the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Verse- by-Verse Bible Commentary
New American Standard Bible
Bible Study Resources
Nave's Topical Bible - Idolatry; Israel, Prophecies Concerning; Scofield Reference Index - Israel; Wife;
Clarke's Commentary
Verse Hosea 2:2. Plead with your mother — People of Judah, accuse your mother, (Jerusalem,) who has abandoned my worship, and is become idolatrous; convince her of her folly and wickedness, and let her return to him from whom she has so deeply revolted.
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Clarke, Adam. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "The Adam Clarke Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/acc/hosea-2.html. 1832.
Bridgeway Bible Commentary
Unfaithful Israel (2:2-23)
In Chapter 2 Hosea’s sons are apparently now grown up and Hosea asks them to plead with their mother to return to him. In the same way the minority of faithful believers in Israel plead with the faithless nation to return to God (2).
Israel’s adultery was to follow Baal instead of Yahweh. The people believed that Baal was the god of nature and he would give them happiness. Just as a husband could strip his unfaithful wife and send her away naked, so God will, by drought and conquest, strip Israel’s land, leaving it bare and fruitless (3-5).
God creates other hindrances designed to stop Israel from going after Baal and to help her return to him, but she persists in pursuing Baal. Only when she cannot get what she wants from Baal does she selfishly turn back to Yahweh, hoping he can do better for her (6-7).
In his grace God receives unfaithful Israel back, but by ruining the productivity of the land he will show her that he, not Baal, is the controller of nature (8-9). As an adulterous wife is shamed by being stripped naked, so the nation that is committing spiritual adultery with Baal will be shamed as her land is stripped bare (10-13).
After she acknowledges her wrong, God will win Israel back to himself. When Israel first entered her land, the Valley of Achor (GNB: Trouble Valley) brought warnings of judgment (see Joshua 7:22-26), but when she returns it will bring hope (14-15). No longer will she try to follow both Yahweh and Baal. Yahweh will be her only husband. In fact, she will be so determined to avoid any identification of Yahweh with Baal, that she will refuse to use the word baal when speaking of Yahweh as her husband or master. She will use the alternative word ish (16-17). Yahweh will protect her from all dangers, whether from the world of nature or from the world of people. He is God of nature and God of history (18).
The ‘re-marriage’ will be based on God’s standards and maintained by his loving faithfulness to the marriage covenant. Israel will know Yahweh and be inseparably united with him (19-20). He, the only God of nature, will then give to Israel the blessings of nature that she desired. The curses signified by the names of Hosea’s three children will then be turned into blessings (21-23).
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Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com. Used by Permission.
Fleming, Donald C. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Fleming's Bridgeway Bible Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/bbc/hosea-2.html. 2005.
Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible
"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."
It is natural to associate the opening words of this verse with the children mentioned in Hosea 1, for they certainly suggest Hosea's domestic situation; but this impression fades quickly "into the picture of a nation under the figure of a marriage which has gone wrong."
"Her whoredoms… and her adulteries" Whoredoms is a reference to licentiousness generally, but "adulteries" refers to Israel's having broken their marriage covenant with the Lord by the committing of idolatry. This figure is used extensively in the Old Testament (Exodus 34:14-15; Leviticus 17:7; Leviticus 20:5-6; Numbers 14:33; Numbers 15:39; Deuteronomy 31:16; Deuteronomy 32:16; Deuteronomy 32:21, etc.). Of course, in the background of these remarks was Hosea's consciousness of Gomer's infidelity.
"For she is not my wife, neither am I her husband" As Mays accurately discerned, the husband here "stands for Yahweh; and the wife represents the corporate people of Israel."
(1) Israel most certainly did break God's covenant, as witnessed by Jeremiah: "Israel and Judah have broken my covenant" (Jeremiah 11:10), and, "Which my covenant they brake!" (Jeremiah 31:32). Thus, the holy covenant between God and Israel was not merely "fractured" but broken.
(2) As to the question of whether the words here are the announcement of a divorce, or not, they are cast in the exact legal terminology of the divorce decree itself. Curt Kuhl noted that:
"She is not my wife, and I am not her husband" is simply the Hebrew equivalent of the Akkadian divorce formula, in the light of new Semitic inscriptions.
Furthermore, McKeating has observed that Ezekiel 16:35-39 seems to presuppose that it was used in Israel as well.
There can be, therefore, very little if any doubt whatever that God divorced Israel and that the decree was final and irrevocable. Several figures are used in the Bible to convey the truth of God's rejecting the old Israel as his "chosen people," a status which was taken away from them and bestowed upon the family of God "in Christ." One of these was mentioned by Paul in Romans 7:1 ff, in which it was pointed out that God Himself was dead "to Israel" in the person of his only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Thus, any claim of the old Israel as the bride of Jehovah is as worthless as the claim of a woman who has been divorced for adultery against a husband who has already died.
None of this however, denies the fact of God's continuing love for all men, including the once "chosen people." Moreover, the stern measures of discipline imposed upon the apostate nation, as outlined in this chapter, were benign in purpose, having as their objective the reclamation of a "remnant" of the old Israel who, in time, would accept the true Messiah, and thus partake of the new marriage of the Lord to another Israel, inclusive of both Jews and Gentiles in Christ. This, of course, actually occurred. All of the holy apostles, as well as countless thousands of other Jews, were the original nucleus of the church of Jesus Christ. Furthermore, it is most likely that countless thousands, or even millions, of the holy church throughout history were by "fleshly descent" children of Abraham, and therefore Israelites in two senses; but, to be sure, this is impossible of documentation because any person obeying the gospel of Christ immediately loses any other religious identity that he once might have possessed. There are persons known to this writer who are of Jewish descent, but this is a truth unknown to their associates, and in the majority of instances, even to their children!
The reasons for God's divorcing Israel are vividly presented in this very verse.
"And let her put away her whoredoms from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts" Jamieson's comment on this is that, "Her unblushing countenance betrayed her lust, as did also her exposed breasts."
"She encouraged Ahab to build shrines for worship and brought hundreds of the religious priests and prophets to Israel. She persecuted the prophets of God and ordered those slain who spoke against her idolatrous ways, Through her daughter Athaliah (2 Kings 8:18), who became wife of Jehoshaphat the king of Judah, the same paganism also penetrated and later destroyed Judah also."
The summons addressed to the children to contend with their mother in this verse, "presupposes that, although the nation regarded as a whole was sunken in idolatry, the individual members were not all slaves to it."
While it is clear enough in the prophecy of Amos that God's rejection of Israel was due to the perversion of their holy religion, the point is made much more clearly in Hosea. As Robinson said: "His emphasis falls much more than that of Amos on the actual immorality of the cult and of its priests."
Coffman's Commentaries reproduced by permission of Abilene Christian University Press, Abilene, Texas, USA. All other rights reserved.
Coffman, James Burton. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/bcc/hosea-2.html. Abilene Christian University Press, Abilene, Texas, USA. 1983-1999.
Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible
Plead with your mother, plead - The prophets close the threats of coming judgments with the dawn of after-hopes; and from hopes they go back to God’s judgments against sin, pouring in wine and oil into the wounds of sinners. The “mother” is the Church or nation; the “sons,” are its members, one by one. These, when turned to God, must plead with their mother, that she turn also. When involved in her judgments, they must plead with her, and not accuse God. God “had not forgotten to be gracious;” but she “kept not His love, and refused His friendship, and despised the purity of spiritual communion with Him, and would not travail with the fruit of His will.” : “The sons differ from the mother, as the inventor of evil from those who imitate it. For as, in good, the soul which, from the Spirit of God, conceiveth the word of truth, is the mother, and whoso profiteth by hearing the word of doctrine from her mouth, is the child, so, in evil, whatsoever soul inventeth evil is the mother, and whoso is deceived by her is the son. So in Israel, the adulterous mother was the synagogue, and the individuals deceived by her were the sons.”
“Ye who believe in Christ, and are both of Jews and Gentiles, say ye to the broken branches and to the former people which is cast off, “My people,” for it is your brother; and “Beloved,” for it is “your sister.” For when Romans 11:25-26 the fulness of the Gentiles shall have come in, then shall all Israel be saved. In like way we are bidden not to despair of heretics, but to incite them to repentance, and with brotherly love to long for their salvation” .
For she is not My wife - God speaketh of the spiritual union between Himself and His people whom He had chosen, under the terms of the closest human oneness, of husband and wife. She was no longer united to Him by faith and love, nor would He any longer own her. Plead therefore with her earnestly as orphans, who, for her sins, have lost the protection of their Father.
Let her therefore put away her whoredoms - So great is the tender mercy of God. He says, let her but put away her defilements, and she shall again be restored, as if she had never fallen; let her but put away all objects of attachment, which withdrew her from God, and God will again be All to her.
Adulteries, whoredores - God made the soul for Himself; He betrothed her to Himself through the gift of the Holy Spirit; He united her to Himself. All love, then, out of God, is to take another, instead of God. “whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire besides Thee.” “Adultery” is to become another’s than His, the Only Lord and Husband of the soul. Whoredom is to have many other objects of sinful love. Love is one, for One. The soul which has forsaken the One, is drawn here and there, has manifold objects of desire, which displace one another, because none satisfies. Hence, the prophet speaks of “fornications, adulteries;” because the soul, which will not rest in God, seeks to distract herself from her unrest and unsatisfiedness, by heaping to herself manifold lawless pleasures, out of, and contrary to the will of, God.
From before her - Literally “from her face.” The face is the seat of modesty, shame, or shamelessness. Hence, in Jeremiah God says to Judah, “Thou hadst a harlot’s forehead; thou refusedst to be ashamed” Jeremiah 3:3; and “they were not at all ashamed, neither will they blush” Jeremiah 6:15. The eyes, also, are the “windows” Jeremiah 9:21, through which “death,” i. e., lawless desire, “enters into” the soul, and takes it captive.
From her breasts - These are exposed, adorned, degraded in disorderly love, which they are employed to allure. Beneath too lies the heart, the seat of the affections. It may mean then, that she should no more gaze with pleasure on the objects of her sin, nor allow her heart to dwell on tilings which she loved sinfully. Whence it is said of the love of Christ, which should keep the soul free from all unruly passions which might offend him Song of Solomon 1:13, “My Well-beloved shall lie all night between my breasts Song of Solomon 8:6, as a seal upon the heart” beneath.
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Barnes, Albert. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/bnb/hosea-2.html. 1870.
Calvin's Commentary on the Bible
The Prophet seems in this verse to contradict himself; for he promised reconciliation, and now he speaks of a new repudiation. These things do not seem to agree well together that God should embrace, or be willing to embrace, again in his love those whom he had before rejected, — and that he should at the same time send a bill of divorce, and renounce the bond of marriage. But if we weigh the design of the Prophet, we shall see that the passage is very consistent, and that there is in the words no contrariety. He has indeed promised that at a future time God would be propitious to the Israelites: but as they had not yet repented, it was needful to deal again more severely with them, that they might return to their God really and thoroughly subdued. So we see that in Scripture, promises and threatening are mingled together, and rightly too. For were the Lord to spend a whole month in reproving sinners they may in that time fall away a hundred times. Hence God, after showing to men their sins adds some consolation and moderates severity, lest they should despond: he afterwards returns again to threatening, and does so from necessity; for though men may be terrified with the fear of punishment, they do not yet really repent. It is then necessary for them to be reproved not only once and again, but very often.
We now then perceive what the Prophet had in view: he had spoken of the people’s defection; afterwards he proved that the people had been justly rejected by the Lord; and then he promised the hope of pardon. But now seeing that they still continued obstinate in their vices, he reproves again those who had need of such chastisement. He, in a word, has in view their present state.
Almost all so expound this verse as if the Prophet addressed the faithful: and with greater refinement still do they expound, who say, that the Prophet addresses the faithful who had fallen away from the synagogue. They have and I have no doubt, been much deceived; for the Prophets on the contrary, shows here that God was justly punishing the Israelites, who were wont to excuse themselves in the same way as hypocrites are wont to do. When the Lord treated them otherwise than according to their wishes, they expostulated, and raised up contention — “What does this mean?” So do we find them introduced as thus speaking, by Isaiah. [Isaiah 58:1.] There, indeed, they fiercely contend with God, as if the Lord dealt with them unjustly, for they seemed not conscious of having done any evil. Hence the Prophet, seeing the Israelites so senseless in their sins, says, Contend, contend with your mother. He speaks here in the person of God: and God, as it has been stated, uses the similitude of a marriage. Let us now see what is the import of the words.
When a husband repudiates his wife, he fixes a mark of disgrace on the children born by that marriage: their mother has been divorced; then the children, on account of that divorce, are held in less esteem. 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 honoured 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 with 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 wife 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 has cast them away for no fault. The Prophet now undertakes the defence of God’s cause, and speaks also in his person, Contend, contend, he says with your mother In a word, this passage agrees with what is said in the beginning of Isaiah 50:1,
‘Where is the bill of repudiation? Have I sold you to my creditors? But ye have been sold for your sins, and your mother has been repudiated for her iniquity.’
Husbands were wont to give a bill of divorce to their wives, that they themselves might see it: for it freed them from every reproach, inasmuch as the husband bore a testimony to his wife: “I dismiss her, not that she has been unfaithful, not that she has violated the bond of marriage; but because her beauty does not please me, or because her manners are not agreeable to me.” The law compelled the husband to give such a testimony as this. God now says by his Prophet, “Show me now the bill of repudiation: have I of my own accord cast away your mother? No, I have not done so. Ye cannot accuse me of cruelty, as though her beauty did not please me, and as though I had followed the common practice approved by you. I have not willingly rejected her, nor at my own pleasure, and I have not sold her to my creditors, as your fathers were sometimes wont to do, as to their children, when they were in debt.” In short, the Lord shows there that the Jews were to be blamed, that they were rejected together with their mother. So he says also in this place, Contend, contend with your mother; which means, “Your dispute is not with me:” and by the repetition he shows how inveterate was their perverseness, for they never ceased to glamour against God. We now see the real meaning of the Prophet.
In vain then do they philosophise, who say that the mother was to be condemned by her own children; because, when they shall be converted to their former faith, they ought then to condemn the synagogue. The Prophet meant no such thing; but, on the contrary, 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. For the comparison between husband and wife is here to be understood; and then the children are placed as it were in the middle. When the mother is dismissed, the children indignantly say that the father has been too inhuman if indeed he wilfully divorces his wife: but when a wife becomes unfaithful to her husband, or prostitutes herself to any shameful crime, the husband is then free from every blame; and there is no cause for the children to expostulate with him; for he ought thus to punish a shameless wife. God then shows that the Israelites were justly rejected, and that the blame of their rejection belonged to the whole race of Abraham; but that no blame could be imputed to him.
And for a reason it is added, Let her then take away her fornication from her face, and her adulteries from the midst of her breasts The Prophet, by saying, “Let her then take away her fornications”, (for the copulative
‘Spread has the harlot her feet,
she called on all who passed by the way,’
(Ezekiel 16:25.)
We now then understand why the Prophet expressly said, Let her take away from her face her fornication, and from her breasts her adulteries: for he teaches that the vices of the people were not hidden, and that they did not now sin and cover their baseness as hypocrites do, but that they were so unrestrained in their contempt of God, that they were become like common harlots.
Here is a remarkable passage; for we first see that men in vain complain when the Lord seems to deal with them in severity; for they will ever find the fault to be in themselves and in their parents: yea, when they look on all impartially, they will confess that all throughout the whole community are included in one and the same guilt. Let us hence learn, whenever the lord may chastise us, to come home to ourselves, and to confess that he is justly severe towards us; yea, were we apparently cast away, we ought yet to confess, that it is through our own fault, and not through God’s immoderate severity. We also learn how frivolous is their pretext, who set up against God the authority of their fathers, as the Papists do: for they would, if they could, call or compel God to an account, because he forsakes them, and owns them not now as his Church. “What! has not God bound his faith to us? Is not the Church his spouse? Can he be unfaithful?” So say the Papists: but at the same time they consider not, that their mother has become utterly filthy through her many abominations; they consider not, that she has been repudiated, because the Lord could no longer bear her great wickedness. Let us then know, that it is in vain to bring against God the examples of men; for what is here said by the Prophet will ever stand true, that God has not given a bill of divorce to his Church; that is, that he has not of his own accord divorced her, as peevish and cruel husbands are wont to do, but that he has been constrained to do so, because he could no longer connive at so many abominations. It now follows —
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Calvin, John. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Calvin's Commentary on the Bible". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/cal/hosea-2.html. 1840-57.
Smith's Bible Commentary
Chapter 2
Say to your brethren ( Hsa Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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" ( Matthew 24:15-18 ). And God will preserve them and keep them. Isaiah 26 , "He will hide them until the tribulation is over, until the indignation is overpast" ( Isaiah 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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 Hosea 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" ( Acts 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. "
Copyright © 2014, Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa, Ca.
Smith, Charles Ward. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Smith's Bible Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/csc/hosea-2.html. 2014.
Dr. Constable's Expository Notes
Hosea called on his children to act as witnesses against the conduct of their mother. She was not acting like a true wife, so he could not be a true husband to her. Perhaps they had separated. She needed to stop practicing harlotry and adultery.
In the figure Yahweh used, He called on the Israelites to contend with their mother, a figure for the nation as a whole.
"Israel’s one hope is that her own sons should stand up in accusation against her, as Ezekiel was later to do with Judah (cf. chs. 16, 20, 23), rebuking her not for her faults but for her fundamental unfaithfulness." [Note: Ellison, p. 106.]
"Contend" (Heb. rib) often refers to a legal accusation. Yahweh was bringing legal charges against Israel that could stand up in court. The legal charge was not a formal declaration of divorce, however, because He wanted to heal the relationship, not terminate it (cf. Hosea 2:6-7; Hosea 2:14-23). The relationship between Yahweh and Israel was not what it should have been because Israel had become a spiritual harlot. [Note: Cf. D. Kidner, Love to the Loveless: The Message of Hosea, p. 27.] She had stopped worshipping and serving Yahweh exclusively and had worshipped and served other gods. This was spiritual adultery. Under the Mosaic Law, a husband could have his wife stoned for being unfaithful (Leviticus 20:10; Deuteronomy 22:22), but this was not God’s intention for Israel.
"Marriage is one of many figures used in Scripture to emphasize the relationship of God to men. This illustration is used in both O.T. and N.T. to picture love, intimacy, privilege, and responsibility. In the O.T., as here in Hosea 2:16-23, Israel is described as the wife of the LORD, though now disowned because of disobedience. Nevertheless eventually, upon repentance, Israel will be restored. This relationship is not to be confounded with that of the Church to Christ (John 3:29). In the mystery of the divine Trinity both are true. The N.T. speaks of the Church as a virgin espoused to one husband (2 Corinthians 11:1-2), which could never be said of an adulterous wife restored in grace. Israel is, then, to be the restored and forgiven wife of the LORD; the Church is the virgin wife of the Lamb (John 3:29; Revelation 19:6-8). Israel will be the LORD’s earthly wife (ch. Hosea 2:23); the Church, the Lamb’s heavenly bride (Revelation 19:7)." [Note: The New Scofield . . ., p. 920.]
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Constable, Thomas. DD. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Dr. Constable's Expository Notes". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/dcc/hosea-2.html. 2012.
Dr. Constable's Expository Notes
1. Judgment on Gomer as a figure of Israel 2:2-7
In this message, the Lord described Israel’s unfaithfulness to Him in terms similar to those that a husband would use to describe his wife’s unfaithfulness to him. The whole message appears to be one that Hosea delivered to his children, but it really describes Israel as the unfaithful "wife" of Yahweh. As explained above (cf. Hosea 1:2), the evidence suggests that Hosea’s wife really was unfaithful to him; this is not just an allegory in which God projected His relationship with Israel onto Hosea and his wife for illustrative purposes.
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Constable, Thomas. DD. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Dr. Constable's Expository Notes". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/dcc/hosea-2.html. 2012.
Dr. Constable's Expository Notes
A. Oracles of judgment 2:2-13
Two judgment oracles follow. In the first one, Hosea and Gomer’s relationship is primarily in view, but the parallels with Yahweh and Israel’s relationship are obvious. In the second one, it is almost entirely Yahweh and Israel’s relationship that is in view. In both parts the general form of the messages is that of the lawsuit or legal accusation (Heb. rib) based on (Mosaic) covenant violation.
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Constable, Thomas. DD. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Dr. Constable's Expository Notes". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/dcc/hosea-2.html. 2012.
Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible
Plead with your mother, plead,.... The congregation of Israel, as the Targum; the body of the Jewish nation, which, with respect to individuals, was as a mother to her children; see Matthew 21:37, that is, lay before her, her sin in rejecting the Messiah, the Head and Husband of his true church and people; endeavour to convince her of it; reprove her for it; expostulate with her about it; argue the case with her, and show her the danger of persisting in such an evil, as the apostles did, Acts 2:23
for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; for though there had been such a relation between them, yet it was now dissolved; she had broken the marriage covenant and contract, and God had given her a bill of divorce, Jeremiah 31:32 or, however, as she behaved not as a wife towards him, showing love and affection, honour and reverence, and performing duty, and yielding obedience; so he would not carry it as a husband towards her, nourishing and cherishing her, providing for her, and protecting and defending her; but leave her to shift for herself, and to the insults and abuses of others; having been guilty of idolatry, which is spiritual adultery, as the Israelites before the captivity were; and as the Jews in Christ's time were guilty of rejecting the word of God, and preferring their own traditions to it: hence it follows,
let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, or "from her face" e,
and her adulteries from between her breasts; alluding to the custom of harlots, who used to paint their faces, and to allure with their looks, words, and actions, and to make bare their breasts, or adorn them, or carry in them what were enticing and alluring. These adulteries and whoredoms, which are the same thing, may signify the many idolatries of the people of Israel before their captivity, and which were the cause of it; or the sins of the Jews before their dispersion; or their evil works, as the Targum, by which they departed from God and the true Messiah, and went a whoring after other lovers: thus they rejected, transgressed, and made of none effect the commandments of God by their traditions; paid tithe of mint, anise, and cummin, and neglected the weighty matters of the law; sought not the honour of God, but that which comes from men; and therefore confessed not the true Messiah, though under convictions of him, and went about to establish their own righteousness, and submitted not to his; these were the idols of their hearts, and the whoredoms and adulteries the Jewish converts, that truly believed in Christ, are ordered to exhort them to put away. The Septuagint and Arabic versions are, "I will take away her whoredoms c.",
e מפניה "a facie sua", Calvin, Pagninus, Piscator, Cocceius "a faciebus suis", Montanus, Schmidt.
The New John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible Modernised and adapted for the computer by Larry Pierce of Online Bible. All Rights Reserved, Larry Pierce, Winterbourne, Ontario.
A printed copy of this work can be ordered from: The Baptist Standard Bearer, 1 Iron Oaks Dr, Paris, AR, 72855
Gill, John. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/geb/hosea-2.html. 1999.
Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible
| The Sinfulness of Israel. | B. C. 764. |
1 Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah. 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; 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 And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms. 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.
The first words of this chapter some make the close of the foregoing chapter, and add them to the promises which we have here of the great things God would do for them. When they shall have appointed Christ their head, and centered in him, then let them say to one another, with triumph and exultation (let the prophets say it to them, so the Chaldee--Comfort you, comfort you, my people, is now their commission), "say to them, Ammi, and Ruhamah; call them so again, for they shall no longer lie under the reproach and doom of Lo-ammi and Lo-ruhamah; they shall now be my people again, and shall obtain mercy." God's spiritual Israel, made up of Jews and Gentiles without distinction, shall call one another brethren and sisters, shall own one another for the people of God and beloved of him, and, for that reason, shall embrace one another, and stir up one another both to give thanks for and to walk worthy of this common salvation which they partake of. Or rather, because the following words seem to have a coherence with these, these also are designed for conviction and humiliation. The mother (Hosea 2:2; Hosea 2:2) seems to be the same with the brethren and sisters (Hosea 2:1; Hosea 2:1), the church of the ten tribes, the body of the people, who were brethren, and in a special manner with the heads and leaders, who were as the mother by whom the rest were brought up and nursed. But who are the children that must plead with their mother thus? Either, 1. The godly that were among them, that witnessed against the iniquities of the times, let them boldly go on to bear their testimony against the idolatries and gross corruptions that prevail among them. Let those that had not bowed the knee to Baal reason the case with those that had, and endeavour to convince them with such arguments as are here put into their mouths. Note, Private persons may, and ought in their places, to appear and plead against the public profanations of God's name and worship. Children may humbly and modestly argue with their parents when they do amiss: Plead with your mother, plead, as Jonathan with Saul concerning David. Or, 2. The sufferers among them, that shared in the calamities of the times, let them not complain of God, let them not quarrel with him, nor lay the blame on him, as if he had dealt hardly with them, and not like a tender father. No; let them plead with their mother, and lay the fault on her, where it ought to be laid; compare Isaiah 50:1. "For her transgressions is your mother put away; she may thank herself, and you may thank her for all your miseries." Let us see now how they must plead with her.
I. They must put here in mind of the relation wherein she had stood to God, the kindness he had had for her, the many favours he had bestowed upon her, and the further favours he had designed her. Let them tell their brethren and sisters that they had been Ammi and Ruhamah, that they had been God's people and vessels of his mercy, and might have been so still if it had not been their own fault, Hosea 2:1; Hosea 2:1. Note, Our relation to God and dependence on him are a great aggravation of our revolts from him and rebellions against him.
II. They must, in God's name, charge her with the violation of the marriage-covenant between her and God. Let them tell her that God does not look upon her as his wife, nor upon himself as her husband any longer. Tell her (Hosea 2:2; Hosea 2:2) that she is not my wife, neither am I her husband, that by her spiritual whoredom she has forfeited all the honour and comfort of her relation to God, and provoked him to give her a bill of divorce. Note, No consideration can be more powerful to awaken us to repentance than the provocation we have by sin given to God to disown and cast us off. It is time to look about us, and to think what course we must take, when God threatens to reject us; for woe unto us if he be not our husband. They must charge this home upon her (Hosea 2:5; Hosea 2:5): Their mother has played the harlot; their congregation has run a whoring after false prophets (so the Chaldee), or, rather, after idols, wherein they were encouraged by their false prophets; she that conceived them has done shamefully, in making and worshipping idols. An idol is called a shame (Hosea 9:10; Hosea 9:10) and idolatry is a shameful thing. It is not only an affront to God, but a reproach to men, to fall down to the stock of a tree, as the prophet speaks. Or it denotes that the sinner was shameless, impudent in sin, and could not blush; Jeremiah 6:15. Or, She has made ashamed, has made all that see her ashamed of her; her own children are ashamed of their relation to her.
III. They must upbraid her with her horrid ingratitude to God her benefactor, in ascribing to her idols the glory of the gifts he had given her, and then giving that for a reason why she paid them the homage due to him only, Hosea 2:5; Hosea 2:5. In this she did shamefully indeed, that she said, I will go after my lovers that give me my bread and my water. Observe here, 1. Her wicked resolution to persist in idolatry, notwithstanding all that God said, both by his prophets and by his providences, to draw her from it. She said, Whatever is offered to the contrary, I will go after my lovers, or those that cause me to love them, whom I cannot but be in love with. The Chaldee understands it of the nations whose alliance Israel courted and depended upon, who supplied them with what they needed. But it is rather to be understood of the idols they worshipped, to justify their love of which they called them their lovers. See who do shamefully; those that are wilful and resolute in sin, and those that openly profess and own their resolution to go on in it. See the folly of idolaters, to call those their lovers that had not so much as life; yet let us learn to call our God our lover; let us keep up good thoughts of him, and put a high value upon our interest in him and in his love. 2. The gross mistake upon which this resolution was grounded: "I will go after my lovers, because they give me my bread and my water, which are necessary to sustain the body, my wool and my flax, which are necessary to clothe the body, and pleasant things, my oil, and my drink, my liquors" (so the word is), "wine and strong drink." Note, (1.) The things of sense are the best things with carnal hearts, and the most powerful attractives, in pursuit of which they care not what they follow after. The God of Israel set before them his statutes and judgments (Deuteronomy 4:8), more to be desired than gold, and sweeter than honey (Psalms 119:10), promised them his favour, which would put gladness in their hearts more than corn, wine, and oil (Psalms 4:7); but they had no relish at all for these things. Whence they thought their oil and their drink came, thither they would return their best affections. O curvæ in terram animæ et cœlestium inanes!--O degenerate minds, bending towards the earth, and devoid of every thing heavenly! (2.) It is a great abuse and injury to God, in pursuance of the pleasures and delights of sense to forsake him, who not only gives us better things, but gives us even those things too. The idolaters made Ceres the goddess of their corn, Bacchus the god of their wine, c., and then foolishly fancied they had their corn and wine from these, forgetting the Lord their God, who both gave them that good land and gave them power to get wealth out of it. (3.) Many are hardened in sin by their worldly prosperity. They had an abundance of those things when they served their idols, and then imagined them to be given them by their idols, which kept them to their service thus they argued (Jeremiah 44:17; Jeremiah 44:18), While we burnt incense to the queen of heaven we had plenty of victuals.
IV. They must persuade her to repent and reform. God will disown her if she persist in her whoredoms; let her therefore put away her whoredoms,Hosea 2:2; Hosea 2:2. Let her be convinced that it is possible for her to reform; the idols, dear as they are, may yet be parted with; and it will certainly be well with her if she do reform. Note, Our pleading with sinners must be to drive them to repentance, not to drive them to despair. Let her put away her whoredoms and her adulteries; the doubling of words to the same purport, and both plural, denotes the abundance of idolatries they were guilty of, all which must be abandoned ere God would be reconciled to them. Let her put them out of her sight, as detestable things which she cannot endure to look upon; let her say unto them, Get you hence,Isaiah 30:22. Let her put them from her face and from between her breasts, that is, let her not do as harlots use to do, that both discover their own wicked disposition, and allure others to wickedness, by painting their faces, and exposing their naked breasts, and adorning them; let her not thus, by annexing all possible gaieties and pleasures to the worship of idols, engage herself and allure others to it. Let her put away all these. 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, will put away not only the whoredoms that lie in sight, but those that lie in secret between their breasts, the 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. Idolaters walked after their own eyes, which went a whoring after their idols (Ezekiel 6:9; Deuteronomy 4:19), and therefore they must put them away out of their sight, lest they should be tempted to worship them. Look not upon the wine when it is red. But that is not enough: the axe must be laid to the root; the corrupt bent and inclination of the heart must be changed, and it must be put away from between the breasts, that Christ alone may have the innermost and uppermost place there. Song of Solomon 1:13.
V. They must show her the utter ruin that will certainly be the fatal consequence of her sin if she do not repent and reform (Hosea 2:3; Hosea 2:3): Lest I strip her naked. This comes in here not by way of sentence passed upon her, but by way of warning given to her, that she may prevent it: Let her put away her whoredoms, that I may not strip her naked (so it may be read), intimating that God waits to show mercy to sinners, if they would but qualify themselves for that mercy. It is here threatened that God will deal with her as the just and jealous husband at length does with an adulterous wife, that has filled his house with a spurious brood, and will not be reclaimed; he turns her and her children out of doors and sends them a begging; I will not have mercy upon her children (Hosea 2:4; Hosea 2:4); the particular persons that share in the calamity of the nation, and the rising generation, shall be ruined by it, for they are children of whoredoms, and keep up the vain conversation received by tradition from their fathers. Now it is here threatened that they shall be both stripped and starved. They thought their idols gave them their bread and their water, their wool and their flax; but God, by taking them away, will let them know that it was he that gave them. 1. She shall be stripped: Lest I strip her of all her ornaments which she is proud of, and with which she courts her lovers, strip her and set her as in the day that she was born, send her as naked out of the world as she came into it; this death does, Job 1:21. I will strip her, and so expose her to cold, and expose her to shame; and justly is she exposed to shame that did shamefully,Hosea 2:5; Hosea 2:5. The day when God brought them out of Egypt, where they were no better than slaves and beggars, was the day in which they were born; and God threatens to bring them back to as low and miserable a condition as he then found them in. Whatever they had that either gained them respect or screened them from contempt, among their neighbours, should be taken from them. See Ezekiel 16:4; Ezekiel 16:39. 2. She shall be starved, shall be deprived not only of her honours, but of her comforts and necessary supports. She shall be famished, shall be made as a wilderness and a dry land, and slain with thirst. She that boasted so much of her bread and water, her oil and her drinks, which her lovers had given her, shall not have so much as necessary food. The land shall not afford subsistence for the inhabitants, for want of the rain of heaven; or, if it do, it shall be taken from them by the enemy, so that the rightful owners shall perish for want of it. Some understand it thus: I will make her as she was in the wilderness, and set her as she was in the desert land, where she was sometimes ready to perish for thirst. So it explains the former part of the Hosea 2:3: I will set her as in the day that she was born; for it was in the vast howling wilderness that Israel was first formed into a people. They shall be in as deplorable a condition as their fathers were, whose carcases fell in the wilderness, and in this respect, worse, that then the children were reserved to be heirs of the land of promise, but now I will not have mercy upon her children, for their mother has played the harlot.
These files are public domain and are a derivative of an electronic edition that is available on the Christian Classics Ethereal Library Website.
Henry, Matthew. "Complete Commentary on Hosea 2:2". "Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible". https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/mhm/hosea-2.html. 1706.
Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible
The prophecy of Hosea naturally divides itself into two principal divisions with minor sections. The first consists of Hosea 1:1-11; Hosea 2:1-23; Hosea 3:1-5; the second, of the rest of the book. Within these greater divisions, however, we have distinct parts.
The first chapter presents the prophet with his ministry "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." He was therefore a contemporary of Isaiah, who prophesied during the same kings, save that in the case of Hosea only do we hear of the then reigning king of Israel, of whom, rather than Judah, our prophet treats. For the word of Jehovah to him takes into account the condition of Israel as a whole, and particularly uses the dismal condition of Ephraim for the moral good of Judah. This is true of the whole book, which is remarkable for its occupation simply with the Jew, without noticing (as do other prophets) the Gentiles either for judgment or for blessing.
Hosea is, one might say, exclusively devoted to the ancient people of God, with a very slight but remarkable exception in the first chapter; but even it is couched in terms so enigmatical (and this, I believe, with divine intention for a special end), that many have failed to discern the truth contemplated in consequence of not using the light supplied in the New Testament. But there cannot be a more striking example than this very instance affords of the all-importance of using one part of scripture, not to correct indeed this were impossible and irreverent but better to understand another. In order to profit by the fuller revelation of the mind of God, we do well to read the earlier communications in the strongest light vouchsafed to us. It is one mind conveyed by one Spirit; and God can give us grace by dependence on Himself to guard us, as far as is consistent with our moral condition, from that narrowness to which we are all too prone, making certain portions of scripture our favourites, so as to interfere with due heed to the rest of the word. Those who indulge in these thoughts cannot be expected to understand the word of God, and, in what they make their one-sided study, are apt to fall into singular and sometimes fatal mistakes. The most precious truths of God, if they are used in an exclusive way, may by the enemy be turned to the support of serious error. Thus there would be danger if there were, for instance, the systematic limiting of the mind to the resurrection or heavenly side of divine truth. Or again, take prophecy; and how withering to the soul when that part of scripture practically becomes a monopoly? Take the church for it does not matter what and in it there is no security one whit more. The reason is simple; the secret of power, blessing, security, and communion is found, not in resurrection or heaven, not in prophecy nor in the church, nor in any other conceivable branch of truth, but in Christ, who alone gives the whole truth. Consequently we see that what we all know to be a doctrine and a necessary principle in God's revelation is true also as applied to every detail of practical experience.
In this case, then, the date of Hosea indicates his interest in Israel, and the work that God assigned him in reference to the twelve-tribed nationality of His people, when the ruin of Israel was at hand, and that of Judah was ere long to follow. Brief as his handling of his subject is, there is a remarkable completeness in the prophecy; and the moral element is as prominent in the second part, as the dispensational is in the first. The parenthesis of Gentile empire is quite omitted throughout. He is filled with the afflictions and the guilt of Israel as a whole, and, more than any other of the twelve shorter prophets, breaks forth into passionate and renewed grief over the people. The book accordingly abounds, as none other does so much, in the most abrupt transitions, which therefore make the style of Hosea singularly difficult in some respects, and, it may be added too, far more so to us just because of its intensely Jewish character. Not being Jews, we do not come under their character of relationship; but those who are to be called as Jews by and by will understand it well. They, having that position, and being thus called (though through the sense of the deepest sins on their part, at the same time knowing the yearnings of the Spirit of God over them), will enter into, as I believe they will profit by, that which to us presents difficulty because we are not in the same position.
The first chapter mainly consists of symbolic action, which represents the course of God's purposes. "The beginning of the word of Jehovah by Hosea. And 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 Jehovah." Nothing can be more evident than this declared object. The prophet is commanded to do that which was necessarily most painful in itself, and suggestive of what he as a man of God must have felt to be humbling as well as repulsive. But such was the attitude of Israel to their God, and Jehovah would make the prophet and those who heeded the prophecy to understand in measure what He must feel as to His people. "So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son. And 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 kingdom of the house of Israel. And it shall come to pass at that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel." This was the first great blow. Israel was to be smitten in the house of Jehu, the avenger of the blood-guiltiness that had been brought in by the idolatrous Jezebel. Jehu was a rough man, vain and ambitious, suited notwithstanding to deal in his rude fashion with that which had dishonoured Jehovah a man far enough outside the current of the feelings of the Spirit of God, but none the less employed in an external way to deal with the evident and open evil of Ahab's house and Israel.
*The very least we can say is that the expression intimated to the prophet what Gomer was going to be. But it must be allowed that the phrase naturally conveys the impression that she had already been guilty of an impure life too common where idolatry reigned. If Salmon begat Boaz of Rahab the harlot, it is not hard to conceive the Lord commanding the prophet to take Gomer to wife as a symbolic parable to Israel. It may be worth noticing that, while in ver. 3 she is said to have borne "him" a son, this is not the phrase, but one more vague, in verses 6 and 8. The mother's character might suffice to stamp itself on the children; but the absence of the pronoun in the ease of Lo-ruhamah and Lo-ammi, as contrasted with Jezreel is under the circumstances remarkable.
Nevertheless this, as it had no root in God, so it had no strength to maintain itself against other evils. Hence, although it suited the policy of Jehu to deal with certain gross idolatries, the political-religious evil that characterized the kingdom of Israel seemed necessary to sustain him against the house of David. Consequently, as he had no conscience as to the sin of Jeroboam, this was judged of Jehovah in due time. God smote not only Jehu's house, but Israel. The kingdom was to pass, though it might linger for a little while afterwards; but it was smitten of God. This is what is represented by Jezreel. God would scatter in due time. The Assyrian broke the power of Israel in the valley of Jezreel (afterwards called Esdraelon), a scene of covetousness and blood from first to last.
Then again we find a daughter appears, whose name was to be called Lo-ruhamah, a name which expresses the absence of pity towards the people. No more mercy was to be shown. Thus the failure of the kingdom of Israel, which soon followed after the dealing with Jehu's house, was not then complete. There would be still more judgment from God; for He says, "I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel." Jezreel was but the beginning of the judgments of God. "I will utterly take them away." It was not therefore the collapse of the kingdom of Jehu only, but Israel as a whole was to be swept from the land, never more to be restored as a separate polity. "But," says He in the very same breath, "I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by Jehovah their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen." The Assyrian was allowed to destroy the kingdom of Israel, but was himself checked by divine power when he hoped to carry off Judah.
Thus there was a lengthening of the tranquillity for Judah. They, at least for the time, exhibited fidelity to Jehovah in their measure. Afterwards another child is born a son; and "then said God, Call his name Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, and I will not be to you." It was no longer therefore simply a case of breaking up Israel completely, but Judah now comes into judgment. As long as the royal tribe stood, there was still a nucleus round which all the people might be gathered. As long as the house of David was true in any measure with Judah attached yet far from being true, God could (morally speaking) yet work recovery, or at any rate He could make them, as it were, swell out into a great people. But now, on the proved faithlessness of the innermost circle, God represents the solemn crisis by the birth of the son called Lo-ammi. Yet there is no notice of the Babylonish conqueror. The prophet abruptly passes by the captivity of Judah, and at once goes forward to the glorious reversal of all the sentences of woe. It is the reunion of all the tribes, but not the scanty return under Zerubbabel. A greater is here, even Messiah. Undoubtedly He is chosen, given and appointed to them by God; but it was important also to show that they will yield willing and active subjection. Gathered together, Israel and Judah shall make (or appoint) themselves one head, and shall come (or go) up out of the land: not Babylon or Assyria, or even the earth at large, I think, but rather an expression of their union religiously in the same solemn assemblies and feasts, as we have already seen them one people under one head. It was accomplished neither after the captivity nor when Christ came, but strikingly the reverse. It remains to be fulfilled when He comes to reign over the earth. "For," then indeed, "great [shall be] the day of Jezreel." God shall sow His people in His land, not scatter them out of it. It is the day not of humiliation but of manifested glory. "Yet," says He in His very sentence of judgment on Judah, "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, in the place where it shall be said unto them, Ye [are] not my people, it shall be said unto them, [Ye are] the sons of the living God."
Observe the remarkable change here. It is the scripture already referred to as the mysterious intimation of the call of the Gentiles in pure grace. This, though distinctly taught in Romans 9:1-33, surprises many readers. The reason is because we are apt to regard all as an antithesis in a merely human or limited fashion. If any man of God on the face of the earth had had the writing of the sentence left to himself, had there not been the full power of God which is meant by inspiration in its true and proper sense, it seems quite inconceivable that this sentence could ever have been written. Who would have said it, let him be supposed the best of men, if he loved Israel as a good Jew? Least of all surely Hosea, whose heart was all on fire for the people, both in horror on account of their wickedness and in yearning after their blessedness. But for that reason he of himself would have said, not "Ye are not my people," but Ye shall be made my faithful people. No, this is not what God says, but something quite different. The strong bias so natural even to a good man would have rendered it out of the question to speak as Hosea does. We find it hard to take in, even when written plainly before our eyes, the distinct teaching of God, conveying as it does an unexpected form of thought and an altogether new subject. The Spirit inspired him and can teach us.
This, as hinted before, is the scripture which the apostle Paul employs inRomans 9:1-33; Romans 9:1-33, as is well known. There he is vindicating, as is plain, the sovereign call of God the only resource for man where all is ruined. How beautifully this fits in with our prophet is evident. The ruin of Israel was already there; the ruin of Judah was impending. All was doomed. What then can man fall back on? If the people of God on the earth turned out only a mass of ruins on one side or another, what was there to look to? Nothing and none but God, not His law, but His sovereign grace. Accordingly this is exactly what does come in; as indeed the sovereignty of God must always be the help and sustainment and joy of a soul that is thoroughly beaten out of itself when its evil is truly judged before God. But it often takes a long while to break a man down to that point. Hence it is that many feel difficulties about it, unless perhaps on their death-bed. Then at least, if anywhere, man is true. God is true always; but man (I am speaking now only of such as are born of God) then parts company with those visions, or rather fitful shadows, which had disordered and misled him during the activities of life. Then indeed he realizes what he is as well as what God is. Accordingly, if he lose all confidence in himself in every possible way, it is only to enjoy a confidence, never so well known before, in God Himself.
This is precisely what we find here in the reasonings of the apostle Paul. It is naturally offensive to the pride of man's heart, and more particularly to a Jew's. For had they not received magnificent promises from God? It was a great difficulty to them, and it sounds very natural and formidable, how it was possible that the promises of God should I may not say fail, but seem to fail. But this came from looking simply at themselves with the promises of God. We must remember that the Bible does not contain merely the promises it largely consists, and particularly the Old Testament, of a divine history of the responsibility of man. We must leave room for both, so as not to let the responsibility of man overthrow the promises of God; but, on the other hand, not to neutralize the responsibility of the one because of the promises of the other.
The tendency of all men is to become what people call either Arminians or Calvinists; and a hard thing it is to hold the balance of truth without wavering to either side. There is nothing, however, too hard for the Lord; and the word of God is the unfailing preservative from either one or the other. I am perfectly persuaded spite of partisans who think only of their own views, or freethinkers who have no difficulty in allowing that both are there that neither Arminianism nor Calvinism is in the Bible, and that they are both thoroughly wrong without even the smallest justification. The fact is, that the tendency to either is deeply seated in unrenewed minds that is, the same man may be an Arminian at one time and a Calvinist at another; and it is likely that, if he has been a violent Arminian one day, he may become a violent Calvinist to-morrow. But the roots of both lie in man and in his onesidedness. The truth of God is in His word as the revelation of Christ by the Spirit, and nowhere else.
So it will be observed inRomans 9:1-33; Romans 9:1-33 how completely the apostle sets aside the Jewish misuse of the promises of God. By a chain of the most convincing facts and testimonies of the Old Testament urged in this wonderful chapter, he compels the Jew to abandon the flattering conceit of national election, used absolutely and exclusively as was his wont; for really it is a conceit of himself after all. If they hold to the exclusive pretensions of Israel as simply deriving from Abraham in the line of flesh (which was their point), in that case they must accept others to be their companions; for Abraham had more sons than Isaac, and Isaac had another son than Jacob. The ground of flesh therefore is utterly indefensible. A mere lineal descent would have let in the Ishmaelites, for instance; and of them the Jew would not hear. If he pleaded that Ishmael sprang from Hagar, a slave, be it so; but what of Edom, born of the same mother as well as father, of Isaac and Rebecca, twin brother of Jacob himself? Consequently the ground taken was palpably unsound and untenable. We must therefore fall back upon the sole resource for man's evil and ruin God's sovereignty and gracious call. This was so much the more in point, because there was a time, even in the early history of the chosen people, when nothing less than God could have preserved it and given a ray of hope. It was not the Ishmaelites, not the Edomites, not the Gentiles, but Israel, who made the calf of gold. Had God dealt with them according to what they had been there to Him, must there not have been utter and immediate destruction? It is referred to now because of the moral principles connected with the citation of Hosea in Romans 9:1-33; and indeed all these truths appear to me to run together in the mind of the Spirit of God. If therefore we would understand the prophecy, we must follow and receive that which may seem discursively pursued in the New Testament, but which really was before the inspiring Spirit here too.
Consequently we have in the prophet what was true morally from the beginning of their sad history. It was now verging towards the bitter end of Israel, with Judah's ruin in full view. The very fact of prophets being raised up proved that the end was approaching; for prophecy only comes in with departure from God. There is no such form of revelation as prophecy when things run smooth and fair; nor is it then, morally speaking, required. What we have in days of comparative fidelity is the setting forth of privilege and duty; but when the privilege is despised and the duty not done, when God's people are in evident guilt, and judgment must follow, prophecy comes to tell of God's judging the evil, but with mercy and yet better blessing to the obedient remnant. This is true in principle even of the garden of Eden. God did not speak of the Seed of the woman till Adam was fallen; and so when Israel had transgressed like Adam, prophecy shines out. If the ruin were before Moses' eyes, as indeed it was, prophecy was vouchsafed to the lawgiver himself, as we see conspicuously in the end of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, not to speak of the wondrous burst through Balaam's mouth in the close of Numbers. Afterwards, when God had brought in every new form of blessing to kings raised up in grace to sustain the people, yet the ruin was only more decided. Prophecy too assumes a more comprehensive, systematic, and complete shape. A whole host of prophets, one might say, appears at this time; mighty prophetic utterances warned the people when outwardly things seemed strong but all was over before God, who therefore caused the alarm to be sounded with a remarkable and persistent urgency. The trumpet, as it were, was blown for Jehovah all over the land; and thus Hosea, as we know, was the contemporary of Amos, Micah, Isaiah, and perhaps other prophets at this time. There had been one even earlier still, as we may see if we compare the history. There was a peculiar reason for not putting the earliest first in order, which I hope to explain when I arrive at his book.
Already then the ruin was such that God's sovereignty was the only sure ground which could be taken. Hence we have seen that the apostle Paul uses this to point out, not merely the resource of grace for Israel, but that on Israel's failure it was perfectly open to God to go out to the Gentiles. For this is what Paul quotes the passage for in Romans 9:1-33: "That he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy which he had afore prepared unto glory, even us whom he hath called, not of the Jews only." From the moment God falls back on His own sovereignty the ground is as open for a Gentile as for a Jew. God is not sovereign if He may not choose whom He pleases. If He is sovereign, then it is but natural that His sovereignty should display itself where it would be most conspicuous. The call of the Gentiles furnishes this occasion; for if they were worst, as they certainly were utterly degraded, for this very reason they were most fit objects for the exercise of the divine sovereignty in grace. "Even us whom he called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles. As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people which were not my people, and her beloved which was not beloved. And it shall come to pass that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there shall they be called the children of the living God." It is evident that verse 25 the apostle interprets of the future call of Israel, the reinstatement of the people of God on a better footing than ever in sovereign grace; but he also applies verse 26 to the Gentiles.
Thus all is here set out in the most orderly method: "Even us whom he hath called, not of the Jews only" (shown in verse 25), "but also of the Gentiles" (referred to in verse 26). "And it shall come to pass that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there shall they be called the sons of the living God." Consequently sonship is far more characteristic of the call of the Gentile than of the Jew. Thus in the change (not a little one, as I was going to say, but very great indeed), in the avoidance of the expression "people" and the employment of "sons," God with the most admirable propriety, intimates by His prophet that when He was going to work in grace He would work worthily of His name. He would bring Gentiles not merely into the place of Israel, but into a better standing. Granted that they were the vilest of the vile: even so grace could and would raise them into the nearest relationship to God Himself. Then they should be, not a mere substitute for Israel, but "the sons of the living God" a title never given in its full force to any but the Gentiles who are now being called.
In a vague and general sense, as compared with distant Gentiles, Israel is called son, child, first-born; but this merely as a nation, whereas "sons" is individual. The expression, "In the place . . . . Ye are the sons of the living God," in the latter part of verse 10, is what has been already spoken of as the dim allusion to the call of the Gentiles. but it is so dim that many persons swamp it all together, making it bear on Israel. It might have been viewed as referring to Israel if God had said, "Then they shall be Ammi." He does not, however, say this, but "sons of the living God."
Such is the point of the apostle Paul; and what confirms this as the true interpretation is, that Peter also quotes from our prophet, and indeed was writing to a remnant of Jews only, as the apostle Paul was writing in his own proper place to Gentiles. Peter, however, though he does quote Hosea, omits the words, "They shall be called the sons of the living God." See 1 Peter 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." For his object he quotes fromHosea 2:1-23; Hosea 2:1-23, not from Hosea 1:1-11.
This strikingly falls in with what has been already observed, that the first chapter shows not merely the restoration of Israel (perfectly true as this is, and therefore in no way to be combated), but in a mysterious way room left by God for the bringing in of the Gentiles too. By the form of the allusion, which might very easily he overlooked, He proves His perfect knowledge beforehand, and makes a communication to us of the call of the Gentiles in their own proper distinctive relationship as sons of the living God, and not merely His people.
Hence it is that Peter, writing to Christian Jews only gives the latter. Although they had lost their place of people of God through idolatry and certainly the rejection of the Messiah did not mend matters, but rather confirmed the righteous sentence of God, that the little remnant which had come back were as bad as their fathers, or even worse, for they certainly perpetrated a greater crime in the rejection of their own Messiah, yet grace is come in, and they who have received the Messiah rejected but glorified, "are now the people of God." But he does not go farther, because he simply takes them up as persons who had by grace entered in faith into the privileges of Israel before Israel. They had received the Messiah; they were the remnant of that people. They who were not a people had become now a people; they who had not obtained mercy have now obtained mercy. But Paul, writing to the Gentiles, avails himself in a most appropriate way of what Peter passes by not ofHosea 2:23; Hosea 2:23, but of Hosea 1:10, which intimates the call of Gentiles in yet greater depth of mercy. At the same time he takes care to show that the Jew will require the very same ground of sovereign grace to bring him in by and by as we have for coming in now.
The prophet, it is well to observe, appears to point out Israel's future restoration immediately after in a slightly different phraseology, which I think ought to be noticed. "Then," he says (that is, when God has brought in the Gentiles, as we have seen), "Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land." Their restoration to the land is made evident here, their being joined not only Judah, but even reprobate Ephraim into Israel as a whole. "For great shall be the day of Jezreel." The very name of Jezreel, which was before a term of reproach and initiatory judgment, is now turned by the grace of God into a title of infinite mercy, when they shall be indeed the seed of God, not for scattering only but for the rich harvest of blessing that is to characterize the millennial day. Such is the first chapter.
Hosea 2:1-23 begins like the end of the first. In the rest of the chapter we have God carrying out a part but not the whole of the wonderful principles that are so compressed in the first chapter. We begin with the message: "Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah. Plead with your mother." It is a call to those who like Hosea could feel, speak, and act according to the Spirit of Christ, with the courage inspired by the certainty of such relationships, though for the present the state of the people was as far from comforting as could well be conceived, as indeed is plain from the next and following verses. "Brethren" and "sisters" look at the Jews (I think) individually. "Your mother" looks at them corporately as a body. "Plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight." Here then we behold a most painful picture Jehovah threatening to put Israel to shame, and to have no mercy upon her children, because their mother had behaved shamelessly towards Himself. "For she is not my wife, nor am I her husband." She must put away her scandalous unfaithfulness, "lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day when she was born, and make her as the desert, and cause her to die of thirst. On her children I will have no mercy; for they are lewd children, because their mother hath committed lewdness, their parent hath acted shamefully; for she said, I will follow my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my wine."
Accordingly Jehovah threatens to hedge up her way with thorns. "Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and raise a wall, that she may not find her paths. And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now." There was compunction occasionally, a little revival from time to time even in Israel; but the people never really repented or consequently abandoned their course of sin. Their good resolutions were the proof of God's goodness and the fruit of His testimony, but they never effected a thorough repentance of Israel. "For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they made into images of gold." Thus all was perverted to the service, and it was imputed to the favour of false gods. "Therefore," says He, "I will take my corn in its time, and my new wine in its season; and I will recover my wool and my flax designed to cover her nakedness. And I will expose her vileness before her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of my hand." Then He threatens that all her mirth shall cease, "her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn assemblies. And I will destroy her vines and her fig-trees." Even her natural blessings must be cut off which her unbelief made an excuse for the idols she set up. "And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them." All her luxurious and idolatrous sins therefore would come up in remembrance for judgment.
Nevertheless Jehovah remembers mercy, and immediately after announces that He will allure her, and, though leading he; into the wilderness, speak soothingly to her. But it should not be the past renewed, the old and sad history of Israel rehearsed once more; for to her He would grant her vineyards thence, the valley of Achor for a door of hope. The very place which of old was a door of judgment under Joshua becomes a door of hope in the prophetic vision. "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." Nor shall this freshness of renewed youth fade away as then. "And it shall be at that day, saith Jehovah, that thou shalt call me Ishi; and shalt call me no more Baali," (that is, "husband" in love instead of mere "lord," were it in the best and truest sense of dominion and possession from her mouth); also the many and false lords should no more be remembered by their names. "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."
Thus we see that, coincident with the return of Israel to Jehovah, and this flowing out of His grace towards them, there shall follow universal blessedness. God will make all the earth to feel to its own joy the gracious restoration of His long-estranged people. With the beasts of the field, and the fowls of heaven, and the reptiles of the earth, Jehovah declares He will make a covenant for them in that day. It is infatuation to think that all this was fully accomplished at the return from the Babylonish captivity. The result is that even Christians, misled by this miserable error, are drawn away into the rationalistic impiety of counting God's 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, man's violence and corruption, as well as reduce to harmless and happy subjection the animal kingdom at large.
On the other hand, it is not the epoch of the Incarnation, as some pious men say; though how they can venture on it is marvellous. "That day" is still future, and awaits the appearing and the kingdom of the Lord Jesus. It its distressing to confound such a prophecy with Peter's vision in order to apply all to the church now. "The bow and the sword and the battle I will break and remove out of the earth or land, and will make them to lie down safely." But, better than all, "I will also betroth thee to myself for ever;" for what is the worth of every other mercy compared with this nearest association with Jehovah Himself? "Yea, I will betroth thee to myself in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies," says He for the third time. "I will betroth thee to myself in faithfulness; and thou shalt know Jehovah."
Then comes a final and still fuller assurance. "And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith Jehovah, 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." What an uninterrupted line of blessing, from the heavens down to every earthly blessing in the land of Israel! Every creature of God shall then reap in full enjoyment the fruits of the restored and consummated union of Jehovah with His ancient people. "And I will sow her unto me in the earth [referring to the name of Jezreel]; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy (or Lo-ruhamah); and I will say to them which were not my people (or Lo-ammi), My people thou; and they shall say, My God."
Alas! the heavens had been severed, necessarily and long severed, from the earth by the sin of man, and Satan had gained power not merely on the earth, but above could claim a seeming title of righteousness as accuser before God; and thus the heavens were turned into brass against His people, whom the same enemy so often deceived, perverting that which ought to have been the constant governing power and symbol of all , that influenced men in relation to God into his mainspring,, of corruption. For instead of looking up to God in adoration, man adored the heavens and their host rather than God as the highest object of his worship. Such was the earliest form of idolatry. It was there that Satan's power particularly developed itself, in the turning of the highest creatures of God, the most significant parts and signs of His blessing to man, into instruments of the worst corruption. In that day Jehovah will show His power and goodness in destroying and reversing the work of Satan.
Instead therefore of longer hearing his accusation in the heavens who had only sought to dishonour God and involve man in his own ruin, Jehovah will clear the heavens. There will be restored freedom between the Creator and the higher creation, which speaks to Him as it were on behalf of the thirsty earth, Satan being then expelled, and his power and corrupting influence broken, never more to enter there again. Then, as it is said here, "the heavens shall hear the earth, and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil." That is, instead of the old and complete breach between the creation and God, and consequently therefore, through the serpent's wiles, desolation justly inflicted by God because of its fallen head, Satan will be effectually gone and all the effects of his power effaced. For the Second man will establish peace on a righteous ground for ever between God and Israel, and all the creatures of God, from the highest down to the lowest, enter into rest and Joy.
Thus there is a total reversal of what Satan had done by sin throughout the universe, but especially in view of Israel; so that the names of the first chapter, which then betokened divine judgment, are now converted into mercy and blessing. "The earth [or land] shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel," as Israel is styled, the seed of God. Lo-ruhamah God calls Ruhamah; and to Lo-ammi He says, "Ammi thou." No doubt there is an allusion in Jezreel to their antecedent dispersion; in no way to anything Israel has been during their days of shame and sorrow, but rather to a fresh sowing of them in the land by Jehovah's grace to His glory. The proper fulfilment of this (whatever be the verification of its principle in the Christian remnant, as we see in 1 Peter 2:1-25) awaits the future and manifest kingdom of Jehovah and His Anointed. Then, not in pledge but in fulness, will it be seen by all the world that Hosea has not written in vain: "I will sow her unto me in the earth." It is granted that Jehovah intends to take all the earth under His manifest sway (Psalms 2:1-12, Zechariah 14:1-21), but a great mistake that "the land" will not have a central place in this vast scheme of earthly blessing. The church will be the New Jerusalem, the heavenly metropolis, coming down from God out of heaven, to which she properly belongs as the bride of the Lamb. But the earth is to be blessed, and pre-eminently the land of Israel under Christ's glorious reign; for the divine purpose is to sum up all things in Him in whom we have obtained an inheritance all things, whether they be things in heaven or things on earth. He, the Son in a way quite unique, is Heir of all in the truest and fullest sense, and the kingdom at His coming will display what faith believes while it is unseen.
Hosea 3:1-5 presents a still more concise summary of Israel's past, present, and future, yet with fresh and striking features in this new outline, brief as it is. Even such Jews as acknowledge their own prophets as divinely inspired confess that Hosea in verse 4 describes exactly their present state, as it has also been for many centuries: neither altar of God nor idolatry, no consultation by the true priests or by idols; though they flatter themselves that they still adhere to Jehovah notwithstanding their sins.* How blind to overlook the teaching that they are out of relation to Jehovah, and that it is only after the present long-lasting anomaly in their state that they are to seek their God!
*Leeser's Twenty-four Books of the Holy Scriptures, page 1242. London edition.
This chapter winds up, as has been stated, the introductory portion of our prophecy. Hosea is still occupied with the purposes of God. "Then said Jehovah unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress." Again that most distressing contrast; the object of Jehovah's affection, and withal the base and gross return of Israel represented by Gomer, who had been unfaithful to the prophet, as was intimated before the marriage that she would be. The precision of the language, and the purity of God's servant even under so singular an injunction, are equally beautiful. She is called no longer thy wife but "a woman;" but her impurity was after marriage, and so she is justly named an adulteress. He is told to go again, and love her, a woman beloved by a "friend." Conjugal love is not intended; yet was she to be loved, as indeed she had been: there was no excuse for her sin in any failure of his affection. The exhortation was not after the manner of men, nor even of the law which regulated Israel's ordinary ways. It was grace, and "according to the love of Jehovah toward the sons of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons [or cakes] of grapes." For the connection of cakes with idolatry, seeJeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 7:18, Jeremiah 44:19. The purchase-money, half in barley, half in money, is that of a female slave; which marks the degradation to which the guilty woman had been reduced; it was of course not a dowry, as she had been married to him already. "And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide [lit. sit] for me many days," said the prophet to her; "thou shalt not commit lewdness, and thou shalt not be to* a man [i.e. neither in sin nor in lawful married life]: so I also toward* thee" his heart and care here, not "to her" as her husband, but "toward" her in affection as a friend. The bearing of this on Israel is next explained: "for the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without seraphim: afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek their God, and David their king; and shall fear Jehovah and his goodness in the latter days."
*The authorised version by giving "for me" and for thee" seems slightly to injure the force by its vague sameness of rendering.
Here are many important points which we could not have gathered from either the first chapter or the second. We have seen the general position down to the end inHosea 1:1-11; Hosea 1:1-11; we have had certain details about Israel in Hosea 2:1-23; but Hosea 3:1-5 furnishes the solemn evidence that the humiliation of Israel was to involve a most marked and peculiar isolation, and that it was not to be a passing visitation but a prolonged state, while grace would bless more than ever in the end. "For the sons of Israel shall abide many days." This could not have been concluded from the language of the preceding chapters. The picture therefore would not have been complete without it. Hence the Spirit of God, true to the divine purpose, gives us enough in these few words to meet the objections of him who might complain that Christianity supposes such an immense time as the period of Israel's blindness and departure from God. The answer is that the Jewish prophet says as much, and thereby the Lord leaves room for all that had to come in meanwhile. Not of course that "many days" would convey the thought of ages as the necessary meaning at first, but that as the time lengthened out, it would be seen that it had been all foreseen and predicted.
But there is more. For they are to remain "without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without a seraphim." Further, they were not to take up idolatrous statues or images, as they had so often done up to the captivity; and as they should be without an ephod, the distinctive priestly apparel, so they should not fall back on tutelary divinities as they used to do for anticipating the future. They should not have a king as before the captivity, nor a prince as the Jews had after their return from Babylon. Israel afterwards had neither; and even the Jews lost what they had not long after Christ came. Again, they were to be "without a sacrifice," their sacred as well as civil polity was at an end; for what is the law without a sacrifice? Thus it is a state of things far more true now since the rejection of the Messiah, than up to that transitional period when Messiah came to them; for, although they had not a king, they had a sort of princely ruler. Certainly in the days of the Lord there was under the authority of the Roman empire a subordinate king or ruler, who might be called prince in a certain sense. They were also to be not only without the worship of the true God, but even without the false gods to which they had formerly been victims. Clearly then this describes the present condition of Israel the most anomalous spectacle the world has ever seen a people who go on age after age without any of those elements which are supposed to be essential for keeping a people in existence. For they have lost their king and prince, they have neither God nor an idol. They are not able to present a sacrifice, having nobody that they know to be a priest. Partly since Babylon carried them into captivity, entirely since Titus destroyed Jerusalem, they are literally without those genealogies which the priests must possess and produce in order to prove their title to minister in the holy place. Whatever their pretensions, they can prove nothing, and yet they are upheld by God.
Thus we have here in a single verse of our prophet the most complete picture of their present state found in the word of God a picture which no Jew can deny to be a likeness of their actual state. The more honest they may be, the more they must acknowledge the living truth of the representation. Now, that God should have no connection with anything on the earth that He should be effectuating no purpose in a distinct manner for His own glory would be a monstrous notion, only fit for the wildest Epicurean dreamer, and a practical denial of the living God. Consequently, that God should use this time of the recess of Israel for the bringing in of other counsels is the simplest thing possible, which we can all understand. The Jew by and by will confess that he was inexcusably faithless in his ways and mistaken in his thoughts; he had here at least the negative side of the picture, his own enigmatic state, the people of God not His people, a nation without a government, and, stranger still, with no false god and yet without the true, having neither priest nor sacrifice. The Spirit of God gives the positive side in the New Testament, where we have the call of the Gentiles meanwhile, and within it the gathering of the faithful into the church Christ's body.
But in addition to all, the last verse furnishes another most distinct disclosure, which none but prejudiced men could overlook, that God has not done with Israel as such. It is not true, therefore, that the sons of Israel are to be merged in Christianity. They are said (ver. 5) afterwards not to turn but to "return," and seek Jehovah their God. This is not a description of becoming members of Christ, or of receiving the new and deeper revelations of the New Testament. They will never as a nation form the heavenly body of Christ, either wholly or in part. They will be saved in God's grace through faith in the Lord Jesus, but rather according to the measure vouchsafed to their fathers than to us now, with the modification of the manifest reign of the Lord. Compare Isaiah 11:1-16, Luke 1:1-80, Romans 11:1-36. Individuals merge in Christianity now of course, and are brought out of their state of Judaism consequently; but here we have a different and future state of things quite distinct in some material respects from anything that was or from anything that is, though there be but one Saviour, and but one Spirit, and but one God the Father. "Afterwards shall the sons of Israel return and seek" not the exalted Head in heaven nor the gospel as such, but "Jehovah their God." I grant you it is the same God, yet as Jehovah. It is not the revelation of His name as the Messiah (when rejected, and above all dead and risen) made Him known as "His Father and our Father, His God and, our God." It is not the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit into which we are baptized with water. Here it is rather the form and measure vouchsafed to the nation of old. In short it is God made known after a Jewish sort. And what confirms this is the next expression, "and David their king" that same blessed person, even the Messiah as such, who unites these two glories in His person, though the former of course not exclusively.
Evidently therefore a state of things is before. us quite distinct from Christianity. The Targum and the Rabbinical expositors own that David here means the Messiah. "And they shall fear toward Jehovah, and toward His goodness in the latter day." Thus we have clearly in this passage, not only the present abnormal condition of Israel, but the future restoration of their blessedness, yea, more than they ever yet possessed.* If "the latter days" mean, according to the well-known rule of Kimchi and other Jewish doctors, the days of the Messiah, the New Testament demonstrates that the question has still to be decided between the days of His first advent or those of His second. The context proves that in the Old Testament these days always look on to His reign in power and glory; but various parts of it in the Psalms and the Prophets attest His profound humiliation and death as clearly as His reign over Israel and the earth. The Jews and the Gentiles are quite if not equally wrong for want of simple-hearted intelligence without confusion of the New Testament with the Old.
*Dr. Henderson renders the last clause, "shall tremblingly hasten to Jehovah and to his goodness." His goodness will attract but overawe their souls. It is real and pious feeling, but in accordance with their relationship hardly with that of the Christian; and so the New Testament never speaks in exactly the same way. It is unwise and unfaithful to force the scriptures.
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Kelly, William. "Commentary on Hosea 2:2". Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/wkc/hosea-2.html. 1860-1890.
