her in her land,’ because that in the wilderness of the peoples he will purify them and consume the rebellious and the transgressors, so that the remainder shall fear (or flock reverently to him). Consequently they shall need consolations, and be shall speak to their heart. Because Godblessed be he!shall give them their land as at the first; therefore he says, ‘And I will speak to their heart.’ And although we have explained that the consolations shall spring out of the distress which they endured in exile, yet will the whole be as well for the one (viz. the consolation) as for the other (the trouble).” It is aptly remarked by Aben Ezra, in relation to the vineyards, that “the words form a contrast to the other words of the prophet, ‘And I will destroy their vine;'” likewise Kimchi asking, “And why has the prophet only mentioned their vineyards (i.e. when purposing to give them the whole land)? Because he had mentioned in their punishment, ‘I will destroy her vines,’ he mentions in the promised consolation her vineyards.”

Hos 2:16, Hos 2:17

In these verses a renewal of God’s covenant with Israel, under the figure of a marriage contract, is predicted. The name by which Israel shall address her beloved shall be henceforth Ishi, not Baali; that is, a term of tender affection, not of stern authority.

(1) The title of “My Husband” will take the place of “My Lord.” Some suppose that the latter title was the idol’s name, which, in the lips of Israel, had superseded that of the true God, the meaning being

(2) “Thou wilt no more call to me, My Baal.” Nay, the names of Baals shall become so abhorrent to their better feelings, as well as hateful to Jehovah, that they shall pass away at once from their mouth and from their memory, never more to be mentioned and never more to be remembered. Rashi’s comment favors

(1); thus: “Ye shall serve me out of love, and not out of fear; ishi denoting marriage and youthful love; baali, lordship and fear.”

Hos 2:18

A state of tranquility was to follow, a sort of golden age was to ensue. With both the rational and irrational creation they would be at peace, enjoying security from the one and safety from the other. Peace would be established with the hostile forces of the outer world, and peace at the same time national and political. With the beasts of the fieldviz, the wild beasts, as contrasted with behemah, tame animalsand with the fowls of heaveni.e. birds of prey, destructive of the fruits of the fieldand with the creeping things of the ground, detrimental to the products of the earth, they would be in league; while weapons of war would be devoted to destruction, the bow and the sword and the battle being broken, and not only so, but banished out of the earth, so that Israel, free from the alarm of a night attack, and protected by night as well as by day, would be made to lie down safely. Milchamah is constructed with eshbor by zeugma; or it includes, as Kimchi explains it, “all the implements of war except the bow and sword, which he has already mentioned.”

Hos 2:19, Hos 2:20

Much as was included in these promises, more and better was to follow. The divorced wife was to be taken back; the marriage contract, which her shameful adultery had vitiated, was to be renewed, and past offences condoned. This certainly evidenced extraordinary forbearance and affection. But it was not all. A new and higher relationship was to be entered on; so entirely had God forgiven and forgotten, if we may so say, all the multiplied and aggravated transgressions of Israel against him, that that people is not to be received back as a repudiated wife, but to be henceforth regarded and treated as a chaste virgin, and in that capacity betrothed unto the Lord. And I will betroth thee unto me is the gracious promise thrice repeated, and each time with an additional element of mercy; nor is this betrothal of a temporary character and of short continuance, like the previous marriage compact which the wife’s guilt a short time had rendered null and void. It is a durable betrothal, lasting forever. Next to the time during which this betrothal shall continue is the manner in which it is effected, or rather, the basis on which it is established. Justice and judgment present righteousness under two aspectssubjective and objective. Tsedeq, equivalent to tsedaqah, being right, is subjective righteousness and an attribute of God. Mishpat, equivalent to objective right, either as executing judgment or as existing in fact Some attribute these characteristics to God and some to Israel, while others to both. Rashi and Kimchi understand both words tsedeq and mishpat, subjectively and in relation to the Israelites. The former: “In righteousness and judgment wherein ye shall walk;” the latter: “In righteousness which the Israelites shall practice.” Wunsche and Hengstenberg understand the righteousness and judgment of God’s doing justice and faithfully fulfilling his covenant obligations to Israel. The latter has well remarked in relation to mishpat when distinguishing it from tsedeq, that a man may render what is right to persons and yet not be righteous; that is, there may be objective apart from subjective righteousness. Keil attributes the attributes in question, not only to God fulfilling his covenant engagements to his people, but purifying them through just judgment, and thus providing for their righteousness. That God possesses these is undeniable, but it is equally obvious that he bestows righteousness on his people both by imputation and impartation; he also executes righteousness in their case, purifying them by salutary chastisement, his object being, not only to cleanse, but to keep clean. And yet such is the frailty of man’s fallen nature, and so many are the faults and the failings to which he is liable, that loving-kindness (God’s condescending love, chesed, equivalent to ) and mercies (inmost compassion on man’s weakness, rachamim, ) on God’s part must be added to righteousness and judgment in order to secure the stability of those whom he takes into covenant, and the continuance of the contract. Nay; for the attainment of the desired end still more is requisite, for, after all his bestowments and all his discipline, and in addition to all his favor and forbearance, his faithfulness (unwavering steadfastness, emunah, corresponding as the reverse side to and securing the leolam) is indispensable to Israel’s perseverance; and thus, notwithstanding Israel’s failures, Jehovah’s faithfulness guarantees ultimate and lasting success. The special quality on Israel’s side is true knowledge of God.

Hos 2:21-23

The eighteenth verse pictures a scene of peace for Israel’s future; the verses following warrant the expectation of its perpetuity, owing to the higher and holier relationship; the verses before us are a vivid description of unlimited prosperity. The corn and wine and oil appeal, by a graphic personification, to mother earth; earth appeals to the over-canopying heavens; and the heavens appeal to him whose throne is in the heavens, but whom the heavens and heaven of heavens cannot contain. Soon the floating cloud is seen and the falling rain is heard; the parched earth drinks in the moisture; and its products, being nourished and refreshed, supply to the utmost the wants and wishes of Jezreel. Kimchi comments on this picture as follows: “He says that then, in the season of salvation, the heavens shall give their dew, and the earth shall give her increase. And he says, ‘I will tear the heavens which were shut up when they were in the land, as in the days of Ahab; on their return to the land at the time of salvation they shall no more be shut.’ And he says, ‘I will answer,’ as if the heavens asked that they might give rain according to their manner, and I will answer; [as if] their earth [asked] that they [the heavens] might give rain after their manner, even showers of blessing. And this ‘ I will answer’ denotes that my favor shall be on them [the heavens]. ‘And they shall answer the earth,’ as if the earth asked rain and longed for it. ‘And the earth shall hear when it shall give its increase, and the tree of the field shall give its fruit ‘ ‘And they shall hear Jezreel,’ for in the multiplying of good things the eaters thereof multiply, for the steppes shall be full of the sheep of Israel. In the punishments he called the name of Israel Jezreel, because they were scattered among the nations. In the time of salvation he likewise calls them Jezreel, because they were sown in their land; accordingly, he says afterwards, ‘I will sow them to me in the land.'” Such is the prophet’s pictorial representation of a prosperity including food in abundance, refreshment limited by moderation, and even luxuries without stint. Old things are passed away; sinful things have ceased; there is a complete reversal of the sorrowful circumstances into which sin had plunged Israel. God’s scattering has now become God’s sowing. “I sow her” is the remark of Aben Ezra, “that they may multiply and be fruitful as the seed of the earth.” The unpitied one has found mercy; the rejected one is received with rejoicing. “I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God.”

HOMILETICS

Hos 2:2-5

The prophet exhibits the gross sin of idolatry.

The prophet in this section exposes the shame as well as sin of idolatry. It is a mistaken notion to suppose, with some, that the tribe of Judah is here urged to plead with the tribes of Israel; for Israel cannot, with any propriety of speech or figure, be spoken of as the mother in this case, however possibly they may be addressed as brethren and sisters. The Church or nation is the mother, and the individual members, as nursed and brought up by her, are the children. The doctrines symbolized in the preceding chapter are here more fully developed and plainly set forth.

I. PLEADING COMMANDED. The explanation which Calvin gives of the first clause of this second verse is ingenious, yet we must regard it as rather specious than sound. Instead of “plead,” he employs the word “contend;” and interprets the contention to imply that Israel, instead of censuring the seeming severity of God’s dealings with them, should rather condemn their mother’s sin as the guilty cause of that severity, and thus cast the blame of their sufferings, not on God, as though he had falsified his covenant, but upon their mother, the Israelitish Church or kingdoms that had fallen away and fallen far from fulfilling the conditions of the covenant. After referring to the mark of disgrace fixed on the children born by a marriage with a wife who has been repudiated by her husband, he says, “When a husband repudiates his wife through waywardness, the children justly regard him with hatred. Why? ‘Because he loved not our mother as he ought to have done; he has not honored the bond of marriage.’ It is, therefore, usually the case that the children’s affections are alienated from their father, when he treats their mother with too little humanity or entire contempt. So the Israelites, when they saw themselves rejected, wished to throw the blame on God. For by the name mother are the people here called; it is transferred to the whole body of the people, or the race of Abraham. God had espoused that people to himself, and wished them to be like a with to him. Since, then, God was a Husband to the people, the Israelites were as sons born by that marriage. But when they were repudiated, the Israelites said that God dealt cruelly with them, for he had cast them away for no fault. The prophet now undertakes the defense of God’s cause, and speaks also in his person. ‘Contend, contend,‘ he says, ‘with your mother [your dispute is not with me].’ He brings this charge against the Israelites, that they had been repudiated for the flagitious conduct of their mother, and had ceased to be counted the children of God the blame of their rejection belonged to the whole race of Abraham (i.e. the mother); but no blame could be imputed to God.” We rather understand the pleading mentioned as that which the pious remnant of the nation, who had still kept themselves separate from idolatry and the general degeneracy, are exhorted to address to their mother, that is to say, to the bulk of the people with the heads of the congregation and rulers of the nation. It is the duty of believers to plead for God and his truth, even though the great body of Church or nation should be opposed to them. This is specially the case in times of spiritual leanness, and in days of deep declension or entire apostasy. Thus our Lord and his apostles plod with the people of the Jews in their days, charging their rulers, the chief priests and scribes and Pharisees, with the gravest dereliction of duty. Yet there must be tenderness in this pleading. It is remarkable that, as Jerome remarks, he commands “the sons (children) to speak not at all to the wife of their father whom she forsook, but to their mother who bare them.” Neither is there, on the other hand, any impropriety in thus pleading with an erring parent, for we find that Jonathan thus pleaded with his father, Saul, on behalf of David. Humble and modest, yet firm and faithful pleading, is not only lawful, but dutiful even on the part of private persons against national corruptions or public profanations, as of God’s Name, or Word, or day, or worship.

II. PENITENCE ENJOINED. Though Israel had forfeited her right to the name or privilege of wife since she had so grievously fallen away from faithfulness and affection, and though God disowned the relationship as she had virtually dissolved her marriage union by her unfaithfulness, yet she had not actually and formally received the bill of divorce parting her away; in other words, her outward and public rejection. There was thus still left space for repentance, and room for hope in case of repentance. So great is the mercy of God, that if she lent an ear to the pleadings of her children orphaned through her misconduct, and put away her whoredoms or defilements with many lovers, and her adulteries or departures from her rightful Husband and Lord, she might hope for restoration. Thus God deals with sinners in general, if they will only hearken to the admonitions and invitations of his Word, and put away from them the objects, one or many, of their sinful attachment, which withdraw their affection from him who is their true and proper Object. There is a practical comment by Matthew Henry on the close of this verse which appears to us well worth quoting. He says, “Every sinful course persisted in is an adulterous departure from God; and here we may see what it is truly to repent of it and turn from it.

(1) True penitents will forsake both open sins and secret sins; will put away, not only the whoredoms that lie in sight, but those that lie in secret between their breaststhe sin that is rolled under the tongue as a sweet morsel.

(2) They will both avoid the outward occasions of sin and mortify the inward disposition to it.”

III. PUNISHMENT THREATENED. The punishment threatened in case of impenitence consists of several particulars.

1. There is destitution of the extremest kind. Israel would be stripped of all the favors, temporal and spiritual, which God had bestowed, and be so situated that she could not help herself. The idea is more fully developed by Ezekiel, who in Hosea 16. presents us with a most pitiable picturethat of an infant exposed, neglected, nude, and helpless: “As for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee; thou was not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to the loathing of thy person, in the day that thou wast born.”

2. Next to destitution is desolation. In this particular the representation is that of a wilderness and a dry land, or rather of a traveler in such a district. The nature of the wilderness or of the way through it is easily inferred from other Scriptures; thus we read of Israel’s departure from Horeb: “We went through all that great and terrible wilderness;” again it is written, “He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness.” A traveler, in journeying through that waste and howling and terrible wilderness, would meet with many a rough road, many a rugged way, many a rocky ascent, many an uncultivated waste, many a harsh sound, many a scaresome sight, many a tangled spot, many a thorny place, many a toil, and many a trial. Travelers passing through such a scene of desolation are said to wander “in the wilderness in a solitary way.”

3. The dangers of the wilderness are manifold. There is the place of lions’ dens. and of the mountains el the leopards. There, too, the Israelites of old encountered the fiery serpents that infested it. For a time they had been restrained, but afterwards they were uncontrolled, and even commissioned to chastise the erring Israelites.

4. Death itself is included in the threatened punishment:” And slay her with thirst.” There is no water to cleanse, no thirst-satisfying fountain, no life-giving spring. Of wayfarers in such a region it is written,” They were hungry and thirsty; their soul fainted in them.”

IV. POSTERITY INVOLVED IN THE THREATENED PUNISHMENT. The repetition of” lest” at the beginning of verse 4 is needed to make the meaning plain and carry on the connection. Particular members of a Church or nation too o[ten share the sins of the general body or rulers of the people; so too children, frequently following in the footsteps of godless parents, suffer by the sad heritage of those parents’ guilt; for God “visits the sins of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation of them that hate him.” It has been well said that “God visits the sins of the parents upon the children until the entailed curse be cut off by repentance.”

V. PERSISTENCE IN SIN. The harlotry and shameful conduct of the libidinous woman, who represents Israel in this passage, evidence the greatest perversity. In spite of warnings ant threatenings, in spite of entreaties and exhortations, and in spite of inducements and invitations, Israel persists in her iniquitous idolatry and perseveres in her shameless conduct. Like an abandoned woman, who has renounced all the instinctive modesty of womanhood, and who, instead of waiting for the addresses of paramours, actually takes the initiative, and pursues them with her unwomanly appeals, Israel goes after her lovers, that is, her idols, or, as some think, her idolatrous allies We may not, however, overlook the fact that, besides the gross idolatry of Israel, there is a spiritual idolatry, to which all are exposed, and to which many are addicted. Anything that draws away our thoughts and affections from God, or that occupies that place in our heart that belongs to him, is an idolnot so rude as the image of wood, or stone, or metal, but not less perilous, not less pernicious, not less insidious. Let us beware of following such lovers; let us beware of spiritual harlotry, and of shamefully pursuing wealth, or fame, or power, or pleasure, anti of turning aside from God!

VI. PROSPERITY REGARDED AS THE BESTOWMENT OF IDOLS. Israel in time of plenty forgot the important lesson that her prosperity came from God. Her sottish stupidity was only equaled by her ingratitude, when she attributed all she had to those miserable idols on which her heart was fixed, and of which she showed herself so dotingly fond. Put by Jehovah into the possession of such a lifesome land, of food in abundance, of raimentgarments tinier and outerand of the luxuries as well as the comforts of life, she forgotbasely forgotthat she continued a pensioner on his providence and blessed by his bounties. Bad enough and base enough as such ingratitude was, it was still worse to transfer her love and her gratitude to idols dumb such as blinded nations fear. How unspeakably mean it was on Israel to form such a low estimate of religion as to value it according to the worldly advantages to be derived from it, or in proportion to the selfish interests served by it! How much worse stilt to depend on idols for such advantages, and in hope of furthering those interests!

Hos 2:6-13

The pains and penalties that are attached to sin.

In the Book of Judges it is stated once and again that, when the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, he delivered them into the hand of their enemies. “They forsook the Lord, and served Baal and Ashtaroth. And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of the spoilers that spoiled them; The children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord And the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin King of Canaan;” “And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord: and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian.”

I. THE DIFFICULTIES PLACED IS THEIR WAY. First there is a hedge, which no one can crush through without risk of painful lacerations. God frequently draws round sinful pleasures, as a fence, severe sufferings to warn men against their indulgence. But when all restraints are cast aside, and men will force their way through all such fences, there is another mode of Divine operation, which opposes an insurmountable barrier to men’s lusts. If a hedge may be broken through, a wall cannot; if a hedge fail to check men in their onward career of sin, a wall will effect the purpose. 1t thorns in the flesh do not deter men from sinful gratifications, a wall is raised up that cannot be passed over, when, through failure of bodily strength, the crippling of worldly resources, the removal of opportunity or occasion, or otherwise, those gratifications become impossible. The sorrows which Israel suffered by their idols and idolatrous alliances were only the hedge, and served merely for a partial and passable fence; the wall was a complete separation between them and their sins.

II. THE DEFEAT OF HER DESIGNS. The most vigorous pursuit fails, the most minute search is frustrated. For years and centuries the Hebrew race has had their eyes directed to a temporal Messiah, who would lead the armies of his people, fight their battles, triumph over all enemies, and raise them to the highest pinnacle of human greatness, and their nation to a proud pre-eminence among the kingdoms of the earth. We know the result. God has hedged up their way and walled up their path. So, too, with sinners in general. God often seeks by cross providences to withdraw man from his purpose. He places thorns and snares in the way of the froward, making the way of sin difficult, sometimes impossible, so that they follow after their beloved lusts but do not overtake them, and seek them but cannot find them. How different with the search after gospel grace! It is “ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find.”

III. THE DETERMINATION AT LENGTH ARRIVED AT. The disappointments which Israel meets with bring them to a sense of sin and its sorrows. Having long and eagerly sought satisfaction in the pursuits of the world and in the pleasures of sense, they are forced at last to acknowledge their mistake. Such things do not and cannot satisfy; they are husks that starve but do not support a hungry soul; their idols cannot succor them in the time of need. They recall the early history of their nation, and, contrasting the past with the present, are convinced of the better days that had long gone by. They thought of the time when Jehovah was the God of Israel, sitting between the cherubim, and when the prosperity of the people had kept pace with their piety. How different now! How different ever after Jeroboam seduced them to the idolatry of the calves, or Ahab indoctrinated them in the heathenish rites of the dual deities of Phoenicia! The retrospect persuaded them of their sad mistake in departing from their true Husband and Head. Finding themselves hardly bestead, their condition desperate, and their hopes blighted, they determine to retrace their steps, and with sentiments and language closely akin to the prodigal in our Lord’s parable, they set about the accomplishment of their purpose.

IV. THE SAD MISTAKE OF ISRAEL. In the time of their plenty and prosperity they mistook the source of their blessings, as also the right use of them. They attributed them to their idols, and abused them in their service. Worldly prosperity was what Israel, in the period of degeneracy, most cared for. What contributed to bodily gratification, luxurious living, and worldly wealth, was most esteemed by them. These they counted blessings, and regarded as the bestowments of their idols. Just as in Jeremiah’s time their brethren, or rather sisters, of Judah clung obstinately and stupidly to the evil and error of their ways, saying,” We will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth, to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, as we have done, we, and our fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.” Whatever excuse the heathen may have had when they spoke of their corn as coming from Ceres, and their wine as the gift of Bacchus, and their wealth as bestowed by Ptutus, Israel had none; for they had early been instructed in the knowledge of the one living and true Cod, and early as well as impressively reminded that the good land, which yielded the corn and on which the vine and olive grew, was God’s gift; and that it was God, moreover, who gave them power to get wealth, so that however plentiful the silver and abundant the gold, they owed all to him. Worst of all, they not only mistook the Author of these mercies, but perverted them to the service of a rival deity, thus provoking Jehovah to jealousy with that which was not God, but the miserable idol of Sidon, Tyre, and Phoenicia.

V. SEVERE CHASTISEMENT WAS THE CONSEQUENCE. This was to be expected. Created things are given to man for his service, and man himself was created for God’s service; but when man perverts the creatures which God has given him, and, instead of serving and glorifying God by means of them, actually employs them in ways and for purposes derogatory to the Divine glory, no wonder the Almighty, in just indignation, should snatch them from him who so misuses and abuses them. As in yen. 8 the addition of the personal pronoun to the verb gives emphasis, so in verse 9 the repetition of the possessive pronoun with the nouns serves the same end. “She did not know, not she, that I even I it was that gave her corn and wine and oil, therefore I will take away my corn, my wine, my wool, and my flax.” God requires two things at least in return for his mercies:

(1) that we gratefully acknowledge the Giver in the gifts; and

(2) that we employ them in his service or to his glory.

Men praise the fruitful earth, but it is God that makes the earth fruitful; men talk learnedly of the laws of nature, but it is God that invests nature with those functions, or arranges those natural sequences called laws; men boast of good fortune, but such fortune is only the bounteous providence of God. Whether, then, it is articles of food, or materials of raiment, or the precious metals which represent wealth that men possess, it is God that either gives or withholds at pleasure. How beautifully this lesson is inculcated in that precious chapter, the eighth of Deuteronomy! “When thou hast eaten and art full, then thou shalt bless the Lord thy God for the good land which he hath given thee;” and again, beware that “thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. But thou shalt remember the Lord thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth.” Further, the question with Israel, as with the heathen both then and now, is, “What shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed?” whereas the question should be. “How shall we use God’s gifts to God’s glory; so that whether we eat or drink, or whatever we do, we may glorify God?” The abuse of God’s mercies abridges the time of their enjoyment; when we misuse or mismanage our stewardship, he turns us out of office, and tells us we may be no longer stewards; when we forget the Giver and forsake his service, we forfeit our interest m his gifts. The manner, too, of their removal adds justly merited severity to the stroke. Just as the time of reaping arrives, the harvest becomes a heap; just as the ship reaches the port, it becomes a wreck; just at the season when all seems sure and hopes are highest, the blight descends and expectation ends in bitterest disappointment.

VI. SHAME AGGRAVATES THE CHASTISEMENT. A sense of shame is sometimes the most painful punishment; men of greatest physical courage have often been found devoid of sufficient moral courage to bear up against a laugh or resist a sneer. Besides, when insult is added to injury, the indignity is complete. When Israel prospered, her folly was covered and her sin cloaked; her lewdness was long concealed, being unseen, or overlooked, or thought lightly of. But when the prosperity is withdrawn, the covering is cast aside and the cloak torn off. Outward prosperity, while it lasts, is like gilding over many a lewd life, or like veneering over a loose character. But when, in the providence of God, the day of adversity comes, the inward vileness becomes transparent; when Israel fell from her prosperous state, her corruption was made manifest, even in the sight of the idols she loved, and whose love-tokens she fancied herself to have enjoyed, or of the idolatrous nations whose alliance she courted, or of the sun and moon which as deities she worshipped; she is stripped naked, and exposed to shame, contempt, and insult. Nor is there any hope of remedy or prospect of recovery. It has been well remarked that “those who will not deliver themselves into the hand of God’s mercy, cannot be delivered out of the hand of his justice.”

VII. SORROW FOLLOWS SHAME IN THE DAY OF ISRAEL‘S DISTRESS. Israel continued to keep up the outward ordinances of religion, but the inward essence had long departed; there was the semblance of worship, but the reality was altogether absent; there was a form of godliness, but it was destitute of the living power. Jeroboam had made the worship of Jehovah a state religion. The changes he introduced were with the view of furthering his political interests. The worship he established was a sort of rival worship, so that the breach between the ten tribes and the two might become wider and still widening. He changed the manner of worship by the introduction of images or symbols, so that Jehovah was worshipped under the form of a calf, as though in allusion to the cherubim over the mercy-seat; he changed the place of worship from its central seat at Jerusalem to Dan in the north and Bethel in the south; he changed the time of worship, at least in the case of the Feast of Tabernacles, from the seventh month to the eighth, as though the harvest was later in the north than in the south; he changed the ministers of worship, taking the priests out of all the tribes without distinction, and not from that of Levi, which had resisted his innovations and refused to sanction his godless novelties. But notwithstanding these changesand important changes they werehe retained so much of the national worship as suited his purpose, and did not clash with his usurpation or tend to weaken his authority. Israel still had the weekly sabbath, memorial of creation work completed; and the month-sabbath, a monthly dedication to God. They had the three yearly festivalsthe pesach, with the chag ha-matzoth, to commemorate the deliverance from Egypt; the chag ha-sh’bu’oth, or feast of weeks, called also chag ha-gatzir, the feast of harvest, and yom ha-biccurim, day of firstfruits; and the chag ha-asiph, the feast of ingathering, or chag ha-succoth. feast of tabernacles, or simply chag, the feast by way of eminence, the completion of the ingathering of fruits and vintage, and commemoration of Israel dwelling in tents in the wilderness; they had all the other solemn feasts of thanksgiving to God for special providences or particular blessings. With all these feasts were associated merry-makings, especially with that of tabernacles; but now God takes all these away. The outward joy had for long been severed from that inward spiritual joy of true religion; only the semblance remained, for the substance was gone. And now shadow as well as substance is to pass away. God in judgment turns their joy into sorrow, their mirth into melancholy. “Sin and mirth,” says an old writer, “can never hold long together; but if men will not take away sin from their mirth, God will take away mirth from their sin.”

VIII. RUIN OF THEIR PROSPECTS AS WELL AS OF THEIR POSSESSIONS. The threatened destruction of their vines and fig trees affected, not only their present and actual possessions, but also their future and possible prospects. The fruits of one year, or even of several, might fail; but other years of better harvests and other seasons of greater fruitfulness might repair in some measure the loss. The destruction here threatened, however, is not only that of one year’s fruits or of one season’s produce, but the cutting off of all future hope. It is not only the destruction of the fruits, but of the trees, and so a ruin without remedy. Neither is it a partial destructionsome of those fruit-bearing trees being still sparedbut total; the country would be laid waste, the fences would be broken down, the enclosures taken away, and the vineyards left as a common; the fig trees would give place to forest trees, and wild beasts devour and dwell amid the ruins. Yet Israel could not say that this ruin was unmerited, for the prophet is careful to remind them bow foully they had abused the favors of God’s providence, and scandalously regarded them as the fruits of their idolatry, the gifts of their idols, or the hire of their spiritual adultery.

IX. RETRIBUTION COMMENSURATE WITH THEIR WRONGDOING. God’s chastisements in this, as often in other cases, bear an obvious proportion to the heinousness of men’s sin and the time of its continuance. Like wicked men and seducers in general, idolaters wax worse and worse. From the wrong way of worshipping God under the images of the calves according to their own devices, they had proceeded to the grosser sin of setting up an idol in his place. This idolatry had long continued, and that continuance made an era in their history here named the days of Baalim.

1. The variety of this idolatry is specified. They worshipped Baal under divers forms, for divers purposes, and in divers places; and hence the plural, Baalim.

2. We may notice the devoutness of their idolatry. The burning of incense preceded the morning and succeeded the evening sacrifice of a lamb in the temple. It was symbolical of prayer and thanksgiving; it was, in fact, the highest and holiest of the priest’s functions, as we may infer from Luk 1:9.

3. Further, the preparation and pomp of this service to which Israel prostituted the wealth she possessed, decking herself, adulteress-like, with her earrings and her jewels, and lavishing the good gifts of God’s providence on contemptible and filthy idols.

4. Her eagerness for idol-worship is as noticeable as it is lamentable. Unsought, unsolicited, without inducement or allurement, she takes the initiative, and with unblushing importunity makes advances to her lovers.

5. The blackest sin of all, and in some sort the source of all, was her forgetfulness of God. Alas! how often do men and women abuse the best gifts of God, and pervert them to the vilest purposes! How often are they far more zealous in a wrong course than in the right! How often do sinful pursuits engross their noblest powers! How often does the storm of evil passion sweep away all thoughts of God out of their mind I How often, amid the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eye, the pride of life, groveling avarice, soaring ambition, and schemes of worldliness, do men forget God altogether; or at least how often do they consecrate to self, or sensuality, or sin in some of its countless forms, the thoughts, affections, and love which God claims as justly his duel How often, too, does God visit with terrible retribution the sins of such!

Hos 2:14-23

Sympathy with Israel in spite of their sins.

The laken which introduces Hos 2:14 is rendered by some “notwithstanding,“ and this is what we might expect; but it is opposed by linguistic usage. We muse adhere to the ordinary translation, which is “therefore.” The word thus translated tends to exalt our idea of God’s goodness. Israel had sinned and forgotten God; the “therefore” we would expect, and the inference we would draw is God‘s final and forever abandonment of such a sinful, God-forgetting people. Not so, however. Israel had sinned by idolatry, and sunk into a depth of misery from which they were utterly unable to extricate themselves. But their extremity is God’s opportunity; their misery appeals to God’s mercy; and what man could not do, and man would not do if he could, God does, lifting Israel up out of the pit of misery into which, through sin and forgetfulness of God, they had plunged. Not their desert, but their distress, turned the eye of Divine compassion upon them. “His ways are not as our ways, neither are his thoughts as our thoughts.” “He hath not dealt with us,” says the psalmist, “after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.” He had indeed dealt with Israel in wrath, tad prepared the people to put away their idols, and now, to prevent them giving way to despair, he deals with them in mercy.

1. “This ‘therefore’ has a strange and wonderful ‘wherefore’ if we dwell on what precedes: ‘She went after her lovers, and forgot me, saith the Lord. Therefore, behold, I will allure her:’ there needs, indeed, a ‘behold’ to be put to this ‘therefore.’… The right knowledge of the fullness, and riches of the grace of the covenant will help us out of this difficulty, and tell us how these two, the greatness of man’s sin and the riches of God’s grace, may have a connection one with another, and that by an illative ‘therefore.'”

2. The allurements of God are

(1) those manifestations which he makes of himself to his people, when he displays to them the beauty of his holiness, the goodness of his grace, the greatness of his mercy, and the glory of his power. Again,

(2) he allures men when he draws them away from the specious blandishments and subtle snares of sin and Satan, the world, and the flesh. He counteracts the enticements of things temporal, and turns the affections to things spiritual and eternal. From earthly gain he allures them to godliness, which, with contentment, is great gain; from the pleasures of the world he allures them to delight themselves in God and in the things of God; from all sinful pursuits and from all unworthy ambitions he allures us to seek our satisfaction in himself, and to set our affections on things above, where Jesus sits at God’s right hand.

3. He speaks comfortably to his people, literally, to their heart. Man can only speak to the ear, God speaks to the heart; yet God’s words in man’s mouth are brought home by the Holy Spirit to the affections, and so to the comfort of man’s heart.

4. Whether, then, the wilderness state be one of afflictive dispensations or of merciful deliverances, the power of Divine attraction is experienced and Divine consolations are enjoyed.

(1) Days of even painfully afflictive dispensations are often days of spiritual consolations; whereas in days of outward prosperity there are many obstructions barring the way to man’s heart and preventing the entrance of heavenly comfort.

(2) Again, what comfort we derive from the record of God’s merciful manifestations to his people in the past! “We may read the stories of God’s wonderful power displayed in delivering his people out of their straits in the wilderness, and make them our own; and plead with God that he would show forth that old, that ancient power and wisdom and goodness of his, as he did unto his people formerly.” Hence the prophet prays and teaches us to pray, “Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord, awake as in the ancient days, in the generations of old.”

I. RELIEF IS THE FIRST MANIFESTATION OF THIS MERCY. That relief is described in terms calculated to remind them of God’s gracious dealings with their forefathers, and to recall his merciful deliverance of them out of Egypt.

1. Several incidents connected with their redemption out of the land of bondage are laid hold of by the prophet and impressed into his prediction, which is thus rendered beautifully vivid and picturesque, of future deliverance. Among these incidents, which give such a life-like coloring to the prophecy, are God’s persuasion of Israel through his servants, Moses and Aaron; their exit from Egypt, and entrance into the wilderness on the way to Canaan; his cordial and comforting dealings with them in the wilderness, when he gave them that fiery, yet just and good and holy Law, instructed them in the ways and means whereby they might worship him acceptably, and took them into covenant with himself.

2. The Prophet Isaiah speaks of the wilderness becoming a fruitful field, and again of the wilderness and solitary place being gladdened, and of the desert rejoicing and blossoming as the rose. Whether, then, the wilderness itself shall bloom with vineyards for Israel, or whether, on emerging from the wilderness, they were to be put in possession of vineyards in the promised land, the promised blessing of restoration remains the same; while the responsive song of praise and thanksgiving, such as Moses and the men el Israel sang for the glorious triumph at the Red Sea, and in which Miriam and the women of Israel responded, shall be repeated on the occasion of Israel’s rehabilitation in their former inheritance.

3. A remembrancer of a practical kind is interjected, if we are to understand Achor rather appellatively than locally. That remembrancer of Achan’s sin, and Israel’s suffering in consequence, teaches the lesson sometimes difficult to realize, that the bitterest sorrow becomes the source of sweetest comfort to penitent souls. God subjects his people to humbling providences in order to make them contrite; he awakens within them painful convictions, to prepare them for heavenly consolations; he tries them by distressing circumstances, but it is by way of wholesome discipline; by all their wanderings in the wilderness he humbles and proves them in order to do them good at the latter end. If, too, like Israel, we put away sin, the accursed thing within us, we may confidently hope for God’s presence with us, and power to prevail over all enemies around us. Mortifying sin expels the troubles kern the camp; “trouble for sin, if it be sincere, opens a door of hope, for that sin that truly troubles us shall not ruin us.”

II. REVIEW OF GOD‘S DEALINGS WITH ISRAEL. In the strong language of prophecy, Israel had been married to God, but had proved unfaithful; going after other lovers, and thus committing spiritual adultery, which is idolatry. Her unfaithfulness had exposed her to the just judgments of God, issuing in her captivity.

1. From the fourteenth verse to the close of the present chapter, however, promises of mercy take the place of denunciation and reproof. Because of Israel’s adultery God had threatened her with a bill of divorce; but now he allures her, that is, woos her again, as a young man a maiden whom he means to make his wife, and in the sequel actually renews that relationship, as we learn from the words, “At that day thou shalt call me Ishi””my Husband.” He here dwells with complacency on his manner of dealing with her when alluring or wooing her in order to make her his wife. Having brought her into the wilderness, or a state of trouble and distress, and thereby humbled her, he wins her heart, not merely by pleasant words, but by most valuable presents.

2. These precious gifts are comfort, hope, and joy. These are the present manifestations of his love which he promises to bestow on Israel. He gives, or rather restores, the vineyards which had been forfeited; that is to say, he gives not only necessaries but delights, not only subsistence but abundance. Vineyards affording wine, which comforts and makes glad the heart of man, imply comfort, with the subsidiary notion of rest and peace, from the figure of men sitting restfully and peacefully under their own vine and fig tree. The second gift is hope. A door of hope, wide and effectual, is opened before God’s people, and they are privileged to enter in. The third is joy, spiritual joy, so that they have good ground and a right disposition to celebrate with songs of joy the praises of their Maker, who is at once their heavenly Husband and gracious Benefactor.

3. We must, however, note the manner of bestowal. It takes place after much trouble and great abasement. He gives “her vineyards from thence,” the reference being to the wilderness mentioned in the preceding verse. After difficulties and distresses in a land where they had been hardly bestead, and a condition in which they had been much straitened, they would have comforts of a most valuable kind. Further, the valley of Achor denotes the valley of trouble, and derives its name from having been the scene where God troubled the troubler of Israel, when Achan, who by his sin had troubled the host of Israel, was stoned to death. Sin is the soul-troubler still; and when sin is slain and forsaken, with sorrow of heart and bitterness of repentance, the door of hope flies open. Just as the valley of Achor was the door of hope to Israel, inasmuch as-it was the first place they got possession of on entering Canaan, and inasmuch as, valley of trouble though it was, it became the source of much good to them; so the valley of trouble and humiliation is often the opening up of hope and comfort to the believer. Conviction of sin causes trouble. The awakened sinner is troubled by a sense of guilt and fear of deserved wrath; but such troubling opens the door to conversion and comfort.

4. The history of Israel repeats itself in the history of God’s people still.

(1) The trials of the wilderness were past, and Israel anticipated rest and happiness in the hind of promise, but on the very threshold a sore trouble awaited them. So with ourselves; we may fancy trouble past, and flatter ourselves with future happiness, at the very time when other great and sore troubles are awaiting us.

(2) As Israel got vineyards from the wilderness, so God prepares us for great mercies by sore troubles or severe afflictions. “The afflictions of the saints are not only harbingers of mercies, but doors of hope to let in mercies, means to advance their progress. God commands light to shine, not only after darkness, but out of darkness. Joseph’s prison, David’s persecution, Daniel’s den, made way for the glorious mercies God had m store for them.” Many a one can say, “The undoing of worldly prosperity has been the making of me in religion;” in times of trouble, therefore, it is our duty to be patient, and our privilege even to be joyful.

(3) Instead of “door of hope,” the Septuagint translates, “to open their understanding;” and, though an inaccurate rendering, it conveys the meaning of God’s having opened the understanding of Israel to perceive the sinfulness of sin, God’s hot displeasure against it, the dreadfulness of his wrath, the holiness of his commandments, and the duty of putting away sin.

III. RENUNCIATION OF IDOLATRY IS IN CASE OF ISRAEL ANOTHER RESULT OF DIVINE MERCY. He draws them, and they run after him; he makes them willing in the day of his power. Relief from suffering is followed by renunciation of sin; this is a blessed consummation.

1. Other lords had dominion over her, but now she renounces all these, and devotes herself to Jehovah alone. So with sinners when they give up the sin that does most easily beset them. No longer is some beloved lust the subject of their thoughts or the object of their affections; no longer are they wedded to sensuality, or avarice, or ambition, or worldliness, or pride, or passion, or sin in any form; their Maker is now their Husband-even the Lord of hosts, which is his name. Nay, more; they acknowledge God as their Lord and Master, and so he is; they look up to him as their Patron and Protector, and so he is; they confess his right of ownership so as to dispose of them according to his sovereign will and pleasureand they do welt, for so he is.

2. But, above all this, they can come nearer to him and claim a closer connection; with holy boldness they can approach his throne with more confidence and less apprehension than Esther to her imperial husband, when she touched the golden scepter which he held out to her. The Church can address Jehovah not merely as Baali”my Lord,” but with true wifely affection as Ishi”my Husband.” Or, if the distinction we have intimated be disallowed, the name of an idol shall never again be put in the place of the living God, according to the injunction in Exo 23:13, “Make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy month.” So with whatever lust, or evil appetite, or sinful gratification, or vicious course we have had for an idol, let it not be once named among us.

3. But how is the change effected? It is God himself who by his grace brings it about. “I,” says God, “will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth.” The very name is to be treated with abhorrence; it must never more be mentioned, but consigned to the oblivion of the past. God himself girds his people with strength for the sacrifice; “for it is God which worketh in you both to will arid to work, for his good pleasure.”

“The dearest idol I have known,

Whate’er that idol be,

Help me to pluck it from thy throne,

And worship only thee.”

IV. RESTORATION TO PEACE LIKE THAT OF PARADISE. Once sin is renounced and man is at peace with God, he has peace with all around.

1. A scene of peace did once prevail on earth; it was in Paradise. In those Eden bowers our foreparents enjoyed sweet peace; they had peace with each other, peace and communion with God. Day was succeeded by night, and night melted into day; they slept, they waked, they walked; they kept that Paradisaical spot and dressed it. Above, around, within, the Divine favor brightly shone. No sound of discord was anywhere heard, nor did jarring note intrude. But soon as man broke the peace by turning rebel against God, the beasts, that till then had been subject to man and rendered him willing service, rose in fury and in fierceness against him. Man by sin turned a foe to himself, roused to rage the creatures before subject to him, and was at war with his fellow.

2. But when Israel returns to allegiance to God, the various sections of animate creation shall resume subjection to him. Wild beasts of the most savage nature, or bloodthirsty disposition, or venomous character, shall be at peace with him; the fowls of heaven, the winged emissaries of the evil one, that snatch the Divine Word out of the heart, shall lose the power of injury; enemies resembling the creeping things of the ground, however harmful before in enticing to low lusts, and leaving the slimy trail of sin behind, shall be restrained from hurtling. Not only so; the curse of war shall cease. Jehovah pledges himself by covenant to bless Israel with peace; but the promise carries us on to that happy day when the Prince of peace shall restore peace to the individual heart, peace to the domestic hearth, and peace to the human family throughout all the world.

3. When the weapons of war shall have perished, men shall’ dwell, not only in safety, but security. They shall he fearless of every foe; fearless of all the powers of evil; fearless in life, for “perfect love casteth out fear;” fearless in death, and triumphant over the last enemy. May the good Lord hasten that time when

“No strife shall rage, nor hostile feuds

Disturb these peaceful years;

To ploughshares men shall beat their swords,

To pruning-hooks their spears.

No longer hosts, encount’ring hosts,

Shall crowds of slain deplore:

They hang the trumpet in the hall,

And study war no more.”

V. RENEWAL OF THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT OR COVENANT. If we take this Old Testament picture and put it in a New Testament frame, or if we take this Old Testament flower and transplant it to the New Testament parterre, we shall realize the words of the apostle to the Ephesians, when he says, “Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word, that he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the Church.”

1. The betrothal is in righteousness, in truthful sincerity, without the suspicion of dissimulation on the one side or the shadow of hypocrisy on the other; in judgment, with due deliberation, not rashly, not unadvisedly, not through some sudden or fitful impulse; in loving-kindness, in outward acts of kindness and innumerable love-tokens; in mercies, in bowels of mercy; this is the source whence all those countless acts of kindness proceed, the fountain from which such abundant streams of love flow forth; in faithfulness, in stability on the part of God, “with whom there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning,” and steadfastness on the part of the saint. These are the precious stones in the wedding-ring which the bride, the Lamb’s wife, receivesrighteousness and judgment, loving-kindness and mercies, faithfulnessand thus the guarantee of a union that is to last for ever.

VI. REVIVAL OF PROSPERITY. In this part of the pictureand a beautiful picture is here presented to uswe see a specimen of the manifold wisdom of God, and of the many links in the chain of his providence. The boldness of the figure, and the beauty of the personification exhibiting the chain of second causes, and their connection with the great First Cause of all, have been much admired. When the people of God stand in need of, and prayerfully seek, outward comforts, “immediately the corn and the wine and the oil, as if they heard their complaints, shall say, O Lord, we would help Jezreel, and satisfy these thy servants. The corn shall cry to the earth, O earth, let me come into thy bowels; I will rot there that so I may bring forth fruit for this people. The vines and the olives shall desire the earth to receive them, to impart juice and nourishment to them, that they may refresh these reconciled ones of God. The earth shall say, Oh that I may receive the corn and wine and oil that I may be fruitful in my kind! but, ye heavens, I can do nothing except I have your influences, and the warm beams of the sun to make me fructify; come, therefore, and assist me, that I may bear fruit for Jezreel. And the heavens shall cry, Lord, we would fain help the earth, that the earth may help the corn and wine and oil, that they may supply Jezreel; but we can do nothing without thy hand; therefore hear us and suffer us to ram upon the earth, that it may become fruitful.” Thus the creatures plead with each other for the saints of God; God hears the heavens, and the heavens the earth, and the earth the corn and wine and oil, and the corn and wine and oil supply abundance to the people of God.

1. If the creatures cry to one another for help to the people of God, shall we turn a deaf ear to the appeals of God’s afflicted people when they cry for help to us? Or shall we refuse to hearken to the call of God when he summons us to help forward his cause and extend his kingdom?

2. If God hears his creatures when they cry to him for our support, what encouragement we have to believe that he will hear his own Son, when, as Advocate and Intercessor, he pleads on our behalf and in the presence of God for us!

HOMILIES BY C. JERDAN

Hos 2:2-7

Jehovah’s condemnation of faithless Israel.

In Hos 1:1-11. the prophet has Fainted a “vigorous fresco” (Ewald) illustrative of his domestic sorrows. And now he presents an explanation of the sad picture in its prophetic meaning. The supreme thought of the Book of Hosea is that of Jehovah’s conjugal love for Israel, which she by her unfaithfulness had so foully dishonored. Here, in Hos 2:1-23; accordingly, we have an allegory suggested by the prophet’s symbolic marriage with Gomer; which depicts the deep sorrow of Jehovah on account of Israel’s fall, and his long-suffering tenderness towards her. The first strophe (Hos 2:2-7) is occupied chiefly with words of solemn condemnation.

I. THE DIVINE, REPROACH. Jehovah charges Israel with:

1. Spiritual adultery. (Hos 2:2, Hos 2:4, Hos 2:5) He was himself the rightful Husband of the nation, but she had slighted and rejected his love. With infatuated determination she kept saying, “I will go after my lovers.” There was the calf-worship; and the calves were simply idols (Hos 13:2). There was the Baal-worship, with its shameful impurities. There was the infidelity which had shown itself in separation from the dynasty of David. These were spurious, carnal loves; and the people who cherished them were guilty of spiritual harlotry.

2. Ascribing her material prosperity to their idols. (Hos 2:5) Jeroboam I. had done so: “Behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up cut of the land of Egypt” (1Ki 12:28). Jeroboam II. was still doing so; during these gala-days of his reign Israel trusted in her own might, and boasted of her military glory. The calf-worship meant virtually the deification of nature. The Baal-worship was the idolatry of mere power, apart altogether from righteousness. Among Hosea’s fellow-countrymen, as by so many in our own days, the worship of the living God was neglected amidst the deification of the popular will, reverence for physical law, and the idolatry of worldly success. These were the powersIsrael judged in her blindnessthat made her land prosperous.

3. The guilt of an outrage upon the Divine honor. (Verse 2) In degrading herself, Israel had foully dishonored her rightful Husband. For two centuries now her infidelity had been one long agony to Jehovah’s heart. And how often, since the days of Hosea, has God been similarly grieved! He was so with Judah before her captivity (Jer 3:8-11), and with the Jewish Church in the time of our Lord. Of how many Christian communities also has the Lord been constrained to say, “She is not my wife”e.g; the Churches at Ephesus and Thyatira (Rev 2:4, Rev 2:20); the Church of the dark ages before the Reformation; every Church that remains in Erastian bondage; every one that is grossly impure in doctrine or communion.

II. THE DIVINE THREATENING. The word “lest” was fitted to remind Israel that, guilty and fallen though she was, it was still possible for her, by timely repentance, to avert the impending judgments. Should she, however, stop her ears to the Lord’s reproaches:

1. He will take away her temporal prosperity. (Verse 3) At the time of her birth as a nation, Israel was in a low condition indeed. In Egypt she had to struggle for life, like a castaway child. The very continuance of her existence seemed a miracle (Eze 16:3-6). But God now threatens to chastise her for her faithlessness by making her again a castaway. He will strip her of her material resources, bring to the ground her national pride, and cause her to become like a parched and desolate desert. The Almighty will touch with his finger her choicest possessions, and consign to destruction everything which has become tainted with the Baal-spirit.

2. He will involve in this distress the individual children of the nation. (Verse 4) The ten tribes had been unanimous in their apostasy. Each citizen had brought his own contribution to the universal guilt. There was meantime no godly remnant who could be thought of with comfort as still the Lord’s people. So all must suffer in one common punishment. And what a dreadful doom to become “Lo-ruhamah”to be shut out even from the very “mercy” of God!

III. THE DIVINE DISCIPLINE. The condemnation is not, after all, with a view to “a bill of divorcement;” rather it is the first step of a course of gracious discipline. The discipline consists of:

1. Restraining words. (Verse 2) Jehovah’s heart is so full of relenting towards Ephraim that he summons individual citizens, who may have become themselves penitent, to reason with the nation at large about its sin. The children are to share in the mother’s punishment; and it is right that they should expostulate with her regarding her manifold idolatry.

2. Restraining providences. (Verses 6, 7) God will effect a forcible separation between Israel and her idols. The seventy years’ captivity of Judah would be as it were a “hedge” of “thorns.” The perpetual exile of Ephraim would be a solid wall interposed between the northern tribes and their “Baalim.” Such methods of restraint God had often employed heretofore. The Book of Judges tells us of no fewer than six thorn-fences which God planted in succession, to break off the seductive alliances formed from time to time with the idolatrous Canaanites. The long drought during Ahab’s reign was a wail thrown up between him and his Baal-worship. But none of these obstructions had been permanently effectual. Only the Assyrian and Babylonish captivities were so. By their long exile the Jews were at length forever weaned from all gross idolatry. They could not forget that their false gods had given them no aid against the thundering advance of the Assyrian, or during the last agonies of Samaria and Jerusalem.

3. Restraining grace. (Verse 7) It is here predicted that the distresses of the protracted exile shall induce repentance, and awaken a longing desire to return to Jehovah. By the moral discipline of sorrow he will operate upon the hearts of his erring people, and sweetly draw them back to himself. As the “mighty famine” became the means of convincing the prodigal that he had wandered from his true well-being in leaving his father’s house (Luk 15:14-19); so Israel, in her days of sad adversity, shall resolve to return to the home of her Divine Husband, to whom she has for so long been unfaithful. This glorious consummation is still future. We think of it as belonging to “the last things.” But it shall most surely be accomplished. There will be a national conversion of the Jews to the Christian faith. Israel shall “go and return to her first Husband;” “for the Lord delighteth in her, and her land shall be married” (Isa 62:4).

LESSONS.

1. The exceeding sinfulness of sin. It is whoredom and adultery. How it debases and brutifies man’s noble nature! It also blinds the mind to the true source of blessing (verse 5). And what an agony it must be to the pure and loving heart of God!

2. The unprofitableness of a sinful life. Even from the sinner’s point of view, such a life never pays. What expenditure of time and toil, of health and substance, a career of vice entails I How precarious, too, are all merely temporal blessings, and how utterly unsatisfying to those who choose them as their soul’s portion!

3. The goodness of God in the restraints which he imposes upon the sinner. He has many “hedges” and “wails”public opinion, conscience, temporal loss, personal sickness, family bereavement, etc. These become inestimable blessings to a man when they hinder him in a course of sin, and constrain him, not only to confess his folly (verse 7), but to turn from it to the Lord.C.J.

Hos 2:8-13

Prosperity abased and blighted.

In this second strophe of the chapter Jehovah continues to expatiate upon Israel’s ingratitude and infidelity, and warns her with solemn iteration of the punishment awaiting her. These verses speak of

I. PROSPERITY PLENTIFULLY BESTOWED. (Hos 2:8, Hos 2:9) The time of Jeroboam II; to which this part of the prophecy refers, was to Israel one of unexampled national wealth. The kingdom seemed as rich and powerful at that period as it had been even in the days of Solomon. The ten northern cantons, we must remember, included the fairest and most fertile districts of Palestine. They possessed “the glory of Lebanon, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon,” the fruitful meadows of Bashan, and the green pasture-lands of Gilead. So Ephraim was rich in “corn and wine and oil,” in “wool and flax,” in “silver and gold.” But has not God bestowed vastly greater gifts upon our own country? The climate of our island is damp, and its soil only moderately fertile; yet how much wealth there is amongst us! God has exalted Great Britain to heaven. The English nation is colonizing the world. And for what purpose does the Lord confer temporal prosperity? It is with the same design for which he lends us spiritual blessingsthat we may learn to know him, and love him, and serve him.

II. PROSPERITY SHAMEFULLY ABUSED. Israel’s prosperity was only in material things. Although imposing, it was external and hollow. It was not the wealth of well-being; for:

1. The Giver was ignored. (Hos 2:8) “She did not know,” means that she was not willing to know. Her material prosperity begat pride, and pride engendered forgetfulness of God. But Israel was without excuse. For she had been taught by Moses (Deu 8:1-20). She had been warned by Elijah (1Ki 17:1-24). Every page of her marvelous history spoke of the Divine bounty. The offering of the first-fruitsthe three great Hebrew festivalsand especially the Feast of Pentecost, were all just so many solemn thanksgivings to Jehovah for the blessings of his providence. It was true that the men of Ephraim still formally observed these institutions, but the living spirit of them had ebbed away; God was no longer remembered as the Giver of all good. And are there not multitudes still, even in Christian lands, who make no grateful acknowledgment of the Divine mercies? They ascribe their successes entirely to their good luck; or, at best, to their skill, or enterprise, or industry (Hab 1:16), without recognizing the smile of a benignant Providence upon their efforts.

2. The prosperity itself was deified. (Hos 2:8, Hos 2:12, Hos 2:13) Ephraim prostituted it to the worship of the powers of physical nature. The people became “lotus-eaters;” they were enervated with sensuous pleasure. They regarded their harvests as the gifts of the Baalimthe “lovers’ wages” which they received from their idols (Hos 2:12). They employed their silver and gold in the manufacture of images of Baal and Ashtaroth (Hos 2:8), as well as in the adornment of their persons for the celebration of the idolatrous festivals (Hos 2:13). But are not similar evils rampant just now amongst ourselves? The air is still full of the spirit of Baalismthe deification of force, the worship of success. We meet with this spirit:

(1) In politics. “Witness the French saying: ‘ God is always on the side of the heavy battalions.’ Witness Prince Bismarck’s motto: ‘Beati possidentes.’ Witness the modern English phrase: ‘ British interests,’ as used to express a rule of diplomacy which some regard as even more binding than the moral Law.”

(2) In economics. There can be only one true system of political economy; but in times of trade-disputes the capitalist and the laborer often adhere to diverse systems. The strike and the lock-out are an appeal to physical forcea virtual offering of the prayer, “O Baal, hear us!”

(3) In philosophy. How many of our modern scientists deify nature under the name of” law”! They repudiate Providence, and recognize only force. They ignore the living God, and substitute in his room some blind impersonal power. They exalt proud reason to the place which should be occupied by a childlike faith. They ask us to accept a reading of the universe which leaves out the fact of sin, and the soul’s hunger for immortality.

(4) In literature. How many of our great authorspoet historians, and even moralistshave dedicated their golden intellectual gifts to the service of materialism!

(5) In social life. The immense increase of wealth in our time tends to foster ostentatious and luxurious habits. What multitudes “bow the knee” to the Baal of commercial success! With many life consists not in being, but only in having. But” the word of the Lord by Hosea” reminds us that the love of the world is moral harlotry, and that deference to its spirit is Baalism.

III. PROSPERITY MISERABLY BLIGHTED. Israel shall suffer:

1. Deprivation. (Verse 9) She has refused to remember God, therefore he win compel her to think of him. He is the real Proprietor of the corn and wine, of the wool and flax. Israel was only his steward, and yet she has claimed these precious gifts as if they were altogether within her own power. So the Lord will suddenly withdraw them. He will send the foreign foe, or the simoom, or the locusts. He will blast the ears of corn when they are just ready for the sickle. He will destroy the vine-clusters in the very hour of the vintage. He will take away his material gifts from those who worship only a God of corn and wine, forgetting that the true God is “righteous,” and “loveth righteousness.” It is a simple matter for Divine Providence to pauperize the man who is making his own prosperity an idol. He may do it by means of business losses, or family bereavement, or personal affliction, or by giving power to the monitions of conscience.

2. Chastisement. God can and will “curse our blessings” (Mal 2:2) if we persistently misuse them. So in store for poor Israel there shall be:

(1) Shame. (Verse 10) The Lord will dishonor her before her idols themselves by withdrawing his gifts, and exposing Israel’s folly in placing her trust in material things.

(2) Mourning. (Verse 11) The people’s sinfulness and their light-hearted mirth, which they had unnaturally wedded to each other, shall be divorced. What though Israel still professed to observe joyfully the Mosaic festivals? She could have no true gladness in Jehovah, so long as she refused to recognize his supremacy in providence. Her mirth was “the laughter of the fool,” and God would turn it into mourning.

(3) Exile. (Verse 12) The vineyards and the fig orchards shall become “a forest” (Psa 107:33, Psa 107:34). The ravaging Assyrian shall come, like “the boar out of the wood,” and root up the vine which was at first brought out of Egypt. Ephraim shall disappear forever from among the nations.

CONCLUSION. We should cherish gratitude to the Hebrew prophets for the great lesson which they constantly teach, viz; that national sin is certain, in the course of providence, to be followed by national calamity.

“In them is plainest taught and easiest learnt
What makes a nation happy, and keeps it so;
What ruins kingdoms, and lays cities flat.”

(Milton)

A nation’s strength does not consist in its wealth, nor in its armies, nor in its diplomacy. The true palladium of a commonwealth is its moral character. And the destiny of a people is determined by their willingness to lay to heart the lessons of national chastisement, and to use these as stepping-stones to a purer life.C.J.

Hos 2:14-20

Israel’s restoration.

The word “therefore,” with which this strophe opens, illustrates the blessed truth that God’s thoughts are not our thoughts. The conclusion here is not what the premises would have led us to expect. This “therefore” is of Divine grace, not of hard cold intellect. Although Israel has foully dishonored her heavenly Husband, and must be severely chastised, he will not give her a” bill of divorcement” to put her away. Rather, her miseries shall attract his mercies. Jehovah’s love uses even her shameful unfaithfulness as an argument for the bestowal of his own matchless grace. These verses describe the future restoration, both of the literal and the spiritual Israel; and they are also a parable illustrative of God’s thoughts and ways towards every returning prodigal.

I. THE METHODS OF ISRAEL‘S RESTORATION. (Hos 2:14) We need not stay to speak of its Author, even although the first “I” (Hos 2:14) is emphatic. Only Jehovah himself has heart and power equal to this task. Only he who makes the summer of the year can produce that spiritual summer which is here described with such tender pathos. His methods are twofold.

1. The outward discipline of the wilderness. After Israel shall have endured the punishments denounced upon her, her national life is to begin anew. The generation that had come out of Egypt with Moses had needed the protracted discipline of the Arabian desert before God could “give them their vineyards;” and so would it be again. The nation must be taken apart, and be for a time alone with Croci. Similarly, the Lord removes the individual soul whom he designs to bless, into the wilderness of temporal loss, or sickness, or sorrow. When the aged Christian reviews his spiritual experience, he generally finds that the most marked spots in it have been connected with his times of sorrow.

2. The inward realization of the constancy and tenderness of the Divine love. The discipline must be spiritual also. Outward providences alone will not restore Israel. Neither will the truth of God presented only to her mind. In the wilderness the Divine Spirit must “speak to her heart.” His purpose in carrying the nation into exile is that he may “allure” her, i.e. decoy her with tender words, persuade her by the persistent manifestation of his love. He will stoop to court her. He will outbid the Baals. His inextinguishable love will woo and win her soul. So, oftentimes, God “speaks to the heart” of the prodigal when he sits by the swine-troughs, in the time of the mighty famine. He “speaks to his heart,” to soften it, comfort it, cleanse it, claim it, fill it. He has his ways of holy enticement for “alluring” sinners to receive and return his love.

II. THE BLESSED RESULTS OF THE RESTORATION. (Hos 2:15-20) These are described with exquisite beauty. The Divine promise is that in “the wilderness” Israel’s national life shall begin afresh. God’s nuptial covenant with her shall be renewed. She shall be enfeoffed again in the land of Canaan, the possession of which she had forfeited. The Lord “will give her her vineyards from thence.” And the results shall be glorious.

1. Fresh hope. (Hos 2:15) The valley of Achor (i.e. trouble) was the door by which Israel had at first entered into possession of the highlands of Palestine. It had been the scene of a dreadful tragedy (Jos 7:1-26): the defeat before Ai, and Achan’s sacrilege, conviction, and doom. But so soon as Israel purged herself of “the accursed thing,” the valley of Achor had become to her “a door of hope.” Now, however, she must again pass through a still more doleful Achor. The destruction of Samaria and the desolation of Jerusalem would mark a defeat greatly more disastrous than the repulse at Ai. But through “the valley of trouble” she shall come again to peace and rest. Does not the expression before us furnish a valuable watchword for the Christian? It reminds him that he must pass through “the great tribulation” (Rev 7:1-2) before he can reach the heavenly Canaan. Every ungodly lust is an Achan in the camp of the soul, which must be convicted and stoned and burned.

2. Youthful joy. (Hos 2:15) Israel, n hen restored to the Divine favor, shall recover the sprightliness and joy of youth. “Site shall sing there, as in the days of her youth;” and in those days she could indeed sing. Is not the song of Moses a masterpiece both of poetry and praise? In conception it is sublime. In execution it must have been thrilling. That old Red Sea ads is the first song of redemption. But, in the days of her restoration, Israel shall resume it, and with a fuller appreciation of its meaning. For the song of salvation which returning penitents now sing is “the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb” (Rev 15:3).

3. Renewed conjugal love. (Hos 2:16, Hos 2:17) In the rapture of her recovered love, Israel shall call Jehovah “Ishi“”my Husband.” She shall no longer use the name “Baali.” In itself, of course, “Baal” is a good enough word. In Hebrew it is a common noun, meaning “master,” “possessor,” “owner;” and it had been used as a designation of Jehovah. But, alas! the word had at length been prostituted to base purposes, and defiled by wicked associations. Its purity was now hopelessly gone. So, in the good time coming, it shall be used no more. God will not be called Baal, lest the word should tempt Israel to think of her old idols.

4. Paradisiacal peace. (Hos 2:18) The picture here suggests a return to the garden of Eden. The forces of nature, once so hostile (Hos 2:9, Hos 2:12), shall be brought into harmony with Israel. Wars shall cease forever. The face of the world shall be changed. How different this picture from the state of matters that is still thought necessary in order to the preservation of the peace of Europe! The favorite maxim just now is that the best security for peace is to be well prepared for war. The Baal-spirit professes to see the basis of peace in our arsenals and ironclads; but Jehovah’s plan is to “break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth.”

5. An everlasting marriage union. (Hos 2:19, Hos 2:20) The Lord will forget all Israel’s past infidelity, and treat her again as if she were innocent and pure. He will espouse her, as if she were a chaste virgin, to himself. He will bestow upon her, as bridal gifts, every Divine and spiritual blessing”righteousness,” “judgment,” “loving-kindness,” “mercies, faithfulness.” And the new marriage-covenant shall be “for eternity” (Hos 2:19). The former one, alas! had been sadly broken; but the renewal of the conjugal relationship shall be enduring as Jehovah’s invincible, unchangeable love.

CONCLUSION. How important for the sinner to “know and believe the love that God hath to him”! The eternal love of God is a fact. Every pure human attachment is but a rill from the infinite fountain of the Divine tenderness. Love, no less than holiness and justice, lies at the root of the Divine wrath against sin. Jehovah our God is “a jealous God;” but he would not trouble himself to cherish holy jealousy about the affections of our poor hearts, if he did not love us with an ardent and a quenchless love. Oh for grace to love him in return as we ought!C.J.

Hos 2:21, Hos 2:22

The golden chain of causation.

This promise is a parable in miniature, and has been much admired for its poetic beauty. It completes the prophetic picture of Israel’s restoration in the Messianic era. Doubtless, also, it refers in its fullness of meaning, not merely to Israel after the flesh, but to the entire Christian Church during the time of the latter-day glory.

I. JEHOVAH IS THE FIRST CAUSE OF ALL THINGS. “I will hear, saith the Lord.” According to Scripture, from its opening utterance (Gen 1:1) onwards, the all-pervading power of God is the mainspring of the universe, and his all-controlling superintendence is its balance-wheel. Jehovah is the First Cause:

1. In the world of nature. He gives “the corn, and the wine, and the oil” (Psa 104:13-15). The order of the year is in his hand. No sunbeam glances, no raindrop falls, but at his bidding. Therefore he says with emphasis and iteration, “I wilt hear, I will hear the heavens.” From this we should learn the sacredness of nature. The heavens are holy: they are “the work of God’s fingers.” The sea is holy he” hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand.” The flowers are holy: each of them “shows some touch of his unrivalled pencil.”

2. In the world of grace. Jehovah is the ultimate Author of all spiritual blessing. He gives the “corn” of Bible truth, and the “wine” of gospel joy, and the “oil” of spiritual influence. When the foundation-stone of a place of worship is laid, sometimes corn and wine and oil are sprinkled upon ita beautiful expression of the great truth, that “except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.” It is Jehovah alone who has “built up mercy forever,” and who sustains the fabric of redemption. The Lord, in the Trinity of his sacred Persons, is the First Cause of our salvation (Tit 3:4-6).

II. ATTACHED TO HIS THRONE HANGS A CHAIN OF SECOND CAUSES. These are represented here by the “heavens,” and the “earth,” and the “corn and wine and oil,” and by “Jezreel.” The second causes have a real efficiency of their own: we live under “the reign of law.” Yet they are at most only second causesinstrumentalities controlled by the will of the First Cause. There can be no such reign of taw as makes Jehovah a subject or an alien in his own world. Law reigns, but God governs. He was, before any second causes began to operate. He used none when he created the universe, when he originated life upon the earth, when he instituted the laws of matter and of mind. And, when be pleases, be may still work without them, both in nature and grace. Usually, however, God does not dispense with second causes. In his ordinary providence everything requires everything.

All are needed by each one;
Nothing is fair or good alone.”

(Emerson)

Second causes combine:

1. In the world of nature. Indeed, there is scarcely any physical effect which we can ascribe to the operation of any one natural force alone. When God wills that it should rain, or that we should have sunshine, he wills that all the physical causes which produce these effects respectively should come into operation. And, moreover, there are many other powers engaged in the management of the world besides what we call physical laws. There are, e.g; the power of animal instinct; the power of human thought and sentiment; the power of love and sympathy; the power of conscience; the power of free-will. There is the power of master-minds, wielded sometimes by direct communications, and oftener by subtle influence. Some men are “world-controllers,” and leave their impress upon millions.

2. In the world of grace. In this region we call the subordinate causes “means of grace.” Of these, some are inward, such as faith and repentance. Some are outwardthe Word, the sacraments, and prayer. Among the means of grace, we must also reckon those influences in providence which operate in the formation of a godly charactereducation, early training, parental example, youthful companionships, disappointments, and afflictions. And these various kinds of means act in combination. They are a “sacred chain that binds the earth to heaven above.” “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God” (Rom 10:17). “All things work together for good to them that love God” (Rom 8:28).

III. PRAYER LINKS ITSELF ON TO THE ENTIRE CHAIN OF CAUSATION. It is represented here as the last link of the chain; and it is in the hands of Jezreel. But who is “Jezreel”? She is “the seed of God,” whom he has “sown unto himself in the earth” (Hos 2:23); i.e. the spiritual Israel, the Christian Church in the latter days. Just as the valley of Esdraelon, in this beautiful parable, is conceived of as praying to “the corn, and the wine, and the oil,” so the supplications of God’s chosen seed have their place among the second causes of things. Believing prayer is, of course, addressed directly only to Jehovah, the First Cause. According to the teaching of Scripture and the testimony of experience, it is the condition which God himself has attached to the enjoyment of his mercies, and especially of all spiritual blessings (Eze 36:37; Mat 7:7, Mat 7:8).

“For so the whole round world is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.”

(Tennyson)

But true prayer takes hold also of the second causes, “They shall hear Jezreel.” It does so:

1. In the world of nature. How does man pray to “the corn, and the wine, and the oil’? He does so by tilling the ground, sowing the seed, planting the vines, and tending the olives. He uses the fixed laws of naturedirecting their action so as to make them subservient to his will. The pious farmer’s motto is, “Ors et labors.” And so with all other pursuits of men. If I pray rightly that I may prosper in some plan or enterprise, I use also the other practical means of attention, arrangement, and diligence, else the larger number o! second causes will make for the failure of my prayer. There must be a settled harmony between my plans of working and the petitions which I offer.

2. In the world of grace. Here prayer is not merely one of the means of grace, co-ordinate with the others; it is an indispensable condition to the successful use of any other. Prayer is not an intermediate link in the chain. It is at the one end; the throne and will of Jehovah being at the other end. But, while it is necessary that we pray for spiritual blessings, we must at the same time see that all the other second causes combine harmoniously with our petitions, e.g. our salvation is of grace alone, and vet the moral influences which go to shape character operate all the same. The revelation of Jesus Christ has not repealed the ethical precepts of the Book of Proverbs. Paul wrote his Epistle to the Galatians to teach that sinners are saved and that saints are sanctified by grace alone; and yet in that same Epistle he solemnly insists that “whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal 6:7). Prayer is one second cause; but there is a whole chain of them to which it must join itself. It is not enough to pray for one’s own growth in grace, or for the conversion of one’s children, or to observe family worship; we must take care that the other influences at our command shall harmonize with our petitions, and conspire to obtain the answer which we plead for.

IV. UNIVERSAL PRAYERFULNESS ON THE PART OF MAN SHALL BRING WITH IT THE RESTORATION OF NATURE. This text asserts the deep sympathy of nature with the cause of righteousness. We know that as soon as Adam in Paradise renounced his allegiance to God, the earth renounced its allegiance to him (Gen 3:17, Gen 3:18). But, on the other hand, so soon as Jehovah shall be at peace with Israel, and the people of the world shall have become “the seed of God” in the day of the Redeemer’s power, all things shall become theirs, and Paradise shall be restored (Psa 67:5-7). Already, it is true, man possesses a wide sovereignty in the kingdom of nature. As holy George Herbert says, in his poem on ‘Man’a poem which is Miltonic in the majesty of its conceptions

“For us the winds do blow;
The earth doth rest, heaven move, and fountains flow.
Nothing we see, but means our good,
As our delight, or as our treasure:
The whole is either our cupboard of food,
Or cabinet of pleasure.
“More servants wait on man
Than he’ll take notice of
O mighty love! Man is one world, and hath
Another to attend him.”

But, in the golden age that is coming, man’s sovereignty over nature shall be complete; and nature’s sympathy with man shall be perfect (Isa 11:6-9).

LESSONS.Let us:

1. Recognize our absolute dependence upon God, the great First Cause.

2. Earnestly seek his presence and aid, both in the discharge of daily duty and for the furtherance of our spiritual life.

3. Accompany our prayers with assiduous practical effort.

4. Rejoice in the hope of the ultimate restitution of all things.C.J.

Hos 2:23

(See homily above, on the curse reversed, Hos 1:10, Hos 1:11, and Hos 2:1)C.J.

HOMILIES BY A. ROWLAND

Hos 2:14, Hos 2:15

The message from home.

There will be but little difficulty in the exposition of this passage if we remember that two distinct figures are blended by the prophet. On the one hand he recalls the early history of Israel. He remembers their degradation in Egypt, and traces the moral effects upon them of the wilderness-life which transformed a horde of slaves into a nation; binding each man to his fellow, and all to God. To the prophet, as a moral teacher, the wilderness appears the place for the cure of idolatry, for the reception of the Law, for the appointment of Divine worship, and for the gathering of national and moral strength. Glancing from the wilderness across the Jordan, he sees, next, the disaster at Ai which ensued on sin, and notes the way in which, in the valley of Achor, the iniquity was purged, so that the people were ready for new victories and the possession of the land of promise. After recalling these incidents, Hoses says to the Israel of his own day, “These experiences shall be repeated in all their essential features. You shall be taken from the Egypt of idolatry, you shall be led into the wilderness of exile, you shall pass through the valley of trouble, and there, your sin being discovered and removed, you shall go on to a nobler future and have the fulfillment of the promises.” But with this figure is blended another, which pervades the first three chapters, in which Israel is represented as a disloyal wife, whose husband loves her still, and seeks by the gentlest means to draw her again to himself. God’s condescension and wisdom are shown in these attempts to set forth Divine responsibilities and privileges by analogies drawn from human relationships. The human is sanctified, and the Divine is made natural by such a method. Here God is represented as the Husband of the Church, bearing with her waywardness and sin, taking upon himself her sorrows and cares, purging her from all evil, that at last she may appear radiant in the sheen of her white robes, and crowned with light in his presence. (Text)

I. CONSIDER THE ENTICEMENT OF SIN LEADING TO ESTRANGEMENT which is set before us in the earlier part of this chapter. The ideal condition of Israel, and therefore of every soul, is that of one betrothed to the Lord, yearning for his society, mourning his absence, cheered by his smile, and waiting for the marriage. Nothing satisfies the soul but God. In the imperfection of our friends, in the mistakes we make about each other, in the spurning of our love, in the loss of dear ones by removal or death, we are disquieted by the ordinance of God, so that, like Augustine, we may say, “Cor nostrum inquietum est, donec in te requiescat.” As Israel said, “I will go after my lovers,” so one says, “I will go after pleasure;” and another, “I will go after wealth,” as if the highest good could be found there. And this sin is aggravated, because (as Hos 2:8 implies) all that is used or enjoyed in this vain pursuit is given to us by the Cod we forget; as the prodigal wasted in the far country what his father had given to him. In order to bring us to thought and penitence, wandering from God is made difficult to us, and often the words have been fulfilled, “I will hedge up thy way with thorns.” He thwarts our plans and disappoints our hopes. The idolized friend proves false, the adored child is torn from our embrace, the hoarded wealth is swept away. The fruit has its bitter kernel, and the rose its thorn. Nor is it only in what is outward that we recognize a hedge planted by God to turn us back from evil. When one is about to sin, he is checked by the thought of dishonor to his father’s name, or by the reproaches of conscience, or by the memories of old teaching, or by the tears of a mother. He can say, as Augustine did in the review of his sinful life, “I escaped not thy scourges, for what mortal can? For thou wert even with me mercifully rigorous, and besprinkling with most bitter alloy all my unlawful pleasures, that I might seek pleasures without alloy. But where to find such I could not discover save in thee, O Lord, who teachest by sorrow, and woundest us to heal, and killest us lest we die from thee.”

II. LISTEN TO THE VOICE OF LOVE CALLING TO THE WILDERNESS. “Therefore I will allure her.” It is the last inference we should expect. Sin and forgetfulness are not inducements to mercy. If trouble is the obvious result of extreme wickedness which is still unreported, the father would say of the child, the husband of the wife, “It is right she should suffer, and till she returns she cannot expect blessing from me.” So long as lawful authority is set at defiance, human law knows no mercy. God does not deal with us, however, as we deal with others. He did not cast Israel off at once, nor did he summon her to his feet by the thunders of Sinai or the terrors of hell, but says, “I will allure her;” speaking gently as Christ did by his Word and life, so that the sin-stained felt that, though no other mercy could be had, it might be found at the feet of the Friend of sinners. “I will draw her into the wilderness,” the place of silence and of solitude. The Divine voice is seldom heard amidst a multitude. God severs the individual from his fellows when he would give him a message far himself or for others. He spoke to Jacob, not in the family, but in the desert, where only the quiet stars wore watching; to Moses, not in the crowded camp, but high above it, on Sinai; to Samuel, not amid the worshippers, but in the silent chamber where the child slept alone; to Elijah, not in the tumult of Carmel’s victory, but in the silence of the cave at Horeb. So Israel had been taught, not in Egypt, but in the wilderness; and thus, said the prophet, it shall be again, and there “I wilt speak comfortably unto her”literally, “I will speak upon her heart”that henceforth my Law and my love may be graven on it. Such has been the experience of the Christian. Convinced of sin, the world seemed dreary as a desert to him, till hope was infused into his heart that pardon and reconciliation were not far from him. Believing that God was near, he lifted up his trembling heart in prayer, and in Christ, the crucified and risen Savior, he saw God reconciled to him; and the glimpse of his infinite beauty, of his unspeakable love, won his heart forever. Then the very place of grief became the place where the fruits of joy were growing, and in the wilderness of repentance the promise was fulfilled, “I will give thee vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope.”

III. LOOK FOR THE DOOR OF HOPE IN THE VALLEY OF TROUBLE. “The valley of Achor,” or of troubling, on the north of Gilgal and Jericho, was the place in which Israel was gathered after the repulse at Ai; when the sin of Achan was discovered with such terrible exactitude, and removed by dreadful expiation (see Jos 6:1-27). But, though it seemed a valley of despair, it was really a place of hope, because the camp was purged from the curse and. the people made ready for Canaan. So, in the coming exile of which Hosea spoke, some even in Israel would cast off their sin and turn to the Lord, and that valley of Achor would be a door of hope. The principle of using the most unlikely means for deliverance and blessing has often been exemplified, by him who brought water out of the rock, and made the cross the means of the world’s salvation, and death the entrance to heaven. Most conspicuously is it seen in our redemption.

1. The door of hope was opened for the world in the valley of trouble, through which Christ walked on our behalf. We are raised to heaven because he came down to earth; we have the life eternal because he submitted to death. But for his obedience in humiliation, God’s Law would not have been vindicated in its righteousness and beauty; but for his sorrows, we should have had no almighty Intercessor whose sympathy is perfect; but for his crucifixion, the handwriting against us would never have been nailed to the cross; and but for his death, and burial, and resurrection, and ascension, we should not have seen the kingdom of heaven opened to all believers.

2. The door of hope was opened for the Jews, as a nation, in the valley of trouble. Egyptian bondage prepared for liberty, wilderness wandering was the means of moral culture, defeat led to the putting away of sin, the captivity in Babylon tore up idolatry by its roots. After the coming of Christ, the destruction of Jerusalem amidst tears and blood was the opening of a new door of hope, for by it the noblest of the race began to look for the heavenly Jerusalem, to understand the spirituality of worship, and to find in Christ the one Center round which the true Israel would gather. Thus every nation may look for a door of hope in its valley of trouble? When called to pass through commercial depression, military disasters, diplomatic defeats, there is hope of finding purification from immorality, extravagance, and self-indulgence, and a new and loftier sense of responsibility to others and to God.

3. The door of hope is opened for sinners in the valley of trouble. Trouble is not itself and of necessity a good. The wind, which wafts one vessel to the haven, may drive another on the rocks. The fiver, which today gives fertility to the fields, may to-morrow bring desolation to the works and to the homes of men. Trouble may injure us, yet it is meant to bless us; and this is specially true of the inward sorrow represented here. If one is convinced of sin, so that the old enjoyment of pleasures is gone, and paradise becomes a wilderness, his penitential grief is the true beginning of the joy the publican had, who went down to his house justified because he cried, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” If we are in the sadder condition of one who has, like Israel, forsaken her first love, and are compelled to say, “Then was it better with me than now,” our hope is found in going out, like Peter, weeping bitterly. And in the valley of the shadow of death, which seems to mortal eyes so dark and strange, so sad and fearsome, that it may well be called the valley of Achor, we shall find in it the door of hopeay, the door of heavenand, like others, we shall sing in it as in the days of our youth, “Thanks be unto God which giveth us the victory.”A.R.

Hos 2:21, Hos 2:22

God’s rule in nature and in grace.

Hosea was projecting himself into the future. He felt as if standing already amid the desolation threatened against Israel. He saw around him a laud barren through drought. Its inhabitants, dying of starvation, were craving the wonted produce of vineyards and corn-fields, but looked in vain for a sign of coming blessing. Under the name “Jezreel” they are represented as crying to the” corn” and wine to satisfy them; but these are in bondage to the earth, and appeal to it for vitalizing power. Then earth takes up the wail; every fissure in it becomes a mouth calling to the heavens for rain. Last in the series, the heavens, not able to send rain except by Divine ordinance, appeal to him who is over them all. (Quote text) Context shows that spiritual as well as natural blessings are portrayed. Prophets saw the analogies of nature, the unity of the whole Divine economy, and devoutly believed that in the realms of nature and of grace the same God reigned. Draw out the analogy between the spring-time promised here, and the new creation in the soul of man. The text reminds us of

I. THE PERSONALITY OF GOD‘S RULE. “I will hear,” etc.

1. All things ultimately dependent on him. This denied by many in Hosea’s days and in ours. “Nature,” with inanimate forces and partially investigated laws, so exalted that a personal God is declared to be needless. Hosea believed that the products of nature expressed God’s thoughts and fulfilled his purpose, and that the cry of his people reached him and moved him through the series of forces represented by corn, earth, and heavens. Surrounding nations held that one god gave corn, another wine, etc. (illustrate from mythology); but Hosea ascribed all to one God, in whom all power centered, to whom all cries ultimately came. (Illustrate this re-echoed cry by the fires on the beacon hills telling from town to town that the Armada was in sight; or by the system of signaling in our army and navy, which makes known peril and want to him who commands in chief)

2. All things mutually dependent on each other. Rain necessary to the earth, earth to seed, seed to bread, bread to man; so the withholding of rain, as in Elijah’s time, brought home the sense of guilt to the sinful. Show intimacy of relation between man and earth, between moral and material prosperity, from history. Paul’s “whole creation groaneth,” etc. Complete reconciliation between man and man, between man and God, will bring about new heavens and new earth, in which righteousness will dwell. Still true “the eyes of all wait upon thee, and thou givest,” etc.; “Thou openest thy hand, and satisfiest,” etc.

II. THE MEDIATENESS OF GOD‘S METHOD. Text reminds that all through the universe one force acts on another to effect the desired result, yet God is not the less working because his hand is unseen. As we do not pay the tool, but the workman whose skilful hand uses it, so we pay homage, not to” force” or to “law,“ but to God. The age wants what the prophets hadspiritual discernment. Ezekiel saw the “wheels,” but also “the living one” within them. He noticed the “hand of the man,” but above it “the wing of the cherubim.” If possible to him, more so to disciples of Christ, who taught so distinctly the care of God even over birds and flowers. The Holy Spirit, moreover, was promised to bring all such truths to our remembrance. Show how God works through secondary menus.

1. Of our physical constitution this is true.

(1) The individual man is not created afresh from the dust. He has intimate relations with predecessors, is affected by their strength, weakness, prejudices, habits, etc. He is the result of complicated agencies working for centuries, yet it is “God that hath made us, not we ourselves.”

(2) Man‘s support comes not directly from God (as in the manna, or Christ’s feeding the multitude), but by process described in text, yet he gives us each day our dally bread.

(3) Man‘s life on earth is terminated, not by angel’s touch, but by some chill, or infection, or developed germ of disease, which brings weakness, then death.

2. Of our spiritual life this is true.

(1) Pardon came through our hearing the truth, which by the power of the Spirit brought us to penitence and prayer.

(2) Reconciliation is possible to the world through the mediation of Christ.

(3) Others will be brought to God, not by the voice that spoke to Abram in Ur of the Chaldees, and to Samuel in the tabernacle, but by pleading of parents, influence of teachers, etc. “He that rejecteth you rejecteth me;” “Ambassadors for Christ,” etc.

CONCLUSION.

1. How great the privilege of God‘s people! They shall hear Jezreel.” Earth and heaven are to supply our wants. “Meek shall inherit the earth;” “All things are yours.”

2. How splendid the destiny of God‘s people! “I will sow her unto me;” “A handful of corn in the earth the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon.” God’s Church the germ of God’s harvest. Perhaps like seed God’s people must be scattered, sown, buried, forgotten; but the harvest is sure, and in it God will find his glory. Application: By his mercies God has said to you, “Thou art my people;” have you answered with loyal heart, “Thou art my God”?A.R.

HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON

Hos 2:5

The delusions of the ungodly.

Israel sinned, not only by forsaking God and by worshipping the idols of the heathen, but by defending this conductby justifying her apostasy, and attributing to the supposed deities her mercies and enjoyments. This is a common case with sinners; who first do wickedly in departing from God, and then give God’s honor to another, praising those whom they have substituted for the great Giver for what they owe to him alone.

I. THE UNGODLY ATTRIBUTE THEIR ADVANTAGES AND ENJOYMENTS TO OTHERS THAN TO GOD. It is not only professed idolaters who act thus. Whoever they may be who turn aside from the Lord, they are one in thisthey all assign to inferior beings or principles the credit and honor which are properly due to God alone. For example, men deify their own created and limited powers of body and of mind. “They give me my bread and my water,” etc. Or they attribute all prosperity and happiness to society, to the political authority under which they live, to human kindred or patrons. God is not in all their thoughts. The agents they see, but him who is above all they see not and will not see.

II. THE UNGODLY CONSEQUENTLY ENCOURAGE THEMSELVES IN DEVOTION TO OTHERS THAN GOD. The unfaithful wife perseveres in the adulterous connections she has formed, because she persuades herself that her happiness and welfare are dependent upon others than her lawful spouse. “I will go after my lovers,” etc. Thus men first forget God, and give themselves to the pleasures and the service of sin, and then, fancying themselves to be under obligation to the gods they have made, they addict themselves the more zealously to the debasing worship in which they have engaged.

III. THE UNGODLY MUST BE CONFRONTED WITH THE SHAMEFULNESS AND VILENESS OF THEIR COURSES. The language of the prophet is frank and unsparing; had it been otherwise it would have been unfaithful. The case is one that does not admit of nice language, or of gentle tones and bated breath. The spiritual harlotry of ungodliness must be exposed and rebuked; otherwise there is no prospect of repentance and of reformation.T.

Hos 2:6

The way hedged up.

A way may be hedged or walled up on either side for security and protection. But when the hedge is planted, or the wall built right across the path, such a barrier is of course intended to impede progress, and to render proceeding in that direction impossible.

I. DIVINE PROVIDENCE SOMETIMES HEDGES UP THE SINNER‘S PATH. It does sometimes seem as if the ungodly were left to go their way unchecked; as if there were nothing to restrain their headlong race upon the downward path; as if sentence against an evil work were not executed speedily. But how often is it observed that Providence does interpose to restrain the mad career of iniquity and folly! To change the figure, it is as though the voice addressed the aging sea, “Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed.”

II. VERY VARIOUS ARE THE HEDGES AND WALLS ENCOUNTERED IN THE WAY OF SIN. Sometimes sickness and infirmity render the sinner incapable of pursuing his evil ways; sometimes temptation is signally removed from his path; sometimes disappointment and sorrow produce revulsion and even disgust; sometimes conscience is awakened, and sternly forbids indulgence in the pleasures of sin.

III. SUCH HEDGES AND WALLS AROUSE A HASTY AND VEHEMENT RESENTMENT. The bird strikes her wings against the iron bars of the cage in which she is confined; the ox kicks against the goad by which the driver urges him. And the first impulse of the sinner who encounters a hedge upon his sinful path, is to resent, to resist, to displace it. This is human nature; and only calm reflection and Divine grace can effect that it shall be otherwise.

IV. NEVERTHELESS, THE INTENTIONS OF DIVINE MERCY MAY IN TIME BE RECOGNIZED. The disappointed adulteress, finding that her unlawful lovers are indifferent to her, and have forsaken her, comes to a better mind, and compares with their treatment of her the conduct of her just and rightful spouse. The sinner, learning by bitter experience that the way of transgressors is hard, comes to see that this is a provision of heavenly tore and pity; acknowledges that it was not intended that the pursuits of worldliness and selfishness should satisfy man’s immortal soul; and thus is led to seek forgiveness and reconciliation from a justly offended God.

V. THE HEDGING UP OF THE WAY THUS APPEARS TO THE PENITENT SINNER S BLESSING 1N DISGUISE. He says within himself, “Had the road been open, and my course unimpeded, perhaps I should never have paused until I had rushed into ruin and destruction. How does it become me to adore and to bless the very mercy which I hated and despised, to which I owe it that my mad career was checked, and that my wandering feet have at last been led into the way of peace!”T.

Hos 2:8

Mercies abused.

Ingratitude and insensibility are odious vices; when displayed by God’s intelligent creatures towards their Maker, they are hateful sins. The case is still worse when, as with Israel, the bestowments of a beneficent Deity are employed in the service of a rival and a foe. Jehovah gave to the people silver and gold; the people made of the precious metals shrines to Baal. Yet this is a just picture of the conduct of those who receive gifts from Heaven and use them in the service of sin.

I. GIFTS MAY BE RECEIVED AND THE GIVER UNRECOGNIZED. The produce of the soilcorn, wine, and oil; the mineral wealth of earthsilver and gold,are all the provision of Divine bounty. But, whilst God opens his hands, multitudes, like Israel, take the gifts but give no thought to the Divine Benefactor. The powers of body and of mind which we possess are provided by Divine wisdom and goodness. Yet how often men use them as if they were absolutely their own, and involved no responsibility!

II. THE GIFTS OF GOD ARE SOMETIMES TRACED, NOT TO GOD, BUT TO HIS FOES. To take from Jehovah, and then to offer thanks and praise to Baalsuch was the base and brutish proceeding of Israel. And now men praise themselves, or they praise fortune, or they praise the sinful arrangements of society, for the gifts they owe to Heaven. They “do not know,” even as Israel “did not know.” It is blamable, inexcusable ignorance, and only Divine forbearance could endure it.

III. THE GIFTS OF GOD MAY EVEN BE TURNED AGAINST HIM AS WEAPONS OF REBELLION. Israel took Jehovah’s gold and made of it images of Baal. How often do men employ the wealth which God has enabled them to get, against the Giver, and in the promotion of the cause of error and of vice! How often do they prostitute the faculties and influence which they owe to God, to the service of Satan! The state, the Church, are from God; yet both have too often been made instruments of evil. Only infinite long-suffering could permit such an abuse of what was provided and intended for man’s highest good.

APPLICATION. Ingratitude should be succeeded by repentance; and the abuse of God’s sifts should be laid aside, and followed by lowly consecration.T.

Hos 2:18

Retribution.

It was part of the office of the prophet to exhibit the righteousness of the Most High. Justice and mercy, the attributes which appear so harmonious in the gospel, are equally apparent in the writings of the inspired seers of the old covenant.

I. THE SIGNS OF APOSTASY AND INFIDELITY. These are again set forth under the similitude of a loved and well cared for, yet unfaithful and adulterous wife.

1. Forgetfulness of the Lord, the Husband. if he had been remembered, honored, and loved, others would not have been permitted to be his rivals and successors. To forget God is to fling one’s self in the way of temptation.

2. The quest of other objects of affection and intimacy. When faithless Israel went after strange gods, “lovers,” or paramours, she furnished an example of human infidelity to God. Men, forgetting God, worship the works of their hands, make idols of their talents, their wealth, their influence, their position in life, etc.

3. Devotion to the service of God’s rivals. As the abandoned woman adorns herself, and sets forth her charms in order to attract the attention and admiration of men, so idolaters consume their substance and waste their energies in superstitious observances; and so all who forsake God encompass the vain objects of their devotion and affection with much lavish display of zeal

II. THE AVENGING OF APOSTASY AND INFIDELITY. The language of Jehovah is simple, but vigorous: “I will visit upon her the days of Baalim.”

1. God observes with indignation the unfaithfulness of those whom he created for his glory. He will not give his honor to another. He is not indifferent or unconcerned when his own depart from him.

2. God makes use of punitive means to assert his authority, and to arrest the downward progress of those who are unfaithful to him. In the previous verses are recounted the several “judgments” which the righteous Governor inflicts upon the disobedient. All affliction is designed to lead our thoughts to him who is the great Chastener.

3. Retribution is with a view to the repentance and reformation of the offender. The Lord does not cast off his people; he does not afflict them willingly; in the midst of wrath he remembers mercy.T.

Hos 2:14

Comfortable words.

In the later periods of Jewish history, references were frequently made to the early experiences by which Israel had been, in the providence of God, made a nation. In this verse the prophet, in assuring the people that the time of Divine reconciliation and favor was approaching, sets forth this prospect in language borrowed from the days of the Exodus. Then Jehovah had delivered his people from the bondage of Egypt, had led them into the wilderness, and there had entered into a covenant of espousals with the nation, and had spoken to them words of comfort and of encouragement. Hosea foretells that a similar experience is in reserve for the smitten but penitent and returning children of the covenant.

I. MAN‘S NEED OF COMFORTABLE WORDS. This may be said to arise from the fact that severe words had been uttered to the people’s sorrow. God is faithful, and he never flatters, and never withholds the correction which is deserved and required. When the voice of God has threatened, and the voice of conscience has condemned, welcome are words of consolation expressive of Divine interest and favor.

II. THE IMPORT OF COMFORTABLE WORDS DIVINE.

1. They are words of forgiveness.

2. They are words expressive of favor.

3. They are words assuring of gracious help.

4. They are words faithful and certain to be exactly and entirely made good.

Unlike the well-meant comfortable words spoken by human lips, which often are nothing but words and are altogether vain, the gracious language of the Divine Deliverer is powerful to effect the purposes of the utterer, and to heal the sorrows and relieve the anxieties of those addressed.

III. THE EFFECT OF COMFORTABLE WORDS.

1. They reassure the timid and trembling.

2. They bring peace to the conscience-stricken and alarmed.

3. They soothe the anxious and distressed.

4. They banish the fears of the foreboding, and inspire with hope.

APPLICATION. The preachers of the gospel are commissioned to “speak comfortably to Jerusalem,” to bind up the broken-hearted, to pour the balm of consolation into the spirit of the lowly and the contrite.T.

Hos 2:15

A door of hope.

Still continuing his reference to the early history of the chosen people, Hosea assures to the penitent and contrite the blessings of Divine favor, promising to returning Israel” the valley of Achor for a door of hope.” As Achor was near Jerichoupon the threshold of the land of promisethe possession of this fertile valley was the earnest of the full and hoped-for inheritance. Entrance upon this was, as it were, passing through the door into the land flowing with milk and honey.

I. MERCIES FOR THE PRESENT.

1. The vineyards represent the possessions end privileges of God’s people. They contrast with the dry and thirsty wilderness. They abound with proofs of God’s care, with provision for man’s wants. God gives his beloved all things richly to enjoy.

2. The songs are songs of deliverance, such as Israel sang upon the Red Sea shore; they are songs of rejoicing over enemies vanquished, safety experienced, fellowship in Divine favor.

II. PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE. It is well to enter at the open door; but the open door admits to the apartments of the house or palace. A guest does not enter by the door in order to remain standing in the hall; he is welcomed to the family hearth, and the society and enjoyments of the abode of his host. Thus, when God opens to his people a door, it, is a door of hope. What they are is a promise of what they shall be, and what they have is an earnest of what is provided for them in the future. Through the vale of Achor they enter into the land of promise; and its abundance is to them the assurance of an unfailing and perennial bounty. Hope extends to every stage of the earthly pilgrimage and warfare; there is progress and victory before the Lord’s people. And hope stretches away to the infinite hereafter, which affords for its anticipations a boundless and immortal scope.

APPLICATION. The door of hope is by the gospel set open before every hearer of the gospel. What encouragement we have to enter in and to possess the land!T.

Hos 2:19, Hos 2:20

Divine betrothal.

The unfaithfulness of the past is forgotten. The love of the Divine Husband is renewed. A joyous betrothal is the prelude to a hallowed, prolonged, and happy union.

I. THE BRIDEGROOM. Jehovah condescends to represent himself as sustaining this relationship. It implies on his part love and attachment, purposes of everlasting kindness, for the marriage cannot be broken, and a provision for all the wants of her whom he takes to himself.

II. THE BRIDE. Israel is here the type of the Church whom the Lord Jesus has purchased unto himselfthe bride of the Lamb. She is indeed happy and honored in the choice of her Divine spouse. She is called to purity, to fidelity, to holy service.

III. THE COVENANT AND CONTRACT. On the side of the Lord all is of grace; and the undertakings of the Bridegroom are “for ever.” On the side of his spouse, the Church, there is implied the spiritual marriage vow, with all which that involves.

IV. THE SPIRIT IN WHICH THE UNION IS CONTRACTED. This is faithfulness, or the certainty of the fulfillment of the pledge voluntarily given. All God’s promises are sure, for he is faithful.

V. THE CONDESCENDING PROMISE OF THE BRIDEGROOM TO THE BRIDE. “Thou shalt know the Lord.” This knowledge shall be of all Jehovah’s gracious attributes, and in itself it is eternal life.T.

Hos 2:21, Hos 2:22

The great First Cause of blessing.

The language of the prophet here is language of true poetry. To his vivid imagination all nature is personified, endowed with hearing and with speech. The wants of the penitent Israel (figured as Jezreel) are known to the products of the earth by which human need is supplied; the earth when called upon yields her fruits, and the heaven, in response to earth’s demands, pours down the fertilizing showers which ensure a plenteous harvest; for the Lord of all hears the entreaty of the skies, and bids them be bountiful and free.

I. HUMAN WANTS ARE SUPPLIED BY PHYSICAL AGENCIES. Man, though a spiritual being, has a physical nature with corresponding necessities. As a servant of the Creator, he depends upon nature for the maintenance of bodily strength and the opportunity of pious service. To despise the material is to question the wisdom of the God of nature.

II. CREATION IS A SYSTEM ARRANGED TO SECURE THE GOOD OF GOD‘S INTELLIGENT SUBJECTS. The body of man depends upon the fruits of the earth; the fruits of the earth depend upon the atmospheric influences. There is mutual dependence among all parts of the great system of which, through our corporeal nature, we form a part. And all things work together, and by Divine appointment, for the good of those who love God.

III. GOD IS HIMSELF THE CONSCIOUS AND BENEVOLENT MAINSPRING OF THE VAST MACHINE. “I,“ saith the Lord, “will hear the heavens.” From this we gather that the Divine mind arranges and controls universal nature, and that the delight of the great Ruler is in the welfare of his dependent and intelligent creatures, for which all things terrestrial and celestial are fashioned to co-operate, to which all things concur. That there is physical law no thoughtful man will question; and those who are alike thoughtful and devout will recognize the Lawgiver who is behind the law, and will delight in the conviction that whilst the Divine mind is infinite wisdom, the Divine heart is infinite love.T.

Hos 2:23

Purposes of pity and of possession.

The name Jezreel had been applied by the Divine command to one of Hosea’s sons, and thence to Israel, by way of marking God’s displeasure with the rebellious people, whose capital has been marked by deeds of disobedience and of bloodshed. But the name itself was good, moaning “God will sow.” And in this verse it is declared that God will indeed sow Israel unto himself, in mercy and for life and blessing. It is thus figuratively asserted that days of favor and of prosperity shall be accorded to repenting Israel.

I. MERCY COMES TO THOSE WHO BY REBELLION HAD PUT THEMSELVES BEYOND MERCY. In this respect the northern tribes are representative, not of the Hebrew people only, but of the human race. God has ever pitied those who have had no pity upon themselves. Had there been no sin, there would have been no room for mercy. This Divine attribute is manifested pre-eminently in the gospel of Jesus Christ, who is incarnate compassion.

II. GOD CLAIMS AS HIS OWN PEOPLE THOSE WHO HAD THROWN OFF HIS AUTHORITY AND THEIR ALLEGIANCE. Israel was bound to Jehovah, both by the common ties of human creatureship and by the special ties of the covenant he had made with the fathers of the nation. It was especially discreditable in those who owed so much to God, to forsake his worship, to despise his ordinances, to break his laws, to defy his authority. Yet, even for those who had so sinned, there was, when they repented, reconciliation and restoration. His of right and his by covenant, Israel now became his by actual possession. The language of mutual appropriation here employed is very beautiful. “Thou art my people,” says Jehovah. And Israel responds, “Thou art my God.” When such language is sincere, the convictions it expresses may be regarded as the foundation of all good. Such a relationship involves unfailing favor from God and unfailing faithfulness from man.

APPLICATION.

1. Consider the light this passage casts upon the Divine disposition towards mankind.

2. Consider the urgency of our condition, and the consequent desirableness of taking advantage of this Divine disposition.T.

HOMILIES BY D. THOMAS

Hos 2:6

Divine restraints.

“Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.” “There is a twofold hedge,” says Burroughs, “that God makes about his people. There is the hedge of protection to keep evil from them, and there is the hedge of affliction to keep them from evil. The hedge of protection you have in Isa 5:5, where God threatens that he will take away the hedge from his vineyard, that is, he will take away his protection; and it is said of Job, that God had hedged him about. But the hedge here meant is the hedge of affliction. I will hedge up thy way, that is, I will bring sere and heavy afflictions upon you, but yet in a way of mercy: these afflictions shall be but as a hedge to keep you from evil, they shall not do evil to you or bring evil upon you.” God puts restraints on the sinner here.

I. THESE RESTRAINTS ARE MANIFOLD. “I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall.” The first metaphor is taken from a husbandman who, to prevent the cattle from breaking away from the field, plants a prickly hedge. The other figure is taken from architecture”a wall.” If the thorns are insufficient, high and massive walls must be built. What are the restraints?

1. There is the restraint of affliction. When the wicked purpose some great crime, affliction comes, breaks their plans, and strikes them down.

2. There is the restraint of public sentiment. Public opinion, as it gets enlightened and strong, is a tremendous check to the wicked. The most daring cower before the public voice.

3. There is the restraint of conscience. Conscience is a Divine officer holding the sinner in.

II. THESE RESTRAINTS ARE NECESSARY. It is necessary that God should plant thorny hedges and build massive walls around the sinner.

1. It is necessary for the sinner himself. Were it not for these he would go galloping to perdition. “O unhappy men,” says Luther,” when God leaves them to themselves and does not resist them in their lusts! You bless yourselves many times that in the way of sin you find no difficulty. Bless thyself! Thou hast cause to howl and wring thy hands; thou hast the curse of God on thee. A dreadful curse to make pleasant the way of sin!”

2. It is necessary for the world. What would become of the world if the wicked were not reined in? Were it not for restraints, the Caesars, the Alexanders, and the Napoleons would soon turn it into a Pandemonium.

3. It is necessary for the Church. Had wicked men their full fling, how long would the Church last! The flames of martyrdom would soon blaze to heaven and consume Zion to ashes. Thank God for thorny hedges and massive wallsfor all the restraints he puts on sinful men.D.T.

Hos 2:11

The conjunction of sin and mirth.

“I will also cause all her mirth to cease.” Mirth is not happiness. It is but the mimicry of real joy. Happiness is river deep and clear; mirth at best is but a sparkling bubble. There is but little happiness in the world, but there is much mirth, much noisy frolic and hilarious glee. The text speaks of mirth in connection with sinfulness. Israel, who had grown corrupt, had, notwithstanding, much mirth. In relation to the conjunction of sin and mirth we may remark

I. THAT THE CONJUNCTION IS COMMON. The notes of jollity and fun are heard everywhere through society. At theatres, taverns, divans, and social festivities it flares and rattles. The drunkard has his mirth, the liar his mirth, the debauchee his mirth, the blasphemer his mirth, the sabbath-breaker his mirth. The union of sin and mirth is, alas! very common. We meet it everywhere, in the dance and in the song, in the joke and in the gibe.

II. THAT THE CONJUNCTION IS INCONGRUOUS. Gaiety and laughter in a sinner are most revolting when rightly regarded. The condition of a sinner is one of awful solemnity; a condition upon which God and his holy universe look with deepest seriousness. The sighs of moral anguish and tears of bitter remorse become the sinner. Fun and laughter are more unbeseeming to him than jests and jollities in a dying chamber. “Mirth,” says Dr. Young, “at a funeral is scarce more indecent or unnatural than a perpetual flight of gaiety and burst of exultation in a world like this is a world which may seem a paradise to fools, but is a hospital with the wise.”

“The ground is hollow in the path of mirth;
Oh! far too daring seems the joy of earth,
So darkly pressed and girdled in by death.”

(Mrs. F. Hemana)

III. THAT THE CONJUNCTION IS TEMPORARY. Amos, who was contemporary with Hoses, and like him was a prophet of the ten tribes, describes the conjunction well and indicates the necessity of the separation: “Ye that put far away the evil day, and cause the seat of violence to come near; that lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall; that chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of music, like David; that drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments: but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph. Therefore now shall they go captive with the first that go captive, and the banquet of them that stretched themselves shall be removed.”

1. The separation is certain. There is no mirth for the sinner either in moral conviction, death, the judgment-day, or in the scenes of final retribution. “If you will not take away sin from your mirth,” says an old writer, “God will take away your mirth from your sin.”

2. The separation will be solemn. It is said that Pope Adrian exclaimed when he was dying, “O my soul, where art thou going? Thou shalt never be merry any more.” “I will cause all her mirth to cease,” says God.

CONCLUSION. Confound not mirth with happiness! The brightest gleams of mirth are but the rays of rushlights; only visible in the dark, and that must go out. Happiness is a quenchless sunbeam; it streams from the eternal Father of lights. Happiness will follow holiness forever; mirth will only, like the ignis fatuus, flare about sin for a short time at most, then go out, and there is pitch darkness.D.T.

Hos 2:12, Hos 2:13

The prosperity of the wicked.

“And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her ear-rings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and forgot me, saith the Lord.” These verses lead us to look upon wicked man in three aspects.

I. As PROSPERING IN THE WORLD. “I will destroy her [i.e. idolatrous Israel] vines and. her fig trees.” Vines and fig trees stand for prosperity. There is a synecdoche here: vines and fig trees mean all outward prosperity. Wicked men are allowed to prosper on this earth; they are often more successful in worldly enterprises than the righteous. They live for the world and to the world, and they have their reward. Their ground becomes fruitful, their trade prosperous, their profession remunerative.

II. AS ASCRIBING THEIR PROSPERITY TO WRONG CAUSES. “These are my rewards that my lovers have given me.” Israel ascribed its prosperity to its idols, here called its “lovers.” The wicked ascribe their success sometimes to fortune, sometimes to chance, sometimes to their own industry, and sometimes to their rogueries. They don’t trace it to the true Source, the great God.

III. AS DEVOTING THEIR PROSPERITY TO WRONG OBJECTS. “And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them,” etc. “Baalim” is the plural number, by which some suppose inferior gods are meant. Israel is here accused of burning incense to these deii minores. Wicked men devote their wealth, not to the improvement of their minds or to the true progress of mankind, but to their own selfish and superstitious ends. God is recognized in the use no more than in the pursuit of their wealth. “She went after her lovers, and forgot me, saith the Lord.”

IV. AS DEPRIVED OF THEIR PROSPERITY BY THE GREAT GOD. “I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim.” The threatening is, that God will not only destroy all their prosperity, “the vines and fig trees,” but punish them for their idolatry. “I will visit upon her the days of Baalim.”

CONCLUSION. “The tinsel glare upon a sinner is too apt to offend the weak eyes of a saint. Alas! why should he envy him a little light who is to be shrouded in everlasting darkness? Why should we throw bludgeons at boughs which are only laden with poisonous fruits?”D.T.

Hos 2:14, Hos 2:15

Soul-restoration.

“Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.” These words refer to the restoration of Israel to friendship and fellowship with God. “The desert,” says Delitzsch, “into which the Lord will lead his people cannot be any other than the desert of Arabia, through which the road from Egypt to Canaan passes. Leading into this desert is not a punishment, but a redemption out of bondage. The people are not to remain in the desert, but to be enticed and led through it to Canaan, the land of vineyards. The description is typical throughout. What took place in the olden time is to be repeated, in all that is essential, in the time to come. Egypt, the Arabian desert, and Canaan are types. Egypt is a type of the land of the captivity in which Israel had been oppressed in its fathers by the heathen power of the world.” The verses may be used to illustrate the subject of soul-restoration, and they suggest two facts.

I. THAT THE STAGES IN SOUL–RESTORATION ARE GRADUAL. The reference throughout here is to the emancipation of the Jews from the Egyptian bondage, their Divine guidance in the wilderness, and their entrance into the promised land. And all this is here employed to illustrate spiritual restoration. We may remark, therefore:

1. That the first step to soul-restoration is froth bondage to liberty. “I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness.” Into the wilderness from where? From Egyptian bondage. In Egypt the Israelites were slaves, in the wilderness they were free. All souls are in moral Egypt, and the first step to their restoration is their exodus into the moral Arabia.

2. The next step is from despondency to hope. The valley of Achor, which was situated to the north of Gilgal, is mentioned by the prophet with a manifest reference to Jos 7:1-26. Through the sin of Achan Israel had incurred the displeasure of the Almighty, and its army against Ai was defeated. But through the prayers of Joshua and the elders, the Divine favor was again obtained, and Israel became triumphant, and the valley of Achor, where there was great trouble, radiated with “hope.” The victory of Ai threw all Canaan into their hands (Jos 7:8), and Achor, once the scene of great trouble, became to them “a door of hope.” It was, indeed, the first place of which they took possession in Canaan; it was the entrance into the promised land. In spiritual restoration the soul passes from trouble into hope; in the “deep valley of affliction it finds a door of hope.” Joseph in his prison, David in his persecutions, Saul in his manifold trials,all found “a door of hope.” Through much-tribulation we enter into kingdoms.

3. The next step is from sterility to fruitfulness. “I will give her her vineyards from thence.” The wilderness was a barren desert, but Canaan was a land of vineyards; it abounded with fruit. In spiritual restoration the soul passes from the sterile into the fruitful; it leaves the desert for a paradise.

4. The next step is from sadness to exultation. “She shall sing there, as in the days of her youth.” The reference here again is to the song which the Israelites sang after they had crossed the Red Sea (Exo 15:1). The song of the redeemed soul at last will be the song of Moses and the Lamb (Rev 15:3). Such are the stages through which the soul in its restoration passesfrom thraldom to liberty, despondency to hope, barrenness to fruitfulness, sadness to exultation.

II. THAT THE AGENCY IN SOUL–RESTORATION IS DIVINE. Who is it that effects this restoration? God. “I will allure her,” etc.; “I will give her her vineyards,” etc. No one but God can restore souls. Mark how he does it.

1. Morally. “I will allure her.” It is not by force or violence, not by menace or might, but by the enticements of the moral beauty of his character and the charms of his love. God restores souls by manifesting all his tenderness, his goodness, his perfections to them through Christ. The power of the gospel is the power of allurement. If souls are to come out of their Egypt into the wilderness, God must allure them.

2. Lovingly. “Speak comfortably unto her.” He declares he has no pleasure in the death of a sinner. He assures of his readiness to pardon and to bless. He says, “Come now, and let us reason together,” etc.

3. Generously. “I will give her her vineyards from thence.” He who gave Canaan to the Jews gives heaven to restored souls.

CONCLUSION. Brother, knowest thou aught of this soul-restoration? Have the allurements of Divine love drawn thee out of Egypt? In the midst of thy deep troubles hast thou found a “door of hope”? Is the wilderness within thee beginning to blossom as the rose, and do the fruitful vines refresh thee with their clusters? Has the song of Moses and the Lamb inspired thy heart and tuned thy voice? If so, “sing praises unto our God, sing praises.”D.T.

Hos 2:18, Hos 2:19

The sublime privileges of the good.

“And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely. And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea,! will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies.” These words present to us a few of the many surpassing privileges which all men might enjoy.

I. INFERIOR CREATURES MIGHT BE DIVINELY RESTRAINED FROM INJURING THEM. “In that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field,” etc. There are creatures that have both the power and the inclination to devour man. Prowling beasts of the field, and ravenous fowls of the air, and creeping scorpions of the earth, have at once the power and passion to put an end to the human race. Who restrains them? God’s hand is on them. He holds them hack. Sometimes he withdraws his hand and men are devoured. Will not a lion devour a saint as well as a sinner? It depends upon whether the saint has committed himself to the Divine protection, and has received into his own heart an assurance of Divine guardianship. Daniel was safe in the presence of the ravenous lions; and in modern times, instances have occurred where savage beasts have been restrained from inflicting injury on godly men. “Thou shalt tread upon the lion and the adder” (Psa 91:13). I have an impression that were man to possess and manifest the moral majesty of goodness, the wildest and most savage creatures would stand in awe of him.

II. HUMAN ENEMIES MIGHT BE MADE TO SUBMIT TO THEM. “I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth.” Those who trust in the Lord need not be afraid of war. The potsherds of the earth might strive with each other, but they would not harm the good. The man who would never strike a blow is not likely ever to be struck. The spirit of the good man is to overcome evil with good. Imagine an army drawn up to attack a body of truly Christly menmen who prayed for their enemies, and did good to them that despitefully used them, and who held no weapons in their hands, They would look calmly on their assailants while they were brandishing their swords and shouldering their bayonets. What would be the result? Why, a moral force would go forth from the unarmed multitude, which would break the” bow, the sword, and the battle.” As a rule, bad as human nature is, it will not intentionally injure the unquestionably good and unoffending. It is the moral power of goodness that can alone break “the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth.”

III. THEY MIGHT ENJOY A PERFECT SECURITY. “Will make them to lie down safely.” Every man might have God as his Refuge and Strength, as his Shield and Buckler. “The Name of the Lord is a strong tower: the righteous shall flee thereto and be safe.” “Who shall harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?” “If God be for us, who can be against us?” What is the true safety? Not the mere safety of the body. The body is not the man; it is hisnot him. The body may be in safety when the soul is in peril, and it might be in danger when the soul is secure. Soul-safety is the safety of the man; and soul-safety means protection from all that is unholy in thought, impure in feeling, unrighteous in volition. Blessed is the man that feels his spirit safe!

IV. THEY MIGHT ENJOY VITAL UNION WITH THE EVERLASTING FOUNTAIN OF GOODNESS. “I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies.” Here is a union! the closest union, one represented by that of a husband and wife; a union formed by immutable ties. Righteousness, judgment, loving-kindness, faithfulness,who can break these bonds? “The mountains shall depart, the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed.”

CONCLUSION. Learn the supreme importance of moral goodness to man. With godliness man has everything. All things are his, and he is Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.D.T.

Hos 2:21-23

God and his universe.

“And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth; and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel. And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God.” As the word “Jezreel” literally means “seed of God,” I shall take it in its etymological sense, and regard it as denoting the good in every age and land. Our subject is God and his universe, and the text contains three facts.

I. That the operations of the universe are UNDER THE WISE DIRECTION OF THE GREAT GOD. The universe is represented as in action. The “heaven,” the “earth,” the “wine,” the” corn,” and “Jezreel” are all acting. There is nothing stationary. Creation is like a flowing river, there is not a particle at rest. It is our happiness, however, to know that all its activities are presided over by God. It is not a self-acting machine; the great machinist is ever in it and with it. The fact of his superintendence serves several useful purposes.

1. To account for the unbroken order of nature. Why does not the ocean overflow its boundaries, or the massive globes swerve from their orbits? God is over all.

2. To impress us with the sanctity of nature. God is in allthe luster of the light, the beauty of the lovely, the majesty of the grand, the support of the feeble, the might of the strong.

3. To inspire with reverence for God‘s greatness. How great must he be, etc.!

II. That the operations of the universe are GENERALLY CONDUCTED UPON THE MEDIATORY PRINCIPLE. “I will hear the heavens,” etc. One part of nature is here represented as acting upon another, in order to give a certain result. In the material as well as the spiritual world, God works out his plans by secondary instrumentalities. Look at this in relation to man.

1. In relation to him as a material being. Whence came these corporeal frames? how are they sustained? by what menus are they broken up? All through secondary means.

2. In relation to him as a spiritual being. How is he instructed, converted, sanctified? Not directly, but mediatively.

III. That the operations of the universe are MERCIFULLY SUBORDINATED TO THE INTERESTS OF THE GOOD. “Jezreel,” the seed of God, i.e. good men, are spoken of as receiving three things.

1. The blessing sought. Jezreel prayed, and all nature is represented as conveying its prayers to God. The universe labors for the good.

2. The multiplication of their number. “I will say to them,” etc. The strongest desire of the truly good is to make others good.

3. The heightening of the sympathy between them and their God. “I will say to them which were not my people,” etc. What a privilege is this!D.T.

HOMILIES BY J. ORR

Hos 2:2-5

Spiritual adultery.

The individuals of the nation are exhorted to plead with their mother Israel, that she may turn from her adulterous courses, and so avert the doom which is otherwise certain to overtake her. Consider

I. ISRAEL‘S SHAMELESS PROFLIGACY. (Hos 2:2, Hos 2:5) The sin charged against Israel is that of adultery, in her relations with Jehovah. Owing to the peculiarity of these relations, the sin was of a specially aggravated kind.

1. The people had withdrawn from Jehovah that undivided allegiance which, as the one living and true God, he demanded of them.

2. They had set up idol images (the calves), and had changed God in their thoughts to a mere nature-deity, like the heathen Baals.

3. They had gone after the heathen Baals as well. In form, the worship of Jehovah was kept up; in reality, idolatry had the sole dominion. This was their adultery. It was public and unblushing. Even in the eyes of the heathen, Israel was guilty of great wantonness, for the heathen were not wont thus lightly to change their gods (Jer 2:11). The crime for which Israel is indicted, however, is not peculiar to that nation. In a deeper regard, it is the fundamental sin of the race. The soul made by God for himself has left him, and gone after other lovers. It has turned to the creature. It lusts for illicit satisfactions. Its dispositions are “evil and adulterous” (Mat 12:39). Especially is this sin committed by those who, entering into a new covenant with God by grace, afterwards go back to the world.

II. HER CERTAIN PUNISHMENT. (Hos 2:3, Hos 2:4) Israel’s adultery dissolved de facto the marriage relation between the nation and Jehovah. Hos 2:2 is the Divine deed of separation. Separation is followed by punishment. Under the Law, adultery was punished by death. This doom also, as respects corporate existence, was about to overtake Israel. But the figure in the text alludes rather to the withdrawal of God’s good giftsthe gifts bestowed on Israel in her relation of spousewith its result in the reduction of the nation to a condition of utter wretchedness and want. The “slaying with thirst” (Hos 2:3) is not absolute, since recovery is predicted (Hos 2:7), but denotes a state of extreme anguish, in which multitudes would actually perish (Deu 28:33, Deu 28:34, Deu 28:48, Deu 28:65-68). There is here:

1. A reminder of the source of natural blessings. God could take away, because it was he who at first gave. It was he who gave Israel all she had. Hence the destitution to which the withdrawal of his gifts reduced her. “If God withdraws his gifts, the consequences are infinitely awful, because, altogether unlike the natural husband, he has everything in his possession; if he does not give anything to drink, he then slays by thirst” (Hengstenberg).

2. A correspondence between sin and punishment. What Israel possessed, she received in virtue of the marriage covenant. At first she had nothing. God had given her all. Answerably to this, she is punished by being reduced to her original destitute condition. Marriage unfaithfulness leads to the withdrawal of the marriage gifts. “The eternal and universal truth which, in the verse before us, is expressed with a special reference to Israel, is, that all the gifts of God are bestowed on individuals as well as upon whole nations, only in order to lead them to the communion of life with him, or because this communion already exists. If we fail to see that the gifts of God have this object, if they be not received and enjoyed as the gifts of God, if the spiritual marriage be refused, or if, having been already entered into, it be broken, sooner or later the gifts will be withdrawn” (Hengstenberg).

3. A picture of the state of the soul from which God has withdrawn himself. The outward is the image of the inward. The soul which has forsaken Godwhich God has forsakenis solitary and desolate, burnt with hunger, parched with intolerable thirst, a desert. God’s design in withdrawing the outward gifts is that the soul may be led to feel the deeper misery and disgrace within.

III. THE ONE WAY OF ESCAPE. (Hos 2:2) Repentance-turning from the evil courses. God is unwilling to proceed to extremities, though, if the sin be persisted in, he must. He gives here a final warning, a last opportunity. There is thus a limit to the Divine forbearance. The last appeal will come some day. Often, by the time it comes, we are so sunk in sin as to be past attending to it, While, however, mercy lasts, the moat abandoned may return.

IV. THE DUTY OF THE INDIVIDUAL. “Plead with your mother, plead’ (Hos 2:2). Individuals are implicated in the guilt of the community. They have a stake in the general well-being (Hos 2:4). They have, accordingly, a responsibility in connection with national backslidings. It is their duty

(1) to separate themselves from the prevailing wickedness;

(2) to testify against it;

(3) to use every means to try to bring about repentance and reformation.J.O.

Hos 2:5-9

The philosophy of the Divine chastisements.

The punishment of Israel, while retributive, was designed also to be reformatory. It would display the Divine wisdom. Consider

I. THE DELUSION UNDERLYING ISRAEL‘S DEVOTION TO THE IDOLS. (Hos 2:5, Hos 2:8, Hos 2:12)

1. The nature of the delusion. The root of it was the notion that her prosperity was attributable to the assiduity of her service of the idols. It was they, she thought, who had given her her corn and wine and oil, her bread and water, her wool and flax. She ignored the real Giver. The delusion is not uncommon. Men put natural laws, second causes, their own skill and power, or the skill and power of others, in place of the living God. They forget him.

2. The sources of the delusion.

(1) Ignorance of the true God. Israel had parted with the right knowledge of Jehovah (Hos 4:6). She had it not, because she did not wish to have it (cf. Rom 1:28).

(2) Corrupt propensities. The state of the heart pointed out the way for the devotions. The heathen idols were more congenial objects of worship than the spiritual, holy God.

3. The effects of the delusion. The prosperity which the people enjoyed confirmed them in their adhesion to the Baals. It led them to redouble their assiduity in serving them (Hos 2:5). It led them increasingly to disregard the true Giver. Hence the necessity for breaking up the delusion by withdrawing the gifts.

II. THE DIVINE DEALING AS DIRECTED TO THE BREAKING UP OF THIS DELUSION. (Hos 2:6, Hos 2:7, Hos 2:9) God declares that he will:

1. Block up Israel‘s way in pursuit of her idols. “Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns,” etc. (Hos 2:6). That is, he would put bars and difficulties in the way of the service of the idol-gods, tie would interrupt and suspend their worship. He would break up the sense of fellowship with them. He would do this by means of afflictions. The effect would be to shatter the dreams of the worshippers. They would find to their discomfiture that the service of the idols was not all bliss. They would be led to consider de novo what they should do. Unexpected checks in the pursuit of favorite objects are among God’s means of inciting us to reflection.

2. Take away from her the blessings which are the chief support of her delusion. (Hos 2:9) The removal of the corn and wine and oil, in fulfillment of the threatening, would show that these blessings were from Jehovah, and were not the gift of the idols. They must be his, else he could not thus take them away. Conversely, the inability of the idols to prevent this deprivation, or to restore the gifts, or to help their devotees in the time of need, would demonstrate the futility of putting trust in gods that were no gods. The removal of earthly blessings is intended in this way to work for our good. God seeks by it to break up false confidences. He would dispel our illusions. He would teach us dependence. He would lead us to recognize in him the only Giver of our good.

III. THE BEHAVIOR OF ISRAEL UNDER THIS DIVINE DISCIPLINE. (Hos 2:7)

1. A first effect would be to make Israel more earnest than ever in pursuit of her idol-gods. “O Baal, hear us!” (2Ki 18:26). Dawning conviction has often this result. The heart is slow to believe that it has been so utterly befooled. It tries hard to defeat God.

2. The second effectwhen she had had full experience of the inability of the idol-gods to help herwould be to lead her to bethink herself of returning to Jehovah. “I will go and return to my first husband,” etc. She sees now, like the prodigal (Luk 15:17, Luk 15:18), the folly of her past conduct; she realizes its wickedness; she feels that it was better with her formerly than now, and that “the way of transgressors is hard” (Pro 13:15). So, cured of her delusions, she returns to her Lord. He, in turn, is ready to receive her. This was the end to which the whole discipline pointed. God is equally willing to receive every sinner who returns to him (Isa 55:6, Isa 55:7). The experience of the bitterness of the fruits of sin is designed to lead to repentance. Well for the transgressor when chastisement produces in him the result here described!J.O.

Hos 2:10-13

Retribution.

Israel’s punishment, while retributive, was reformatory. It is equally true that, while reformatory, it was retributive. It repaid Israel for her sins. It vindicated righteousness. All earthly punishments have this double character. The following principles come to light in the passage:

I. SIN ENDS IN THE FULL REVELATION OF ITS HIDEOUSNESS. (Hos 2:10) At first its true nature is concealed. It comes with fair appearances; it decks itself in festal garments (Hos 2:13); it makes large promises. Only at a later period is the mask stripped off, and it appears in its full hideousness. Such a day of revelation will come for every sinner. He will find himself put to shame even in the eyes of those whom he sought to serve. How loathsome even the body can become when sin has wrought its work in it (the drunkard, the harlot)! How much more the soul! Every rag of deceptive appearance will yet be stripped off, and the foul, abhorrent spectacle of depravity exposed to the whole universe.

II. SIN ENDS IN THE DYING OUT OF JOY. “I will also cause all her mirth to cease” (Hos 2:11). This is literally true, even in the present life. After a time, sin ceases to yield the pleasures which at first were found in it. The very capacity for joy dies out. The debauchee, the fortune-hunter, the slaves of fashion, the victims of ambition, know this well.

III. SIN ENDS IN THE WITHDRAWAL OF ABUSED PRIVILEGES. (Hos 2:11) The feast days, new moons, sabbaths, and other festivals, which Israel had turned into days of unholy carnival, would be taken from her. They were given her for different ends, and she had abused them. We cannot hope to reject God and yet retain unimpaired our religious liberties, opportunities, and blessings; e.g. our sabbaths. These will vanish with our regard for the Giver of them.

IV. SIN ENDS IN THE REMOVAL OF NATURAL BLESSINGS. (Hos 2:12) Failing in the due acknowledgment of God in the reception of them, we may look for the withdrawal of these also.

V. SIN ENDS IN POIGNANT MEMORIES OF AN EVIL PAST. “The days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself,” etc. (Hos 2:13). The memory of past follies is no small part of the sinner’s misery. “Son, remember” (Luk 16:25).J.O.

Hos 2:14

Israel’s recovery.

It had already been told that God’s dealings with Israel would not be permanently in vain. This truth is now expanded. Times and seasons are not specified; for

(1) it was not given to the prophet to know them (cf. Act 1:7); and

(2) it lay with Israel itself, in some measure, to make the times and seasons.

1. The earliest phase of the predicted allurement is seen in the promises held out in connection with the return from the Babylonian captivity. These promises embraced Israel as well as Judah (Isaiah 40-66.; Eze 37:1-28.; Zec 8:1-23; etc). The result, however, showed that Israel was not yet in a fit condition to receive the fulfillment.

2. The second phase of the allurement was in the preaching of Christ’s gospel. This, which was addressed to both Jews and Gentiles, tells of God’s redeeming love, and prays, “Be ye reconciled to God” (2Co 5:20). Many of the “house of Israel” listenedmany still listento this allurement.

3. The final fulfillment will be reached in the day of Israel’s national conversion. Then, as the result, perhaps, of great experience of trouble (Hos 2:15), God’s words will come with new power to their hearts. Earnest penitence will ensue. “All Israel shall be saved” (Rom 11:26). The fulfillment of these promises is connected in prophecy with the coming of a Redeemer and the gift of the Spirit. This supposes new dispensational arrangements. There is implied the bringing in of a new economy, which yet, from its nature, would have a wider scope than the economy which then existed. Israel participates in the blessings of the new covenant only as part of a larger “people of God.” This is the principle which legitimizes the extension of these promisesso far as they are not plainly nationalto the whole Church of believers.J.O.

Hos 2:14-18

Allurement.

Wonderful are the steps of Divine love in the history of the recovery of a soul. View those which are here presented.

I. WILDERNESS PREPARATION. (Hos 2:14) Chastisement would prepare the way for mercy. Israel was to be taken out “into the wilderness.” There, deprived of her idols, and stripped of her earthly blessings, she would bethink herself of the God from whom she had departed. It takes much discipline, oftentimes, to bring us into the state of mind in which we are willing to listen to God. Pride needs to be humbled; self-will needs to be broken; the heart built up in self-righteousness needs to be convinced of sin. To this end God employs trials, hardships, crosses, bereavements, sorrows of various kinds. He trains us by the wilderness.

II. DIVINE ALLUREMENT. (Hos 2:15) We are led here to study the operations of Divine love under the character of allurement. “I will allure her.” Allurement is the art of reaching the heart by soft influences. It is not compulsion. It is not conviction by argument. It is a persuasive, drawing influence exerted on the affections and will. It is gentle, not violent; it is mild, not passionate. It conquers by the might of love. Some persons have more of this power of attraction, of fascination, than others. It is a giftan influence, emanating from the personality. It cannot be communicated. The Divine Spirit is the great Allurer. His dealings with a soul are a secret between that soul and himself. God allures:

1. By solitude. “I will bring her into the wilderness.” He takes the soul apart by itself, he isolates it, as he did Israel when he spoke with her at first (Exo 19:3-5). We cannot hear God’s voice amidst the busy hum of earth. Our own age stands much in need of more solitary communion.

2. By word. “I will speak comfortably unto her.” The words of God are found in Scripture. How well fitted the Bible, with its gracious, tender, comforting, reassuring utterances, is for this purpose of allurement, we all know. It is shaped and adapted in every way to draw the soul to God.

3. By gift. “I will give her her vineyards from thence.” The typical blessings shadow out the higher. God attests his love to us by gift as well as by word. He has given his Son (Joh 3:16). He gives himself. He gives all spiritual blessings (Eph 1:3). He gives eternity. Christ is “the unspeakable Gift” (2Co 9:15). “All things are yours” (1Co 3:21).

4. By chastisement. “And the valley of Achor for a door of hope.” The valley of Achor lay at the entrance of Canaan. It was there that God “troubled” Israel for the sin of Achan (Jos 7:1-26). That sin barred the entrance to the land, and only when it was judged and removed could Israel proceed. The meaning is that, so often as sin bars the way to the possession of the inheritance, and brings down chastisement, so often will grace, working through judgment on the sin, bring good out of evil, and new hope out of the experience of sorrow (2Co 7:9-11). Israel, after the sin had been put away, received a pledge of the Divine presence with them for future victories. “In this relation the Lord here promises that the place of sanctified trial shall not only be a re, on of endurance, but a door of hope.” Trouble becomes a means of spiritual profiting.

5. God’s allurement begets joy. “She shall sing there, as in the days of her youth,” etc. God puts a new song in the mouths of his people (Psa 40:1, Psa 40:2). It is, as in the triumph at the Red Sea, a song

(1) of deliverance;

(2) of victory.

“The song of Moses and the Lamb” (Rev 15:1-8). The joy is the greater after the sorrow (Rev 7:9-17).

III. HOLIER ESPOUSALS. (Hos 2:16, Hos 2:17) Won by the Divine allurements, Israel ratifies a new marriage covenant with Jehovah. The new union is very different from the older one. It is a union marked:

1. By earnest affection. “Thou shalt call me Ishi“”my Husband.”

2. By purified feeling. “And shalt no mere call me Baali“”my Baal.” Israel’s feelings towards Jehovah would be purged of all idolatrous associations.

3. By sincere abhorrence of the past. “I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth.” So does the sinner shudder at the very thought of the things which formerly pleased him. They are hateful to him. He would count it a shame even to speak of those things in secret (Eph 5:12).

4. By jealous care for the future. “They shall no more be remembered by their name.” Israel would guard, in her future relations with Jehovah, against the intrusion of even the thought of her former paramours.J.O.

Hos 2:18-23

The new betrothal

Jehovah, on his part, signs, as it were, a new marriage contract with Israel. The relation will this time be an enduring one. He will grant to Israel security and peace. He will restore her blessings. He will dower her with fresh gifts. He will increase her fruitfulness. The promises may be legitimately extended to all the Israel of faith.

I. SECURITY AND PEACE IN THE NEW RELATION. (Hos 2:18)

1. The new covenant will be, not merely a covenant of God with man, but a covenant of God with nature on behalf of man. “I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven,” etc. The idea here is that of security. The figure is common in the prophets (Le 26:6; Isa 11:6-9; Eze 34:25). Underlying the promise is the deep truth that redemption will involve a palingenesis of natureof the earth. So bound together are man and nature that the dissolution of the tic between him and his God leads also to the loss of his dominion over the creatures. This will be restored. The animal world will stand in awe of him, will serve him, will be tame before him.

2. The new covenant will ensure peace. “I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth,” etc. A promise like this can only be fulfilled on the basis of a universal regeneration of society, and therefore points to the bringing in of a covenant not limited in its scope to the literal Israel. On the peace tendency of the gospel, see Foster’s two sermons on ‘The Cessation of War an Effect of the Prevalence of Christianity.’

II. THE ENDURINGNESS OF THE NEW RELATION. (Hos 2:19, Hos 2:20) The first covenant failed because of

(1) want of depth in Israel’s knowledge of God;

(2) want of entire surrender of heart to him;

(3) want of spiritual powers, under the Law, adequate to renew the heart.

The new covenant was not to be like that old one. Compare with this passage Jer 31:31-34, “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers,” etc.

1. The new covenant was to be formed after a discipline in which Israel had learned to know God thoroughly. “Thou shalt know the Lord” (Jer 31:20). Knowing God as she had come to do, Israel would be no longer under any temptation to wander from him.

2. The new covenant would be based on fuller manifestations of the character of God. “I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies” (Jer 31:19). The sin of Israel was the means of God’s character becoming better known. His righteousness, judgment, loving-kindness, mercy, and faithfulness come to light in her history in many awful and affecting ways. It is with this fuller knowledge of the character of God that she now unites herself to him in love. The union is not one of impulse, of haste, of indiscretion. It is a true, sincere, heartfelt, and intelligent union, certain never to be repented of. Yet fuller knowledge of the character of God is derived from the manifestation of his attributes in the saving work of Christ. It is there, most of all, that we see displayed his hatred of sin, his determination to punish it, his exalted righteousness, his unspeakable goodness and love.

3. God engages his own attributes to secure the perpetuation of this new covenant. (Jer 31:19, Jer 31:20) He had prepared the way for it; had laid the foundations of it deep; and he would now take the perpetuation of it into his own hands. He engages his righteousness, mercy, and faithfulness to accomplish this. “We are not under the Law, but under grace” (Rom 6:14). The new covenant has powers at its disposal which the old covenant had not. It is based on renewal, on regeneration. God sees to it that his people, once spiritually quickened, do not utterly tall away again. He preserves his Church by judgment and mercy.

III. THE REVERSAL OF THE CURSE IS THE NEW RELATION. (Jer 31:21, Jer 31:22) For Israel’s sake the land had been cursed, and made barren (Deu 29:22-28). That curse was now to be recalled. So one effect of redemption will be the recall of the primal curse on the earth for man’s sin (Gen 3:17, Gen 3:18).

1. Israel pleads for the removal of the curse. The end of the chain of prayer is Jezreel. “They shall hear Jezreel” (Jer 31:22). Till Israel became penitent, removal of the curse was impossible. The success of the earth’s prayer depended on hers.

2. Nature pleads for the removal of the curse. All her departments hang together. Each depends on the other. The suffering of one is the suffering of all. The corn, wine, and oil entreat the earth; the earth entreats the heavens; the heavens entreat God (cf. Rom 8:19-22).

3. God hears. He answers Nature’s prayer. Nature becomes friendly. She showers her blessings on the restored people. The natural blessings are typical of the spiritual.

IV. FAITHFULNESS IN THE NEW RELATION. (Jer 31:23) Jezreel, in the sense of “I will scatter,” is changed into Jezreel, in the sense of “I will sow.” Lo-ruhamah becomes Ruhamah; and Lo-ammi becomes Ammi (Jer 31:1). God “sows” Israel in the earth, so that she becomes greatly multiplied. The spiritual seed is here included with the natural. The widening of the covenant to embrace the Gentiles gives the words, “I will have mercy on her that had not obtained mercy,” etc; a greatly extended application (Rom 9:25; 1Pe 2:9).J.O.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Hos 2:1. Say ye, &c. Several intepreters join this verse with the foregoing chapter. “When the great day of Jezreel, or the restoration of the Jews, shall be accomplished, you may alter your manner of speaking to those of your brethren and sisters whom I had before disavowed, and you may call them Ammi, or my people; and Ruhamah, or she that hath obtained mercy. The prophet alludes to the 6th and 9th verses of the preceding chapter. See Rom 9:25 and Pococke.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

SUPERSCRIPTION. Hos 1:1

1The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri,1 in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel.

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PART FIRST. Hos 1:2 to Hos 3:5

Hos 1:2 to Hos 2:3

A. The Rejection of the Kingdom of Israel, and especially of the House of Jehu, on account of their Whoredom, is symbolically announced.Hos 1:2-9

2 The beginning2 of the Word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea [In the beginning when Jehovah spoke with Hosea, then Jehovah 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 [Jehovah]. 3So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which [and she] conceived, and bare him a Song of Solomon 4 And the Lord [Jehovah] said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause to cease the 5 kingdom of the house of Israel. And it will come to pass in that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel. 6And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And God said unto him, Call her name Lo-ruhamah [Unpitied];3 for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away [that I should keep on forgiving them ]. 7But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by the Lord [Jehovah] their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle [war ], by horses, nor by horsemen. 8Now when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived, and bare a son [And she weaned Lo-Ruhamah and conceived and bare a son ]. 9Then said God, call his name Lo-ammi [Not-my-people ], for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God [yours].4

B. And yet Israel will be again accepted by God

Hos 2:1-3

1 Yet [And] the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where5 it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said 2 unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head; 3 and they shall come up out of the land: for great is the day of Jezreel. Say to your brethren, Ammi [My-people ], and to your sisters, Ruhamah [compassionated ].

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Hos 1:1. Superscription. It has been shown al ready in the Introduction ( 1) that the chronological limits assigned in the title must be admitted to be essentially correct. Difficulties have been suggested to the minds of some from the circumstance that when the duration of Hoseas ministry is given, it is, in the first line, placed in relation to the reigns of Judah, and that a king of Israel is mentioned only in the second line. To argue from this, however, that Hosea belonged to the kingdom of Judah, is inadmissible; for as we saw in the Introduction, all other evidence goes to prove that he was a resident of the Northern Kingdom.

But a further difficulty is felt. Only one king of Israel is named, whom Hosea long survived, and the succession of Judaic kings brings down the life of the prophet far beyond the time of that single monarch, Jeroboam II. Hence it is: alleged that the second part of the superscription does not agree with the first.
Keil seeks to solve this difficulty by assuming that the Prophet acknowledged only the legitimate rulers of the kingdom of Judah as the real kings of the people of God; and that he defined the limits of his ministry according to the real succession of that kingdom. He introduces along with the names of those kings, that of the Israelitish monarch, under whom he began his prophetic course, not only to indicate that occasion more definitely, but chiefly on account of the significant position occupied by Jeroboam in the kingdom of the Ten Tribes. He was the last king through whom God vouchsafed any aid to that state. The succeeding rulers scarcely deserved the title of king.

But this explanation, brought forward in order to defend the originality of the superscription, can scarcely be acquitted of the charge of arbitrariness. (The precedence assigned to the Judaic kings would be better explained on the hypothesis that Hosea, at a later period, took up his residence in Judah and there composed his book.) Ewald, who, to be sure, does not admit in its full extent the correctness of the chronological statements of the superscription, supposes that the allusion to the kings of Judah was added by a later hand (which also inserted Isa 1:1), while the remainder is the old original superscription, which, however, he thinks belonged at first only to chaps, 1, 2.

The question, whether the superscription in its present form is quite original, must be allowed to remain undecided.
[As serving however to defend the genuineness of the superscription, comp. with the view of Keil adduced above, the following full and forcible presentation of the probable design of the prophet in its insertion given by Hengstenberg in his Christology: Hosea mentions, first and completely, the kings of the legitimate family. He then further adds the name of one of the rulers of the Kingdom of Israel, under whom his ministry began, because it was of importance to fix precisely the time of its commencement. Uzziah, the first of the series of the kings of Judah mentioned by him, survived Jeroboam nearly twenty-six years. Now, had the latter not been mentioned along with him, the thought might easily have suggested itself, that it was only in the latter period of Uzziahs reign that the prophet entered upon his office; in which case all that he says about the overthrow of Jeroboams family, would have appeared to be a vaticinium post eventum, inasmuch as it took place very soon after Jeroboams death. The same applies to what is said by him regarding the total decay of the kingdom which was so flourishing under Jeroboam; for, from the moment of Jeroboams death, it hastened with rapid strides toward destruction. If, therefore, it was to be seen that future things lie open to God and his servants before they spring forth (Isa 42:9), it was necessary that the commencement of the Prophets ministry should be the more accurately determined; and this is effected by the intimation that it took place within the period of the fourteen years during which Uzziah and Jeroboam reigned contemporaneously.6 That this is the main reason for mentioning Jeroboams name is seen from the relation of Hos 1:2 to Hos 1:1. The remark made in Hos 1:2, that Hosea received the subsequent revelation at the very beginning of his prophetic ministry, corresponds with the mention of Jeroboams name in Hos 1:1. But this is not all. There was a considerable difference between him and the subsequent kings. Cocceius remarks very strikingly: The other kings of Israel are not viewed as kings but as robbers. Jeroboam possessed a quasi legitimacy. The house of Jehu to which he belonged, had opposed the extreme of religious apostasy. It was to a certain degree recognized even by the Prophets. Jeroboam had obtained the throne not by usurpation but by birth. He was the last king by whom the Lord sent deliverance to the Ten Tribes; comp. 2Ki 14:27.

The English commentators hold to the originality of the superscription, with the exception of Noyes, who speaks of it as doubtful. The arguments which establish it are mainly these: (1.) The very fact of its existence in its present form from the earliest known period. (2.) The analogy of other prophetic books as well as of many other portions of the Old Testament, the genuineness of whose superscriptions has never been successfully impugned either by German critics or their English followers. (3.) The improbability of any other hypothesis. Any redactor (Ewald and others) could have had no reason to insert such a peculiar title. Its anomalous character shows it to have been the work of the author himself. Any other would either have made no allusion to the kings of Israel, or would have given a complete list of the contemporary ones. There is a purpose manifest here which a collector would not have conceived, and which it was beyond his province to convey to the world by embodying it in an addition to his authors writings. (4.) The exact correspondence between the character of the superscription, the contents of the book, and the position of the author, as partly shown above, and as might be further proved abundantly.
The superscription therefore is original, and original in its present form. As to the place of its composition there is no improbability in the opinion, mentioned by Schmoller above, that with the rest of the book it was composed in Judah. But this cannot explain, as he supposes, the anomalies of the superscription. It only increases the difficulties. Why was an Israelitish king mentioned at all? This question remains unanswered, while the old difficulty of the non-allusion to succeeding kings of Israel remains in all its force. The true solution must therefore be sought not in any local conditions of the Prophet, but in his necessary relations as a Prophet of God to the two kingdoms, as determined by their respective characters, and in his desire to assign definitely the limits of his ministry.M.]

A. Hos 1:2-9. The Prophet announces symbolically to the Kingdom of Israel that it will be rejected on account of its Whoredom.

Hos 1:2-3. In the beginning of Jehovahs speaking with Hosea and bare him a son, literally, in Hosea, that is, into Hosea. The simple translation in, as expressive of an inner revelation which he received, is excluded even by the usage of the language (comp. Zec 1:9; Zec 1:14); as also is the explanation: by Hosea. This into, however, must not be modified into simple to him. This would have been. evidently expresses here a closer, personal relation into which the speaker enters with another person, while , to, merely indicates the direction of the discourse. It therefore betokens an energy of speaking, probably also in connection with a certain continuity; answering best to our speaking with (comp. besides the passages cited above, also Num 12:6; Num 12:8; Hab 2:1). The whole clause, , could be regarded as a kind of superscription = The beginning of that which Jehovah spoke with Hosea. The discourse would then begin with . But it is preferable to attach the whole clause, as a specification of time, to the following and to take which is therefore = in the beginning, as an accusative of time: In the beginning, when Jehovah spoke. The sense would be: When Jehovah began to speak with Hosea, then, etc. [For the internal structure of the clause, see the first Grammatical Note.J. F. M.] This means that God has begun his revelation to the Prophet with the command immediately following; in other words, that the prophet must enter upon active duty with the following testimony against the spiritual adultery of the kingdom of Israel: Go take to thee a wife of whoredom and children of whoredom. Wife of whoredom: occurs only in the plural, expressing a plurality of acts. , a woman whose element is whoredom, with whom the is a thing not merely incidental. From this designation, as applied to the woman it is evident that it was just in her marriage with the prophet that she would show herself to be an , and would thereby become an adulteress (though naturally this does not exclude the idea that the Prophet begets children by her). The truth to be represented demands this view of the case. For it is Israel married to Jehovah that commits whoredom.

But who are the ? Children mentioned along with the wife, naturally make the latter appear to be the mother. But they cannot be called children of whoredom simply for the reason that their mother is an . They can have that designation only because they themselves stand essentially connected with . But in what relation? It is readily suggested: they are related to it as its results = they are the fruit of the , of the mother, are born of the mother in consequence of her unchastity, are of illegitimate birth. But, according to this explanation, the genitive would have a sense different from that which it has in the former connection, and this creates a difficulty. If a woman, who practices lewdness and is in fact wholly given up to it, is called it is most natural to assume that the construction exactly similar and immediately following should be understood in like manner to express action and disposition. therefore = children who act and are disposed like their mother, children of the same character as their mother. And this must be admitted to be the correct explanation when it is remembered what is to be represented by the woman and her children, namely, Israel conceived of as the mother of a people, and its children. And the fact which is to be established with regard to Israel and its children is, that they all practice whoredom; comp. the explanatory clause, . It is not said that the children are of adulterous origin, but that the whole peoplethe people as a whole and in their individual members, or, according to the Hebrew personifying mode of conception, the mother and her children, commit lewdness. Go, take to thee: is, according to the constant Hebrew usage, equivalent to our phrase, to take a wife, i.e., to take a woman to be a wife, to marry. And (Hos 1:3), which expresses the fulfillment of the command given with , has certainly no other sense. In our verse, another object, still, , is joined to . This is done by zeugma, in the sense: Accipe tibi uxorem et suscipe ex ea filios scortationum. He is, accordingly, to ally himself with an unchaste wife, and the children which he begets with her are to be like their mother. This is just the position of Israel. Israel, Jehovahs spouse, committed lewdness, and the children, who belonged both to Jehovah and to her, acted just as their mother did. Wife and children grieved equally the Husband and Father. The reference here is therefore not to children which the woman is supposed to have had before her marriage with the Prophet. The force of the painful experience of grief over his own children, through which the Prophet was to pass, would then be lost. By these children of whoredom we are not to understand directly just the three children mentioned afterwards, for the expression is a general one, but they do certainly fall under this category, and it is only they who are named.

The command which the Prophet receives is supported by the words: for the whole land is whoring, whoring away from Jehovah (falling away from Jehovah). : evidently a metaphorical expression here designating apostasy from Jehovah to idolatry, according to the conception of Israels relation to Jehovah as that of a marriage. He who serves idols accordingly commits whoredom and breaks the marriage vow, is unfaithful to a lawful spouse, because surrendering himself to a stranger, with whom no marriage relation can exist. This notion of infidelity is further indicated expressly by the addition: . is a significant composite preposition, which expresses not merely absence from Jehovah, but conveys the notion that a relation, the direct opposite of , has been entered into, and therefore expresses forcibly a position of infidelity, of a discontinuance of fidelity. On this notion of in a spiritual sense, see the Doctrinal Section. As expressed the intensity of the apostasy, so expresses forcibly its extent. As the sequel shows, it is the inhabitants of the kingdom of Israel who are meant. This whole sentence gives the ground of the command which the Prophet receives to take a wife of whoredom. He is to take a wife who commits bodily unchastity because the whole land commits whoredom spiritually. Why? The most natural answer is: In order to hold up to the people a mirror in which they might behold their guilt, and thus to bring to their consciousness more surely and powerfully than could be done by mere didactic discourse, how greatly they, by their idolatry, had sinned against their God. and dishonored Him. God would thus be represented as standing in a position which would hardly be imputed to a man, namely, that of living in marriage with a woman given up to adultery; or that such a relation would be as dishonoring to God as marriage with a whorish woman would be to a prophet. But the taking of this wife had, besides, the express purpose of begetting children with her, who by their names should annonnce to Israel the punishment incurred by its guilt. For to the people (represented by the woman and her ) was to be presented the consequence of their whoredom, and it was to be brought to their consciousness what punishments then rightful husband, Jehovah, would inflict as the consequences of their infidelity. The children, as , represent the children of Israel in their guilt, but, at the same time, by their names, the punishment thereby entailed, and as those names, significant of punishment, are affixed to those who represent the guilt, the fact is expressed that the punishment is directly consequent upon the guilt.

It is clearly incorrect to lay stress upon and the alliance of the Prophet with the woman, by itself considered, and so give to the thought a positive turn: that, by the Prophets marriage with a lewd woman, and by the announcement of its results and by the names of the children, it was intended to be illustrated how Jehovah entered into a marriage with the faithless nation of Israel through Hosea, and that the children and the consequences of such marriage would represent severe chastisements from the hand of love (Lwe). This notion is imported into the sentence. In so far as it is correct, it belongs to chap. 3 and not here. But of an alliance being entered into between Jehovah and the disloyal people, there is nothing said even there, simply because Jehovah had, on his part, entered into such a marriage with the people long before. To infer from the fact of the Prophets marriage that God entered into the same alliance would be a false application of the image. The Prophet cannot be conceived of as standing already in that relation. He must contract this marriage in order to symbolize Jehovahs marriage with the people already existing. It would be just as baseless, however, to infer from this marriage contracted by Hosea with the woman, that the original covenant between God and his people at Sinai is to be represented; that God had concluded the alliance with the people as with a pure virgin, and that they became unchaste after they came under the covenant; that therefore also is not a woman who has already practiced lewdness, but that an undefiled virgin is to be understood, of whom, however, it was foreseen that she would become unfaithful and bear children of adultery. Apart from the emphasis placed upon the words , this view is seen to stand in direct contradiction to the causal sentence: for the land, etc. Because the land commits whoredom must the prophet take a maiden who will become unchaste? No. The marriage which the prophet was to contract was simply intended to symbolize the relation already existing between Jehovah and Israel, and not the way in which it had come into existence. The wife does not represent the nation of Israel in its virgin state, when the covenant was being concluded at Sinai, but the nation of the Ten Tribes in its relation to Jehovah at the period of the prophet, when that kingdom, considered as a whole, had become a wife of whoredom, and in its several members resembled children of whoredom. (Keil.)

Hos 1:3. Took Gomer, a daughter of Diblaim. The command is obeyed without delay. occurs elsewhere only as the name of a nation: Gen 10:2-3; Eze 38:6. If the name be taken here symbolically, the derivation from might afford the signification, completion, i.e., not annihilation, utter ruin; but, completion of whoredom=completed whoredom (so already Aben Ezra, Jerome). According to Frst it is also possible to explain, fire-glow, literally, a being consumed with passion. occurs only as a proper name. In attempts to interpret it, it is usually explained as =, fig-cakes (so already Jerome), in which an allusion is perceived to chap. 3 Hos 1:1, where raisin-cakes appear as an image of that idolatry which ministers to sensuality. Daughter of fig-cakes would then=loving fig-cakes, or more generally, deliciis dedita. The identification of and has its difficulties, however. Frst supposes that the root , besides the sense, press together, from which we have , fig-cake, has also the signification, enclose, and thus gains the meaning, embracing (strictly, as in the dual form: double-embracing, copulation), therefore: daughter of embraces. And this would naturally mean, not the fruit of such embraces, but (as in the other explanation, expressing a connection or intercourse), abandoned to embraces, complexibus dedita. The interpretation of these names is accordingly attended with difficulties. For we cannot say that in themselves they necessarily demand such an explanation, at least so far as our knowledge of the Hebrew language permits us to judge. But it cannot be adduced against the admissibility of such interpretation that the names are not elucidated for us as are those in Hos 1:4 ff. This may be simply explained from the circumstance that the name was not given to the woman, but that she had it already when the prophet married her (Keil). If the names have really these meanings, it is clear that a woman designated, consummata in scortatione, complexibus dedita, would be a striking picture of Israel, uttering a severe rebuke.

[Henderson, holding the literal interpretation of the narrative, maintains that there is no need of assuming any symbolical meaning whatever for these names. On the other hand, if the narrative be not the record of actual occurrences, the necessity of a symbolical interpretation of the names is manifest. Most of the English expositors who note the names show a general agreement with the explanations: completed whoredom, and: given up to dainties.J. F. M.]

And she conceived and bore to him a son. The taking of the wife had evidently in view the birth of children. That the woman conceived by the prophet, and that the son is to be regarded as his, is clear even from the simple connection of the words, but is placed beyond question by the express addition: bore to him. The opinion that the children were illegitimate, has arisen only from the false assumption, at variance with the context, that the woman must have formerly been a virgin; for the designation, , must then be justified, and if she were not such before marriage, she must have become unchaste after it.

Hos 1:4-5. Then the Lord said to him: Call his name Jezreelin the valley of Jezreel. The names of the children were to be significant, in view of the announcement of punishment, and must therefore be determined by God. That of the first child was to be Jezreel. This was to the house of Jehu a nomen cum omine, on account of the significant connection of the plain of Jezreel with that family. It should remind them of that place and of that which occurred there. It cried out to them according to the meaning of the word, God will disperse, and thus threatened punishment for what was there transacted; and also, according to what follows, presented to their fears the plain of Jezreel as the place where the punishment should be inflicted. Blood-guiltiness of Jezreel. Jehu had, by one fearful massacre, exterminated the whole house of Ahab in the city of Jezreel (2Ki 9:30; 2Ki 10:17). This city was situated in the plain of Jezreel, which lay in the well-known Valley of Kishon. Now there appears this difficulty: Jehu did this at the express command of God through Elisha (2Ki 9:1 ff.), and the deed was afterwards commended by God (1 Kings 10:30), and yet it is to be avenged as murder upon Jehus house. It might be said that in the mind of the author of the books of the Kings, and in that of the prophet, there were different views with regard to the violent overthrow of Ahabs house. But the prophet also could regard the overthrow of a family like that of Ahab only as a merited judgment of God, and hold the same view with reference to the extension of the massacre to Ahaziah of Judah and his brethren, by reason of their connection with the house of Ahab. The correct solution may be seen in the words of Keil: The apparent contradiction is resolved simply by distinguishing between the act itself and the motive by which Jehu was instigated. Regarded in itself, as a fulfillment of the command of God, the extermination of Ahabs family was an act for which Jehu could not be held criminal. But the motive which actuated Jehu was not at all the desire to fulfill the will of the Lord; for, even if he did not use the command of God as a cover for his own selfish and ambitious feelings, he did yet in no way enter into the intention of the Divine injunction. God desired that the kingdom of Israel should be cleansed from idolatry by the extermination of the house of Ahab and the elevation of a new dynasty. In that purpose lay the justification of the deed, which was to be simply a judgment of God upon idolatry. But Jehu, though ceasing from the worship of Baal, retained the worship of the calves. He fulfilled Gods command indeed, but only went half way. After he had gained the throne, to which God had destined him, he struck out for himself a false path, from a false policy in which he thought it advisable to retain the worship of the calves, and thus rendered Gods intentions nugatory. Thus was the bloody deed of Jehu divested of all real value, and thus it entailed a burden of guilt upon him and his house (wherefore also the possession of the throne was promised to him only to the fourth generation). This section of the book shows directly that the idolatry countenanced by Jehu and his house is to be brought into connection with his deed as an act of blood-guiltiness, for the whoring of the land is expressly designated as the sin to be punished (Hos 1:2). Such apostasy from Jehovah (this is the first announcement), is to be punished by the way in which the deed of blood in Israel is regarded and avenged as a sinful act of blood-guiltiness. The ground of the resentment towards that act therefore does not lie in the deed itself, but the punishment is inflicted for something else without which it would not have been incurred. The objection therefore is not just which maintains that this deed cannot be the crowning crime of Jehu and his house. Nor is there any discrepancy between the prophet and the books of the Kings, where all the members of that louse are adduced as guilty by not departing from the sin of Jerusalem. [Pusey: Jehu, by cleaving against the will of God to Jeroboams sin, which served his own political ends, showed that in the slaughter of his master he acted not as he pretended, out of zeal (2Ki 10:16) for the will of God, but served his own will and his own ambition only. By his disobedience to the one command of God he showed that he would equally have disobeyed the other, had it been contrary to his own will or interest. He had no principle of obedience. And so the blood which was shed according to the righteous judgment of God, became sin to him who shed it in order to fulfill not the will of God but his own. Thus God said to Baasha: I exalted thee, out of the dust and made thee prince over my people Israel, which he became by slaying his master the son of Jeroboam and all the house of Jeroboam (1Ki 16:2). Yet because he followed the sins of Jeroboam, the word of the Lord came against Baasha for all the evil that he did in the sight of the Lord in being like the house of Jeroboam, and because he killed him (Hos 1:7). The two courses of action were inconsistent: to destroy the son and the house of Jeroboam, and to do those things for which God condemned him to be destroyed. Further yet; not only was such execution of Gods judgments itself an offense against Almighty God, but it was sin, whereby he condemned himself, and made his other sins to be sins against the light. In executing the judgment of God against another, he pronounced his judgment against himself, in that he that judged, in Gods stead, did the same things (Rom 2:1). M.]

Will visit: alluding to extermination which corresponds to the act of Jehu. It followed not long after the death of Jeroboam II. in the murder of his son through the conspiracy of Shallum (2Ki 15:8 ff.). But the threatening goes further: will utterly destroy the kingdom of the house of Israel. House of Israel here designates the kingdom of Israel in a special sense, the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, as distinguished from the house of Jehu (ver 7). The kingly office in general should cease in the kingdom of Israel, and that would naturally be a cessation of the kingdom itself. But this was connected with the fall of the house of Jehu, because, in consequence of that event, a state of the wildest anarchy ensued, so that only one king, Menahem, had a son for successor, the rest being all overthrown and slain by conspirators. The fall of that house was therefore the beginning of the end, the beginning of the process of rejection (Hengstenberg).

Hos 1:5. And it happens in that day, that I break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel. That day is the day on which the destruction of the kingdom takes place. Bow of Israel by synecdoche for the military force on which the strength of the kingdom and consequently its existence rested (Keil). The valley of Jezreel is the plain in which the city Jezreel lay, in the Apocrypha and Josephus: , or simply: . There the threat was to be fulfilled, because it was there that the bloody deed was committed. It was, moreover, the natural battle-field of the northern kingdom (comp. Jdg 4:5; Jdg 6:33). Israel forms here an unmistakable paronomasia with Jezreel. The words, and especially also the mention of a locality, point clearly to a battle, here an overthrow, by which the before-named destruction of the kingdom should be effected, and thus in this sentence not only is the punishment indicated, but the mode of its infliction stated. The enemy who should effect this annihilation of the kingdom is not yet indicated. No definite enemy is named before the second part of the book where Assyria is brought forward. (It is not mentioned in the books of the Kings where Assyria dealt this blow.)

Hos 1:6-7. And she conceived again and bore a daughter,by horses and riders. The second child is a daughter who receives the symbolical name: [See Gram. Note]. That the second child should be a daughter is not a voucher for the necessity of the literal view, but is grounded in the inner connection between the female sex and compassion. The announcement that there was no more compassion, becomes so much the more emphatic as the representative of the nation which was not to find compassion was a daughter. For the female sex finds more compassion than the male, and yet there is no compassion to be found. That must be a sad case indeed! The explanation is incorrect which supposes that the daughter signifies a more degenerate race (e. g., Jerome). For I will no longer have any compassion. An explanation, telling what the name of the daughter implies, namely, the exhaustion of Divine compassion. The kingdom owed its preservation in the midst of the prevailing idolatry only to the undeserved compassion of God. [On the rest of Hos 1:6, see Gram. Note.]

Hos 1:7. But I will have compassion on the house of Judah. A keen reproach for the house of Israel; if they were like the house of Judah, they too would find compassion; but they are not so; they live only by the compassion of Jehovah as is plain from the words. Why Judah finds favor, and Israel does not, is indicated in the words that follow, in the peculiarly emphatic expression: I will deliver them through Jehovah their God (comp. Gen 19:24). Here allusion is made to the connection in which Judah stands with Jehovah, while it contains, at least by implication, the thought that Judah owes its deliverance directly to the fact that it acknowledges Jehovah to be its God, and not, as is further said, to its military force, while Israel on the contrary, trusting in its military strength instead of in Jehovah who is its God no longer, shall for that very reason, and in spite of its warlike resources, utterly perish. By war is an unexpected expression as occurring along with, the other words; but it naturally means not: by weapons of war, but obviously: by waging war. The bow and the sword are named, as the weapons, and the words: by war, show more definitely that the employment of those weapons is meant. Horses and riders, according to a familiar mode of expression, indicate the force which completed the military strength in which so much pride was taken. The occurrence of these words at the close is specially emphatic. When Jehovah delivers, He needs no weapons of war, no horses or riders, nor can these give any help without Him.

Hos 1:8-9. And she weaned Lo-Ruhamah, will not be yours. The weaning and the conception are to be taken together, that is, as soon as she had weaned, she again conceived, in order to indicate the continuity of the announcement of evil. There is no interruption until the end of the rejection. [Henderson: The mention of the weaning of Lo-Ruhamah seems designed rather to fill up the narrative than to describe figuratively any distinct treatment of the Israelites. J. F. M.]. Not my people: thus should the people in the kingdom of Israel be designated. The covenant relation between God and his people is to be completely dissolved. =I will not belong to you [see Gramm. Note]. On the relation of the three threatenings to one another, see the Doctrinal Section (2). On the whole narrative see Introd. 3.

B. Hos 2:1-3. And yet Israel shall be accepted again.

Immediately upon the announcement of the judgment extending even to the complete rejection of the kingdom of Israel, follows, to the surprise of the reader, an announcement of deliverance. The verses, in distinction from the Hebrew arrangement, should form one section with chap. 1. The arrangement by which Hos 1:1-2 are joined to chap. 1, and a new chapter begun with Hos 1:3, as is done by the LXX. and Jerome, and after them by Luther, is more incorrect still.

Hos 2:1. And the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea,children of the living God. The promise in Hos 1:1 a, agrees almost verbatim with the promise of Gen 22:17; Gen 32:13, an agreement which is designed. The rejection of the Ten Tribes just announced forms a strong contrast to the promise there made to the patriarch with regard to the boundless increase of his posterity. Now if the promise is firmly believed one might have doubts of the rejection, or if the threatening of the Prophet were to be accepted one might feel that he had mistaken the promise. Hence the Prophet goes back directly to that promise, and shows how the promise is in no way annulled by the threatening, but that the latter agrees well with the former, which will certainly reach its fulfillment. (Comp. also the reference to that promise in Isa 10:22, in opposition to false security, and in Jer 33:22). The promise given to the fathers is just the pledge that a time of deliverance will come again! The announcement of deliverance in Hos 1:1 ff. is rooted in that promise. Thus the words are strictly to be regarded as a citation=and yet what was promised will come true, that, etc., is therefore naturally to be understood of the people of Israel generally (against Keil). For the promise is made with reference to the whole people, and in Hos 1:2 mention is made expressly of a union between those who had been divided. But that enlargement of the whole body cannot take place with the return of those whose rejection is now announced. Hence the second member of the verse turns to them. For those who are here called not my people are naturally identical with those referred to in Hos 1:9. In the place in which it is said to them, etc. There is no need of inquiring what place is meant, whether Palestine or the Land of Exile. The expression has rather the more general sense: Just as it has been saidso will it now rather be said, etc. The one will answer exactly to the other. Children of the living God. Instead of simply: my people, or, people of God, which would be expected at first, we have here a much stronger expression, naturally in opposition to dead idols, whose service brings the people to ruin. They are not merely a people of God, but his children: they shall have in Him not merely a God but a Father (see below in the Doctrinal Section). There is no allusion here to the moral ground of this gracious acceptance, and such a notion must not be introduced. For to the darkness of the first part (chap. 1) the light is here contrasted quite abruptly and in a way quite unprovided for. The connecting link is not found before the more profound exhibition of the subject in chap. 2. It is understood, of course, that only a remnant is to meet with compassion, but it is not here expressed.

Hos 2:2-3. And the children of Judah and the children of Israel are gathered togetherRuhamah. The acceptance of the rejected ones by God will be followed by a reunion of those who had been separated (inwardly as well as outwardlyon the one side belief in God, on the other idolatry). Comp. Jer 50:4, which rests upon our passage, and 3:18, and still more fully Eze 37:15 ff. The children of Israel, by being contrasted with the children of Judah, receive here their more restricted and special meaning, as belonging to the Ten Tribes. The words: appoint for themselves one head, denoting one common king, express this union still more definitely (comp. Hos 3:5; Eze 34:24; Eze 37:24). And go up out of the land. These words are difficult. The land is, according to most, the land of Exile, and a return from it would therefore be expressed. It is certain that the Prophet does not in our section predict a leading away into exile; for the place, etc., in Hos 1:1 is not necessarily to be understood of a foreign land. Yet the remark of Reinke is not incorrect: When it is said of Israel that they are no more a people of God, and will no more receive compassion, the fact is presupposed that they could remain no longer in the Holy Land which they had received as Gods people and had retained through his mercy. Already in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 banishment into an enemys country was threatened to the people as the punishment of obdurate apostasy. It may be objected, however, that by this explanation, the Prophet would seem to have presupposed an exile of Judah, while he says absolutely nothing of it, but, on the contrary, distinguishes in Hos 1:7, Judah from Israel. Difficulty is felt further in the indefinite expression: , which gives no hint of a land of exile. Reinke, however, as after him Keil, gives this explanation: The prophet refers to Exo 1:10 and borrows the expression from that passage, a supposition put beyond doubt by Hos 2:16-17, where the re-acceptance of Israel is represented as a leading through the wilderness to Canaan, and a parallel is drawn to the leading forth out of Egypt, as in chaps. Hos 8:13; Hos 9:3, the carrying into Exile is described as a carrying into Egypt (comp. also already Deu 28:68). Egypt was thus a type of the heathen world, over which Israel was to be dispersed; the deliverance from Egypt a type and earnest of deliverance from captivity and dispersion among the heathen. Well: but would , an altogether general expression, in telligible in itself, have been a strictly technical term for going up out of Egypt. And upon the single passage, Exo 1:10, in which, moreover, no allusion is really made to a withdrawal from Egypt as from a land of captivity, but Pharaoh only speaks of a departure of the Israelites from it, could such a linguistic usage have been based that would have been understood correctly without any explanation? No other passages occur upon which such a usage could have been founded, and none in which it actually occurs. In Hos 2:15, e. g., Egypt is expressly mentioned. No matter how much, therefore, may be said for this explanation as being actually correct, it cannot be approved unconditionally. Others therefore understand the land, simply of Palestine. Going up out of the land, is thus viewed either as a marching up to Jerusalem (Simson), and to this the context gives much support, especially in the reference to the reunion of Israel and Judah under one head (David). This would imply that Jerusalem would become again the common central point of the nation. But to this also objection may be made (in another direction) to the too general expression . The terminus a quo would then be quite irrelevant. Why then mention this terminus a quo, and omit the terminus ad quemto Jerusalem (Zion), which is the important point? Hence is regarded by others as a marching forth to victory (Ewald), as David did. The comparison with Mic 2:13 f. is certainly a fitting one. The preceding words, about their marshalling, and uniting and appointing one head, also suit this view well; one is led to think in this of a rising up to vigorous action (because viribus unitis). This explanation demands the mention of the place whither this was to be directed less than the others. But perhaps it is indicated in the following still more obscure sentence: for great is the day of Jezreel. This naturally refers back to Hos 1:4-5. But there Jezreel was the place of overthrow of divine judgment. Keil supposes the same thing is meant here also, that that day of defeat was great, i.e., decisive, glorious, because it formed the critical occasion by which the return of the recreant and their reunion with Judah were rendered possible! Others think of the appellative meaning of the name Jezreel, which certainly appears in 2:24, 25: God sows. This use of the term is supposed to express the notion that the Valley of Jezreel, in consequence of the overthrow there suffered, becomes a place where God sows the seed of the peoples renovation. Keil also admits this as a secondary allusion. But to understand by , that day of disaster, and to suppose that a day of defeat is called great on account of its good remote results, is a far-fetched notion. Here in Hos 2:1-2, in the announcement of deliverance, we find ourselves upon other ground than that of Hos 2:4 ff. What is here praised as great, is not and cannot be the same as that which in chap. 1 is announced as punishment, but must be something of an opposite character. But if we leave out of view that day of battle, we have left only the vague notion: time of Gods sowing, i.e., when God plants as He had before rooted out, i.e., the time of reacceptance; and such a time is designated as great by . But our sentence cannot be supposed to give utterance to such a general thought. The confirmatory does not suit such a view; for alludes too definitely (as Keil has perceived correctly) to Hos 1:4, and therefore refers to a definite event; only not the same event, but one which is its counterpart. The sense evidently is this, that there where Israel was overthrown, and its bow broken, a victory will yet be achieved: thither will the children of Israel and Judah gather themselves together under one king, marching up out of the country. And still the appellative significance of Jezreel may be retained; for by this victory God makes a new sowing or planting. Thus, as the threatening is connected with the names of the children, Hos 1:4 ff., so also is the promise: in the first name without any modification, in the other two by the change into their opposite by the omission of the . [The English expositors usually take the reference to be primarily to the return from the Babylonian captivity. Some of them (of whom Cowles is the latest) refer the fulfillment only to the consequences of the reign of Messiah, the Head chosen not only by the united children of Israel and Judah but also by the world. Henderson, denying any multiple sense in prophecy, interprets the head to be Zerubbabel, because the Messiah, whom most suppose to be intended, is nowhere spoken of as appointed by men, but always as the choice and appointment of God. But (1) it is not said that they will appoint their leader to be the Messiah. That is of course Gods appointment. (2.) The Messiah thus appointed must necessarily be the chosen leader of his people. It is the service of a willing people in which they engage. Even God always offers Himself to his people as their king. They are to choose whom they will serve. This argument is evidently only the plea of one who has a theory to uphold. As to the main application of these verses, it is probably best to regard its promise as partially and but to a very small degree fulfilled in the case of those out of the Ten Tribes who returned to Jerusalem after the Exile, and to be constantly undergoing its fulfillment in the increase of the true Israel until the great multitude which no man could number of all nations (the 144,000, the mystical number of those sealed of the twelve tribes of Israel), shall be completed. That the Messianic application is almost exclusively the true one is evident both from the grand comprehensiveness of the promise, and from the paucity of evidence as to subsequent reunion to any extent of the representatives of the two kingdoms.M.]

Hos 2:3.Say to your brethren, Ammi, and to your sisters, Ruhamah. According to some the children of the Prophet are addressed. Those who had first called out to the people by their own names: Not-my-people! and Unfavored! are now to call out to them the opposite, the son to his brethren, the daughter to her sisters, that is, to the rest of the Israelites. According to others, it is the people who obtain mercy that are addressed, whose members are to salute one another with the new name bestowed on them by God (Hengstenberg, Keil, Umbreit). The latter is to be preferred. For the verse is naturally connected with the close of Hos 1:2, and it should therefore present the rejoicing shouts of the victors. Their victory is to them a pledge of their acceptance by God, which is to be celebrated by these joyful shouts, according to the requirement of the Prophet, or rather of God through him.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. One of the most profound conceptions of the Old Testament is that which regards the covenant relation between Jehovah and Israel as a marriage. As a consequence, Israels idolatry and apostasy from God appear as whoredom or adultery; for idols are paramours as contrasted with Jehovah the husband.

The fundamental elements of this conception are found as early as in the Pentateuch: Exo 34:14-15; Lev 17:7; Lev 20:5-6; Num 14:33; (Num 15:39); Deu 31:16; Deu 32:16; Deu 32:21. Exo 34:14-15 must be regarded as the most important and the fundamental passage.

Other passages are Jdg 2:17; Jdg 8:33; 1Ki 14:24; 1Ki 15:12; 1Ki 22:47; 2Ki 9:22; 2Ki 23:7; 1Ch 6:25; 2Ch 21:11; 2Ch 21:13. Further in the Psalms (if we leave Psalms 45 out of the question); Psa 73:27; Psa 106:39.

Such passages of later time, as those from Chronicles, naturally presuppose the prophetic development of this doctrine. This is found first in our Prophet, who has made that conception the fundamental idea of his discourses, in some of which it is directly discussed, while it permeates others as an essential principle (e. g., in chap. 11). On the ground of these discourses it is more fully presented by Jeremiah (especially chaps. 3; Jer 5:7; Jer 13:27, etc.), and Ezekiel (chaps. 1623). It is only hinted at in Isaiah (chaps. Isa 1:21; Isa 54:5; Isa 57:3; Isa 62:5). It is not met with in the other prophets. For Nah 3:4 ff. does not belong here (although the expressions show allusions to our prophet). Nor does Isa 23:16 ff.; for there it is not idolatry that is represented by the whoredom of Nineveh and Tyre. In addition, on the positive side, namely, the love of Jehovah to Israel, we must name the Song of Solomon, which bears besides, unmistakable allusions to our Prophet. In the New Testament this conception returns, naturally modified in form, in the description of the great Whore, Revelation 17. ff. (embracing, at the same time, the ideas that are found in the last-named passages concerning great and commercial cities). But the positive notion of a marriage of Jehovah to his people is found again in a New Testament form in Eph 5:22 ff, though there in an inverted order; for an actual marriage is first taken, and a parallel is then drawn between it and the relation of Christ to the Church.

For the meaning and significance of this whole conception of Jehovahs relation to his people, our Prophet is, according to the above remarks, the best commentator in all his writings, and especially in chap. 2. See therefore the remarks upon that chapter.
2. God will not be mocked is the truth which the writings of the Prophet, written in letters of flame, bear upon their front in the announcement of the destroying judgments which God must and will inflict upon his apostate people. The mode of this announcement in our chapter through the three children with symbolical names, is full of instruction. The very fact that they represent the apostate children of Israel and declare by their names the punishment for this apostasy, sets forth unmistakably the close connection between sin and guilt, namely, that punishment is, so to speak, attached to sin. And the sudden appearance of the three children without any interval expresses evidently the certainty and unavoidableness of the infliction of the divine judgment. The three symbolic names, moreover, were given for the purpose of intensifying and emphasizing the announcement of the judgment. If the first name simply presages the fact of a retribution by an overwhelming judgment, the second unveils with terrible clearness its ground in the divine nature: it is that they shall no more find compassion, that God has turned away from them. And the result of all this is that the nation ceases to be a people of God. Thus the whole significance of this judgment is exhibited. Destruction, the cessation of I mercy, might be felt by any other people or kingdom; but with the people of God its influence was different, it was to them the loss of its special prerogative. Such a judgment has therefore a significance which is not merely political or social but also theocratic, and must be inflicted with a terrible severity elsewhere unfelt.
But it is most palpably enounced in our chapter how far judgment is from being the end of Gods ways toward his people. Immediately after the three strokes of destruction, so to speak, had been dealt, the sun of divine favor breaks forth from the darkest clouds of divine judgment in the brightest splendor of words of deliverance, as three names are again sounded forth each more distinctly than the former. This great transformation is presented without the least preparation, evidently as an enigma, thus exciting the greatest desire for its solution. The connecting link between these two announcements so broadly contrasted; namely, on the side of God, love, in which even his wrath against his faithless people is rootedif He were indifferent He would not be angry,and on the side of man, a return to Him in consequence of the chastening of his judgments, is not yet displayed here. This is done by the longer exposition given in the following chapter.
3. A man may be the instrument of God and, by his acts, execute his will, and yet be rejected: so Jehu. Our position is determined by the relation which we inwardly bear to that will, according to the simple truth that God regards the heart, whether we make the desires of God our own and are willing to be nothing but his instruments and to serve Him, or whether we assert and claim a place for our own interests, and thus in truth seek our own will and not the will of God. If we in this seek our own ends, the result is inevitable; our execution of the divine will is impeded and disturbed, if it is not rather only a seeming fulfillment and our labors abortive.
4. The New Testament conception of sonship with God, has as its Old Testament correlative that of a people of God. This places God in a close, unique relation to men. But God appears there as only Lord and King, though bestowing blessings and offering the conditions of life; and man, to whom He thus stands in relation, is not the individual but only the people of God as a whole. Therefore also this government of God has for one of its aims the restoration and preservation of the outward conditions of national existence, including the natural basis of such a community, the land itself. Under the New Covenant there is also a people of God, but the individuals, who constitute the whole, are all regarded as children of God.

But in another direction the Old Testament notion of a people of God tends undeniably towards the New Testament conception of sonship, and thus shows itself to be a germ ever developing with living power as the earnest of its fruit. All Israel appears as a son of God in the significant passage, Exo 22:11; comp. further Hos 11:1. The Israelites themselves are also called sons of God, Deu 14:1; Deu 32:19, and here in our chapter. But these are only single whispers, and the grand distinction must not be overlooked, that this expression is applied only to the totality of the people, even when it relates to their great multitude. Moreover our passage is contained in an announcement with regard to the future, and we must hold beyond question that the prophets go beyond the stand-point of the Old Covenant. It is just as Paul declares in Gal 4:1 ff. Israel indeed actually held the position of sonship toward God, but . . Only the incarnation of the Son of God Himself in an individual person could confer the privilege of the relation of individual and personal sonship towards God, the of individual personality.

5. How is the promise in Hos 2:1-3 fulfilled? We might at first be inclined to seek the fulfillment in the return of the people from Babylonish Exile. For that event certainly marks the turning-point where Gods judgment upon his people reached its end and his favor again shone upon them. But in truth we cannot yet discern the accomplishment of the prophecy in that event. It could hardly be the subject of the promise, inasmuch as the Prophet only speaks and knows here of a judgment upon the Ten Tribes. But if a return from the Assyrian Exile and a consequent reunion with the kingdom of Judah had taken place, we might expect to see in these events a fulfillment of the promise. But such a return and consequent remission of the judgment upon the kingdom of Israel never took place; and the return from the Babylonish Exile affected that kingdom but very slightly, and brought about only to a very small degree a season of deliverance. Gods favor returned, indeed, inasmuch as this period was an assurance that God had not utterly rejected his people, and the hope of the fulfillment of the prophetic promises became so much the brighter. But it was not the fulfillment itself. No; to arrive at that we have only to look at our promise a little more closely.

Before the eye of the Prophet there is evidently standing here a picture of a people of Israel, not only innumerably increased and united into one kingdom, but also actually realizing the idea of a people of God (sons of the living God). That is, the time which he promises is in his mind directly the time of fulfillment, which we, upon the ground of other prophecies, since Hosea himself scarcely speaks of the Messiah (not even in Hos 3:5), must designate the Messianic. Hence we can in no case seek the fulfillment in events which transpired before the advent of the Messiah.

But now the Messiah has come in Jesus of Nazareth. Is this promise of prophecy already fulfilled? Is this picture of the future already realized? If we keep to the words of the Text we must answer, No.
In fact the coming of the Messiah did not bring for Israel, as a whole, the time of deliverance, but on account of its guilt, rather a time of rejection, and the consequence was the infliction of a new and still more complete judgment. It is quite clear also that we cannot find the fulfillment of the present promise in the acceptance of the Messiah by the comparatively few who did accept Him. Must we then say that God did indeed design for the people in the Messiah such blessings as are here promised; but that, since they rejected Him, the promised time will never be theirs? In one respect this is perfectly true. But we cannot rest satisfied with it. The prophetic promise with all its rich fullness of meaning would then simply fall to the ground.
But still more unjustifiable is the assumption that the promise is to be regarded as only suspended for the people of Israel during the time of their obduracy, and to expect its fulfillment in that nation when it shall be converted to the Messiah. For this opinion, though so much favored of late, simply holds mechanically and restrictively to the letter, with a complete misconception of the nature of the Old and New Testament and their mutual relations, and of the higher plane to which divine Revelation rose with Christ, and supposes it possible that Revelation could retreat from the stand-point of the fulfillment to that of the Old Testament preparation, where Israel as a people represented the kingdom of God. It would assume also that allusion was made to the one kingdom only, for the purpose of showing that the distinction between children of Judah and children of Israel was lost by the extinction of the whole kingdom, even of the kingdom of Judah, independently of the consummation of the reunion under one head here promised. And therefore a promise which takes that division for granted and holds out the prospect of its removal and conversion into a higher unity, cannot be regarded as one whose fulfillment (according to the plain sense of the words) is still to be expected; or is that division of the two kingdoms, which no longer exist, yet to take place, in order that it may at some time be removed? If we have to give up the main position of this assumption of a literal fulfillment yet to be accomplished, on account of its intrinsic impossibility, all support is taken away from the notion that the promise will be realized in and for the people of Israel upon the soil of the Holy Land. It falls to pieces from internal weakness.

Instead, therefore, of dreaming of a future fulfillment in the literal sense, we must rather say, that the Prophet knows of a people of God only in the form of Israel, and hence what he hopes and promises for the people of God he hopes and promises for Israel, and in the form conditioned by Israels history. But it has become clear to as under the New Testament through Christ: Israel was only a type, necessary for its time and chosen by God, of the true people of God, only a shell which contained the kernel in the mean while, but at the same time was also to protect it until the time of its maturity. But the shell was too small and must be burst; the kernel had not and has not sufficient room, and it would be reversing the order of things, after the kernel is laid bare to retain the shell. It is not the outward Israel that is Gods people; it was just the period of its ruin, just the rejection of the Messiah at his coming by the external Israel that opened the way for this. It was made clear that a people as such was insufficient for this high calling, to be the chosen people of God, as the prophets themselves distinguished more and more between the mere external Israel and the true Israel, and saw the heathen coming to Zion and entering the breach. And though Israel is still held as the central point, the fulfillment is not in outward form, but ideally, inasmuch as Christ came the Saviour of the Jews; Israel therefore remaining the root in which the others were engrafted. We can understand now the promise of the innumerable increase (Hos 2:1). Literally it would apply to the people of Israel, but can only apply to them as the people of God; and even though the older prophets say nothing as yet of the calling of the Gentiles, as Micah and Isaiah do, we have now assuredly a right to abandon the notion of an increase of the external Israel, and to see the fulfillment in the founding of a people of God by Christ just in the time of the final ruin of Israel, who have become, especially by the conversion of the heathen, a numberless multitude, and will become still more numerous. Then the reunion of the divided kingdoms is an essential element in the Messianic picture of the future held up in prophecy, as this very passage shows. This is altogether natural. Since prophecy knows a people of God only in the form of the people of Israel, it was necessary, if salvation was to be brought by the reign of the Messiah, that the breach, so harmful to Gods people, and the fruitful source, even more than the consequence, of apostasy from Jehovah, should be removed. If Israel was to be described as becoming converted to God, it must also be represented as returning to its unity under the divinely chosen House of David. This element also in the promise belongs naturally to its form, the form which it must naturally assume under the Old Covenant. As in the New Testament it was declared that the outward Israel was not to constitute Gods people for all time, this element lost its significance; we cannot expect a literal fulfillment of this promise, but the idea which lies at its foundation has been and is being realized, that is, the idea of the real unity of Gods people under one head of the house of David, who was, however, more than the son of David, namely, under Christ. These promises have thus a higher range than the Prophet conceives, and find their fulfillment in a far higher sense than he hopes, and as they are thus more than mere human aspirations and pious wishes, they are seen to proceed from the Spirit of God, who preformed and prevised the New Covenant in the Old. So little does this view do away with the divine authority of the prophetic word, that it is rather its only real attestation and adequate expression, unlike the other literalizing view disproved above.

But if the reproach of spiritualizing should be brought against this conception, our defense is that we only spiritualize in reference to Old Testament promises, along with the Apostles, and would not be more realistic than they, who (1Pe 2:10; Rom 9:25-26), although fully aware of the literal sense of our passages, yet do expressly refer them to the conversion of the heathen. Peter in the same connection (Hos 1:9) sets the New Testament people of God, Christians, directly in the place of those of the Old Testament, and therefore the former are now the true Israel. This extension with reference to the heathen is also quite consequent. If the words: not my people, were once pronounced over Israel, it was because they had sunk quite to the level of the heathen. And if they are to be received again, they would be received just as those who had actually become like heathen; and it is no longer right to exclude the heathen, who are behind them in no respect. But there is this difference between the reacceptance and the first choice. When the Israelites were chosen they were not in positive opposition to God, but now they are so; and therefore a longer exclusion of the heathen would be a particularizing to a greater extent than their disciplinary training demanded; it would be a violation of justice. For the rest: Paul declares clearly that Israel itself shall not be excluded (Rom 11:26). Only thus should the people of God attain to its full increase (And surely, in the fact of the preservation of Israel in its nationality even under the New Testament, we may see a promise of this conversion, although that wonderful preservation by Gods providence is to be regarded in its most patent aspect as a part of the judgment decreed upon Israel by God. It is preserved as a living witness of the rejection decreed by God on account of its unbelief and rejection of the Messiah.) Only Paul says not a word, when promising Israels conversion, that would lead us to think that a people of God, , will be continued, not a word of the glory of the kingdom of Israel, though his heart beat so warmly (comp. chap. 9) towards his nation in its outward sense.

Finally we have only further to remark that in our references to the Messianic period inaugurated by Christ, as the time of the fulfillment of the prophetic promises, Messianic time is taken in the fullest sense of the term, and the whole course of the New Testament dispensation, from its foundation to its completion, is regarded as one whole, so that we have not yet attained to the perfect fulfillment, although the promises of prophecy have been undergoing their realization since the time of Christ. For it doth not yet appear what we shall be. The fulfillment is not yet complete, but we stand in expectation of it. This perfect realization consists least in the literal fulfillment with respect to the external Israel alone, but it too, in so far as it is converted to the Messiah, will have a share in the complete salvation ready for all who will be converted to God through Christ.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Hos 1:2. Starke: All departure from Gods Word and from true religion is a spiritual whoredom. Blessed are they who beware of this!

Hos 1:4. Starke: As a good intention without Gods counsel does not make a cause good, so it cannot be said that the divine will has been fulfilled, when it has been executed with a perverted heart and not in accordance with the divine purposes. (Comp. the Doctrinal and Ethical section, No. 3.)

Wrt. Summ.: Gods wrath often falls upon posterity, and they must suffer for the sins of their forefathers, if they walk in their evil footsteps (Exo 20:5).

Tub. Bible: Public sins of a whole nation or of its kings and princes are followed by a general judgment of God, by which whole lands are destroyed.

[Pusey: So awful a thing it is to be the instrument of God in punishing or reproving others if we do not by his grace keep our own hearts and hands pure from sin.M.]

Hos 1:6. Wrt. Summ.: Behold here the severity of the divine wrath. God is certainly compassionate, but his compassion is regulated by his holy righteousness. His compassion exceeds all human petitions and understanding; but his wrath goes beyond all human reckoning. Men may keep on sinning against our beloved God too long, so that when He has waited long exhorting them to repentance, and they do not follow Him, his words at last are: Lo-Ruhamah Lo-Ammi. Beware of this and do not defer your repentance; for God may soon become as angry as He was merciful.

Hos 1:7. Cramer: When human help ceases, divine help begins. He is not limited to the use of means, but is Himself our Help and Shield.

[Burroughs: The more immediate the hand of God appears in his mercy to his people, the more sweet and precious ought that mercy then to be. Dulcius ex ipso fonte. Created mercies are the most perfect mercies.M.]

Starke: Woe to him whose God the Lord will no longer be. Let men therefore beware lest by presumptuous sin they trifle away all intercourse with God.

Rieger: When God thus renounces those who were his people, it is much more lamentable than any severance between those who are married or betrothed. I will be your God and ye shall be my people, was the formula of the covenant. They had broken the last condition by their unbelief; and thus they stirred up the Lord to anger so that He renounced the first. Yet He has not expressly retracted the whole formula of the covenant. He did not say: I will not be your God, but He cut short his words in anger: I will not be yours. Thus room is left for that mercy which shall awake anew for them.

Hos 1:9. The threatenings are indeed terrible: but how merciful it was in God to announce the judgment before it comes; and the plainer and more striking these threatenings are the greater the mercy. This is a ground for hoping that the judgment will be averted.

Chap. 2 Hos 2:1. This is the order and method of Gods dealings: He slays, not that He may keep under the power of death, but that He may bring to repentance. Thus He dispersed Israel among the heathen, and without any compassion and mercy, as it seemed to outward observation, rejected them utterly. For the Ten Tribes have not yet returned to their own land. But how abundantly has God compensated to them this misfortune! For those who were scattered among the heathen, He gathered again by the Gospel, and so gathered them that a great multitude of the heathen came to the knowledge of the kingdom of Christ along with the remnant in the kingdom of Israel. He points the people of Israel to this compensation, that they may not despond in such affliction, as we also assuage, by the hope of the future glory, prepared for us by the death of Christ, the sorrows of those calamities which we see before our eyes.

[Burroughs: If we expect God to be a living God to us, it becomes us not to have dead hearts in his service. If God be active for our good, let us be active for his honor.M.]

Hos 2:2. Starke: The Church of the New Testament has only one Head, who is Christ. Blessed are we if we cleave to and follow Him!

[Matthew Henry: To believe in Christ is to appoint Him to ourselves for our Head, that is, to consent to Gods appointment and willingly to submit to his guidance and appointment; and this in concurrence and communion with all good Christians who make Him their Head; so that though they are many, yet in Him they are one, and so become one with each other. Qui conveniunt in aliquo tertio inter se conveniunt.M.].

Hos 2:3. The prophet gives the best application of the names which God bade him apply to his children in order that the Christian Church may be convinced thereby that all the former things are reversed, that wrath is done away, and that the unfathomable compassion and mercy of God stand open to every man. For how should God, after He gave his son, not with Him have given all things? This word say belongs to the office of public preaching. We are to understand by it that the servants of God in the New Testament are commanded to comfort believers, and to declare to them that they stand in mercy and are a people of God.

[Pusey: The words my people are words of hope in prophecy; they become words of joy in each stage of fulfillment. They are words of mutual joy and gratulation when obeyed; they are words of encouragement until obeyed. God is reconciled to us, and willeth that we should be reconciled to Him.M.].

Footnotes:

[1][Hos 1:1.explained by Gesenius as meaning, fountain; by First et al.: one who explains, comp. Deu 1:5. If a symbolical meaning is sought, the latter is probably to be preferred; if not, the signification must remain undecided. There seems to be no necessity for holding a symbolical sense.M.]

[2]Hos 1:2. . By the construct state in which the first word stands the following ( being not an infinitive but a prterite), becomes a sort of substantive phrase subordinate to . [ is thus made equivalent to an adverb of time=when at first (Ewald). The construction would thus be similar to that of the phrase , Exo 6:28; 1Sa 25:15 et al. See Ewald, Gr., 286, 3. For the view which regards the first clause of the verse as a kind of superscription, see the exposition and Green, Heb. Gr., 255, 1,2.M.] , according to the familiar Heb. emphatic mode of expression, the is here marked as complete.

[3] Hos 1:6. is usually regarded as a participle with fallen away. But according to Keil it is rather the 3 fem. prt. (in the pausal form on account of the Athnach, as in 2:3, 24)=she finds no sympathy, is not compassionated. [This is a question which must remain undecided, as the word occurs only in pause. Yet the common view is preferable, because (1) the part. is the better form for an appellative, as it approaches more nearly to a noun, and (2) if the verb became an appellative it would probably remain a fixed form, or at least not be subject to such changes as the 3 prt. undergoes in pause. The part, would of course retain the Kamets in any case.M.]

The difficult words probably give a further explanation of the . = to forgive: I will no longer have compassion on them that I should forgive them (Meier: is climactic=how much less forgive them). The object: sin, is certainly then to be supplied as also in Gen 18:24. But, according to the context, it is easier to supply this than to translate with Hengstenberg: I will take away from them, namely, what they have, or everything they have. In Gen 5:16, in the sense of taking may without difficulty be construed absolutely. But here, especially with the dative, an object is expected.

[Pusey, Henderson, Cowles, et al. follow E. V. in rendering: But I will utterly take them away. Newcome: But I will surely take them away. Ewald agrees with Meier in the translation given above. Henderson admits that followed by elsewhere means to forgive, and that it might have the same sense here if it were only preceded by the copulative , but that meaning but excludes such repetition. Here it is forgotten that may mark consecution or result, as it does frequently, comp. Gen 40:15; Isa 29:16; Psa 8:5, with many other passages. But Schmoller as well as Keil, who discern the true connection and meaning of the words, have overlooked the occurrence of the inf. before the future of the same verb. All the other critics give to this combination the force of emphasis or intensity. Is it not better to suppose that repetition is implied, which is the fundamental notion? And if the last clause is explanatory of the preceding, the of the one must find its counterpart in the frequentative construction of the other: I will no longer have mercy on them that I should continue to forgive them. Greater fullness of meaning and appropriateness is also seen to mark this part of the verse: God had overlooked their sins often before, but He would not keep on overlooking them forever.M.]

[4][Hos 1:9. ; I will not be for you, i.e, not be yours, not belong to you. There is no need of maintaining that God is understood, as Henderson, Cowles, and the English expositors generally do. The sense is complete without supposing an ellipsis. Houbigant (followed by Newcome) has gone so far as to transpose the letters of the last two words into . But this has no support in the MSS. or Versions, and is besides very improbable, not to mention that it supposes the omission of the latter .M.]

[5] Hos 2:1. . We might be inclined to render: in the place of [its being said]; the usage of the expression elsewhere is however too clearly opposed (comp. Lev 4:24-33; Lev 14:13; Jer 22:12; Ezek. 21:35; Neh 4:14). But with the subject following is perhaps=instead of, in Isa 33:21.

[6][This will show the groundlessness of the opinion of Noyes, that from the contents of the book it is probable that he did not exercise his office until after the death of Jeroboam, when the kingdom of Israel was in, a state of great distraction and anarchy.J. F. M.]

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

We have here a most interesting Chapter, describing the Lord’s gracious dealings with his people, in bringing them from a state of sin to salvation.

Hos 2:1

I beg the Reader to observe, how soon the change is made from the foregoing Chapter. The Lo, the not is taken off; and the Lord calls his people again Ammi, and Ruhamah, beloved. And Reader! pray observe the cause. They are called Brethren. Yes! Jesus is not ashamed to call them so. Heb 2:11 . And the Church glories in it. Son 8:1 . Oh! how gracious!

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

The Christian in the Wilderness

Hos 2:14-15

Little as the Israelites were permanently benefited by their sufferings in the desert, they appear never to have forgotten them. Hence ‘the wilderness’ became another word among them for trouble and sorrow. It bears that meaning here.

I. It points out to us, in the first instance, the Author of affliction.

II. The text shows us next why God afflicts us; at least, it discovers to us one of the most frequent causes of our sorrows.

III. We learn further in the text how God sometimes afflicts us. It describes Him as doing it gradually, compassionately, tenderly.

IV. Having followed the Christian into the wilderness, consider, in the next place, the comfort the Lord imparts to him there. ‘I will speak comfortably unto her.’

V. But consolation is not all that an immortal spirit needs in sorrow. Our attention is called, therefore, to the supplies which God furnishes in tribulation.

VI. The hope that God excites in affliction. The valley of Achor was situated at the very entrance of the promised land.

VII. The effect to be produced on Israel by the mercies vouchsafed to her. ‘She shall sing there as in the days of her youth.’

C. Bradley, Sermons, p. 21.

The Valley of Troubling

Hos 2:15

I. ‘Achor ‘means ‘troubling,’ and the valley got its name from a great crime, a great disaster, and a great act of judicial punishment. The crime was that of Achan, who hid in his tent spoil that ought to have been consecrated to Jehovah. The disaster was the consequent defeat of the Israelites in their assault upon one of the hill cities of Canaan. The judicial act was that, by Divine command, the culprit who had troubled Israel, bringing on it defeat, was stoned to death, his body and all his possessions burned, and a great cairn piled over his ashes. Hosea is prophesying of the captivity in Babylon under the figure of a repetition of the earlier history and the experience of the Exodus. The valley of trouble is turned into a means by which hope draws nearer to the beaten and desponding host.

II. The strength of a Christian man is in his sinlessness. And so we may learn that if we have been beaten once, and again attack, and again are foiled, the shameful disaster is a Divine warning to us to look not only to our equipment, but to our temper, and see whether the reason for failure lies, not only in something wrong in the details or accompaniments of our effort, but in something lacking in the communion which we have with God Himself. But again, Hosea’s imaginative use of the old story teaches us how hope may co-exist with trouble, sorrow, trial, affliction, or the like. Such co-existence is quite possible.

III. Hosea here teaches us, not only the possible co-existence of hope and trouble, but the sure issue of rightly borne trouble in a brighter hope. Assuredly if a man has accepted the providences there will follow on the darkest of them a brightening hope. Then there is another reason why the sure child of trouble patiently, Christianly borne, is a more joyful hope. And that reason is set out in full by a man that was an expert in trouble, viz. Paul, when he says, ‘tribulation worketh patience’. Thus tribulation which borne in faith works patience, and patience which brings evidence of a Divine Helper, teach us to say, ‘Thou hast been my help; Thou wilt be my help’. And so hope is the last blessed result of tribulation.

A. Maclaren, The Baptist Times and Freeman, 15 August, 1902, p. 603.

References. II. 15. J. M. Neale, Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, vol. iii. p. 337. A. Maclaren, Weekday Evening Addresses, p. 159. Bishop Lightfoot, Old Testament Outlines, p. 266. II. 21, 22. J. M. Neale, Sermons on the Prophets, vol. ii. p. 72. III. 5. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv. No. 888.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Agnosticism

Hos 2:8

The youngest reader of the Bible will be able to understand the words “They did not know.” There is a theory which is known to-day by the difficult name Agnosticism. A great deal of worthless thinking may be hidden under that dark term. Let us understand what it means, and then inquire what it is worth. The meaning is supposed to be not-know-ism. Men do not now blatantly and vulgarly say, “There is no God”; that is generally considered now to be a fool’s peculiar speech: now men say, If there is a God, we do not know him; he does not come within the range of our observation, experience, or consciousness; we do not say there is no God, we simply say we do not know him. That is the meaning, in general terms, of the doctrine that is known under the name of Agnosticism. If it were an intellectual doctrine only, there might appear to be about it somewhat of the charm of modesty. How can a man look otherwise than blankly humble when he says he does not know? What attitude would befit such a declaration but an attitude of the profoundest self-distrust and self-disregard? But it is not only an intellectual doctrine; it is infinitely more. What great case does the intellect wholly cover? Is man all intellect, all intelligence; is he a repertory of information; is he well nourished and well furnished with mere news or facts or historical memories? Agnosticism cannot begin and end where it likes; even though it bear such a name as that, full of syllables, we must not let it have all its own way. Even Agnosticism must not be allowed to run riot over the church floor and the church altar, and put aside everything as if it alone represented the consummation of wisdom, speculation, and cherished thinking. “She did not know that I gave her corn”: so Agnosticism was not only an intellectual deprivation; it was a moral insensibility.

Do not imagine that religion touches only the intellectual faculties. You cannot dismiss God, and then be as good and wise and true and beneficent as if you had acknowledged him in all the mystery of his triune personality. If you think you can thus treat religion, then religion is one of the things you have not begun to understand. God cannot be expelled from the intellect without the moral quality of the whole nature going down; without the heart also being as agnostic as the mind. Think of an agnostic heart! The life plucks all the grapes in the vineyard and all the flowers in the garden, and enjoys all the light of the sun, and when it is asked whence came they, it says, “I do not know.” So, then, we have not only to deal with intellectual modesty, falsely so-called; we have to deal with a great moral deprivation; with the irrational case of a rational being eating, drinking, thriving on innumerable bounties, and not knowing whence they came, or whom to thank for a banquet so profuse. The great difficulties will lie in that direction. The dear, meek, modest, self-renouncing, self-humiliating, intellectual agnostic who sits down and says, “I do not know,” does not end the case. We could get over his intellectual ignorance. Tell me that a dog does not know the hand that gives him food, and you will prove him to be but a dog; but do not tell me that rational, intelligent, educated, civilised, progressive beings can be eating, drinking, enjoying, yea, and taking the higher meanings of things in a certain poetic sense, without ever asking, What hand is behind, giving, controlling? That would be a miracle, exciting and justifying the incredulity of mankind. All persons, but especially the young, should guard themselves against the mock humility which says respecting God, “I do not know him”; because not to know the Eternal, is not to know the temporal; not to confess with adoring reverence the impenetrable metaphysic of theology, is not to know what hand painted the lily, or guides the fowls of the air in all their wanderings.

Agnosticism is a larger question than any that can be limited to the mere dry intellect. And Agnosticism of this kind means not only deprivation of moral sensibility, as expressed in the action of gratitude, but it makes responsibility at once frivolous and impossible. Responsible to whom? Let us say, responsible to society. Did society light the sun? Does society marshal the seasons in their order? Does society balance these wondrous lights that gleam in the infinite spaces? Does society make harvest? Let us put the case analogically thus: the captain, the officers in charge of the great vessel filled with passengers, say to these passengers, We ignore everything that does not come within our own control; we cannot be held responsible for things which lie immeasurably beyond us; we will therefore take you and do the best we can for you on the sea; you shall have good accommodation, you shall have an excellent table; we will do what we can to entertain you with conversation, and we will hold a very mirthful and exhilarating fellowship one with another; but as to guiding the ship by the north star, or having anything to do with any sort of star whatsoever, we do not dream of it our responsibilities are social. Will you go with that agnostic captain? You would not send a dog with him that you value. There is a larger responsibility. Responsibility does not lie between one man and another alone; there are responsibilities that take in far-away views, grand considerations, immeasurable quantities, ministries and mysteries boundless and infinite. Responsibility never reaches its true realisation until it touches the point of reverence simple, earnest, continual dependence upon God, otherwise responsibility will be a calculation it will be an arrangement of postures and attitudes, it will take upon itself the form of a selfish reckoning, so that so much done shall mean so much returned: that responsibility may be represented by the balance; so much on the one side, so much on the other; such the total, such the dividend. When men talk so they do not know the meaning of responsibility. When a man denies God he cannot do his duty to his fellow man. Yet there is a sense in which he can be dutiful, honourable, beneficent, useful; but that is a limited sense; lacking the mystery of religion, it lacks its reverence; lacking reverence, it lacks depth; lacking depth, it will soon wither away.

So even Agnosticism is not the easy light-mannered method of getting rid of God and religious thought and religious obligation; a sweet new modest way of throwing off eternity. Do not misunderstand this not-know-ism. The man that does not know God does not know himself. A philosophy profound to infinity is that which says: All commandments sum themselves in two directions love to God and love to man; the one being the root of the other. No man can love God without loving God’s image as seen in human kind. Theology not formal and scientific, but spiritual and inspired is the fount and origin of beneficence, and exalted morality. If any instances that indicate discrepancy should occur to the memory of criticism, these instances only prove that the religion is absent: not because of religion, but for want of it do men disregard social duties and human rights.

What is God’s reply to Agnosticism? His answer is given in these words:

“Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness” ( Hos 2:9 ).

This is rational, this is just, this is simple, and it is impossible for it to escape the approval of mankind. Where God is not known, why should he continue his bounty? Who will throw life away? Who will throw flowers into the darkness? Is not that a wastefulness forbidden by every instinct, not knowing the prohibition of a written law, but prohibited by the interdict of instinct, and bearing upon itself the approval of eternal righteousness? Is it a grateful exercise to be sending messages to people who do not know the writer or inquire for him, or reply to his communications? Is it a delightful and inspiring exercise to be giving bread, and the persons receiving it not knowing whence it came, or caring as to the name and character of the giver? It may be so; but where the giving of the bread is meant not to end in itself, but to lead to other, further, brighter, grander results, who can waste his energy in the conduct of processes which have no termination? God never gives bread by itself. Jesus Christ never healed a blind man merely that the blind man might see the wonderful things round about him that would have been childish and frivolous; Jesus Christ opened the eyes of the blind that he might lead the man to think whether it would not be better still to have the vision of his soul illumined, so that he could see the mystery of the divine action in universe and history.

So when God gives bread to the body he does not want to keep our bones together, a mechanism anatomical; he only feeds the body that he may get at the soul. God has therefore determined that if men do not know him, or ask concerning him, or recognise the purpose of his ministry, he will come down and claim his corn and wine and wool and flax. This is just. God must keep some control over things. It is good of him now and then to send a bad harvest; it is excellent management to blight the wheat-field, and make the people mad with hunger. That is love. Presently they will begin to ask questions, to wonder; and there is a kind of amazement which nearly touches religion, approaching the mysterious line which separates the highest wonder from the beginning of the profoundest reverence. It was good of God to take away the one ewe lamb; it was infinitely merciful of him to strike down the only tree we had one little tree, and God wrenched it out of the earth by its dry roots, and shook the black soil back, and burned the tree. What did he mean by it? To teach us that it was his tree, not ours. You have no children, except in a very secondary and temporary sense. The Lord looks down from heaven and says: My children; my corn, my wine, my wool, my flax; all souls are mine; the gold and the silver are mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. There is but one Proprietor. Yet we call ourselves landlords! It pleases us, poor babies; it gives a man importance in his own family, if nowhere else, to call himself a landlord. Not an inch of land does any one of us possess. There are no landlords; in fact, there are no lords at all. Not until we realise that we are stewards, servants, trustees, people occupying responsible positions, shall we begin to realise the true dignity of life. He is the landlord in veriest truth who holds the land in trust, for cultivation, for the feeding of the poor and the maintenance of the State. He is aristocratic with more than nominal profession who says, My strength belongs to the weak man; my wisdom is the refuge of the unintelligent; my experience is a bank; and I allow all men known to me, who care to do so, to trade upon my treasure, for I hold it on their account The Lord comes to take back the things that belong to him, and he takes them back with a weary and aching heart. The Lord does not like to take anything back; he meant us to have it when he gave it; he giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; he never means to reclaim in any sense of rebuke whatever he has bestowed upon us. He says to us rather, Use it, dear children; make the best of it; I mean it for your gladness, and he who eats my harvests with a thankful heart doubles them; he who blesses his bread before breaking it will find more at the end than there was at the beginning.

What is the issue of this Agnosticism?

“I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them” ( Hos 2:11-12 ).

This is not vengeance, this is reason; this is not arbitrary punishment, this is a natural consequence and necessity. Divine gifts are abused, are misunderstood, or in some sense resented: what if divine patience should be outworn, or if only through a temporary suspension of his fortunes man can be brought to consideration? Recognise the greatness of things, the manifold relationships of life, and understand that Providence is not an arbitrary beneficence, but a critical and discriminating ministry. And there comes a time when God will say to the cloud, Rain no more on that unthankful life; and to the sun, No longer shine on ingratitude so base and desperate. This is God’s method; it is not mysterious; it is simple, frank, direct, intelligible, and just. If there be any fat, prosperous, gross atheists, so there be fat beasts maturing for the knife and the poleaxe. Do not misunderstand the outward and temporary prosperity of wickedness. It has been the mystery of the ages, but the mystery has been again and again dissolved, and men have seen the action of the divine Sovereignty, even in instances that appeared to prosper without the altar and without the revelation of the Word.

Does it all end here? God cannot end at a point like this. There is a divine rhetoric that requires other syllables to complete the Gospel sentence; it would be poor reading if it ended here. God goes from judgment to Gospel:

“Therefore [the critics say, Nevertheless], behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt” ( Hos 2:14-15 ).

So, we repeat, God cannot be angry all day; he breaks down, he proposes reconciliation. The Cross is not a human thought; it is an eternal proposal of love. The Lamb of God was slain from before the foundation of the world. We have often had occasion to say, the atonement was rendered before the sin was committed. God cannot be second; we cannot surprise him into new movements. The Gospel, as we understand it, occupies a certain historic or chronological point as to its revelation and framework, but in its innermost thought who is this that cometh up from eternity? It is the Son of God, who, ere the universe arose, either by divine fiat, or from fire-cloud, or how it might, was slain for the sin of the world. Gracious mystery! Blessed fact!

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

VII

THE BOOK OF HOSEA PART I

Hos 1:1-4:5

Books commended: (1) “Pulpit Commentary,” (2) “Bible Commentary,” (3) “Cambridge Bible,” (4) Sampey’s Syllabus. Hosea, the prophet, was one of three who bore this name. The other two were Hoshea, afterward called Joshua (Num 13:8-16 ), and Hoshea, the last king of Israel. These are shortened forms of the name “Jehoshea” which means, the Lord is my help, but the short form means savior, or deliverer. Hosea, the prophet, was a son of Beeri, but we know nothing of Beeri; nor do we know where Hosea was born or buried. We know that he was a prophet of Israel and, perhaps, was a native of the Northern Kingdom, but his tribal relation is only a guess with much uncertainty. He had frequent messages for Judah as well as for Israel, and at first he praised Judah but later on he warned and threatened her.

In the title Hosea is said to have prophesied “in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel.” Now the reign of these kings of Judah covered a period of one hundred and twelve years; so he must have lived to be quite an old man. Hosea probably commenced his prophetic work in the latter part of the reign of Jeroboam and in the early part of the reign of Uzziah, and extended it through the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and into the reign of Hezekiah, which would give us a period of fifty or sixty years for his work, say from 780 B.C. to 725 B.C., about fifty-five years. The internal evidence fully corroborates the statement of Hos 1:1 .

The period covered by his prophetic utterances was undoubtedly the darkest in the whole history of the kingdom of Israel. Political life was characterized by anarchy and misrule. The throne was occupied by men who obtained possession by the murder of their predecessors and the people were governed by military despotism. Zechariah was slain after a reign of six months; Shallum, after only one month. A dozen years later Pekahish was assassinated by Pekah, who met the same fate at the hands of Hoshea. All these were ungodly rulers, and the morals of the nation were sinking to the lowest ebb. The conditions were terrible in the extreme; luxurious living, robbery, oppression, falsehood, adultery, murder, accompanied by the most violent intolerance of any form of rebuke. The language of the prophet is influenced by the confusion about him in the nation and the disgrace of his own home. Then Israel being situated midway between Egypt and Assyria, two factions existed: one favoring alliance with Egypt; the other, with Assyria. Such were the circumstances which furnished the occasion of this prophecy.

The genuineness and canonicity of the prophecies of Hosea have never been widely called in question, nor has the book of Hosea been successfully distributed among the several authors differing in character, culture, and date, a division of labor which has played a great part in the criticism of other prophets. The book of Hosea, of a date and authenticity unquestioned, is a witness of the utmost value for previous portions of the Old Testament. A number of allusions put it beyond all reasonable doubt, that Hosea, in the eighth century before Christ, had in his hands a Hebrew literature identical with much of which we possess at this time.

In this book we find several allusions to the history of Genesis: (1) Adam’s sin in paradise and expulsion there from (Hos 6:7 ) ; (2) the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Hos 11:8 ) ; (3) God’s promise to Abraham (Hos 1:10 ); (4) Jacob’s experience (Hos. 12:3-4:15).

In Exodus, besides general allusions to Moses, we have the following verbal references: (1) Hos 1:11 is a reference to Exo 1:10 ; (2) Hos 2:17 , to Exo 23:13 . The curse denounced in Lev 26:14 ff is alluded to in Hos 7:12 . The sin in the matter of Baal-peor discussed in Numbers is alluded to in Hos 9:10 .

There are several verbal citations of passages in Deuteronomy: (1) Deu 31:18 , in Hos 3:1 ; (2) Deu 17:8-13 , in Hos 4:4 ; (3) Deu 19:14 ; Deu 27:17 , in Hos 5:10 , and in many other instances. So we can find allusions to Joshua, Judges, and Samuel, showing that all these books were in the canon of sacred Scriptures in the time of Hosea just as we have them today.

Many of the finest passages in Hosea, practically all of the promises, are treated by the radical critics as interpolations by later writers; most of the references to Judah are stricken out, and the historical allusions to great men and events in the past are also cut out. This is revolutionary criticism and completely reverses the message of Hosea. There is not a scintilla of evidence to justify such a mutilation of “this book.

To show the fallacy of the radical critic theory of the Pentateuch I take the following from Sampey’s Syllabus:

Professor James Robertson, in his able work on the Early Religion of Israel, has delivered heavy blows against the current radical theory of the origin of the Pentateuch, by emphasizing the following facts concerning Amos and Hosea, who are admitted by all parties to have lived and labored in the eighth century, B.C.:

1. These prophets had a rich vocabulary of moral and theological terms, implying a high degree of religious culture prior to their time.

2. They displayed literary skill such as would argue for a high development of the Hebrew language and literature before their time.

3. Both of these prophets, as well as Micah and Isaiah, far from regarding themselves as pathfinders in thought and practice, speak of their work as a return to the law of God given in former times. They plainly regard themselves as reformers, not innovators. These three lines of argument unite in favoring a date for the Pentateuch much earlier than that assigned by Wellhausen and his school.

Hosea, of all the prophets, is the most difficult to translate and interpret. His style is marked by obscure brevity; his mind was so aflame with the fiery message which he brought that he did not stop to weigh words for the sake of clearness. Jerome says, “Hosea is concise, and speaks in detached sentences.” The prophet felt too deeply to express himself calmly. Amos 1-3 is in prose; the rest of the book is rhythmical, but almost destitute of parallelism, a general characteristic of Hebrew poetry. The first three chapters are symbolical and strikingly graphic; the rest is literal, that “he may run who reads,” i.e., “run through it in reading.”

This book naturally divides itself into two parts: a shorter one (Hosea 1-3), and a longer one (Hosea 4-14), as follows:

ANALYSIS HOSEA SPIRITUAL ADULTERY

I. The preparation of the prophet (Hosea 1-3)

1. His domestic relations and the symbolical import (Hos 1:2-2:1 )

(1) His orders, his marriage, and his family (Hos 1:2-9 )

(2) His vision of hope (Hos 1:10-2:1 )

2. His domestic tragedy, a revelation (Hos 2:2-23 )

(1) The charge explained (Hos 2:2-7 )

(2) The severity of love (Hos 2:8-13 )

(3) The tenderness of love (Hos 2:14-20 )

(4) The promise of enlargement (Hos 2:21-23 )

3. His reclamation of Gomer and its revelation (Hos 3:1-5 )

(1) His orders (Hos 3:1 )

(2) His obedience (Hos 3:2-3 )

(3) His vision of future Israel (Hos 3:4-5 )

II. The preaching of the prophet (Hos 4:1-14:8 )

NOTE: Of all the parts of the Bible, this, perhaps, is the hardest to analyze. Sampey says, “These chapters defy logical analysis,” and Bishop Lowth calls them “scattered leaves of a sibyl’s book.” This section consists of detached selections from Hosea’s prophecies, without regard to logical order. They are perhaps more chronological than logical. There have been several attempts to analyze these chapters but all alike seem to have been baffled with the difficulty of the task. The author ventures, as a kind of analysis to guide us in our study of this section, the following selected outline:

1. Pollution and pursuit (Hos 4:1-6:3 )

2. Pollution and punishment (Hos 6:4-10:15 )

3. Pollution and pity (Hos 10:1-14:8 )

On the three main views of the marriage of Hosea I take the following from Sampey’s Syllabus:

1. That the whole is an allegory or parable. This is the view of Calvin, who objects to an actual marriage of the prophet with an unchaste woman on the ground that it would discredit him with the very people whom he wished to influence. He says: “It would have then exposed the prophet to the scorn of all if he had entered a brothel and taken to himself a harlot.” Calvin insists that the expression “wife of whoredom” could mean nothing less than a common prostitute. He replies to the argument that this was an exceptional case by saying that it seems inconsistent with reason that the Lord should thus gratuitously render his prophet contemptible. He thinks the expression, “Children of wantoness,” also militates against the literal view. Calvin seems to think that the woman referred to in the third chapter was different from the one named in the first, but that we are not to imagine a real occurrence in either case. Calvin’s interpretation, in detail, of the language of Hosea seems to be greatly weakened by his theory of the imaginary character of the marriage.

2. Some think that Hosea actually married a woman who was leading an unchaste life; that she bore three children to him and then lapsed into her old life once more, sinking into a condition of slavery from which she was bought by Hosea and restored to his home, though not at first to the full intimacy of married life. This view, it must be confessed, would seem the most natural to a plain reader. The chief objection is moral. How could the Holy God direct a pure-minded prophet to form such an unnatural union? Some authorities think that Hosea’s language, in describing his marriage has been colored by his later experiences; and that he has interpreted God’s command to him to marry in darker words by reason of the experiences which followed the union. However that may be, it seems exceedingly difficult to believe that God would direct His prophet to marry a woman already living in unchastity.

3. Others hold that Hosea was directed to marry a woman given to idolatry, an idolatry which was often associated with licentiousness, although his bride was not an actually unchaste woman at first, but only a spiritual adulteress. She bore to the prophet three children, to whom symbolical names were given. Later on, idolatry brought forth its natural fruitage, and Hosea’s wife became an actual adulteress. Whether she then deserted Hosea, or whether he divorced her, we are not told. Now Hosea could understand why Jehovah was grieved with unfaithful Israel to the point of casting her off. The unspeakable love and compassion of God for His unfaithful spouse prepared Hosea in some measure to obey the divine command to recover his own unfaithful wife and restore her to his home.

The third view has more to recommend it than either of the other two. Hosea’s bitter domestic sorrow became an object-lessen for himself and his people. His heart was almost broken by shame and grief, but he was thereby fitted to portray the heinousness of apostasy, on the one hand, and, on the other, Jehovah’s tenderness and compassion toward His unfaithful people.

In Hos 1:2-9 we have set forth the condition of the people of Israel at this time and their relation to Jehovah. There are several words and phrases in it that need explanation. “When Jehovah spoke at the first” means the beginning of Hosea’s prophecies in the latter part of the reign of Jeroboam II, and refers to God’s first command to him. “Gomer” means failing, or consummation and indicates the decline of Israel at that time because of her sins. “Jezreel,” the name of the first-born means scattered by God and is contrasted with “Israel” which means, prince with God, i.e., “Jezreel” indicates a prophecy of Israel’s scattering which was fulfilled in the destruction of the house of Jehu in which God would avenge the awful deeds of Jehu though he did his work at the command of God, but with the spirit of vengeance and with no thought of the glory of God. The kingdom of Israel, though spared about fifty years, soon ceased, when her bow, the symbol of her strength, was broken in the valley of Jezreel by Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, & Israel was scattered.

Then a daughter was born to Gomer whom the prophet was instructed to call “Lo-ruhamah,” which means hath not obtained mercy and as applied to Israel at this time, signifies that God had visited her in her wickedness; that Israel was pass-ing beyond the hope of mercy and pardon. Then the prophet contrasts with this condition of Israel the mercy of Jehovah to Judah which was fulfilled in the destruction of Sennacherib’s army and the extension of the life of Judah one hundred and thirty-two years beyond that of Israel. This prophecy concerning Judah was, doubtless, intended to encourage the faithful in Israel.

Then followed a third child born to the woman, whom the prophet was instructed to name “Loammi,” which means not my people and indicates Jehovah’s complete rejection of Israel because of her violation of the marriage covenant. So the prophet’s children symbolized, step by step, the sad gradation of Israel’s fast-coming calamity. The name, “Jezreel,” scattered of God, denotes the first blow dealt to them by divine Providence, from which it was possible for them by repentance to recover; “Loruhamah,” without mercy, imparts another and heavier blow, yet not beyond all hope of recovery; but “Loammi,” not my people, puts an end to hope, implying the rejection of Israel by the Almighty. The national covenant was annulled; God had cast off his people who were left hopeless and helpless, because of their sinful and ungrateful departure from the fountain of all blessing.

In Hos 1:10-2:1 we have set forth clearly the promise of the return and conversion of the Jews. There is, perhaps, a primary fulfilment in the return under Zerubbabel and Joshua but the larger and clearer fulfilment is yet to be realized in the gathering of the Jews and their consequent conversion at which time the millennium will be introduced and the great multitudes of spiritual Israel here referred to will be converted. Then Jezreel will be reversed in its application and made to apply to the planting of Israel in her own land; and right where they are now said not to be God’s people they shall be called God’s people. Israel and Judah shall have one head, the Messiah, and not only will Jezreel be reversed in its application, but also the names of the other two children will lose their negative meaning, and, instead of Loruhamah and Loammi, there will be Ammi, my people and Ruhhamah, the beloved. Such will be the conditions of fellowship on their return. This accords with Rom 9:26-27 and other New Testament quotations.

The charge against the Israelites in Hos 2:2-7 is their idolatries in which they have forgotten him and their obligations to him. The mother here is Israel taken collectively and is represented as a wife, unfaithful to the marriage relation. The threat of stripping her naked is in accord with the Oriental custom of dealing with the harlot, which is the method also of the Germans in dealing with an adulteress. This is described by Tacitus thus: Accisis crimibus nudatam coram propingius expellit domo maritus . Her children are the children of Israel individually who are also barred from the privileges of the covenant and there are no blessings for them. Her lovers mentioned here are her idols to which she had turned for support, for which the Lord pronounces the curse upon them, that will turn them back to himself.

The severity of Jehovah’s love for them is shown in Hos 2:8-13 . For her disregard of Jehovah’s blessings, and attributing them to Baalim, he removes them and subjects Israel to the most severe chastisements, here described as “nakedness,” “shame,” “mirth to cease, her feasts, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn assemblies,” the waste of the land, the visit of the days of Baalim, etc., which are expressions of the severity of his love to bring Israel to repentance. The fulfilment of these predictions we find in part in the conditions of the captivity but the author believes the reference here to the feasts and solemn assemblies to include the fulfilment of them by Christ on the cross as expressed in Col 2:14-17 .

The passage, Hos 2:14-20 , is in contrast with the preceding paragraph and should be translated: “Notwithstanding, I will allure, etc.,” which expresses Jehovah’s kindness to Israel in her captivity, which is intended to allure her to return to him. He shows here his tender love for Israel by making her troubles valley of Achor) the door of her hope. The new relation is expressed by the word, “Ishi,” which means my husband instead of “Baali,” my master. These terms are appellatives and should not be translated as proper names. There is a play upon the word, “Baal,” by which it is made to express their former relation to Jehovah as servant and master, because of Israel’s going after Baalim, as if to say, “If you make Baal your God, then I will be to you as Baali, i.e., master, but in this captivity I will take Baalim out of your mouth.” This is one of the blessings of the captivity, viz: The permanent cure of Israel of all forms of idolatry.

Then his love finds expression in the covenant with the beasts of the field, the doing away with war and the establishing of the betrothal relation in perfect righteousness. The covenant with the beasts here seems to correspond exactly with Isa 11:6-9 in which there is a clear reference to the messianic age, and does not find its larger fulfilment until the millennium. May the good Lord hasten the time when No strife shall rage, nor hostile feuds Disturb these peaceful years; To plowshares men shall beat their swords, To pruning-hooks, their spears. No longer hosts, encount’ring hosts, Shall crowds of slain deplore; They hang the trumpet in the hall, And study war no more.

In Hos 2:21-23 we have a clear and distinct promise of the conversion of the Jews and their consequent evangelization (together with Gentile Christians) of the world in the millennium. The blessings of this period are given in the terms of both the temporal and the spiritual, the temporal referring to the response of the heavens and the earth to the call of God and his people in giving blessings and the spiritual blessings are expressed in the sowing of Israel among the nations and the blessings upon them who were not God’s people. This certainly comprehends the time of the millennium in which the Jews shall play such a signal part in the evangelization of the world, as expressed in Rom 9:23 .

Hos 3 sets forth God’s command to Hosea to go and buy back Gomer, his unfaithful wife, who had been sold as a slave, the prophet’s prompt obedience and his vision of future Israel. This is an illustration of God’s great and boundless love for depraved unfaithful Israel, though like the unfaithful wife, she had forsaken Jehovah, her husband. The prophet kept her many days exercising the restraint upon her necessary to bring her to repentance. So the prophet explains that the children of Israel shall abide many days without king, etc., after which they shall return and seek Jehovah, their God, and shall have his favor upon them in the latter days.

There was a partial fulfilment of Hos 3:4 in the period of the captivity, but surely there is a clear prophecy here of the long period of the tribulation which followed the Jewish rejection of the Messiah and which will continue until the Jews shall look on him whom they have pierced and by faith embrace him as their long looked-for Messiah. As we behold the Jew today we see him “without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without pillar, and without ephod or teraphim,” but after many days he shall turn and seek Jehovah his God and David (Christ) his king and in the days of their ingathering will be the joy of the harvest.

QUESTIONS

1. Who was Hosea?

2. What was the date of his prophecy?

3. What was the occasion, or circumstances, of his prophecies?

4. What of the genuineness and canonicity of this book?

5. What was its relation, in general, to the sacred canon?

6. What allusions do we find in this book to the book of Genesis?

7. What allusions to the history in Exodus?

8. What allusion to Leviticus?

9. What allusion to Numbers?

10. What allusions to Deuteronomy?

11. How do the Radical Critics deal with the book of Hosea?

12. What was the relation of Amos and Hosea to recent theories of radical criticism respecting the origin of the Pentateuch, as shown by Prof. James Robertson?

13. What can you say of the character and style of this prophecy?

14. What is the outline, or analysis, of the book?

15. What are the three main views of the marriage of Hosea and which is the more commendable?

16. What is the interpretation and application of Hos 1:2-9 ?

17. What was the promise of Hos 1:10-2:1 ?

18. What was the charge against Israel as revealed in the domestic tragedy of Hos 2:2-7 ?

19. How is the severity of Jehovah’s love for them shown in Hos 2:8-13 , and what the fulfilment of the predictions contained therein?

20. How does Jehovah show the tenderness of his love in Hos 2:14-20 and what the fulfilment of its predictions?

21. What is the promise of Hos 2:21-23 and when the ideals here set forth to be realized?

22. What is the contents of chapter III and what is revelation?

23. What is the fulfilment of the predictions of Hos 3:4-5 ?

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

Hos 2:1 Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

Ver. 1. Say unto your brethren, Ammi ] Besides the public preaching of this gracious promise, Hos 1:10 , “There it shall be said unto them,” &c., charge is here given that this be the subject of their more private discourse also: and that they that fear the Lord speak often one to another, We that were not a people, are now a people: we that had not obtained mercy, have now obtained mercy. Iubet per prophetam ne haec vox in ecclesia taceatur (Mercer). God commands by the prophet that these sweet words, Ammi, Ruhamah, be tossed and spoken of at every friendly meeting; I will not leave you fatherless: in me the fatherless findeth mercy: I will never leave thee, I will not, not, not forsake thee ( , , Heb 13:5 ): so many “nots” there are in the original for more assurance. God would have such precious passages as these to be rehearsed (even in the “places of drawing water,” Jdg 5:11 , where the maids met to fetch water, or do other ordinary chars) for mutual encouragement, and for the praise of his name. Oh, the matchless mercy of our God! Oh, the never enough adored depth of his free grace! who would not fear thee, O King of nations! Jer 10:7 ; who would not be telling of thy goodness in the morning, and of thy faithfulness every night? Read that triumphant Psa 114:1-8 , and be you ever chanting out (as they of old at their daily employments), aliquid Davidicum; so building up one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Think but on these two words in the text, and you cannot want matter. Is it nothing to be in covenant with God, and to be under mercy? Oh, blessed are the people “that have the Lord for their God,” saith David, Psa 144:15 . “But I obtained mercy,” saith Paul, 1Ti 1:16 , and that was his , his confident boasting, wherever he came, being a constant preacher of God’s free grace: (as was likewise Augustine, which makes him hardly censured by the Semipelagian Papists and Arminians as an enemy to nature, because so high a friend to grace). Neither is he forgetful to tell his Ephesians and others to whom he writeth, that they were once dead in sins and trespasses, but now “quickened together with Christ,” &c. They were foreigners, but now fellow citizens with saints: they were darkness, but now light in the the Lord, and should therefore “walk as children of light,” Eph 5:8 , and talk of his praises, who had drawn them out of dreadful darkness into marvellous light. Come, saith David, and I will tell you what God hath done for my soul, Psa 66:16 . The Lord hath done great things for us, saith the Church, whereat we are glad, Psa 126:3 . He which is mighty hath done to me great things: and holy is his name, saith the blessed Virgin, Luk 1:49 . Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi, and to your sisters, Ruhamah. Say it, say it, to brethren and to sisters, upon every opportunity, and with the utmost importunity, that it may take impression upon their spirits, and not be as a seal set upon the water, nor as rain falling upon a rock that leaves no sign behind it. The Grecians being delivered out of servitude by Flaminius, the Roman general, rang out Soter, Soter, that is, Saviour, Saviour, with such a courage, that the very birds of the air, astonished thereat, fell to the earth. The people of Israel gave such a loud shout at the return of the ark, that the earth rang again. A drowning man, being pulled out of the water by Alphonsus, king of Aragon, and rescued from so great a death, cried out (as soon as he came again to himself) by way of thankfulness, Aragon, Aragon. Let us cry as loud Ammi, Ruhamah, hitherto God hath helped us, 1Sa 7:12 , who were lately (with those Israelites in the wilderness) talking of our graves. Say therefore with the Psalmist, “Because thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, my feet from falling, I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living,” &c., Psa 116:8 .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Hos 2:1-7

1Say to your brothers, Ammi, and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

2Contend with your mother, contend,

For she is not my wife, and I am not her husband;

And let her put away her harlotry from her face

And her adultery from between her breasts,

3Or I will strip her naked

And expose her as on the day when she was born.

I will also make her like a wilderness,

Make her like desert land

And slay her with thirst.

4Also, I will have no compassion on her children,

Because they are children of harlotry.

5For their mother has played the harlot;

She who conceived them has acted shamefully.

For she said, ‘I will go after my lovers,

Who give me my bread and my water,

My wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.’

6Therefore, behold, I will hedge up her way with thorns,

And I will build a wall against her so that she cannot find her paths.

7She will pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;

And she will seek them, but will not find them.

Then she will say, ‘I will go back to my first husband,

For it was better for me then than now!’

Hos 2:1 Say This word (BDB 55, KB 65) is a Qal IMPERATIVE, which figuratively denotes a certain future action of restoration and unification. This verse should go with the preceding salvation oracle (Hos 1:10 to Hos 2:1).

Ammi This means My people (BDB 766). It is a covenant designation for the people of God (e.g., Exo 6:6-7; Exo 19:5-6). This is the reversal of Hos 1:9 (cf. Hos 2:23).

Ruhamah This word means pitied, tender mercy, or compassion (BDB 933). This is an expression of the great love, compassion, and mercy of God. This is the reversal of Hos 1:6 (cf. Hos 2:23).

Hos 2:2

NASBContend. . .contend

NKJVbring charges. . .bring charges

NRSV, TEVplead. . .plead

NJBto court. . .to court

JPSOArebuke. . .rebuke

This is a legal term (BDB 936, KB 1224, Qal IMPERATIVE, used twice in this verse) for a lawsuit (cf. Hos 4:1-3; Hos 12:2; Jer 2:5-9; Mic 6:1-8). This verse is an analogy of Hosea’s divorce (cf. Deu 24:1-4) from Gomer. There are similar divorce formulas in Akkadian literature. The significance of Hosea’s use of the marriage contract as an analogy of the covenant between God and Israel is seen also in Isa 50:1; Isa 54:4-8; Jer 3:1-20; Ezekiel 16, 23; Mat 9:15; Joh 3:29; Eph 5:22-33; Rev 19:7-9; Rev 21:9; Rev 22:17.

Hosea calls on the children to plead with their mother (national Israel) to stop (lit. put away BDB 693, KB 747, Hiphil JUSSIVE) the activity (i.e., idolatry) that has led to the divorce case.

One wonders if this metaphor of parent and children is related to the multigenerational comment of Exo 20:5; Deu 5:9-10. Evil and rebellion move through families (third and fourth generations), but the good news is that forgiveness is possible and that it also moves through generations (to a hundred generations, cf. Deu 7:9)!

with your mother This verse relates to the formal divorce charges against Israel. Usually national unfaithfulness is attributed to the father’s sins, but here and in Isa 50:1; Ezekiel 16 it is attributed to a wife’s unfaithfulness! The covenant is broken because of their repeated unfaithfulness!

she is not my wife, and I am not her husband This simple declarative statement, said publically, may have been the official announcement of a divorce in the ancient Near East. However, here the context demands that divorce is only a threat because the husband (YHWH) calls on his wife (Israel) to return lest he is forced to act (cf. Hos 2:3).

let her put away This VERB (BDB 693, KB 747, Hiphil JUSSIVE) can mean turn away from, as in Deu 7:4. It is used in Amos for God rejecting Israel’s worship (cf. Amo 5:23). Hosea uses this VERB often (cf. Hos 2:2; Hos 2:17; Hos 4:18; Hos 7:14; Hos 9:12). Context is everything!

her adultery from between her breasts This may refer to (1) identifying jewelry (cf. Jer 4:30) or marks that cultic prostitutes wore (cf. Hos 2:13; lit. holy thing) or literally to a male lover positioned over a prostitute (i.e., from her face; between her breasts).

Hos 2:3 Or I will strip her naked Nakedness is one of the consequences of covenant disobedience in Deu 28:48 (cf. Jer. 16:39; Jer 23:29). This custom of dismissing a divorced woman publicly and stripping her naked (cf. Eze 16:35-42) is found in the cuneiform tablets, both from Hana and Nuzi, dating from around 1500 B.C. It is a symbol of her (1) divorced and going into slavery or (2) the fruitlessness of the land (the curses of Deuteronomy 27-29) because of her repeated idolatry.

I will also make her like a wilderness The rest of Hos 2:3 describes one of the covenant curses (cf. Deuteronomy 27-20) which will fall upon Israel. YHWH, not Ba’al, is the source of fertility! One of God’s ways to attract the nations to know Him was the promise of abundance. Abraham’s descendants’ lack of covenant obedience thwarted this from occurring. Therefore, this promised abundance is negated temporally, but reaffirmed eschatalogically (cf. Amo 9:13-15; Joe 3:18).

Hos 2:4 I will have no compassion This is the same word (BDB 933) in a verbal form (KB 1216, Piel IMPERFECT) found in Hos 1:6, which is the name of Gomer’s second child. It is used without the negative, in a positive sense in Hos 2:19; Hos 2:23.

The seeming vacillation between judgment and blessing illustrates the mood swings (anthropomorphic) of God’s heart. He wants to bless, but blessing involves a personal trust and willingness to live out His character!

Because they are children of harlotry The idolatry of the mother (cf. Hos 2:5) also characterizes the children. The wife symbolizes unfaithful national Israel, while the children symbolize individual Israelites (cf. The Jewish Study Bible, p. 1146).

Hos 2:5 Here is an example of Israel assuming that Ba’al and Asherah provided her food, clothing, and luxuries, while all the time it was the covenant God of Sinai, YHWH (cf. Hos 2:8; the curses of Deuteronomy 27-29; Jer 14:22). YHWH is a jealous (love word) God (e.g., Exo 20:5; Exo 34:14; Deu 6:24; Deu 5:9; Deu 6:15). The descendants of Abraham made YHWH jealous by going after other Gods (e.g., Deu 32:16; Deu 32:21; Psa 78:58). Later the Northern Ten Tribes (Israel) made Him jealous (e.g., Hos 2:8) and also Judah (cf. 1Ki 14:22; Zec 1:14; Zec 8:2).

There is debate among OT scholars about the sexual aspects of Canaanite worship. There is little textual or pictorial evidence for a sexually oriented fertility cult in Canaan. Much of the language in Hosea and Jeremiah is metaphorical, not literal. If this is correct then Israel and later Judah corrupted even Canaanite religion!

For she said There is a repetition in this quote that might reflect a liturgy for Ba’al worship.

Hos 2:6 I will hedge up her way with thorns Hedges (BDB 962) were used (1) to keep animals or humans out of the fields or (2) for an enclosure to keep animals contained. Number 2 fits this context best.

There is a threefold repetition of metaphors in this verse.

1. hedge up (BDB 962, KB 1312,Qal ACTIVE PARTICIPLE) your way with thorns

2. wall up (BDB 154, KB 180, Qal PERFECT) her wall (COGNATE ACCUSATIVE)

3. her faith she will not find (BDB 592, KB 619, Qal IMPERFECT)

Israel’s true husband does not immediately put her away as unfaithful, but tries to lead her to repentance by blocking her access to Ba’al worship (assuming her lovers are fertility gods of Canaan).

If, on the other hand, her lovers are foreign powers (and by implication of treaty rituals their gods) then this verse is parallel to Hos 5:13. Notice YHWH still desires repentance and restoration (cf. Hos 5:15)! The purpose of YHWH’s judgments is always redemptive (cf. Hos 3:5; Hos 6:1; Hos 14:1).

Hos 2:7 pursue. . .eagerly chase after These are both Piel PERFECTS. In Hosea the lovers (cf. Hos 2:5) refers to Ba’al worship. However, they could also refer to political alliances (cf. Hos 5:13, see NIDOTTE, vol. 4, pp. 422-426).

Then she will say, I will go back to my first husband,

For it was better for me then than now’ God’s purpose in temporal judgments (cf. Deuteronomy 27-29) was to cause Israel to return to Him. Their prosperity (cf. Hos 2:21-23) was meant to be a way to attract the attention of the world.

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

Ammi = My People.

Ruhamah = Pitied One.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Chapter 2

Say to your brethren ( Hsa Hos 2:1 ),

And here he leaves out the Lo, which is the negative.

Say to your brethren, My people; and to your sister, Ruhamah ( Hsa Hos 2:1 ).

Or, “having obtained mercy.”

So the negative Lo is taken away in chapter 2.

And say to your brother, my people; and to your sister, having obtained mercy. 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 in 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, and my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink. Therefore, behold, I will hedge up the way with thorns, and make a wall, and she shall not find her path. And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but she shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for it was better with me than now ( Hsa Hos 2:1-7 ).

So Israel’s period of desolation, the period of wondering and wandering until she says, “I’m gonna return to my first husband. I’ll return to God. It was at least better for me then that it is now.”

For [the Lord said,] she did not know that I gave her the corn, and the wine, and the oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness ( Hsa Hos 2:8-9 ).

Failed to realize that their blessings had come to them from God. So often, as a nation is blessed of God, they forget the source of blessing. “America, America, God shed His grace on thee.” But we forget that. We begin to extol the merits of democracy, the value of the free enterprise system. And we begin to attribute the greatness of America to many other things, forgetting that it was God who gave us the corn, the oil, and the wine, the gold, the silver; it was God that made us great. And we’re prone to forget these things. And when you forget the true source of the blessing in your life, the result is the misuse of those blessings. Taking those very blessings that God has bestowed and misusing them, using them against God.

So the children of Israel were taking the wine, the oil that God had given, and they were offering it as a sacrifice unto Baal. They took the gold and the silver that God had blessed them with and they made little pagan idols of Baal or Molech and they worshipped them, taking the very blessings of God and turning them against God, as we so often see today. People who have been talented by God, given beautiful voices to sing with, and yet they are singing songs of blasphemy, suggestiveness. People have a marvelous talent for writing and they’re writing pornographic material. Taking the very assets that God has given to them and using them against the Lord. Men that God has endowed with great brilliance, powerful intellects, and they use that intellect to try to prove that there isn’t a God or to destroy the faith of others who may believe in God. Taking the very blessings of God and turning them against the Lord.

Now this, of course, God said, “I’ll come and take I’ll take away the corn in its time.” You see, if you abuse those blessings of God, God will take them away. How many have lost those very things that God had given to them because of their misuse of them?

Now God said,

I will discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of my hand. I will also cause her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, her sabbaths, and all of her solemn feasts. And I will destroy her vines, her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them ( Hsa Hos 2:10-13 ),

Baalim, of course, being the plural of the Baals, the various lords, the various gods that they were burning incense to.

and she decked herself with earrings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and forgot me, saith the LORD ( Hsa Hos 2:13 ).

And thus, God’s indictment against Israel worshipping all these false gods, going after these false gods and forgetting the Lord.

Therefore, behold, [the Lord said,] I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her ( Hsa Hos 2:14 ).

This is a prophecy of that time when during the Great Tribulation God will bare a portion of the nation of Israel down to the wilderness where He will protect them for the three and a half years of the Great Tribulation period. In Revelation, chapter 12, we read where God will give them wings of an eagle that they might be born to the wilderness place where they will be nourished for three and a half years. Jesus mentioning this said, “When you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet, flee into the wilderness. Don’t bother to go back to your house to get your coat” ( Mat 24:15-18 ). And God will preserve them and keep them. Isa 26:1-21 , “He will hide them until the tribulation is over, until the indignation is overpast” ( Isa 26:20 ).

“Therefore, behold,” the Lord said, “I will allure her.” God is going to begin to deal again with the nation of Israel as He preserves them from the man of sin during the Great Tribulation period. “I will bring her into the wilderness, and there I will speak comfortably to her.”

And I will give her her vineyards from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope ( Hsa Hos 2:14-15 ):

Now the valley of Achor is that valley that comes from Jericho up through to Bethel. It was in the valley of Achor the trouble (the word Achor is “trouble”) is where, when they had conquered the city of Jericho and the children of Israel were moving into the land where there was this little town of Ai, and some of Joshua’s men said, “Hey, don’t send the whole army. We’ll go over and we’ll wipe out Ai and we’ll bring you all of the loot.” And so they went over and the men of Ai came out against them and began to defeat them. They came running back to Joshua and Joshua fell on his face and began to pray and the Lord says, “Why are you crying unto Me? Why are you praying now? If everything was all right you would have had victory, but there’s sin in the camp.” And so the Lord revealed that Achan, one of the men of Israel, had taken some of the loot from Jericho, which was all to be given to the Lord. He said, “You know, the first belongs to Me. The rest, as you go into the land, you can divide among yourself, but the first belongs to Me.” Firstfruits always unto God. Jericho, the firstfruit, as they conquer the land, all belongs to God.

Well, Achan saw this beautiful Babylonish garment and he hid it in his own tent and all. And so the Lord reveals the sin of Achan, and it was dealt with there in the valley of Achor, the valley of trouble. They called the place Achor after the trouble that Achan, he said, “For you have troubled Israel.” And so this valley where Israel was troubled, of course, coming up out of the Jordan valley into the land again will be the door of hope to the people.

and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt ( Hsa Hos 2:15 ).

As in, after the Great Tribulation period when the Lord returns and these people then come from the wilderness, they will make their way back up into Israel through this valley of Achor and there they will be singing as they did years ago in the times of Joshua as they were coming into the land that God had promised, with singing and rejoicing. So, therefore, they shall come and sing in the heights of Zion and this glorious day in the future.

And it shall be at that day, saith the LORD, that thou shalt call me Ishi [that is, my husband]; and no longer Baali ( Hsa Hos 2:16 ).

Now Baali is, of course, is lord but it is using that pagan term Baal. So you don’t call him, “My Lord,” but you’ll be calling him, “My husband.”

For I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their name. And in that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and I will make them to lie down safely ( Hsa Hos 2:17-18 ).

That’s equivalent to Isaiah’s prophecy where they will beat their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning hooks and all. And they will make a covenant with the animals. The animals will no longer be vicious. The lion will lie down, or the lion will eat grass with the ox and a little child shall lead them. The animal kingdom will again be at peace. In those days you women won’t have to have that abhorrence of snakes or all anymore or worried spiders or things of this nature. God is going to bring peace over the whole earth. No more wars and people will lie down in peace and in safety.

And I will betroth thee unto me for ever ( Hsa Hos 2:19 );

God is going to just restore forever.

yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies. And I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the LORD ( Hsa Hos 2:19-20 ).

This is a prophecy that is yet to be fulfilled. Still in the future when this glorious work of God is wrought upon the people of Israel and upon that nation.

And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith the LORD, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth; And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel. And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God ( Hsa Hos 2:21-23 ).

And so the restoration. And this of course, you remember, as Peter was speaking in the book of Acts, he said, “As the scripture in all places speaks of the restitution of all things” ( Act 3:21 ). This is that restitution that Peter was speaking about. Not a universal restitution of all men, but the restitution of the nation of Israel to God and the restitution of this relationship where they say, “You are my God,” and God says, “You are My people.” And God betroths them again in faithfulness and in love and in mercy and all. This undying love that God has for these people. God’s incurably in love with them. In this glorious time when they are restored, when they acknowledge God, He acknowledges them. “

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

Hos 2:1-5

ISRAELS INGRATITUDE-SPIRIT OF HARLOTRY

TEXT: Hos 2:1-5

Israels apostacy is portrayed here under the figure of a wife leaving her husband for paramours. The Prophet pleads with the people to reason with one another and repent of the spirit of religious harlotry (idolatry) in their hearts.

Hos 2:1 SayH559 ye unto your brethren,H251 Ammi;H5971 and to your sisters,H269 Ruhamah.H7355

Hos 2:1 SAY . . . UNTO YOUR BRETHREN, AMMI; AND TO YOUR SISTERS, RUHAMAH. The Hebrew text of the O.T. makes Hos 1:10-11 to become Hos 2:1-2 and thus as we have it here in the English version would be Hos 2:3 of the Hebrew text. This preserves the continuity of context and is to be preferred above our present English version. In other words Hos 2:1 as we have it in the English version, belongs contextually to Hos 1:10-11. Our present Hos 2:2 begins another context and so the division in the English version leaves much to be desired. The English version has followed the arrangement of the Septuagint (LXX) and the Latin Vulgate in dividing the context as it has.

Zerr: Hos 2:1. There were always some individuals in the Jewish nation who were righteous, and they are the ye of this verse. The exhortation means for ye (as Individuals who were the righteous) to speak to their brethren and sisters, which means the nation as a whole and which formed the group spoken of in terms of family relationship.

Ammi, means My people. Ruhamah, means Pited or Beloved. The victory which is accomplished (Hos 1:10-11) at the fulfillment of the covenant and when all Israel (spiritual Israel) is gathered together under one head will so change mans relationship to God and Gods relationship to man that redeemed man would thereafter be called Gods people, and God would thereafter have pity upon them. So this is the conclusion of that which would be accomplished according to Hos 1:10-11 and rightfully belongs to that context.

Hos 2:2 PleadH7378 with your mother,H517 plead:H7378 forH3588 sheH1931 is notH3808 my wife,H802 neitherH3808 am IH595 her husband:H376 let her therefore put awayH5493 her whoredomsH2183 out of her sight,H4480 H6440 and her adulteriesH5005 from betweenH4480 H996 her breasts;H7699

Hos 2:3 LestH6435 I stripH6584 her naked,H6174 and setH3322 her as in the dayH3117 that she was born,H3205 and makeH7760 her as a wilderness,H4057 and setH7896 her like a dryH6723 land,H776 and slayH4191 her with thirst.H6772

Hos 2:2-3 CONTEND WITH YOUR MOTHER . . . LET HER PUT AWAY HER WHOREDOMS . . . LEST I STRIP HER NAKED . . . The word contend would be better translated, reason, persuade, plead or beg. The mother is Israel the nation. The children are the individual Israelites. This is simply a rhetorical mode of expression. Although the nation, regarded as a whole, had fallen into idolatry, a very few faithful formed a remnant and to these the Prophet pleads. They are the last hope for the nation. They must persuade the nation to put away its whoredoms.

Zerr: Hos 2:2. These righteous individuals were to plead with their mother (the nation as a whole). She is not my wife is a prediction in the form of a warning, referring to the captivity that was to come upon Israel, which would be like a man putting his wife away because of her unfaithfulness. Israel (as a whole) was totally corrupted with idolatry, which is compared to adultery in the Bible. These righteous individuals were to plead with the leaders of the nation, exhorting them to abolish Idolatry. Hos 2:3. A wronged husband would be disposed to treat an unfaithful wife in the manner described here. Its application refers to the national rejection by the Lord of Israel, and her shameful exposure by the Assyrians.

Whoredom here probably refers to the idolatry practiced by the nation. Israel had entered into the covenant with Jehovah its God; Israel had joined itself to God as a woman joins herself to a husband. When it went after other gods its idolatry became a breach of the faithfulness which it owed to its God. Its idolatry was even more deplorable than that of the heathen for the idolatry of Israel constituted rebellion and ingratitude against greater privilege, more blessed circumstances, and greater revelation. Idolatry is referred to as whoredom (cf. Exo 34:14-15; Lev 17:7; Lev 20:5-6; Num 14:33; Num 15:39; Deu 31:16; Deu 32:16; Deu 32:21).

Actually, this section (Hos 2:2-5) would better fit our outline under the title Israels Ingratitude, Love of Sin. But that would place it out of its textual order and since we wish to deal with the text in the order it is given, the outline must become secondary.

The face can mirror or display either modesty or immodesty, shamelessness or shame (cf. Jer 6:15; Jer 8:6; Jer 9:21). It was customary even in that day for the harlot to paint her face with cosmetics to attract and allure lovers. Nationally speaking, Israel was in some way displaying outwardly the face of a spiritual harlot. The harlot also adorned and exposed her breasts in order to allure. We have here a synonymous parallelism; an exhortation that Israel should correct the outward display of idolatrous practices for they exhibit the spirit of harlotry and rebellion that is within her national heart.

Israel is warned that if she continues in idolatry, God will strip her naked . . . like she was the day she was born. When Israel was born as a nation, she came from a disorganized, penniless, mass of slaves then serving the Egyptian pharoah. She had no worldly goods, no worldly position or nationhood and no land she could call her own, (cf. Ezekiel 16). God took her from Egypt, gave her a land, blessed her with material abundance, gave her national prominence and influence. But now that she has been unfaithful, God is going to disinherit her and cast her off and take away from her all that He has given. She will once again become the slave of a foreign nation; once again she will be without nationality and without material abundance. Israel as a nation will be like a land that has become arid, desolate, As a nation she will become worthless, cease to produce and die.

Hos 2:4 And I will notH3808 have mercy uponH7355 her children;H1121 forH3588 theyH1992 be the childrenH1121 of whoredoms.H2183

Hos 2:5 ForH3588 their motherH517 hath played the harlot:H2181 she that conceivedH2029 them hath done shamefully:H954 forH3588 she said,H559 I will goH1980 afterH310 my lovers,H157 that giveH5414 me my breadH3899 and my water,H4325 my woolH6785 and my flax,H6593 mine oilH8081 and my drink.H8250

Hos 2:4-5 . . . UPON HER CHILDREN WILL I HAVE NO MERCY . . . THEIR MOTHER HATH PLAYED THE HARLOT . . . SHE SAID, I WILL GO AFTER MY LOVERS, THAT GIVE ME MY BREAD . . . We like the statement of K & D, The fact that the children are specially mentioned after and along with the mother, when in reality mother and children are one, serves to give greater keenness to the threat, and guards against that carnal security, in which individuals imagine that, inasmuch as they are free from the sin and guilt of the nation as a whole, they will also be exempted from the threatened punishment. The nation and its leadership (civil and religious) played the harlot by becoming idolaters and they led the people into the same sin. The children were not forced into whoredom. They loved to have it so, and willingly followed the leading of the nation.

Zerr: Hos 2:4. Her children means the members of the nation. Even the individuals who were righteous had to suffer nationally with the unfaithful ones in that all had to be exiled together. This is the sense in which it is predicted that the Lord would not have mercy upon her children. Hos 2:5. The complaint the Lord has against his people is because of their unfaithfulness in connection with the false gods. And as the comparison is made with spiritual adultery, the language is in the form of that pertaining to fleshly harlotry. A literal harlot might profess to have turned away from her corrupt associations, and become the companion of a good man. This wife had done that very thing when she became the partner in life with Hosea. If this woman actually returned to her former life of looseness, it would be a specific illustration of what Israel as a nation did. In that case, the treatment of Hosea towards her would be like that of God towards Israel. Or, if she is only supposed t.o do that, it is still intended for the same lesson. I will not attempt to decide which theory is correct (both having been advanced by commentators for either serves the same purpose of portraying the record of Israels conduct toward God! And in the following verses and chapters, I shall make my comments on the basis of spiritual adultery, because we know that such was the actual condition of affairs for centuries. However, that will not need to shut out all references to fleshly unfaithfulness when the occasion arises for the purpose of illustration.

The mother, however proud and vain she might represent herself, did a shameful thing when she was unfaithful to her God. I will go after could be literally translated, Let me go, or, I would go after. She does not wait to be enticed or allured or seduced. She brazenly goes, uninvited, unsought and contrary to the instinctive feelings of woman, after those who make no overtures to draw her and away from her Husband (God) who has loved her and beckoned her. Enviously she regarded the surrounding nations (Phoenicia, Egypt, Assyria) who did not worship Jehovah, yet possessed far greater political power and prestige, worldwide commerce, huge riches, marvelous luxuries, and far greater freedom from moral restraints than Gods people. The spirit of worldliness made Israel think of her God as a cruel and unloving taskmaster and of His law as an unbearable yoke. She began to worship idols. Then as her prosperity and political prestige grew she rationalized that her lovers had supplied all these things she so greedily wanted. In the days of Jeroboam II idolatrous Israel suddenly gained power and riches rivaling those of David and Solomon. It seemed that idolatry paid better wages than service to Jehovah. God had warned them against such pride and ingratitude and idolatry in plain words (Deu 8:1 ff). It is interesting to note that the people of Judah said the same thing of their idols (Jer 44:15-18); they attributed their prosperity to the heathen gods they worshipped rather than Jehovah. It is frighteningly true that people in so-called Christian America (and other Christianized nations) have not learned much from Israel and Judah. A great number of people today attribute the material and political affluence and prestige to their idols of science, man, sex or some other philosophy. This is just as brazen and shameful and just as much spiritual whoredom as Baalism was in the days of Hosea. Let us take the exhortation of Hosea to heart and plead with our mother that she put away her whoredom from her face.

Questions

1. What is the proper division of chapters 1 and 2? Where should Hos 2:1 go?

2. Who is the mother and who are the children? What literary form is being used here?

3. What is the whoredom of which both mother and children are guilty?

4. How will God strip Israel naked?

5. What makes Israels going after other gods so shameful?

6. Why did Israel think her heathen gods supplied the things she wanted?

7. How do nations act the same way today as Israel acted then?

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

the Bitter Sin of Wandering from God

Hos 2:1-13

Hosea is represented as having exhausted his expostulations upon his faithless wife. He has tried every arrow in loves quiver, but in vain; so now he sends his children, worse than motherless, to plead with their mother, before she brings upon them all irretrievable retribution.

Almost insensibly our mind passes from the pleadings of the human love to the divine Bridegroom. Often He has to erect thorn hedges about us-not that He takes pleasure in thwarting us, but that we may be diverted from ruin. There was no better method of turning Israel from her idols than by withholding that material prosperity which she thought they gave. Has not this been our experience also? Our mirth has ceased and our prosperity has vanished. We have sat amid the wrecks of a happy past. It is not that God has ceased to care for us, but that He longs to wean us back to Himself. Have we reached the point of saying, It was better with me then than now? Then let us be of good cheer! The dawn is already on the hills, and Gods coming to us, in restoring grace, is like the breaking glory of the morning!

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Chapter 2

The Valley of Achor

Gods ways of grace and government are marvelously blended in this first recorded instance of the prophets ministry, which follows closely on the promise in the last two verses of the previous chapter. In accordance with the assurance of future restoration and blessing, Jehovah cries, Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi, and to your sisters, Ruhamah (ver. 1). It is faiths anticipation of the time when the Lo (not) shall be removed, and they shall again be owned as His people, who have obtained mercy. This, of course, looks on for its accomplishment to the Millennium, when all Israel shall be saved.4 But it becomes true even now whenever a soul of either Israel or the nations turns to God in repentance, trusting the once-rejected Messiah.

It is to lead Israel to this place of self-judgment and abhorrence of her past ways that He so searchingly outlines her grievous sin in departing from Himself in verses 2 to 5. As a wretched harlot-nay, worse than such, an adulteress-He had to put her away. For, after all the love and grace lavished upon her, she had turned from Him to idols, in spiritual harlotry. Because of this He will see that she eats of the fruit of her own devices. His dealings with her in His holy and righteous government are solemnly portrayed in verses 6 to 18. This is in full accord with Jeremiahs words, Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God (Jer 2:19). It is in this way He makes sin to serve. If His people do not refrain their feet from evil, but persistently take their own course, and refuse to obey His voice, then they must be taught by their own sin the lesson they would not learn from His words of warning and admonition. Israel had forsaken Him for idols: she should be given up by Him for a time, and left to the idols of her own choosing for her correction; and in her trouble she would find none to answer (ver. 7). Broken-hearted and world-weary at last, chastened and disciplined by her experiences, she would cry, I will go and return unto my first husband, for then was it better with me than now. Amazing the grace that, after such heartless abandonment on her part, would yet cause Him to open His arms to her again in the day of her genuine repentance.

It is the same love and grace that every weary sinner and every failing saint is made to know when he seeks Gods face, confessing the sin and shame of his evil ways. No transgression is too great for Him to pardon, no evil-doing is too much for His mercy, if there be but a breaking-down before Him, and He be justified by the erring one, while the wrong-doer condemns himself.5

Touchingly Jehovah points out the insensibility of Israel as to the true source of all her past blessing. She did not know, He says, that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal (ver. 8). The treasures He bestowed with lavish hand she had poured out upon the altars of her shame! Therefore He would withhold His favor until she learned that her false gods could bring her no good, but only sorrow and want of all things. One by one, all she valued would be stripped from her till she should learn that in Jehovah, whom she had so dishonored, was all blessing to be found. His gifts she had attributed to her idols, saying, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me (ver. 12): but, bereft of all, she shall learn that she had been deluding herself and dishonoring Jehovah.6

When at last her lesson has been learned, Jehovah has purposes of grace in store for her which will be fully revealed upon her repentance. This is the precious and tender theme of the balance of the chapter. Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her (Heb., speak to her heart). And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor (Trouble) for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of Egypt (vers. 14, 15). He loves to remember the days of her first betrothal to Himself, when she went after Him into the wilderness, into a land that was not sown; when she was holiness unto the Lord, and her heart was fixed upon Him alone. Those happy days of her first love are to be renewed. Once more He will allure and draw her away from the scenes of her captivity and dishonor. Alone with Himself in the wilderness of the peoples (see Eze 20:35), He will plead with her face to face. Her vineyards of joy will He restore, and the valley of Achor (of trouble) shall become an opening of expectation. Achor was the scene of Achans judgment, as recorded in Jos 7:24-26. Defiled by her unholy departure from her God and coveting of the accursed thing, Israels blessing shall begin when the sin that has troubled her is judged and put away. Then, restored to Him from whom she had wandered so long, she shall sing (or, perhaps, respond) as in the days of her early freshness, as in the days of her coming out of Egypt.

The application to the individual soul is simple and natural. For the backslidden child of God who, having learned the folly of departure from the Eternal Lover of his soul, returns to Him, stoning his Achans, and thus putting away the accursed thing, the joy of early days will be restored, and communion, long lost, be once more enjoyed.

In the day of Israels restoration she shall be owned as the wife of Jehovah. It is important to notice the difference between her place and portion and that of the Bride of the Lamb in Rev. 19 and 21. The one is earthly; the other, heavenly. The former is not called a bride, because she is a restored wife, who had long wandered from her husband. The latter is presented, as the bride for the first time at the marriage-supper of the Lamb in heaven. In the Millennium, the Lamb and His heavenly bride will reign over all redeemed creation. On the earth the restored wife of Jehovah will have her place in the land of Palestine. The New Jerusalem above is the capital city of the first; the rehabilitated Jerusalem on earth that of the second. Then will the words be fulfilled, And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call Me Ishi (i. e., my Husband); and shalt call Me no more Baali (i. e., my Lord, or my Master). For I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their name (vers. 16,17). These will be the days of Isa 54:6, For the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God. Then shall the land become the land of Beulah, and both land and people be manifestly Jehovahs.

Of this joyous period the prophets treat in large measure. It is the day of the glory of the kingdom, when Jesus shall be owned as the blessed and only Potentate by the world that once rejected Him.

It will be a time of universal diffusion of spiritual light and blessing. But not only that, the curse shall be lifted from the ground, and the lower creation be brought into the liberty of the glory for which it has groaned so long (Rom 8:22). In that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely (ver. 18). All this is the result of the exaltation of the Son of Man of the 8th psalm, whose beneficent sway all creation shall rejoice in. Isa. 11 strikingly sets forth the blessings of that halcyon age, the true golden age, to be ushered in by the return of the Lord Jesus from heaven, who is to shepherd the nations with a rod of iron (Ps. 2; Rev. 19).

Nor shall Israel ever prove unfaithful again. The blotted history of the past will be forgotten, or remembered only to emphasize the grace that shall have restored. And I will betroth thee unto Me forever is Jehovahs word; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies: I will even betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the Lord (vers. 19, 20). Not to the Church do these words refer, but to literal Israel, who, upon the expiration of the now fast-concluding times of the Gentiles, will be grafted in again into the olive-tree of promise, restored to God and to their land, and made the inheritors of the promises assured to the fathers. A careful reading of such portions as Rom. 11; Jer. 30; 31; Eze 36:22-38, and 37 should make clear to the least-instructed reader that God has not cast off His ancient people forever. When He restores them, it will be in pure grace, on the ground of the New Covenant, sealed already with the blood of His Son. Nothing shall ever destroy that hallowed union, or again divorce the earthly spouse from Jehovah.

A lovely millennial picture concludes the chapter. And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth; and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel. And I will sow her unto Me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not My people, Thou art My people; and they shall say, Thou art my God (vers. 21-23). This passage may be a little plainer if we read respond to or answer in place of hear. In the soon-coming day of Messiahs glory, heaven and earth shall together be united in the blessing, of the times of restitution of all things spoken by the prophets.

The heavens, in which will dwell the glorified saints who have been raised or changed at the coming of the Lord, will respond to the joy of a redeemed earth, even as God Himself will respond to them. It will be a scene of blissful communion, never again to be broken, despite Satans last effort to mar and ruin what God shall have wrought (Rev 20:7-10).

The earth, freed from the primeval curse, shall no longer yield thorns and briars, but shall respond with overflowing supplies of corn, and wine, and oil. The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. No more in the sweat of his face shall man eat his bread with weariness, but, as though an animate thing, the earth shall ungrudgingly yield her treasures for the redeemed of the Lord.

To Jezreel all shall likewise respond. Israel will be sown as the seed of God in the very land that had once been stained with the blood of the righteous One, and since, in awful retribution, with their own blood.

There they shall take root downward and triumphantly spring upward, and the people called once Lo-Ruhamah shall become Ruhamah, while the Lo-Ammi sentence shall be forever repealed and they shall be called Ammi. In gladsome response they lift their eyes and hearts to Jehovahs throne, and with deepest reverence and self-abandonment exclaim, My Mighty One!

This shall be the closing scene of the day of Jezreel. No more shall sin and sorrow, war and desolation, sweep the plains of the field of blood, which shall become the scene of unmingled joy and blessing when Jesus is owned as Sovereign-Lord.

Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets

Hos 2:14

God’s presence in loneliness-a sermon for Lent.

I. From the first dawning of conversion to the hour of death, it is in solitude mostly that God speaks to the soul. God’s will, as Himself, is everywhere; within and without He speaks to our souls, if we would hear. Only the din of the world, or the tumult of our own hearts, deafens our inward ear to it. Stillness is as His very presence, for like the prayer for the prophet’s servant, it opens our senses to perceive what was there to behold, only our eyes were holden. All God’s works, because He made them, bear traces of His hand, and speak of Him to the soul which is alone with Him. All works of man directed or. overruled by His providence-everything, good or bad, speaks of His presence or His absence. But chiefly, in the inmost soul He speaks, because there He dwells.

II. Once, we must be alone; and lonely, indeed, is that journey if He be not by us who first trod it for us, that in it we might fear no evil. Learn to be alone with God now. There shall He renew thy soul, hear thy prayer and answer it, shed hope around thee, kindle thy half-choked love, give thee some taste of His own boundless love; give thee the longing to pass out of all besides, out of thy decayed self; gathered upward unto Him, who came down hither to our misery to bear us up unto Himself, and make us one spirit with Him.

III. One thing only deafens us to the voice of God, untunes all, sets us out of harmony with all, that we should not, in all things, feel the thrill of His love, and behold there the earnest of heaven,-sin. Labour, by His grace, to cleanse away this; pray Him to cleanse it with His precious blood; commend thyself morning by morning to Him, do thy daily work unto Him, and He will be with thee, as with Adam in the garden; and thy daily labour shall again be a dressing and keeping of the Paradise of God, where He shall walk with thee.

E. B. Pusey, Sermons for the Church’s Seasons, p. 196.

References: Hos 2:14-Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Ecclesiastes to Malachi, p. 306; W. Robertson, Sunday Magazine, 1881, p. 47; J. N. Norton, Golden Truths, p. 134.

Hos 2:14-15

Our text belongs, we may suppose in a special sense to the Jew. It may in part have been accomplished in his past history, but its thorough fulfilment is to be looked for in the future. But there is every reason why the passage should admit of a secondary application-an application to ourselves as the subjects of the chastisements which God appoints or permits.

I. Notice, first, the expression “allure.” There is no apparent keeping between the process and the result; the process-that of allurement; the result-that of a wilderness. Yet if we think for a moment we shall see, that we are often actually allured into the wilderness. For what are all those brilliant and fascinating hopes, which God suffers for a time to float before our vision, but so many allurements? And when these hopes vanish, as they frequently do, where are we left but in a wilderness-a wilderness into which the hopes had led us?

II. God speaks comfortably in the wilderness. If we force Him to make a wilderness in order that He may be heard, He does not make it that He may speak terror and despair to our souls. The object is, with the wicked, to draw off their attention from earth and its vanities; with the righteous to discipline them for an “exceeding and eternal weight of glory; and what, in both cases, is this but comfortable speaking?

III. The text is more than an assertion as to God’s comforting His people under affliction; it declares that their afflictions may be made an occasion of advantage, or be converted into instruments of spiritual good. “I will give her her vineyards from thence: “Christians gather their best grapes from the thorn. “And the valley of Achor for a door of hope:” Sorrows which are especially the chastisements of misdoing may issue in a firmer hope of everlasting salvation. God never breaks a man’s heart except that He may be able to pour in, like the good Samaritan, the oil and the wine. He brings the sinner into the valley, the terrors of the law urge him forward and prevent all retreat. But just then it is-when the sinner feels himself utterly lost and at the same time confesses God’s justice in destroying him-that the Almighty shows him, as it were, a cleft in the rock, into which he may run. The valley of Achor terminates in a door of hope; gladness comes back into the soul, the sense of pardon, the sense of reconciliation; he sings in the valley “as in the days of his youth, and as in the day when he came up out of the land of Egypt.”

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 1843.

I. The text expresses the constancy and tenderness of the Divine love. (1) The relation between Jehovah and His people is spoken of in terms of the relation between husband and wife: “I will betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness.” Blended with the Divine wrath against idolatry-yea, lying at the very root of that wrath-is the eternal love. God does not spurn Israel away, and bid her begone again to the lot which she has chosen; but, in the exercise of that affection which has survived all her shame, He says, “Behold, I will allure her… and speak comfortably unto her.” (2) These words not only reveal constancy, they also breathe tenderness. To speak comfortably is, literally, to speak to the heart. Such speaking is not addressed to the ear only; nor does it merely inform the understanding; it reaches the affections; it thrills the soul; it awakens responsive echoes there. God has His unobtrusive yet mighty forces. Goodness, as well as evil, woos the soul.

II. The text points to the beneficent purpose of the Divine discipline and chastisement. (1) The wilderness is typical of the discipline to which God subjects His people. Through all trial there runs the same beneficent purpose. God designs to bring us into a true and safe prosperity; and so He seeks, by strengthening our character, to prepare us for entering into the land of “vineyards.” (2) “The valley of Achor” may be taken as typical, more especially, of the Divine chastisements. The afflictions with which we are visited often assume to our consciences the aspect of correction. This is because our calamities-bringing us more directly into the light of God-bring us also face to face with the sins which that light condemns. Only accept your trouble as the chastisement of One who loves you and there, in the valley of your humiliation, where the blackness of your sin is revealed to you, rise up against the traitor, lust, and stone it to death. Then “the valley of Achor” shall be made unto you also a “door of hope;” and with confident expectation, because with purified heart you will march on to fuller conquest and final victory.

T. Campbell Finlayson, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xi., p. 251.

Hos 2:15

This promise, like all God’s promises, has its well-defined conditions. Achan has to be killed and put safe out of the way first, or no shining hope will stand out against the black walls of the defile. The tastes which knit us to the perishable world, the yearnings for Babylonish garments and wedges of gold, must be coerced and subdued. There is no natural tendency in the mere fact of sorrow and pain to make God’s love more discernible, or to make our hope any firmer. All depends on how we use the trial; or, as I say: First stone Achan and then hope!

I. So the trouble which detaches us from earth gives us new hope. Vain regret, absorbed brooding over what is gone, a sorrow kept gaping long after it should have been healed, like a grave-mound off which desperate love has pulled turf and flowers in the vain attempt to clasp the cold hand below-in a word, the trouble that does not withdraw us from the present will never be a door of hope, but rather a grim gate for despair to come in at.

II. The trouble which knits us to God gives us new hope. That bright form which comes down the narrow valley is His messenger and herald-sent before His face. All the light of hope is the reflection on our hearts of the light of God. If our hope is to grow out of our sorrow, it must be because our sorrow drives us to God.

III. The trouble which we bear rightly with God’s help gives new hope. If we have made our sorrow an occasion for learning by living experience somewhat more of His exquisitely varied and ever-ready power to aid and bless, then it will teach us firmer confidence in these inexhaustible resources which we have thus once more proved. We build upon two things-God’s unchangeableness, and His help already received; and upon these strong foundations we may wisely and safely rear a palace of hope, which shall never prove a castle in the air.

A. Maclaren, Weekday Evening Addresses, p. 159.

References: Hos 2:15.-Homiletic Magazine, vol. x., p. 199; Bishop Lightfoot, Old Testament Outlines, p. 266. Hos 2:19-20.-B. Baker, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. iii., p. 139. Hos 2:23.-Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Ecclesiastes to Malachi, p. 309. Hos 3:1.-Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 35. Hos 3:4, Hos 3:5.-S. Leathes, Good Words, 1874, p. 226. Hos 3:5.-Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv., No. 888. Hos 4:6.-C. J. Vaughan, Memorials of Harrow Sundays, p. 56.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

CHAPTER 2

Appeal and Punishment for Unfaithfulness The Resumed Relationship

1. The appeal and complaint (Hos 2:1-5)

2. The punishment for Unfaithfulness (Hos 2:6-13)

3. The resumed relationship and its great blessing (Hos 2:14-23)

Hos 2:1-5. Who is addressed in the first verse of this chapter? Some think the children of the prophet are meant. The godly in Israel, those who obtained mercy, are addressed, for the Lord acknowledges such still as Ammi-my people. The godly are to plead with the rest of Israel their mother, but who is disowned by Jehovah as the wife, on account of her adulterous conduct. Then the Lord threatens her with severe punishment because of her unfaithfulness. She is to be stripped naked and be as in the day she was born (see Eze 16:4). Nor would there be mercy for her children because the mother, Israel, continued to go after her lovers.

Hos 2:6-13. Her way is to be hedged up with thorns; a wall of separation is to be raised and to keep her from her lovers. And if she follow after them and make a sinful alliance with them (symbolical of the idol worship of heathens which Israel practiced) she would not find them. Thus she might return to her first husband, to Jehovah. Israel had received from the Lord corn, wine, oil, silver and gold. Then they attributed it all to Baal and used it in idol worship. In Hos 2:9-13 the punishment is fully made known. She is to be left alone; the gifts and blessings will be withdrawn; her lewdness is to be uncovered, all mirth will cease and the days of Baalim, spent in licentious worship, would be visited upon her in judgment.

Hos 2:14-23. Immediately after the announcement of her punishment follows the assurance or future mercy. Israels conversion is promised (Hos 2:14-17) and the great mercies of Jehovahs covenant are to be renewed (Hos 2:18-23). The Lord of love will not forever abandon His people and though Israel has played the harlot so long, with no willingness to return unto Him, He Himself in infinite love is going to woo her back. He will allure her, as He brings her into the wilderness, and there speak to her heart (the Hebrew meaning). That will be in the coming day when the Lord will remember the remnant of His people during the time of Jacobs trouble and save them in that day. Then she will get her vineyards, her place of blessing, promised to Israel as His earthly people. The valley of Achor shall be the door of hope. In that valley Achan died, on account of whom all Israel had fallen under the ban Jos 7:1-26. There judgment had been enacted and after that blessing was restored to Israel and the ban was removed. Achor means troubling. When Israel is in that great trouble, the great tribulation, the valley of trouble will become the door of hope, for then the Lord will forgive them their sins, cover them with His grace and redeem them by His power. Then the singing times begin again for Israel. She shall sing there as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt. Songs of praise on account of accomplished redemption by Jehovahs power will then burst forth Exo 15:1-27; Isa 12:1-6. She will be fully restored to her former relationship, typified by marriage. It shall be in that day, saith the Lord, that Thou shalt call Me Ishi (my husband), and shalt call Me no more Baali (my master). She will be re-married to the Lord, symbolically speaking, and become the earthly wife of Jehovah, while the church, the espoused virgin, becomes in glory the Lambs wife Rev 19:6-21).

But greater blessing will be connected with that coming day of blessing, when Israel is received back Rom 11:15. Verse 18 tells us that creation will then be blest; the time of its deliverance has come. Here the same is indicated as in Isa 11:6-7 and Rom 8:21. The end of wars comes then and universal peace blesses the whole earth. This is always the order in the divine forecasts. First, Israel has to be brought back, and after that the blessings for the earth and the nations, including that peace, which the blinded world-church tries to secure without the Lord Jesus Christ. All these promises as to the future of Israel, her restoration and spiritual blessings, are unrealized. It is infatuation to think that all this was fully accomplished in the return of a remnant from the captivity. The result is that even Christians, misled by this miserable error, are drawn away into the rationalistic impiety of counting Gods Word here mere hyperbole to heighten the effect, as if the Holy Spirit deigned to be a verbal trickster, or a prophet were as vain as a litterateur. No; it is a brighter day, when the power of God will make a complete clearance from the world of disorder, misrule, mans violence and corruption, as well as reduce to harmless and happy resubjection the entire animal kingdom.

In that day all the great covenant blessings will return to redeemed Israel. Betrothed again to Jehovah in righteousness, in judgment, in faithfulness and mercies, Israel will know Jehovah. There will be an uninterrupted line of blessing from the heavens down to every earthly blessing. Heavens and earth will be gloriously united, and in answer to the call of His people the heavens will hear and cover all with blessing, for Satans power is now gone. Israel is no more Lo-ammi, but they will be His people and He will be their God, while the redeemed nation itself will be a blessing in the earth.

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

unto: Hos 1:9-11

Ammi: That is, My people, Exo 19:5, Exo 19:6, Jer 31:33, Jer 32:38, Eze 11:20, Eze 36:28, Eze 37:27, Zec 13:9

Ruhamah: That is, Having obtained mercy, Hos 2:23, Rom 11:30, Rom 11:31, 2Co 4:1, 1Ti 1:13, 1Pe 2:10

Reciprocal: Isa 54:6 – a woman Mat 5:7 – for

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Hos 2:1. There were always some individuals in the Jewish nation who were righteous, and they are the ye of this verse. The exhortation means for ye (as Individuals who were the righteous) to speak to their brethren and sisters, which means the nation as a whole and which formed the group spoken of in terms of family relationship.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Hos 2:1-2. Say to your brethren Many interpreters consider this verse as being connected with the preceding chapter, thus: When that general restoration of the Jewish nation shall take place, you may change your language in speaking to those of your brethren and sisters whom I had before disowned, and you may call them Ammi, my people, and Ruhamah, she that hath obtained mercy. The prophet alludes to the 6th and 9th verses of the preceding chapter. Other expositors, however, with more apparent reason, consider this verse as connected with the following words, and translate it thus: Ye that are my people, and have obtained mercy, speak to your brethren and sisters, and plead with your mother, &c. Although the Israelites, in the days of Hosea, were in general corrupt, and addicted to idolatry; yet there were among them, in the worst times, some who had not bowed the knee to Baal. These were always Ammi and Ruhamah; Gods own people, and a darling daughter. God commissions these faithful few to admonish the inhabitants of the land in general, of the dreadful judgments that would be brought upon them by the gross idolatry of the Jewish Church and nation; and to reprove, and use their best endeavours to reform that general corruption which the nation had contracted by its idolatry; whereby the people had broken the covenant God had made with them, and had caused a separation, or divorce, between him and them. Let her therefore put away her whoredoms, &c. Let her leave off her idolatries. These are often expressed in the Scriptures by the fondness and caresses which pass between unchaste lovers.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Hos 2:1. Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi, that is, my people; and to your sisters, Ruhamah, that is, mercy, or oh mercy, or having obtained mercy, or mercy shall follow.

Hos 2:3. Lest I strip her naked. The feminine name was given by the Greeks to all countries, and on that idea the text is founded. Nudity was the ancient punishment of an adulteress. Eze 16:37. The scenes of drunkenness and prostitution which attended gentile feasts, were such as cannot be recited.

Hos 2:12. I will destroy her vines and her fig-trees, by the army of Salmanezer, who devastated Samaria. 2Ki 17:6. A contemporary prophet speaks in the same manner as Hosea: Wo to the drunkards of Ephraim. Isa 28:1.

Hos 2:15. I will give herthe valley of Achor for a door of hope. This was the entrance to the promised land, a beautiful vale, and situate near Jericho. As God purged Achans sin in this place, so he promises to purge his christian Israel, and to give them every blessing of the new covenant. Any farther import of this impressive promise must refer to the glory of the latter day.

Hos 2:16. Thou shalt call me Ishi. Man, my man, or my husband. No more Baal, lord or oppressor. This may indicate the bondage of the law; but the bride calling the Messiah her husband implies the highest privilege, liberty and honour which the church can enjoy.

Hos 2:17. I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth. The mention of the name of idols was forbidden by the Mosaic law. Exo 23:13. The church having her Maker for her husband, must scorn the name of idols. I believe many young men, by reading the Greek and Roman classics, get their attachment diminished, if it ever existed, to the sacred scriptures. Hence abridgments of the classics have been advised for the use of christian schools.

Hos 2:18. I will make a covenant with the [wild] beaststhe fowlsand the creeping things, as serpents, not to hurt them. This is coincident with the promise in Isa 11:6-9. The Psyllians of Africa boasted of a power against the bite of serpents.

Gens unica terras Incolit a svo serpentum innoxia morsu Marmarid Psilli. Pax illis cum morte data est. PHAR. 9:894.

Of all who Africs scorching sun endure,

None like the swarthy Psyllians are secure;

With healing gifts and privileges graced,

Well in the land of serpents were they placed;

Truce with the dreadful tyrant death they have,

And border safely on his realm the grave. ROWE.

Hos 2:22. And they shall hear Jezreel. The heaven and the earth shall hear Jezreel, or the sons of the prophets, or the people of Israel who formerly inhabited the valley of Jezreel, or Gods dispersed people. It implies that heaven and earth should hear the Lords converted people, praising him for the temporal and spiritual blessings of his covenant.

REFLECTIONS.

Hosea, proceeding with his subject, is led to pronounce the Lords divorce against his carnal people for idolatry, and incorrigible wickedness. He declares concerning his once chosen church, she is neither my wife, nor am I her husband. This awful sentence, which it is presumed Hosea lived to see accomplished, should strike terror on certain apostate men who seem, in their style of manners, to be superior to the weakness of a scrupulous conscience, and of sanctifying fear. Perhaps their confidence, and superior wisdom may not guard every avenue at which punishment may enter.

We have the aggravation of Israels sin. She said, my lovers have given me this bread and water, this wool and flax. Thus she honoured the newly- imported idols of the gentiles above the God whom her fathers revered, and who gave her the land. To ascribe our mercies either to chance, or to our own industry and skill, is a sin which is marked in heaven.

We have Israels punishment. I will hedge up her way with thorns, or the three usual calamities of famine, sickness, and war, as Joel, a contemporary prophet, has remarked in chap. 4. Thus her mirth, her feasts, her beauty departed; yet she returned not to the Lord. What follows must therefore respect the new-testament church, and the glory of the latter day.

We have the recollection and repentance of the church. She said, I will go and return to my first husband, for then it was better with me than now. The few of the ten tribes who survived at home might continue their corruptions in exile, and pine away, and lose their glory by marrying with the gentiles; yet God is ever nourishing his spiritual Zion, by converts brought to recollection and to tears. And oh, it is peculiarly happy when back-sliders are so far recollected and humbled as to return to the Lord, and to his house.

We have lastly, the return of consolation to the church, which seems to flow with a double tide for having been obstructed. I will allure her, as in Egypt, and bring her into the wilderness. Yes, and when I shall gather in my people, and give the gentiles a portion with them, I will make a covenant with the beasts not to hurt them. I will break the bow, and make wars to cease. I will also betroth thee unto me for ever in righteousness and in faithfulness. St. John affirms the same of the church. Rev 21:22.

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Hos 2:1. brethren and sisters: read with LXX, brother and sister.

The whole passage is clearly out of place, and may be a later insertion. Still the language is not inharmonious with Hoseas diction, especially if go up from the land can mean gain the mastery over the land. Further, the conception of north-Israelites and Judans marching together under one head suggests a date prior to the downfall of the Northern Kingdom (722 B.C.). Many scholars think that the section should follow Hos 2:23. A better suggestion is that Hosea 3 was originally intended to follow immediately on Hos 1:2-9. Then the promise of restoration, ethically conditioned, would follow on Hos 3:4 f.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

2:1 Say ye unto your {a} brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah.

(a) Seeing that I have promised you deliverance, it remains that you encourage one another to embrace this promise, considering that you are my people on whom I will have mercy.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

The Lord instructed representatives of the restored nation to announce to their fellow Israelites then that they were again "my [God’s] people" and that they were again Yahweh’s "loved one" (cf. Deu 30:1-9; Rom 11:25-32).

The fulfillment of this prophecy has not come yet, so we look forward to the regathering of Israel, rule by David’s descendant, and Israel flourishing in her land in the future. Amillennial interpreters believe the church replaces Israel in the promises of God and that Jesus began the day of Jezreel at His first advent. [Note: E.g., Stuart, p. 41.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

THE STORY OF THE PRODIGAL WIFE

Hos 1:1-11; Hos 2:1-23; Hos 3:1-5

IT has often been remarked that, unlike the first Doomster of Israel, Israels first Evangelist was one of themselves, a native and citizen, perhaps even a priest, of the land to which he was sent. This appears even in his treatment of the stage and soil of his ministry. Contrast him in this respect with Amos.

In the Book of Amos we have few glimpses of the scenery of Israel, and these always by flashes of the lightnings of judgment: the towns in drought or earthquake or siege; the vineyards and orchards under locusts or mildew; Carmel itself desolate, or as a hiding-place from Gods wrath.

But Hoseas love steals across his whole land like the dew, provoking every separate scent and color, till all Galilee lies before us lustrous and fragrant as nowhere else outside the parables of Jesus. The Book of Amos, when it would praise Gods works, looks to the stars. But the poetry of Hosea clings about his native soil like its trailing vines. If he appeals to the heavens, it is only that they may speak to the earth, and the earth to the corn and the wine, and the corn and the wine to Jezreel (Hos 2:23) Even the wild beasts-and Hosea tells us of their cruelty almost as much as Amos-he cannot shut out of the hope of his love: “I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground.” (Hos 2:20) Gods love-gifts to His people are corn and wool, flax and oil; while spiritual blessings are figured in the joys of them who sow and reap. With Hosea we feel all the seasons of the Syrian year: early rain and latter rain, the first flush of the young corn, the scent of the vine blossom, the “first ripe fig of the fig-tree in her first season,” the bursting of the lily; the wild vine trailing on the hedge, the field of tares, the beauty of the full olive in sunshine and breeze; the mists and heavy dews of a summer morning in Ephraim, the night winds laden with the air of the mountains, “the scent of Lebanon.” {Hos 6:3-4; Hos 7:8; Hos 9:10; Hos 14:6; Hos 7:7-8} Or it is the dearer human sights in valley and field: the smoke from the chimney, the chaff from the threshing-floor, the doves startled to their towers, the fowler and his net; the breaking up of the fallow ground, the harrowing of the clods, the reapers, the heifer that treadeth out the corn; the team of draught oxen surmounting the steep road, and at the top the kindly driver setting in food to their jaws. {Hos 7:11-12; Hos 10:11; Hos 11:4 etc.}

Where, I say, do we find anything like this save in the parables of Jesus? For the love of Hosea was as the love of that greater Galilean: however high, however lonely it soared, it was yet rooted in the common life below, and fed with the unfailing grace of a thousand homely sources.

But just as the Love which first showed itself in the sunny Parables of Galilee passed onward to Gethsemane and the Cross, so the love of Hosea, that had wakened with the spring lilies and dewy summer mornings of the North, had also, ere his youth was spent, to meet its agony and shame. These came upon the prophet in his home, and in her in whom so loyal and tender a heart had hoped to find his chieftest sanctuary next to God. There are, it is true, some of the ugliest facts of human life about this prophets experience; but the message is one very suited to our own hearts and times. Let us read this story of the Prodigal Wife as we do that other Galilean tale of the Prodigal Son. There as well as here are harlots; but here as well as there is the clear mirror of the Divine Love. For the Bible never shuns realism when it would expose the exceeding hatefulness of sin or magnify the power of Gods love to redeem. To an age which is always treating conjugal infidelity either as a matter of comedy or as a problem of despair, the tale of Hosea and his wife may still become what it proved to his own generation, a gospel full of love and hope.

The story, and how it led Hosea to understand Gods relations to sinful men, is told in the first three chapters of his book. It opens with the very startling sentence: “The beginning of the word of Jehovah to Hosea:-And Jehovah said to Hosea, Go, take thee a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry: for the Land hath committed great harlotry in departing from Jehovah.”

The command was obeyed. “And he went and took Gomer, daughter of Diblaim; and she conceived, and bare to him a son. And Jehovah said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little and I shall visit, the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will bring to an end the kingdom of the house of Israel; and it shall be on that day that I shall break the bow of Israel in the Vale of Jezreel”-the classic battlefield of Israel. “And she conceived again, and bare a daughter; and He said to him, Call her name Unloved,” or “That-never-knew-a-Fathers-Pity; for I will not again have pity”-such pity as a Father hath-“on the house of Israel, that I should fully forgive them. And she weaned Unpitied, and conceived, and bare a son. And He said, Call his name Not-My-People; for ye are not My people, and I-I am not yours.”

It is not surprising that divers interpretations have been put upon this troubled tale. The words which introduce it are so startling that very many have held it to be an allegory, or parable, invented by the prophet to illustrate, by familiar human figures, what was at that period the still difficult conception of the Love of God for sinful men. But to this well-intended argument there are insuperable objections. It implies that Hosea had first awakened to the relations of Jehovah and Israel-He faithful and full of affection, she unfaithful and thankless-and that then, in order to illustrate the relations, he had invented the story. To that we have an adequate reply. In the first place, though it were possible, it is extremely improbable, that such a man should have invented such a tale about his wife, or, if he was unmarried, about himself. But, in the second place, he says expressly that his domestic experience was the “beginning of Jehovahs word to him.” That is, he passed through it first, and only afterwards, with the sympathy and insight thus acquired, he came to appreciate Jehovahs relation to Israel. Finally, the style betrays narrative rather than parable. The simple facts are told; there is an absence of elaboration; there is no effort to make every detail symbolic; the names Gomer and Diblaim are apparently those of real persons; every attempt to attach a symbolic value to them has failed.

She was, therefore, no dream, this woman, but flesh and blood: the sorrow, the despair, the sphinx of the prophets life; yet a sphinx who in the end yielded her riddle to love.

Accordingly a large number of other interpreters have taken the story throughout as the literal account of actual facts. This is the theory of many of the Latin and Greek Fathers, of many of the Puritans and of Dr. Pusey-by one of those agreements into which, from such opposite schools, all these commentators are not infrequently drawn by their common captivity to the letter of Scripture. When you ask them, How then do you justify that first strange word of God to Hosea, {Hos 1:2} if you take it literally and believe that Hoses was charged to marry a woman of public shame? They answer either that such an evil may be justified by the bare word of God, or that it was well worth the end, the salvation of a lost soul. And indeed this tragedy would be invested with an even greater pathos if it were true that the human hero had passed through a self-sacrifice so unusual, had incurred such a shame for such an end. The interpretation, however, seems forbidden by the essence of the story. Had not Hoseas wife been pure when he married her she could not have served as a type of the Israel whose earliest relations to Jehovah he describes as innocent. And this is confirmed by other features of the book: by the high ideal which Hosea has of marriage, and by that sense of early goodness and early beauty passing away like morning mist, which is so often and so pathetically expressed that we cannot but catch in it the echo of his own experience. As one has said to whom we owe, more than to any other, the exposition of the gospel in Hosea, “The struggle of Hoseas shame and grief when he found his wife unfaithful is altogether inconceivable unless his first love had been pure and full of trust in the purity of its object.”

How then are we to reconcile with this the statement of that command to take a wife of the character so frankly described? In this way-and we owe the interpretation to the same lamented scholar. When, some years after his marriage, Hosea at last began to be aware of the character of her whom he had taken to his home, and while he still brooded upon it, God revealed to him why He who knoweth all things from the beginning had suffered His servant to marry such a woman; and Hosea, by a very natural anticipation, in which he is imitated by other prophets, pushed back his own knowledge of Gods purpose to the date when that purpose began actually to be fulfilled, the day of his betrothal. This, though he was all unconscious of its fatal future, had been to Hosea the beginning of the word of the Lord. On that uncertain voyage he had sailed with sealed orders.

Now this is true to nature, and may be matched from our own experience. “The beginning of Gods word” to any of us-where does it lie? Does it lie in the first time the meaning of our life became articulate, and we are able to utter it to others? Ah, no; it always lies far behind that, in facts and in relationships, of the Divine meaning of which we are at the time unconscious, though now we know. How familiar this is in respect to the sorrows and adversities of life: dumb, deadening things that fall on us at the time with no more voice than clods falling on coffins of dead men, we have been able to read them afterwards as the clear call of God to our souls. But what we thus so readily admit about the sorrows of life may be equally true of any of those relations which we enter with light and unawed hearts, conscious only of the novelty and the joy of them. It is most true of the love which meets a man as it met Hoses in his opening manhood.

How long Hosea took to discover his shame he indicates by a few hints which he suffers to break from the delicate reserve of his story. He calls the first child his own; and the boys name, though ominous of the nations fate, has no trace of shame upon it. Hoseas Jezreel was as Isaiahs Shear-Jashub or Maher-shalal-hash-baz. But Hoses does not claim the second child; and in the name of this little lass, Lo-Ruhamah, “she-that-never-knew-a-fathers-love,” orphan not by death but by her mothers sin, we find proof of the prophets awakening to the tragedy of his home. Nor does he own the third child, named “Not-my-people,” that could also mean “No-kin-of-mine.” The three births must have taken at least six years; and once at least, but probably oftener, Hosea had forgiven the woman, and till the sixth year she stayed in his house. Then either he put her from him or she went her own way. She sold herself for money and finally drifted, like all of her class, into slavery. {Hos 3:2}

Such were the facts of Hoseas grief, and we have now to attempt to understand how that grief became his gospel. We may regard the stages of the process as two: first, when he was led to feel that his sorrow was the sorrow of the whole nation; and, second, when he comprehended that it was of similar kind to the sorrow of God Himself.

While Hosea brooded upon his pain one of the first things he would remember would be the fact, which he so frequently illustrates, that the case of his home was not singular, but common and characteristic of his day. Take the evidence of his book, and there must have been in Israel many such wives as his own. He describes their sin as the besetting sin of the nation, and the plague of Israels life. But to lose your own sorrow in the vaster sense of national trouble-that is the first consciousness of a duty and a mission. In the analogous vice of intemperance among ourselves we have seen the same experience operate again and again. How many a man has joined the public warfare against that sin, because he was aroused to its national consequences by the ruin it had brought to his own house! And one remembers from recent years a more illustrious instance, where a domestic grief-it is true of a very different kind-became not dissimilarly the opening of a great career of service to the people:-

“I was in Leamington, and Mr. Cobden called on me. I was then in the depths of grief-I may almost say of despair, for the light and sunshine of my house had been extinguished. All that was left on earth of my young wife, except the memory of a sainted life and a too brief happiness, was lying still and cold in the chamber above us. Mr. Cobden called on me as his friend, and addressed me, as you may suppose, with words of condolence. After a time he looked up and said: There are thousands and thousands of homes in England at this moment where wives and mothers and children are dying of hunger. Now, when the first paroxysm of your grief is passed, I would advise you to come with me, and we will never rest until the Corn Laws are repealed.” {from a speech by John Bright}

Not dissimilarly was Hoseas pain overwhelmed by the pain of his people. He remembered that there were in Israel thousands of homes like his own. Anguish gave way to sympathy. The mystery became the stimulus to a mission.

But, again, Hosea traces this sin of his day to the worship of strange gods. He tells the fathers of Israel, for instance, that they need not be surprised at the corruption of their wives and daughters when they themselves bring home from the heathen rites the infection of light views of love. {Hos 4:13-14} That is to say, the many sins against human love in Israel, the wrong done to his own heart in his own home, Hosea connects with the wrong done to the Love of God by His peoples desertion of Him for foreign and impure rites. Hoseas own sorrow thus became a key to the sorrow of God. Had he loved this woman, cherished and honored her, borne with and forgiven her, only to find at the last his love spurned and hers turned to sinful men: so also had the Love of God been treated by His chosen people, and they had fallen to the loose worship of idols.

Hosea was the more naturally led to compare his relations to his wife with Jehovahs to Israel, by certain religious beliefs current among the Semitic peoples. It was common to nearly all Semitic religions to express the ration of a god with his land or with his people by the figure of marriage. The title which Hosea so often applies to the heathen deities, Baal, meant originally not “lord” of his worshippers, but “possessor” and endower of his land, its husband and fertilizer. A fertile land was “a land of Baal,” or “Beulah,” that is, “possessed” or “blessed by a Baal.” Under the fertility was counted not only the increase of field and flock, but the human increase as well; and thus a nation could speak of themselves as the children of the Land, their mother, and of her Baal, their father. When Hosea, then, called Jehovah the husband of Israel, it was not an entirely new symbol which he invented. Up to his time, however, the marriage of Heaven and Earth, of a god and his people, seems to have been conceived in a physical form which ever tended to become more gross; and was expressed, as Hosea points out, by rites of a sensual and debasing nature, with the most disastrous effects on the domestic morals of the people. By an inspiration, whose ethical character is very conspicuous, Hosea breaks the physical connection altogether. Jehovahs Bride is not the Land, but the People, and His marriage with her is conceived wholly as a moral relation. Not that He has no connection with the physical fruits of the land: corn, wine, oil, wool, and flax. But these are represented only as the signs and ornaments of the marriage, love-gifts from the husband to the wife. {Hos 2:8} The marriage itself is purely moral: “I will betroth her to Me in righteousness and justice, in leal love and tender mercies.” From her in return are demanded faithfulness and growing knowledge of her Lord.

It is the re-creation of an Idea. Slain and made carrion by the heathen religions, the figure is restored to life by Hosea. And this is a life everlasting. Prophet and apostle, the Israel of Jehovah, the Church of Christ, have alike found in Hoseas figure an unfailing significance and charm. Here we cannot trace the history of the figure; but at least we ought to emphasize the creative power which its recovery to life proves to have been inherent in prophecy. This is one of those triumphs of which the God of Israel said: “Behold, I make all things new.”

Having dug his figure from the mire and set it upon the rock, Hosea sends it on its way with all boldness. If Jehovah be thus the husband of Israel, “her first husband, the husband of her youth,” then all her pursuit of the Baalim is unfaithfulness to her marriage vows. But she is worse than an adulteress; she is a harlot. She has fallen for gifts. Here the historical facts wonderfully assisted the prophets metaphor. It was a fact that Israel and Jehovah were first wedded in the wilderness upon conditions, which by the very circumstances of desert life could have little or no reference to the fertility of the earth, but were purely personal and moral. And it was also a fact that Israels declension from Jehovah came after her settlement in Canaan, and was due to her discovery of other deities, in possession of the soil, and adored by the natives as the dispensers of its fertility. Israel fell under these superstitions, and, although she still formally acknowledged her bond to Jehovah, yet in order to get her fields blessed and her flocks made fertile, her orchards protected from blight and her fleeces from scab, she went after the local Baalim. {Hos 2:13} With bitter scorn Hosea points out that there was no true love in this: it was the mercenariness of a harlot, selling herself for gifts. {Hos 2:5; Hos 2:13} And it had the usual results. The children whom Israel bore were not her husbands. {Hos 2:5} The new generation in Israel grew up in ignorance of Jehovah, with characters and lives strange to His Spirit. They were Lo-Ruhamah: He could not feel towards them such pity as a father hath. They were Lo-Ammi: not at all His people. All was in exact parallel to Hoseas own experience with his wife; and only the real pain of that experience could have made the man brave enough to use it as a figure of his Gods treatment by Israel.

Following out the human analogy, the next step should have been for Jehovah to divorce His erring spouse. But Jehovah reveals to the prophet that this is not His way. For He is “God and not man, the Holy One in the midst of thee. How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? How shall I surrender thee, O Israel? My heart is turned within Me, My compassions are kindled together!”

Jehovah will seek, find, and bring back the wanderer. Yet the process shall not be easy. The gospel which Hosea here preaches is matched in its great tenderness by its full recognition of the ethical requirements of the case. Israel may not be restored without repentance, and cannot repent without disillusion and chastisement. God will therefore show her that her lovers, the Baalim, are unable to assure to her the gifts for which she followed them. These are His corn, His wine, His wool, and His flax, and He will take them away for a time. Nay more, as if mere drought and blight might still be regarded as some Baals work, He who has always manifested Himself by great historic deeds will do so again. He will remove herself from the land, and leave it a waste and a desolation. The whole passage runs as follows, introduced by the initial “Therefore” of judgment:-

“Therefore, behold, I am going to hedge up her way with thorns, and build her a wall, so that she find not her paths. And she shall pursue her paramours and shall not come upon them, seek them and shall not find them; and she shall say, Let me go and return to my first husband, for it was better for me then than now. She knew not, then, that it was I who gave her the corn and the wine and the oil; yea, silver I heaped upon her and gold-they worked it up for the Baal!” Israel had deserted the religion that was historical and moral for the religion that was physical. But the historical religion was the physical one. Jehovah who had brought Israel to the land was also the God of the Land. He would prove this by taking away its blessings. “Therefore I will turn and take away My corn in its time and My wine in its season, and I will withdraw My wool and My flax that should have covered her nakedness. And now”-the other initial of judgment-“I will lay bare her shame to the eyes of her lovers, and no man shall rescue her from My hand. And I will make an end of all her joyance, her pilgrimages, her New-Moons and her Sabbaths, with every festival; and I will destroy her vines and her figs of which she said, They are a gift, mine own, which my lovers gave me, and I will turn them to jungle and the wild beast shall devour them. So shall I visit upon her the days of the Baalim, when she used to offer incense to them, and decked herself with her rings and her jewels and went after her paramours, but Me she forgat-tis the oracle of Jehovah.” All this implies something more than such natural disasters as those in which Amos saw the first chastisements of the Lord. Each of the verses suggests, not only a devastation of the land by war, but the removal of the people into captivity. Evidently, therefore, Hosea, writing about 745, had in view a speedy invasion by Assyria, an invasion which was always followed up by the exile of the people subdued.

This is next described, with all plainness, under the figure of Israels early wanderings in the wilderness, but is emphasized as happening only for the end of the peoples penitence and restoration. The new hope is so melodious that it carries the language into meter.

“Therefore, lo! I am to woo her, and I will bring her to the wilderness,

And I will speak home to her heart.

And from there I will give to her vineyards

And the Valley of Achor for a doorway of hope.

And there she shall answer Me as in the days of her youth,

And as the day when she came up from the land of Misraim.”

To us the terms of this passage may seem formal and theological. But to every Israelite some of these terms must have brought back the days of his own wooing. “I will speak home to her heart” is a forcible expression, like the German “an-das Herz” or the sweet Scottish “it cam up roond my heart,” and was used in Israel as from man to woman when he won her. But the other terms have an equal charm. The prophet, of course, does not mean that Israel shall be literally taken back to the desert. But he describes her coming exile under that ancient figure, in order to surround her penitence with the associations of her innocency and her youth. By the grace of God, everything shall begin again as at first. The old terms “wilderness,” “the giving of vineyards,” “Valley of Achor,” are, as it were, the wedding ring restored.

As a result of all this (whether the words be by Hosea or another),

“It shall be in that day-tis Jehovahs oracle-that thou shalt call Me,

My husband, And thou shalt not again call Me, My Baal:

For I will take away the names of the Baalim from her mouth,

And they shall no more be remembered by their names.”

There follows a picture of the ideal future, in which-how unlike the vision that now closes the Book of Amos!-moral and spiritual beauty, the peace of the land and the redemption of the people, are wonderfully mingled together, in a style so characteristic of Hoseas heart. It is hard to tell where the rhythmical prose passes into actual meter.

“And I will make for them a covenant in that day with the wild beasts, and with the birds of the heavens, and with the creeping things of the ground; and the bow and the sword and battle will I break from the land, and I will make you to dwell in safety. And I will betroth thee to Me for ever, and I will betroth thee to Me in righteousness and in justice, in leal love and in tender mercies; and I will betroth thee to Me in faithfulness, and thou shalt know Jehovah.”

“And it shall be on that day I will speak-tis the oracle of Jehovah-I will speak to the heavens, and they shall speak to the earth; the earth shall speak to the corn and the wine and the oil, and they shall speak to Jezreel,” the “scattered like seed across many lands”; but I will sow him for Myself in the land: and I will have a fathers pity upon Un-Pitied; and to Not-My-People I will say, “My people thou art! and he shall say, My God!”

The circle is thus completed on the terms from which we started. The three names which Hosea gave to the children, evil omens of Israels fate, are reversed, and the people restored to the favor and love of their God.

We might expect this glory to form the culmination of the prophecy. What fuller prospect could be imagined than that we see in the close of the second chapter? With a wonderful grace, however, the prophecy turns back from this sure vision of the restoration of the people as a whole, to pick up again the individual from whom it had started, and whose unclean rag of a life had fluttered out of sight before the national fortunes sweeping in upon the scene. This was needed to crown the story-this return to the individual.

“And Jehovah said unto me, Once more go, love a wife that is loved of a paramour and is an adulteress, as Jehovah loveth the children of Israel,” the “while they are turning to other gods, and love raisin-cakes”-probably some element in the feasts of the gods of the land, the givers of the grape. “Then I bought her to me for fifteen “pieces” of silver and a homer of barley and a lethech of wine. And I said to her, For many days shalt thou abide for me alone; thou shalt not play the harlot, thou shalt not be for any husband; and I for my part also shall be so towards thee. For the days are many that the children of Israel shall abide without a king and without a prince, without sacrifice and without maccebah, and without ephod and teraphim. Afterwards the children of Israel shall turn and seek Jehovah their God and David their king, and shall be in awe of Jehovah and towards His goodness in the end of the days.”

Do not let us miss the fact that the story of the wifes restoration follows that of Israels, although the story of the wifes unfaithfulness had come before that of Israels apostasy. For this order means that, while the prophets private pain preceded his sympathy with Gods pain, it was not he who set God, but God who set him, the example of forgiveness. The man learned the Gods sorrow out of his own sorrow; but conversely he was taught to forgive and redeem his wife only by seeing God forgive and redeem the people. In other words, the Divine was suggested by the human pain; yet the Divine Grace was not started by any previous human grace, but, on the contrary, was itself the precedent and origin of the latter. This is in harmony with all Hoseas teaching. God forgives because “He is God and not man.” (Hos 9:9) Our pain with those we love helps us to understand Gods pain; but it is not our love that leads us to believe in His love. On the contrary, all human grace is but the reflex of the Divine. So St. Paul: “Even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.” So St. John: “We love Him,” and one another, “because He first loved us.”

But this return from the nation to the individual has another interest. Gomers redemption is not the mere formal completion of the parallel between her and her people. It is, as the story says, an impulse of the Divine Love, recognized even then in Israel as seeking the individual. He who followed Hagar into the wilderness, who met Jacob at Bethel and forgat not the slave Joseph in prison, remembers also Hoseas wife. His love is not satisfied with His Nation-Bride: He remembers this single outcast. It is the Shepherd leaving the ninety-and-nine in the fold to seek the one lost sheep.

For Hosea himself his home could never be the same as it was at the first. “And I said to her, For many days shalt thou abide, as far as I am concerned, alone. Thou shalt not play the harlot. Thou shalt not be for a husband: and I on my side also shall be so towards thee.” Discipline was needed there; and abroad the nations troubles called the prophet to an anguish and a toil which left no room for the sweet love or hope of his youth. He steps at once to his hard warfare for his people; and through the rest of his book we never again hear him speak of home, or of children, or of wife. So Arthur passed from Guinevere to his last battle for his land:-

“Lo! I forgive thee, as Eternal God Forgives: do thou for thine own soul the rest.

But how to take last leave of all I loved?

I cannot touch thy lips, they are not mine

I cannot take thy hand; that too is flesh,

And in the flesh thou hast sinned; and mine own flesh,

Here looking down on thine polluted, cries I loathe thee; yet not less, O Guinevere,

For I was ever virgin save for thee,

My love thro flesh hath wrought into my life

So far, that my doom is, I love thee still.

Let no man dream but that I love thee still.

Perchance, and so thou purify thy soul,

And so thou lean on our fair father Christ,

Hereafter in that world where all are pure

We two may meet before high God, and thou

Wilt spring to me, and claim me thine, and know

I am thine husband, not a smaller soul

Leave me that, I charge thee my last hope.

Now must I hence.

Thro the thick night I hear the trumpet blow.”

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary