When Yahweh spoke at first by Hosea, Yahweh said to Hosea, “Go, take for yourself a wife of prostitution and children of unfaithfulness; for the land commits great adultery, forsaking Yahweh.”
So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; and she conceived, and bore him a son.
Yahweh said to him, “Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel on the house of Jehu, and will cause the kingdom of the house of Israel to cease. It will happen in that day that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.”
She conceived again, and bore a daughter. Then he said to him, “Call her name Lo-Ruhamah; for I will no longer have mercy on the house of Israel, that I should in any way pardon them.
But I will have mercy on the house of Judah, and will save them by Yahweh their God, and will not save them by bow, sword, battle, horses, or horsemen.”
Now when she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, she conceived, and bore a son.
He said, “Call his name Lo-Ammi; for you are not my people, and I will not be yours.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv2–9 The Prophet shows here what charge was given him…
The Prophet shows here what charge was given him at the beginning, even to declare open war with the Israelites, and to be, as it were, very angry in the person of God, and to denounce destruction. He begins not with smooth things, nor does he gently exhort the people to repentance, nor adopt a circuitous course to soften the asperity of his doctrine. He shows that he had used nothing of this kind, but says, that he had been sent like heralds or messengers to proclaim war. The beginning, then, of what the Lord spake by Hosea was this, “This people are an adulterous race, all are born, as it were, of a harlot, the kingdom of Israel is the filthiest brothel; and I now repudiate and reject them, I no longer own them as my children.” This was no common vehemence. We hence see that the word beginning was not set down without reason, but advisedly, that we may know that the Prophet, as soon as he undertook the office of teaching, was vehement and severe, and, as it were, fulminated against the kingdom of Israel.
Now, if it be asked, why was God so greatly displeased? why did he not first recall the wretched men to himself, since the usual method seems to have been, that the Prophet tried, by a kind and paternal address, to restore those to a sound mind who had departed from the pure worship of God, — why, then, did not God adopt this ordinary course? But we hence gather that the diseases of the people were incurable. The Prophet, no doubt, intimates here distinctly, that he was sent by God, when the state of things was almost past recovery. We indeed know that God is not wont to deal so severely with men, but when he has tried all other remedies; and this may doubtless be easily learned from the records of Scripture. The ten tribes, immediately after their revolt from the family of David, having renounced the worship of God, embraced idolatry and ungodly superstitions. They ought to have retained in their minds the recollection of this oracle,
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‘The Lord has chosen mount Zion, where he has desired to be worshipped; this,’ he said ‘is my rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have chosen it,’ (Psalm 132:13,14.)
And this prediction, we know, had not been once or ten times repeated, but a hundred times, that it might be more firmly fixed in the hearts of men. Since, then, they ought to have had this truth fully impressed on their hearts, that the Lord would have himself worshipped nowhere except on mount Zion, it was monstrous stupidity in them to erect a new temple and to make the calves. That the people, then, had so quickly fallen away from God was an instance of the most perverse madness. But, as I have said, they had reached the highest point of impiety. When God punished so great sins by Jehu, the people ought then to have returned to the pure worship of God, and there was some reformation in the land; but they ever reverted to their own nature, yea, the event proved that they only dissembled for a short time; so blinded they were by a diabolical perverseness, that they ever continued in their superstitions. It is not, then, to be wondered at, that the Lord made this beginning by Hosea, “Ye are all born of fornication, your kingdom is the filthiest brothel; ye are not my people, ye are not beloved.” Who, then, will not allow, that God, by fulminating in so dreadful a manner against this people, dealt justly with them, and for the best reason? The contumacy of the people was so indomitable that it could be overcome in no other way. We now understand why the Prophet used this expression, The beginning of speaking which God made
Then it follows, in Hosea. He had said in the first verse, The word of Jehovah which was to Hosea; he now says, נהושע, beusho, in Hosea; and he adds God spake and said to Hosea, repeating the preposition used in the first verse. The word of the Lord is said to have been to Hosea, not simply because God addressed the Prophet, but because he sent him forth with certain commissions, for in this sense is the word of God said to have been to the Prophets. God addresses his word also indiscriminately to others whomsoever he is pleased to teach by his word, but he speaks to and addresses his Prophets in a peculiar way, for he makes them the ministers and heralds of his word, and puts, as it were, into their mouth what they afterwards bring forth to the people. So Christ says, that the word of God came to kings, because he constitutes and appoints them to govern mankind. “If he calls them gods,” he says, “to whom the word of God came;” and that psalm, we know, was written with a special reference to kings. We now perceive what this sentence in the first verse contains. The word of God came to Hosea; for the Lord did not simply address the Prophet in a common way, but furnished him with instructions, that he might afterwards teach the people, as it were, in the person of God himself.
It is now added in the second verse, The beginning of speaking, such as the Lord made by Hosea. They who give this rendering, “with Hosea,” seem to explain the Prophet’s meaning frigidly. The letter ב, beth, I know, has this sense often in Scripture; but the Prophet, no doubt, in this place represents himself as the instrument of the Holy Spirit. God then spake in Hosea, or by Hosea, for he brought forth nothing from his own brain, but God spake by him; this is a form of speaking with which we shall often meet. On this, indeed, depends the whole authority of God’s servants that they give not themselves loose reins, but faithfully deliver, as it were, from hand to hand, what the Lord has commanded them, without adding any thing whatever of their own. God then spake in Hosea. It afterwards follows, The Lord said to Hosea. Now this, which is said the third time, or three times repeated, is nothing else than the commission in different forms. He first said in general, “The word of the Lord which was to Hosea;” now he says, The Lord spake thus, and he expresses distinctly what the word was which he referred to in the first verse.
Go, he says, take to thee a wife of wantonness, and the children of wantonness; and the reason is added, for by fornicating, or wantoning, has the land grown wanton. He doubtless speaks here of the vices which the Lord had long endured with inexpressible forbearance. By wantoning then has the land grown wanton, that it should not follow Jehovah.
Here interpreters labour much, because it seems very strange that the Prophet should take a harlot for a wife. Some say that this was an extraordinary case. Certainly such a license could not have been borne in a teacher. We see what Paul requires in a bishop, and no doubt the same was required formerly in the Prophets, that their families should be chaste and free from every stain and reproach. It would have then exposed the Prophet to the scorn of all, if he had entered a brothel and taken to himself a harlot; for he speaks not here of an unchaste woman only, but of a woman of wantonness, which means a common harlot, for a woman of wantonness is she called, who has long habituated herself to wantonness, who has exposed herself to all, to gratify the wish of all, who has prostituted herself, not once nor twice, nor to few men, but to all. That this was done by the Prophet seems very improbable. But some reply as I have said, that this ought not to be regarded as a common rule, for it was an extraordinary command of God. And yet it seems not consistent with reason, that the Lord should thus gratuitously render his Prophet contemptible; for how could he expect to be received on coming abroad before the public, after having brought on himself such a disgrace? If he had married a wife such as is here described, he ought to have concealed himself for life rather than to undertake the Prophetic office. Their opinion, therefore, is not probable, who think that the Prophet had taken such a wife as is here described.
Then another reason, utterly unresolvable, militates against them; for the Prophet is not only bidden to take a wife of wantonness, but also children of wantonness, begotten by whoredom. It is, therefore, the same as if he himself had committed whoredom. For if we say that he married a wife who had previously conducted herself with some indecency and want of chastity, (as Jerome at length argues in order to excuse the Prophet,) the excuse is frivolous, for he speaks not only of the wife, but also of the children, inasmuch as God would have the whole offspring to be adulterous, and this could not be the case in a lawful marriage. Hence almost all the Hebrews agree in this opinion, that the Prophet did not actually marry a wife, but that he was bidden to do this in a vision. And we shall see in the third chapter (Hosea 3:1) almost the same thing described; and yet what is narrated there could not have been actually done, for the Prophet is bidden to marry a wife who had violated her conjugal fidelity, and after having bought her, to retain her at home for a time. This, we know, was not done. It then follows that this was a representation exhibited to the people.
Some object and say, that the whole passage, as given by the Prophet, cannot be understood as relating a vision. Why not? For the vision, they say, was given to him alone, and God had a regard to the whole people rather than to the Prophet. But it may be, and it is probable, that no vision was presented to the Prophet, but that God only ordered him to proclaim what had been given him in charge. When, therefore, the Prophet began to teach, he commenced somewhat in this way: “The Lord places me here as on a stage, to make known to you that I have married a wife, a wife habituated to adulteries and whoredoms, and that I have begotten children by her.” The whole people knew that he had done no such thing; but the Prophet spake thus in order to set before their eyes a vivid representation. Such then, was the vision, a figurative exhibition, not that the Prophet knew this by a vision, but the Lord had bidden him to relate this parable, (so to speak,) or this similitude, that the people might see, as in a living portraiture, their turpitude and perfidiousness. It is, in short, an exhibition, in which the thing itself is not only set forth in words, but is also placed, as it were, before their eyes in a visible form. The reason is added, for by wantoning has the land grown wanton
We now then see how the words of the Prophet ought to be understood; for he assumed a character, when going forth before the public, and in this character he said to the people, that God had bidden him to take a harlot for his wife, and to beget adulterous children by her. His ministry was not on this account made contemptible, for they all knew that he had ever lived virtuously and temperately; they all knew that his household was exempt from every reproach; but here he exhibited in his assumed character, as it were, a living image of the baseness of the people. This is the meaning, and I see nothing strained in this explanation; and we, at the same time, see the meaning of this clause, By wantoning has the land grown wanton. Hosea might have said this in one word, but he had to address the deaf, and we know how great and how stupid is the madness of those who delight themselves in their own superstitions, they cannot bear any reproof. The Prophet then would not have been attended to, unless he had exhibited, as in a mirror before their eyes, what he wished to be understood by them, as though he had said, “If none of you can so know himself as to own his public baseness, if ye are all so obstinate against God, at least know now by my assumed character, that you are all adulterous, and derive your origin from a filthy brothel, for God declares thus concerning you; and as you are not willing to receive such a declaration, it is now set before you in my assumed character.”
That it should not follow Jehovah, literally, From after Jehovah, מאחרי, meachri. We here see what is the spiritual chastity of God’s people, and what also is the signification of the word wantoning. Then the spiritual chastity of God’s people is to follow the Lord; and what else is this to follow, but to suffer ourselves to be ruled by his word, and willingly to obey him, to be ready and prepared for any work to which he may call us? When then the Lord goes before us with his instruction and shows the way, and we become teachable and obedient, and look up to him, and turn not aside, either to the right or to the left hand, but bring our whole life to the obedience of faith, — this is really to follow the Lord; and it is a most beautiful definition of the spiritual chastity of God’s people.
And we may also, from the opposite of this, learn what it is to grow wanton; we do so when we depart from the word of the Lord, when we give ear to false doctrines, when we abandon ourselves to superstitions; when we, in short, wander after our own devices, and keep not our thoughts under the authority of the word of the Lord. But as to the word wantoning, more will be said in chapter 2; but I only wished now briefly to touch on what the Prophet means when he chides the Israelites for having all become wanton. Now follows —
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 That is, one that of long time hath accustomed…
That is, one that of long time hath accustomed to play the harlot: not that the Prophet did this thing in effect, but he saw this in a vision, or else was commanded by God to set forth under this parable or figure the idolatry of the Synagogue, and of the people her children.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv2–9 Hos 1:2 The beginning of the word of the…
Hos 1:2 The beginning of the word of the LORD by Hosea. And the LORD said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, [departing] from the LORD.
Ver. 2. The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea] Heb. in Hosea: to note, that the Lord was both in his mind and mouth, in his spirit and speech. God spake in him before he spake out to the people. His prophecy must therefore needs be divine and deep. That is the best discourse that is digged out of a man’s own breast, that comes a corde ad cor, from the heart to the heart. And blessed are the people (saith one) that have such ministers, that shall speak nothing to them but what hath been first spoken by God in them: saying, with David and Paul, "We believe, therefore have we spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak," 2Co 4:13; we have experimented what we deliver; we believe and are sure, that God is in us of a truth, and that we preach cum gratia et privilegio, with grace and prvilege.
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The beginning] Hence some gather that Hosea was the first prophet: Hoseas videtur tempore et maiestate aliis prior, saith Oecolampadius. Certain it is he began before Isaiah (because he prophesied in the days of Jeroboam, who was before Uzziah); whether before Amos or not is not so certain. Eusebius tells us there was no Greek history extant before Hosea’s time. {a} Well, therefore, might that ancient priest of Egypt say to Solon, You Grecians are all boys and babes in matters of antiquity: neither is there one old man among you (Plato in Timaeo). Samuel is counted the first prophet, Act 3:24, but Hosea was the first of those that lived in these kings’ days, and likely held out longest; {See Trapp on "Hos 1:1"} as did father Latimer, preaching twice every sabbath day, though of a very great age; and rising to his study winter and summer at two o’clock in the morning. Others read the words thus, At the beginning when the Lord spake by Hosea, he said to Hosea himself, "Go, take unto thee," &c. An uncouth precept, and a rough beginning for a young preacher, whose youth might be despised, and whose sharpness might be disgusted. But truth must be spoken, however it be taken; and a preacher should take the same liberty to cry down sin that men take to commit sin, Isa 58:1. Jerome was called fulmen Ecclesiasticum, the Church thunderbolt; and our Mr Perkins applied the word so close to the consciences of his hearers, that he was able to make their hearts fall down and their hairs almost to stand upright (Mr Puller’s Holy State). But in old age he was more mild, and delighted much to preach mercy; as did also our prophet Hosea, whose prophecy is comminatory in the fore part, consolatory in the latter part.
And the Lord said to Hosea] This is now the third time inculcated for more authority’ sake, which the people, so rubbed and menaced, would be apt enough to question. He therefore shows them his commission, and that he hath good ground for what he saith; that they may have no cause to cavil, but reply, as that good Dutch divine did (if God would give them a heart so to do), Veniat, veniat, verbum Domini, et submittemus ei, sexcenta si nobis essent colla: Let the word of the Lord come, yea, let it come, and we will submit thereunto, though we had six hundred lives to lose for so doing (Melch. Ad.).
Go take unto thee a wife of whoredoms] An arrant whore, a stinking strumpet, scortum obsoletum, a known and trite harlot; such as were Thais, Lais, Phryne, &c.; yea, and such a one as, after marriage with a former husband at least, went astray after other sweethearts; for so the application of the figure to the subject, Hos 2:2-5, requireth it to be understood. Whereby it appears (saith Diodati) that all this was done in a vision. Others infer as much from that phrase in this verse, "The beginning of the word of the Lord in Hosea," that is (saith Polanus), appearing and speaking to him by an inward vision, as it were in an ecstasy. Besides, in the third chapter and three first verses, the prophet is bidden to marry another harlot, to buy her for his own use, and to keep her at his house for a time. Now, scimus hoc non fuisse completum, saith Calvin; we know that this was never really done. It follows therefore that this figure was only proposed to the people, that they might perceive, in the looking glass of this allegory, first, their duty towards God; second, their disloyalty; thirdly, their penalty for the same. It is not a historical narration, but a prophetic vision. "Children of fornication, a bustardly brood," such as this "evil and adulterous generation" is; sons of the "rebellious whorish woman, children of transgression, a seed of falsehood," Isa 57:4. The Hebrews call such children brambles, such as Abimelech was, who grew in the hedgerow of a harlot: they call them also Mamzer, as ye would say, a strange blot; and Shatuki, or silent, because when others are praising their parents, such must hold their peace, and hold down their heads with shame enough, because they are bastards.
For the land hath committed great whoredoms] Fornicando fornicata est, i.e. frequentissime et fiedissime, most frequently and most filthily. See Eze 23:2-4, throughout. Aholah (that is, Israel) played the harlot when she was mine, Eze 23:5, In her youth they lay with her, Eze 23:8, so that she might say, with that impudent strumpet, Quartilla, in Petronius, that she could never remember herself a virgin: yea, she grew old in her adulteries, Eze 23:43, opened her feet to every passenger, and multiplied her whoredoms, Eze 16:25. Meretricis scilicet hoc est meretricissimae. Such a common prostibulum prostitute is the whore of Rome, whom her followers call piam matrem, quae gremium claudat nemini. a pius matron who excludes no one. Joan of Naples was a saint to her. Idolatry is spiritual whoredom in many respects. It defiles the soul, God’s bridal bed. It breaks the marriage knot, and discovenants. It enrageth God, who in this case will take no ransom. It subjecteth men to God’s deepest displeasure: it besots them and unmans them: they that make idols are "like unto them, so are all they that trust in them," Psa 115:8.
Lastly, idolatry is seldom without adultery, in a proper sense; as appears in the old heathens, at their feasts of Priapus, Lupercalia, &c., the Canaanites had filled the land from one end to another with their uncleanness, Ezr 9:11; and in the Papists today, who reckon fornication a venial sin, have their stews allowed them; yea, among the very Indians, who abhor their most loathsome living. And for Rome itself - tota est iam Roma lupanar, it is become a great brothel house, and her stench is come up to heaven, as Matthew Paris (one of her sons) long since said.
Departing from the Lord] In whom all amiables and admirables are concentred. This did exceedingly aggravate the unkindness.
{a} De Praep. Evang. l. 20, c. ult.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv2–9 The beginning of the word of the Lord: this,…
The beginning of the word of the Lord: this, say some, gives Hosea the precedence of all the prophets, which perhaps may be allowed to him among all the prophets that have written distinct books of their prophecies, but simply first of all the prophets he was not; in David’s and Solomon’s times we meet with Nathan and Ahijah the Shilonite. Or this
beginning may be, as our ordinary phrase, so soon as God spake, or at the very first of God’s speaking, to Hosea, he commanded him to take such a wife, &c.
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The Lord: see Hos 2:1.
By Hosea; in Hosea; denoting the impulse of the Spirit of prophecy, the internal motions and influence of the Spirit in the prophet: see Hos 1:1.
The Lord said; directed and commanded him: this was warrant to him, doing which otherwise was unseemly for a prophet to have done. Go,
take unto thee: this was, say some, done in vision, and was to be told to the people as other visions were: it was parabolically proposed to them, and this might be sufficient to convince the Jews, would they have considered it well, as David considered Nathan’s parable. Others say it was really acted, and that the prophet did, as commanded, marry one who had been a strumpet, or that proved to be so after she was married. And though this would have been unseemly in the prophet, had he done it without this particular direction, now the scandal ceaseth, and it is very fit God be obeyed, and the prophet may with credit enough do what God had by his command made a necessary duty to him, and marry one known to be a lewd whore.
A wife of whoredoms; an openly noted whore, a notorious one, so the Hebrew phrase,
wife of whoredoms, as, a man of bloods, or man of sorrows; a woman of many whoredoms, and very lively emblem of idolatrous Israel.
Children of whoredoms; either that, born of such a mother, are. as she, addicted to lewdness; or else, with the mother made his wife, he is to receive and maintain the children she had by her adulterers. And thus understood, it may lead our thoughts to God’s rich mercy towards their ancestors, who were (Abraham himself not excepted) idolaters, when they dwelt on the other side the river, Jos 24:2,3; yet God took them, and married them to himself, and did show wonderful kindness to them and theirs; all which is slighted and forgotten by their posterity, by you, O idolatrous Israelites! Or it may refer more expressly to what God did for Israel, when he brought them out of Egypt, and made covenant with them in Horeb, which was as a solemn espousing them to God. The Lord found them tainted with Egyptian idolatries, yet, as the prophet here, married them to himself, and covenanted with them to be faithful to him, but they broke the covenant.
The land, i.e. the people of the land, intimating the universal spreading of this sin, all, or most of all, so infected.
Hath committed great whoredom: the phrase, Heb. playing the harlot hath played the harlot, speaks the continuance of this idolatry among them, as well as the greatness of the whoredom. From their forefathers they had been idolaters; while God was giving them his law (from the nuptial day to Hosea’s time) they committed spiritual whoredom, and first made, next worshipped, the golden calf.
Departing from the Lord; so they left their first Husband, and doted on adulterers, on idols, as Hos 2:5.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv2, 8 These words, The beginning of the word of the…
These words, The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea, may refer either, 1. To that glorious set of prophets which was raised up about this time. About this time there lived and prophesied Joel, Amos, Micah, Jonah, Obadiah, and Isaiah; but Hosea was the first of them that foretold the destruction of Israel; the beginning of this word of the Lord was by him. We read in the history of this Jeroboam here named (Kg2 14:27) that the Lord had not yet said he would blot out the name of Israel, but soon after he said he would, and Hosea was the man that began to say it, which made it so much the harder task to him, to be the first that should carry an unpleasing message and some time before any were raised up to second him. Or, rather, 2. To Hosea's own prophecies. This was the first message God sent him upon to this people, to tell them that they were an evil and an adulterous generation. He might have desired to be excused from dealing so roughly with them till he had gained authority and reputation, and some interest in their affections. No; he must begin with this, that they might know what to expect from a prophet of the Lord. Nay, he must not only preach this to them, but he must write it, and publish it, and leave it upon record as a witness against them. Now here,
I. The prophet must, as it were in a looking-glass, show them their sin, and show it to be exceedingly sinful, exceedingly hateful. The prophet is ordered to take unto him a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms, Hos 1:2. And he did so, Hos 1:3. He married a woman of ill fame, Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, not one that had been married and had committed adultery, for then she must have been put to death, but one that had lived scandalously in the single state. To marry such a one was not malum in se - evil in itself, but only malum per accidens - incidentally an evil, not prudent, decent, or expedient, and therefore forbidden to the priests, and which, if it were really done, would be an affliction to the prophet (it is threatened as a curse on Amaziah that his wife should be a harlot, Amo 7:17), but not a sin when God commanded it for a holy end; nay, if commanded, it was his duty, and he must trust God with his reputation. But most commentators think that it was done in vision, or that it is no more than a parable; and that was a way of teaching commonly used among the ancients, particularly prophets; what they meant of others they transferred to themselves in a figure, as St. Paul speaks, Co1 4:6. He must take a wife of whoredoms, and have such children by her as every one would suspect, though born in wedlock, to be children of whoredoms, begotten in adultery, because it is too common for those who have lived lewdly in the single state to live no better in the married state. "Now" (saith God) "Hosea, this people is to me such a dishonour, and such a grief and vexation, as a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms would be to thee. For the land has committed great whoredoms." In all instances of wickedness they had departed from the Lord; but their idolatry especially is the whoredom they are here charged with. Giving that glory to any creature which is due to God alone is such an injury and affront to God as for a wife to embrace the bosom of a stranger is to her husband. It is especially so in those that have made a profession of religion, and have been taken into covenant with God; it is breaking the marriage-bond; it is a heinous odious sin, and, as much as any thing, besots the mind and takes away the heart. Idolatry is great whoredom, worse than any other; it is departing from the Lord, to whom we lie under greater obligations than any wife does or can do to her husband. The land has committed whoredom; it is not here and there a particular person that is guilty of idolatry, but the whole land is polluted with it; the sin has become national, the disease epidemical. What an odious thing would it be for the prophet, a holy man, to have a whorish wife, and children whorish like her! What an exercise would it be of his patience, and, if she persisted in it, what could be expected but that he should give her a bill of divorce! And is it not then much more offensive to the holy God to have such a people as this to be called by his name and have a place in his house? How great is his patience with them! And how justly may he cast them off! It was as if he should have married Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, who probably was at that time a noted harlot. The land of Israel was like Gomer the daughter of Diblaim. Gomer signifies corruption; Diblaim signifies two cakes, or lumps of figs; this denotes that Israel was near to ruin, and that their luxury and sensuality were the cause of it. They were as the evil figs that could not be eaten, they were so evil. It intimates sin to be the daughter of plenty and destruction the daughter of the abuse of plenty. Some give this sense of the command here given to the prophet: "Go, take thee a wife of whoredoms, for, if thou shouldst go to seek for an honest modest woman, thou wouldst not find any such, for the whole land, and all the people of it, are given to whoredom, the usual concomitant of idolatry."
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II. The prophet must, as it were through a perspective glass, show them their ruin; and this he does in the names given to the children born of this adulteress; for as lust, when it has conceived, brings forth sin, so sin, when it is finished, brings forth death.
1. He foretels the fall of the royal family in the name he is appointed to give to his first child, which was a son: Call his name Jezreel, Hos 1:4. We find that the prophet Isaiah gave prophetical names to his children (Isa 7:3; Isa 7:3), so this prophet here. Jezreel signifies the seed of God (so they should have been); but it signifies also the scattered of God; they shall be as sheep on the mountains that have no shepherds. Call them not Israel, which signifies dominion, they have lost all the honour of that name; but call them Jezreel, which signifies dispersion, for those that have departed from the Lord will wander endlessly. Hitherto they have been scattered as seek; let them now be scattered as chaff. Jezreel was the name of one of the royal seats of the kings of Israel; it was a beautiful city, seated in a pleasant valley, and it is with allusion to that city that this child is called Jezreel, for yet a little while and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, from whom the present king, Jeroboam, was lineally descended. The house of Jehu smarted for the sins of Jehu, for God often lays up men's iniquity for their children and visits it upon them. It is the kingdom of the house of Israel, which may be meant either of the present royal family, that of Jehu, which God did quickly cause to cease (for the son of this Jeroboam, Zechariah, reigned but six months, and he was the last of Jehu's race), or of the whole kingdom in general, which continued corrupt and wicked, and which was made to cease in the reign of Hoshea, about seventy years after; and with God that is but a little while. Note, Note, Neither the pomp of kings nor the power of kingdoms can secure them from God's destroying judgments, if they continue to rebel against him. (2.) What is the ground of this controversy: I will revenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, the blood which Jehu shed at Jezreel, when by commission from God and in obedience to his command, he utterly destroyed the house of Ahab, and all that were in alliance with it, with all the worshippers of Baal. God approved of what he did (Kg2 10:30): Thou has done well in executing that which is right in my eyes; and yet here God will avenge that blood upon the house of Jehu, when the time has expired during which it was promised that his family should reign, even to the fourth generation. But how comes the same action to be both rewarded and punished? Very justly; the matter of it was good; it was the execution of a righteous sentence passed upon the house of Ahab, and, as such, it was rewarded; but Jehu did it not in a right manner; he aimed at his own advancement, not at the glory of God, and mingled his own resentments with the execution of God's justice. He did it with a malice against the sinners, but not with any antipathy to the sin; for he kept up the worship of the golden calves, and took no heed to walk in the law of God, Kg2 10:31. And therefore when the measure of the iniquity of his house was full, and God came to reckon with them, the first article in the account is (and, being first, it is put for all the rest) for the blood of the house of Ahab, here called the blood of Jezreel. Thus when the house of Baasha was rooted out it was because he did like the house of Jeroboam, and because he killed him, Kg1 16:7. Note, Those that are entrusted with the administration of justice are concerned to see to it that they do it from a right principle and with a right intention, and that they do not themselves live in those sins which they punish in others, lest even their just executions should be reckoned for, another day, as little less than murders. (3.) How far the controversy shall proceed; it shall be not a correction, but a destruction. Some make those words, I will visit, or appoint, the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, to signify, not as we read it the revenging of that bloodshed, but the repeating of that bloodshed: "I will punish the house of Jehu, as I punished the house of Ahab, because Jehu did not take warning by the punishment of his predecessors, but trod in the steps of their idolatry. And after the house of Jehu is destroyed I will cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel; I will begin to bring it down, though now it flourish." After the death of Zechariah, the last of the house of Jehu, the kingdom of the ten tribes went to decay, and dwindled sensibly. And, in order to the ruin of it, it is threatened (Hos 1:5), I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel; the strength of the warriors of Israel, so the Chaldee. God will disable them either to defend themselves or to resist their enemies. And the bow abiding in strength, and being renewed in the hand, intimates a growing power, so the breaking of the bow intimates a sinking ruined power. The bow shall be broken in the valley of Jezreel, where, probably, the armoury was; or, it may be, in that valley some battle was fought, wherein the kingdom of Israel was very much weakened. Note, There is no fence against God's controversy; when he comes forth against a people their strong bows are soon broken and their strong-holds broken down. In the valley of Jezreel they shed that blood which the righteous God would in that very place avenge upon them; as some notorious malefactors are hanged in chains just where the villainy they suffer for was perpetrated, that the punishment may answer the sin.
2. He foretels God's abandoning the whole nation in the name he gives to the second child. This was a daughter, as the former was a son, to intimate that both sons and daughters had corrupted their way. Some make to signify that Israel grew effeminate, and was thereby enfeebled and made weak. Call the name of this daughter Lo-ruhamah - not beloved (so it is translated Rom 9:25), or not having obtained mercy, so it is translated Pe1 2:10. It comes all to one. This reads the doom of the house of Israel: I will no more have mercy upon them. It intimates that God had shown them great mercy, but they had abused his favours, and forfeited them, and now he would show them favour no more. Note, Those that forsake their own mercies for lying vanities have reason to expect that their own mercies should forsake them, and that they should be left to their lying vanities, Jon 2:8. Sin turns away the mercy of God even from the house of Israel, his own professing people, whose case is sad indeed when God says that he will no more have mercy upon them. And then it follows, I will utterly take them away, will utterly remove them (so some), will utterly pluck them up, so others. Note, When the streams of mercy are stopped we can expect no other than that the vials of wrath should be opened. Those whom God will no more have mercy upon shall be utterly taken away, as dross and dung. The word for taking away sometimes signifies to forgive sin; and some take it in that sense here: I will no more have mercy upon them, though in pardoning I have pardoned them heretofore. Though God has borne long, he will not bear always, with a people that hate to be reformed. Or, I will no more have mercy upon them, that I should in any wise pardon them, or (as our margin reads it) that I should altogether pardon them. If pardoning mercy is denied, no other mercy can be expected, for that opens the door to all the rest. Some make this to speak comfort: I will no more have mercy upon them till in pardoning I shall pardon them, that is, till the Redeemer comes to Zion to turn away ungodliness from Jacob. The Chaldee reads it, But, if they repent, in pardoning I will pardon them. Even the greatest sinners, if in time they bethink themselves and return, will find that there is forgiveness with God.
III. He must show them what mercy God had in store for the house of Judah, at the same time that he was thus contending with the house of Israel (Hos 1:7): But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah. Note, Though some are justly cast off for their disobedience, yet God will always secure to himself a remnant that shall be the vessels and monuments of mercy. When divine justice is glorified in some, yet there are others in whom free grace is glorified. And, though some through unbelief are broken off, yet God will have a church in this world till the end of time. It aggravates the rejection of Israel that God will have mercy on Judah, and not on them, and magnifies God's mercy to Judah that, though they also have done wickedly, yet God did not reject them, as he rejected Israel: I will have mercy upon them and will save them. Note, Our salvation is owing purely to God's mercy, and not to any merit of our own. Now,
1. This, without doubt, refers to the temporal salvations which God wrought for Judah in a distinguishing way, the favours shown to them and not to Israel. When the Assyrian armies had destroyed Samaria, and carried the ten tribes away into captivity, they proceeded to besiege Jerusalem; but God had mercy on the house of Judah, and saved them by the vast slaughter which an angel made, in one night, in the camp of the Assyrians; then they were saved by the Lord their God immediately, and not by sword or bow. When the ten tribes were continued in their captivity, and their land was possessed by others, they being utterly taken away, God had mercy on the house of Judah and saved them, and, after seventy years, brought them back, not by might or power, but by the Spirit of the Lord of hosts, Zac 4:6. I will save them by the Lord their God, that is, by myself. God will be exalted in his own strength, will take the work into his own hands. That salvation is sure which he undertakes to be the author of; for, if he will work, none shall hinder. And that salvation is most acceptable which he does by himself. So the Lord alone did lead him. The less there is of man in any salvation, and the more of God, the brighter it shines and the sweeter it tastes. I will save them in the word of the Lord (so the Chaldee), for the sake of Christ, the eternal word, and by his power. I will save them not by bow nor by sword, that is, (1.) They shall be saved when they are reduced to so low an ebb that they have neither bow nor sword to defend themselves with, Jdg 5:8; Sa1 13:22. (2.) They shall be saved by the Lord when they are brought off from trusting to their own strength and their weapons of war, Psa 44:6. (3.) They shall be saved easily, without the trouble of sword and bow, Hos 1:7. Isa 9:5, I will save them by the Lord their God. In the calling him their God, he upbraids the ten tribes who had cast him off from being theirs, for which reason he had cast them off, and intimates what was the true reason why he had mercy, distinguishing mercy, for the house of Judah, and saved them: it was in pursuance of his covenant with them as the Lord their God, and in recompence for their faithful adherence to him and to his word and worship. But,
2. This may refer also to the salvation of Judah from idolatry, which qualified and prepared them for their other salvations. And this is indeed a salvation by the Lord their God; it is wrought only by the power of his grace, and can never be wrought by sword or bow. Just at the time that the kingdom of Israel was utterly taken away, under Hoshea, the kingdom of Judah was gloriously reformed, under Hezekiah, and was therefore preserved; and in Babylon God saved them from their idolatry first, and then from their captivity.
3. Some make this promise to look forward to the great salvation which, in the fulness of time, was to be wrought out by the Lord our God, Jesus Christ, who came into the world to save his people from their sins.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv2–9 The beginning of the word of the Lord by…
The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea,.... Or "in Hosea" (i); which was internally revealed to him, and was inspired into him, by the Holy Ghost, who first spoke in him, and then by him; not that Hosea was the first of the prophets to whom the word of the Lord came; for there were Moses, Samuel, David, and others, before him; nor the first of the minor prophets, for Jonah, Joel, and Amos; are by some thought to be before him; nor the first of those contemporary with him, as the Jewish writers interpret it, which is not certain, at least not all of them; but the meaning is, that what follows is the first part of his prophecy, or what it began with; by which it appears he was put upon hard service at first, to prophesy against Israel, an idolatrous people, and to do it in such a manner as must be disagreeable to a young man:
and the Lord said to Hosea, go, take thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms; a woman given to whoredom, a notorious strumpet, one taken out of the stews, and children that were spurious and illegitimate, not born in lawful wedlock. Some think this was really done; that the prophet took a whore, and cohabited with her, or married her which, though forbidden a high priest, was not forbid to a prophet; and had it been against a law, yet the Lord commanding it made it lawful, as in the cases of Abraham's slaying his son, and the Israelites borrowing jewels of the Egyptians; but this seems not likely, since it would not only look like countenancing whoredom, which is contrary to the holy law of God; but must be very dishonourable to the prophet, and render him contemptible to the people; and, besides, would not answer the end proposed, to reprove the spiritual adultery or idolatry of Israel, but rather serve to confirm in it; for how should that appear criminal and abominable to them, which was commanded the prophet by the Lord? others think that the woman he is bid to marry, though before marriage a harlot, was afterwards reformed; but this is directly contrary to Hos 3:1 and besides, the children born of her, whether reformed or not, yet in lawful wedlock could not be called children of whoredom; nor would the above end be answered by it, since such a person would be no fit representative of Israel committing spiritual adultery or idolatry, and continuing in it; and moreover, whether this or the former was the case, the prophecy must be many years delivering; it must be near a year before the first child was born, and the same space must be between the birth of each; so that here must be a long and frequent interruption of the prophecy, which does not seem likely: nor is it probable that he took his own wife, which is the opinion of others, and gave her the character of a whore, and his children with her, and called them children of whoredom, in order to represent and reprove the idolatry of Israel: what Maimonides (k), and the Jewish writers in general, give into, is more agreeable, that this was all done in the vision of prophecy; that it so seemed to the prophet in vision to be really done, and so he related it to the people; but this is liable to objection, that such an impure scene of things should be represented to the mind of the prophet by the Holy Spirit of God; nor can the relation of it be thought to have any good effect upon the people, who would be ready to mock at him, and reproach him for it. It seems best therefore to understand the whole as a parable, and that the prophet, in a parabolical way, is bid to represent the treachery, unfaithfulness, and spiritual adultery of the people of Israel, under the feigned name of an unchaste woman, and of children begotten in fornication; and to show unto them that their case was as if he had taken a woman out of the stews, and her bastards with her; or as if a wife married by him had defiled his bed, and brought him a spurious brood of children. So the Targum interprets it,
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"go, prophesy a prophecy against the inhabitants of the idolatrous city, who add to sin:''
for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord; or
"for the inhabitants of the land erring, erred from the worship of the Lord,''
as the Targum; that is, the inhabitants of the land of Israel have committed idolatry, which is often in Scripture signified by adultery and whoredom; as an adulterous woman deals treacherously with her husband, so these people had dealt with God, who stood in such a relation to them; see Jer 3:1, this interprets the parable, and shows the reason of using the following symbols and emblems.
(i) , Sept.; in Hosea, V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius, Tarnovius. (k) Moreh Nevochim, par. 2. 46. Aben Ezra & Kimchi in loc.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 Go take - This was, probably, done in vision,…
Go take - This was, probably, done in vision, and was to be told to the people, as other visions were: it was parabolically proposed to them, and might have been sufficient to convince the Jews, would they have considered it, as David considered Nathan's parable. A wife of whoredoms and children - Receive and maintain the children she had before.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 Verse 2. A wife of whoredoms] That is, says…
Verse 2. A wife of whoredoms] That is, says Newcome, a wife from among the Israelites, who were remarkable for spiritual fornication, or idolatry. God calls himself the husband of Israel; and this chosen nation owed him the fidelity of a wife. See Ex 34:15; De 31:16; Jdg 2:17; Isa 54:5; Jer 3:14; Jer 31:32; Eze 16:17; Eze 23:5; Eze 23:27; Ho 2:5; Re 17:1-2. He therefore says, with indignation, Go join thyself in marriage to one of those who have committed fornication against me, and raise up children who, by the power of example, will themselves swerve to idolatry. See Ho 5:7. And thus show them that they are radically depraved.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2–8 Hos 1:2. The beginning of the word of the…
Hos 1:2. The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea — Or, as some render it, to Hosea; phrases however of different import; for to speak to a person, expresses that the discourse was immediately addressed to him. To speak by him, that through him it was addressed to others. And that the speech so addressed to others was not the person’s own, but God’s; God using him as his organ of speech to the people. This latter is evidently the meaning of the Hebrew phrase here used, which is not אל הושׂע, but בהושׂע, and has been judiciously attended to by our translators, as it was also by the LXX., the Vulgate, the Chaldee, Luther’s Latin translation, Calvin’s, and Archbishop Newcome’s. And the Lord said, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms — Commentators differ much with respect to the meaning of this command. Maimonides, a noted Jewish writer, supposes, that what was enjoined was only to be transacted in a vision; and many learned men, both ancient and modern, have been of his opinion. Archbishop Newcome supposes, that the command refers to the spiritual fornication, or idolatry, of the Israelites: and that its meaning is only, “Go, join thyself in marriage to one of those who have committed fornication against me; and raise up children, who, by the power of example, will themselves swerve to idolatry:” see Hos 5:7. Some others suppose, that God only enjoins the prophet to marry one, who, he foresaw, would afterward be unfaithful to him, and become a harlot. Others again, and persons of great eminence for learning and Biblical knowledge, suppose the command implied, that he was to marry one who actually was at the time, or had been, a harlot. These different opinions, Bishop Horsley, in a preface to his translation of this prophecy, examines at large; and seems to have clearly proved, that the last-mentioned sense of the words is the true one. His train of reasoning on the subject is too long to find a place in these notes; a very short extract is all that can be inserted. “Here two questions arise, upon which expositors have been much divided; 1st, What is the character intended of the woman? What are the fornications by which she is characterized? Are they acts of incontinence, in the literal sense of the word, or something figuratively so called? And, 2d, This guilt of literal or figurative incontinence, was it previous to the woman’s marriage with the prophet, or contracted after it? The Hebrew phrase, a wife of fornications, taken literally, certainly describes a prostitute; and children of fornications are the offspring of a promiscuous commerce. Some, however, have thought, that the expression may signify nothing worse ‘than a wife taken from among the Israelites, who were remarkable for spiritual fornication, or idolatry.’ And that children of fornications may signify children born of such a mother, in such a country, and likely to grow up in the habit of idolatry themselves, by the force of ill example. But the words thus interpreted contain a description only of public manners, without immediate application to the character of any individual; and the command to the prophet will be nothing more than to take a wife. It is evident, that a wife of fornications describes the sort of woman with whom the prophet is required to form the matrimonial connection. It expresses some quality in the woman, actually belonging to the prophet’s wife in her individual character. And this quality was no other than gross incontinence, in the literal meaning of the word. The prophet’s wife was, by the express declaration of the Spirit, to be the type, or emblem, of the Jewish nation, considered as the wife of God. The sin of the Jewish nation was idolatry, and the Scriptural type of idolatry is carnal fornication; the woman, therefore, to typify the nation, must be guilty of the typical crime; and the only question that remains is, whether the stain upon her character was previous to her connection with the prophet, or afterward? I should much incline to the opinion of Diodati, that the expression may be understood of a woman that was innocent at the time of her marriage, and proved false to the nuptial vow afterward, could I agree to what is alleged in favour of that interpretation by Dr. Wells and Mr. Lowth, that it makes the parallel more exact between God and his blacksliding people, than the contrary supposition of the woman’s previous impurity; especially if we make the further supposition, that the prophet had previous warning of his wife’s irregularities. But it seems to me, on the contrary, that the prophet’s marriage would be a more accurate type of the peculiar connection which God vouchsafed to form between himself and the Israelites, upon the admission of the woman’s previous incontinence. God’s marriage with Israel was the institution of the Mosaic covenant, at the time of the exodus, Jer 2:2; but it is most certain that the Israelites were previously tainted, in a very great degree, with the idolatry of Egypt, Lev 17:7; Lev 18:3; Jos 24:14; and they are repeatedly taxed with this by the prophets, under the image of the incontinence of a young unmarried woman: see Ezekiel 23. To make the parallel, therefore, exact in every circumstance between the prophet and his wife, God and Israel, the woman should have been addicted to vice before her marriage. The prophet, not ignorant of her numerous criminal intrigues, and of the general levity of her character, should nevertheless offer her marriage, upon condition that she should renounce her follies, and attach herself, with fidelity, to him as her husband; she should accept the unexpected offer, and make the fairest promises, Exo 19:8; Exo 24:3-7; Jos 24:24. The prophet should complete the marriage contract, (Deu 7:6; Deu 26:17-19,) and take the reformed harlot with a numerous bastard offspring to his own house. There she should bear children to the prophet; (as the ancient Jewish Church, amidst all her corruptions, bore many true sons of God;) but in a little time she should relapse to her former courses, and incur her husband’s displeasure, who yet should neither put her to death according to the rigour of the law, nor finally and totally divorce her. Accordingly, I am persuaded, the phrases אשׂת זנונים, and ילדי זנונים, are to be taken literally, a wife of prostitution, and children of promiscuous intercourse; so taken, and only so taken, they produce the admirable parallel we have described.
“If any one imagines, that the marriage of a prophet with a harlot is something so contrary to moral purity as in no case whatever to be justified; let him recollect the case of Salmon the Just, as he is styled in the Targum upon Ruth, and Rahab the harlot. If that instance will not remove his scruples, he is at liberty to adopt the opinion, which I indeed reject, but many learned expositors have approved, that the whole was a transaction in vision only, or in trance. I reject it, conceiving that whatever was unfit to be really commanded, or really done, was not very fit to be presented, as commanded, or as done, to the imagination of a prophet in his holy trance. Since this, therefore, was fit to be imagined, which is the least that can be granted, it was fit, (in my judgment,) under all the circumstances of the case, to be done. The greatness of the occasion, the importance of the end, as I conceive, justified the command in this extraordinary instance. The command, if it was given, surely sanctified the action: and, upon these grounds, till I can meet with some other exposition, which may render this typical wedding equally significant of the thing to be typified by it in all its circumstances, I am content to take the fact plainly, as it is related, according to the natural import of the words of the narration; especially as this way of taking it will lead to the true meaning of the emblematical act, even if it was commanded and done only in vision. In taking it as a reality, I have with me the authority, not certainly of the majority, but of some of the most learned and cautious expositors; which I mention, not so much to sustain the truth of the opinion, as to protect myself, in the avowal of it, from injurious imputations.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv2–9 The beginning of the word of the Lord by…
The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea or in Hosea - God first revealed Himself and His mysteries to the prophet’s soul, by His secret inspiration, and then declared, through him, to others, what He had deposited in him. God enlightened him, and then others through the light in him.
And the Lord said unto Hosea - For this thing was to be done by Hosea alone, because God had commanded it, not by others of their own mind. To Isaiah God first revealed Himself, as sitting in the temple, adored by the Seraphim: to Ezekiel God first appeared, as enthroned above the cherubim in the holy of holies; to Jeremiah God announced that, ere yet he was born, He had sanctified him for this office: to Hosea He enjoined, as the beginning of his prophetic office, an act contrary to man’s natural feelings, yet one, by which he became an image of the Redeemer, uniting to Himself what was unholy, in order to make it holy.
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Go take unto thee - Since Hosea prophesied some eighty years, he must now have been in early youth, holy, pure, as became a prophet of God. Being called thus early, he had doubtless been formed by God as a chosen instrument of His will, and had, like Samuel, from his first childhood, been trained in true piety and holiness. Yet he was to unite unto him, so long as she lived, one greatly defiled, in order to win her thereby to purity and holiness; herein, a little likeness of our Blessed Lord, who, in the Virgin’s womb, to save us, espoused our flesh, in us sinful, in Him all-holy, without motion to sin; and, further, espoused the Church, formed of us who, “whether Jews or Gentiles,” were all under sin, aliens from God and gone away from Him, “serving divers lusts and passions Eph 5:27, to make it a glorious Church, without spot or wrinkle.”
A wife of whoredoms - i. e., take as a wife, one who up to that time had again and again been guilty of that sin. So “men of bloods” Psa 5:6 are “men given up to bloodshedding;” and our Lord was “a Man of Sorrows Isa 53:3, not occasional only, but manifold and continual, throughout His whole life. She must, then, amid the manifold corruption of Israel, have been repeatedly guilty of that sin, perhaps as an idolatress, thinking of it to be in honor of their foul gods (see the Hos 4:13, note; Hos 4:14, note). She was not like those degraded ones, who cease to bear children; still she must have manifoldly sinned. So much the greater was the obedience of the prophet. Nor could any other woman so shadow forth the manifold defilements of the human race, whose nature our incarnate Lord vouchsafed to unite in His own person to the perfect holiness of the divine nature.
And children of whoredoms - For they shared the disgrace of their mother, although born in lawful marriage. The sins of parents descend also, in a mysterious way, on their children, Sin is contagious, and, unless the entail is cut off by grace, hereditary. The mother thus far portrays man’s revolts, before his union with God; the children, our forsaking of God, after we have been made His children. The forefathers of Israel, God tells them, “served other gods, on the other side of the flood” Jos 24:14, (i. e., in Ur of the Chaldees, from where God called Abraham) “and in Egypt.” It was out of such defilement, that God took her Eze 23:3, Eze 23:8, and He says, “Thou becamest Mine” Eze 16:8. whom He maketh His, He maketh pure; and of her, not such as she was in herself by nature, but as such as He made her, He says, “I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals when thou wentest after Me, in the wilderness” Jer 2:2. But she soon fell away; and thenceforth there were among them (as there are now among Christians,) “the children of God, the children of the promise, and the children of whoredoms, or of the devil.”
For the land ... - This is the reason why God commands Hosea to do this thing, in order to shadow out their foulness and God’s mercy. What no man would dare to do Jer 3:1, except at God’s bidding, God in a manner doth, restoring to union with Himself those who had gone away from Him. “The land,” i. e., Israel, and indirectly, Judah also, and, more widely yet, the whole earth.
Departing from - Literally, “from after the Lord.” Our whole life should be Phi 3:13, forgetting the things which are behind, to follow after Him, whom here we can never fully attain unto, God in His Infinite Perfection, yet so as, with our whole heart, “fully to follow after Him.” To depart from the Creator and to serve the creature, is adultery; as the Psalmist says, “Thou hast destroyed all them, that go a whoring from Thee” Psa 73:27. He who seeks anything out of God, turns from following Him, and takes to him something else as his god, is unfaithful, and spiritually an adulterer and idolater. For he is an adulterer, who becomes another’s than God’s.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv2, 4, 6, 7, 9 Fornications. That is, a wife that hath been given…
Fornications. That is, a wife that hath been given to fornication. This was to represent the Lord’s proceedings with his people Israel, who, by spiritual fornication, were continually offending him. (Challoner) --- The prophet reclaimed her. (St. Jerome) --- She denoted Samaria, abandoned to idolatry, Ezechiel xvi. 15. Several such actions were prophetical. Many have supposed that this was only a parable; but the sequel proves the contrary. (Calmet) --- Of fornications. So called from the character of the mother, if not also from their own wicked dispositions. (Challoner) --- He is ordered to marry a woman who had been of a loose character, and to have children who would resemble her; (Worthington) or he takes her children to his house; (Grotius) unless the children of the prophet were so styled because the mother had been given to fornication. So the rod of Aaron retains its name when it was become a serpent, Exodus vii. 12. --- Shall, or rather, "has departed;" and therefore he denounces future chastisements.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–9 beginning--not of the prophet's predictions generally, but of those…
beginning--not of the prophet's predictions generally, but of those spoken by Hosea.
take . . . wife of whoredoms--not externally acted, but internally and in vision, as a pictorial illustration of Israel's unfaithfulness [HENGSTENBERG]. Compare Eze 16:8, Eze 16:15, &c. Besides the loathsomeness of such a marriage, if an external act, it would require years for the birth of three children, which would weaken the symbol (compare Eze 4:4). HENDERSON objects that there is no hint of the transaction being fictitious: Gomer fell into lewdness after her union with Hosea, not before; for thus only she was a fit symbol of Israel, who lapsed into spiritual whoredom after the marriage contract with God on Sinai, and made even before at the call of the patriarchs of Israel. Gomer is called "a wife of whoredoms," anticipatively.
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children of whoredoms--The kingdom collectively is viewed as a mother; the individual subjects of it are spoken of as her children. "Take" being applied to both implies that they refer to the same thing viewed under different aspects. The "children" were not the prophet's own, but born of adultery, and presented to him as his [KITTO, Biblical Cyclopædia]. Rather, "children of whoredoms" means that the children, like their mother, fell into spiritual fornication. Compare "bare him a son" (see Hos 2:4-5). Being children of a spiritual whore, they naturally fell into her whorish ways.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv2–8 HOSEA’S WIFE AND CHILDREN, Hos_1:2-9.
HOSEA’S WIFE AND CHILDREN, Hos_1:2-9.
The prophet relates how, at the divine command, he took in marriage a wife of whoredoms, Gomer the daughter of Diblaim. By her he had three children, to whom he gave names symbolic of the truths he taught: Jezreel, symbolizing the overthrow of the dynasty of Jehu; Lo-ruhamah, announcing that Jehovah will have no more mercy upon Israel; and Lo-ammi, symbolizing the utter rejection of Israel.
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2b-5. The marriage of Hosea and the birth of the first child. 2.
Take… a wife — Common expression for marry.
A wife of whoredoms — Not harlot, that is, a woman already a sinner, whether in a literal or a spiritual sense (Hos_2:5), but a woman with deeply rooted tendencies toward unchastity (Introduction, pp. 12ff.).
Children of whoredoms — Either children inheriting the mother’s evil tendencies, or children born of a woman with such tendencies, or both (Hos_2:4).
The land hath committed [“doth commit”] great whoredom — The reason for leading the prophet into this peculiar experience. By his own domestic life he was to apprehend more clearly the relation of Jehovah to Israel. As the prophet in his later life meditated over his own sad experience he recognized that the affliction came to him from Jehovah to teach him, in order that he might be a teacher of others. That does not mean that he was not a prophet until his eyes were thus opened. He was conscious of a prophetic call when his first son was born, as is clear from the giving of the symbolic name. In fact, he understood the significance of his own domestic experience because he had the prophetic gift. Nevertheless, his experience led him into a deeper appreciation of the most important phase of his message to the people. Israel, like his wife, had adulterous tendencies; for a while they were restrained, but at the slightest provocation they broke forth.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv2–8 2. The beginning of the word of the Lord…
2. The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea] If we render the Hebrew text thus, the words are a heading to the first part of the book, viz. chaps 1–3; they are apparently taken thus by the LXX., the Vulg., and perhaps the Targ. and the Peshito. It would however be better to translate with the Vulg., ‘The beginning of Jehovah’s speaking by (or, with) Hosea’, because ‘by Hosea’ goes better with a verbal than with a common noun; or, with Kalisch, ‘The beginning of that which Jehovah spoke’ (comp. Job_18:21; Psa_81:6); or, with Ewald, ‘At the first, when Jehovah spoke with Hosea’ (comp. Psa_4:8; Psa_90:15, and possibly Gen_1:1). ‘With Hosea’ is the preferable rendering. As Ewald remarks, the phrase ‘to speak with’ implies that he who speaks is a superior being (comp. Zec_1:9; Zec_1:13-14; Num_12:2; Num_12:8). The original narrative no doubt began at ‘Jehovah said’: the words prefixed make the sentence heavy.
take unto thee] i.e. marry (as Gen_6:2 and often), with regard to Gomer; recognize as thine own with regard to the children. Is this marriage of Hosea a real or a fictitious one? Symbolical it certainly is, but whether literally true or not, the student must decide on a view of the somewhat peculiar exegetical data. See Introduction, and comp. note below on Hos_1:3.
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a wife of whoredoms] i.e. (a) one with a deeply rooted inclination to adultery, or (b) as most explain, a woman already steeped in sin. In favour of (a), it may be pointed out that the prophet does not say, ‘Take unto thee a harlot’. His wife is brought before us throughout as a type of Israel; she must at first have been innocent in act to symbolize what Jehovah elsewhere calls ‘the kindness of thy (Israel’s) youth, the love of thine espousals’ (Jer_2:2). Upon this view it follows that the language employed is dictated by Hosea’s subsequent experience. He could not, of course, know that Gomer had an inclination to infidelity, until it had been exhibited in act.
children of whoredoms] i.e. either children inheriting their mother’s evil tendencies, or the offspring of an adulterous union. (Comp. Hos_2:4.)
for the land hath committed …] This is the meaning of Hosea’s acted parable. As Gomer became the wedded wife of the prophet, so ‘the land’, i.e. the people, of northern Israel had entered into an analogous mystic relation to Jehovah (see on Hos_2:21-22). As Gomer, after her espousals, committed whoredom, so Israel, after her first love, went astray after other gods (see chap. 2). Israel in the narrower sense of the word seems to be meant, for afterwards we read ‘I will have mercy upon the house of Judah’ (Hos_1:7).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 (2) The beginning of the word . . .—More…
(2) The beginning of the word . . .—More correctly, In the beginning when the Lord spoke to Hosea, the Lord said . . .
Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms.—How are we to interpret the prophet’s marriage to the licentious Gomer? Is it an historic occurrence, the only too real tragedy of the author’s personal experience, employed for the purpose of illustration? (Comp. the domestic incident, Isa_8:1-4.) Or is this opening chapter a merely allegorical representation, designed to exhibit in vivid colours the terrible moral condition of Israel? (Comp. the symbolic actions described in Jer_25:15-29; Eze_4:4-6; and perhaps Isa_20:1-3.) Able writers have advocated each of these opposed theories; but in our opinion the balance of evidence inclines to the former view, which regards the events as historic. The further question arises, Was Gomer guilty before or after the marriage? The former supposition involves the harshness of conceiving such a marriage as the result of a Divine command; but the latter supposition admits of a satisfactory interpretation. The wickedness which after marriage revealed itself to the prophet’s agonised heart was transfigured to the inspired seer into an emblem of his nation’s wrong to Jehovah. In the light of this great idea, the prophet’s past came before him in changed aspect. As he reflected on the marvellous symbolic adaptation of this episode to the terrible spiritual needs of his fellow-countrymen, which he was called by God to supply, the Divine purpose which shaped his sorrowful career became interpreted to his glowing consciousness as a Divine command—“Go, take unto thyself a wife of whoredoms.” He had suffered acutely, but the agony was part of God’s arrangement, and the very love that was repeatedly outraged proves ultimately to have been suggested by a Divine monition.
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Children of whoredoms.—Children of Hosea’s marriage. The whole result of his family history was included in this divinely ordered plan.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv2–9 The beginning of the word of the Lord by…
The beginning of the word of the Lord by (literally, in) Hosea. These words may be rendered at once more literally and more exactly,
(1) The beginning (of that which) Jehovah spoke by Hosea." Thus Gesenius translates, understanding ashen, which is often omitted as a pronoun in the nominative or accusative, indicating relation, and as including the antecedent personal or demonstrative pronoun. When the pronoun thus supplied is in the genitive, the preceding noun is in the construct state, as here.
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(2) Rosenm without necessity, takes the noun in the adverbial sense; thus: "In the beginning Jehovah spake by Hosea." He also suggests the possibility of dibber being a noun of the same meaning as dabar , but of different formation; while in two manuscripts of De Rossi and one of Kennicott the regular form of the construct state of davar is expressed.
(3) Keil takes the noun as an accusative of time, and accounts for its construct state by the substantival idea of the succeeding subordinated clause; thus: At the commencement of "Jehovah spake," Jehovah said to him." But what is the beginning here mentioned? It cannot mean that Hoses was the first of the prophets by whom God made known his will to Israel, or the first of the minor prophets; for Jonah, as is rightly inferred 2Ki_14:25, preceded him; Joel also is usually regarded as before him in point of time; neither can it denote his priority to Isaiah and Amos, who also prophesied in the days of Uzziah. The plain meaning is that which becomes obvious when we adopt the right rendering of Gesenius, as given above, that is, the beginning of the prophecies which Hoses was commissioned by Jehovah to make known. The peculiarity of the expression, in Hosea," as the word literally means, deserves attention. Maurer compares Num_12:2, Num_12:6, Num_12:8, to prove that the expression signifies speaking to rather than in or by; he also cites other passages to the same purpose, But while the verb "to speak," followed by b and the verb constructed with el, may coincide in signification at a certain point, it does not thence follow that they are everywhere and always synonymous. Long ago Jerome drew attention to the distinction which this difference of construction suggests. "It is one thing," says that Father, "for the Lord to speak in Hosea, another to speak to
(4) Hosea: when it is in Hosea he does not speak to Hosea himself, but by Hosea to others; but speaking to Hosea denotes communication to himself. So in the New Testament (Heb_1:1) we find the corresponding Greek expression, viz. o Yeosav en profhtaiv , which the Revised Version rightly renders, "God having... spoken the ... in the prophets." The first verse is the general heading for the whole book; the first clause of the second verse is the special heading of the first section of the book, which extends to the end of the third chapter. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms. Whether the transaction here enjoined is to be understood as a reality, or a vision, or an allegory, has been keenly debated. To enter fully into the discussion of this point would lead us too far from our purpose; nor could it minister to edification. Though high authorities have maintained it to be a real occurrence, we do not see our way to concur with their view. A canon of interpretation sanctioned by Augustine forbids the literal acceptation of this command, for, according to the canon referred to, if the language of Scripture taken literally would involve something incongruous or morally improper, the figurative sense must be preferred. Again, we can scarcely understand it of a vision; for there is no mention of or reference to anything of that kind in the passage, nor does the context countenance the notion of a vision. Keil regards it as such when he speaks of it as "an inward and spiritual intuition in which the word of God was addressed" to the prophet. We are, therefore, shut up to that interpretation which explains the whole as an allegorical or imaginary narrative, which is thus constructed in order to impart greater vividness to the prophet"s declaration. The Chaldee paraphrase understands it in this sense. "Go," says the paraphrast, "declare a prophecy against the inhabitants of the idolatrous city, who persist in sin." Jerome also explains it allegorically, and urges against the literal sense that passage in Eze_4:4-6, where the prophet is commanded by God to bear the iniquity of the house of Israel, and to lie upon his left side three hundred and ninety days a thing impossible according to the literal understanding of the injunction; he accordingly concludes, in reference to the particulars here commanded, that "sacramenta indicaut futurorum." Calvin rightly understands it in the sense of a parabolic representation as follows: "The Lord had bidden him (the prophet) to relate this parable, so to speak, or this similitude, that the people might see, as in a living portraiture, their turpitude and perfidiousness. It is, in short, an exhibition in which the thing itself is not only set forth in words, but is also placed, as it were, before their eyes in a visible form." Kimchi considers it to be a prophetic vision; while some of the older Hebrew interpreters viewed it in the light of an actual transaction. Kimchi"s words are: "And the whole took place in the vision of prophecy, not that Hoses the prophet had taken to himself a wife of whoredoms; although it is found in the words of our rabbins that the meaning is according to the literal signification of the words." By "a wife of whoredoms" we understand a woman addicted to whoredoms, and thus likely to prove an unfaithful wife, as" a woman of quarrels" is a quarrelsome woman, "a man of bloods" is a bloody man, "a man of sorrows" a sorrowful man; while "children of whoredoms" are children who follow in the footsteps of their mother"s lewdness, or children on whose birth their mother"s licentiousness bad left a stigma so that their legitimacy is questionable. The construction of the verb "take," with both objects, is an example of the figure zeugma, by which one word does duty to two clauses, though it undergoes a modification of sense in its application to the second. The meaning here is clearly that the prophet should take a wife of the character indicated, and beget children by her, not take such a wife and such children already born to her. This view is favored by the Vulgate, Sume tibi uxorem fornicationum et fac tibi filios fornicationum; though Keil maintains that Hosea was to take children of prostitution as well as a wife who had lived by prostitution. For the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord. This is more exactly rendered, for the land hath utterly gone a-whoring from after (that is, from following) the Lord. From this we learn the symbolic import of the command, in whatever way that command is interpreted, whether as a reality, or vision, or allegory, the prophet"s marriage to an unfaithful wife sets forth Jehovah"s marriage to an unfaithful nation. God often condescends graciously condescends to represent his relation to his people as a marriage covenant; while unfaithfulness on their part is spiritual adultery. The mother and the children may represent the country and its inhabitants, or the nation as a whole and its several members, or generally the people and their posterity in succeeding generations. The father of the Hebrew race had served other gods on the other side of the flood, that is, in Ur, in the land of the Chaldees, whence God had called Abraham. When taken into covenant relationship, how often had they fallen into the former sin of idolatry! The fearful consequences of their sin is graphically portrayed in the verses immediately following, symbolized in the names of the prophet"s children. They are national ruin, the loss of the Divine favor, and the forfeiture of their proud position as the chosen people of Jehovah.
Vers. 2, 3. Hosea"s marriage and prophetic training.
When this text is announced, possibly some may say, "What a shocking subject to preach about! Well it is shocking, indeed. God intends it to be so. But to our feelings spiritual adultery should be even more revolting than the literal whoredom which the Holy Spirit presents here as its prophetic symbol. And we must not forget that this painful passage records "the beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea.
I HOSEA"S CONJUGAL DISHONOR. How are we to explain the narrative portions (Hosea 1 and Hos 3) of this book? The most interesting problem of Hosea"s life, and the "vexed question" in the exposition of his prophecy, lies in the meaning of this story of his domestic experiences. There have been three principal interpretations. At the one extreme is the severely literal view; viz. that Hosea, in obedience to a Divine command, united himself in marriage with a woman notorious for her impurity (Augustine, Pusey, Dean Stanley, etc.). At the other extreme is the purely allegorical view; viz. that the narrative is to be regarded merely as a parable; or, at most, that the marriage took place in prophetic vision only (Jerome, Calvin, Hengstenberg, etc.). The exegesis which the writer of this homily prefers lies between these two; viz. that Hosea"s marriage was real, but that Gomer did not become profligate until after she had borne the prophet"s three children (Ewald, Professor A.B. Davidson, Dr. Robertson Smith, etc.). No view which it is possible to take is free from difficulties; but this last one is not exposed to the insurmountable objections which, in the writer"s judgment, adhere to the two extreme interpretations. It also furnishes an appropriate parallel in Hosea"s experience to the love of God for his people Israel. The prophet, accordingly, contracted a marriage which turned out to be unhappy. Gomer did not love God. Her heart became contaminated with the moral miasma which was poisoning the social life of the whole nation. Hosea"s quiet home, his simple occupations, and his devout sabbath-keeping, grew distasteful to her. She felt her life intolerably slow. After the birth of her third child she was directly tempted, and wandered and fell. Gomer joined the throng of the priestesses of Ashtoreth, took part in the abominable rites of the Phoenician idolatry, and left her poor husband to "cry to vacant chairs and widowed walls" that she had made his home desolate. Hosea"s love for his spouse had been very deep and tender, and he felt that he loved her still, despite the fierce conflict which his affection had now to wage against his outraged honor. It would almost seem too, from the ominous names given to the children, that they also, as they grew up, followed for a time in their mother"s evil ways. So Hosea begins his book by showing that it was the blighting of his fireside joys and the breaking of his household gods that first made him "a man of sorrows." Now I sit All lonely, homeless, weary of my life, Thick darkness round me, and the stars all dumb, That erst had sung their wondrous tale of joy. And thou hast done it all, O faithless one! O Gomer! whom I loved as never wife Was loved in Israel, all the wrong is thine! Thy hand hath spoiled all my tender vines, Thy foot hath trampled all my pleasant fruits, Thy sin hath laid my honor in the dust. (Dean Plumptre.)
II GOD"S PROVIDENCE IN THIS DISHONOR. The shipwreck of his home-happiness taught Hosea very solemn spiritual lessons. He heard in it the voice of Jehovah pointing out to him his life-work. Looking around, he perceived that his experience was not an isolated one. Rather, his home was a picture of the moral state of the entire northern kingdom. The land was reeking with sensuality. And with that sin the sin of idolatry was closely intertwined. So Hosea became very deeply convinced that all the crime and vice of the age sprang from one spiritual root: "The land had committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord." He reflected that his own bitter experience was but a parable of God"s experience. What Gomer was to him, the Israelitish nation had been to Jehovah. She had been betrothed to God "in the days of her youth, when she came up out of the land of Egypt;" and the nuptials had been celebrated at Mount Sinai. But, alas I she had fallen now into foul and shameless idolatry. Hosea, from his own sad experience, could have sympathy with God. Himself a victim and not an eye-witness merely of the wickedness of his age, herealized more fully than he could otherwise have done the odiousness of Israel"s apostasy. When he thought of Gomer, he could understand the words of the second commandment, "I the Lord thy God am a jealous God." And thus his conjugal dishonor was his birth as a prophet. It was "the beginning of the word of the Lord in Hosea." The Book of Hosea is a poem; and while, of course, "the poet is born, not reader events in his own life are oftentimes needed to strike from him the poetic fire. Although the poet is dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, the love of love," it is also true that Most wretched men Are cradled into poetry by wrong: They learn in suffering what they teach in song. (Shelley.)
It was notably so with Hoses. Affliction was his one prophetical school. So, when he now sits down to begin his book, he recounts at the outset his domestic wrongs, in the light of his ripe experience of their Divine meaning. God had "girded" him, though at first he had "not known" it. The Lord had said, in his own Divine plan of Hosea"s life, "Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms." The event had taught him that his desolate home was a type of Israel"s ruin; and his pity for Gomer which longed to restore her from her wasted life a faint shadow of the yearning love of God for his apostate people.
III LESSONS FOR OURSELVES.
1. God himself is the supreme end of our life. He is so:
(1) To the individual. "Man"s chief end is to glorify God." The life which does not do this is a failure.
(2) To the family. This sad story reminds us of the blessedness of household piety, and of a pure family life. Holy Scripture everywhere magnifies the family, and enjoins that the fear of God be enthroned in its very heart. "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.
(3) To the nation. National religion, on the part of a self-governing people, depends upon the spiritual state of the persons and households which compose the nation. "Departure from the Lord," whether in the case of the individual, or the family, or the commonwealth, is idolatry and adultery; and it leads inevitably to ruin. (Psa_73:27)
2. All of us require to repent of Gomer"s sin. Our evil hearts have gone a-whoring from our God; our wrong words and actions are the children born of our adultery. Each of us may sayThou, my soul, wast loved, As bride by bridegroom, by the eternal Lord; And thou, too, hast been false. (Dean Plumptre.)
3. A course of affliction affords a valuable prophetic curriculum. There is a sense in which "all the Lord"s people" should be prophets." But, before we can be fully qualified and accomplished to teach the truth as it is in Jesus, we must be washed, not only in his blood, but in our own hearts" blood also. C.J.
Spiritual infidelity.
The figurative language in which Hosea was inspired to expose and denounce the sinful idolatry and apostasy of Israel is startling, and the symbolic act in which these sins were set forth in their abomination and horror is evidently intended to shock the mind of every reader.
I GOD IS THE HUSBAND OF HIS PEOPLE. Human relationships are pressed into the service of religion; and the fact that God created man in his own image is the justification of such similitudes as that of the text. The Creator is represented as the King, the Father, and the Husband of the children of men. Under each relationship some new aspect of religious life and duty is brought into prominence. Jehovah declares that he espoused Israel in selecting her from among the nations, admitting her to special" intimacy, and conferring upon her peculiar dignity and favors.
II GOD"S PEOPLE ARE UNDER OBLIGATION TO FAITHFULNESS TO THEIR LORD. The wife who has accepted a man as her husband binds herself to "keep to him only." Adultery has ever been regarded as a shameful vice and crime. How much more are those, whom the eternal Supreme has favored with the revelation of his Law and his purposes, bound to render to him the most loyal and faithful service! He alone is to be worshipped, adored, obeyed, and served. Israel was distinguished among the nations by many events in the national history; and "in these last days" all to whom the gospel has come are signally honored, and are placed under a sterner responsibility.
III IRRELIGION AND APOSTASY ARE NOTHING LESS THAN FLAGRANT INFIDELITY. When Hosea wrote, the northern tribes, constituting the kingdom of Israel, were again and again guilty of idolatry, and even those who were free from this stain in many instances fell into gross ungodliness and disobedience. Such conduct was represented as equivalent to spiritual adultery. Israel forsook her espoused husband and went after other lovers, and attached herself guiltily and disgracefully to the worthless rivals who wooed her. And all who depart from God are guilty of infidelity of a flagrant kind, such as the Lord cannot overlook or treat with indifference.
IV THE UNFAITHFUL ARE SUMMONED TO REPENTANCE, AND ARE INVITED TO RETURN TO THE LORD. Conscience witnesses to the justice of God"s claims and to the sinfulness of neglecting and outraging them. And the word. of the Lord comes to the unfaithful in mercy and compassion. For, whilst he might righteously cast off his unfaithful spouse, he graciously opens the arms of his love and welcomes hack the penitent and the contrite. T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 The beginning Of the Wold of the Lord by…
Hos_1:2
The beginning Of the Wold of the Lord by Hosea.
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The prophet Hosea
The prophet Hosea is the only individual character that stands out amidst the darkness of this period--the Jeremiah, as he may be called, of Israel. His life had extended over nearly the whole of the last century of the northern kingdom. In early youth, whilst the great Jeroboam was still on the throne, he had been called to the prophetic office. In his own personal history he shared in the misery brought on his country by the profligacy of the age. In early youth he had been united in marriage with a woman who had fallen into the vices which surrounded her. He had loved her with a tender love; she had borne to him two sons and a daughter; she had then deserted him, wandered from her home, fallen again into wild licentiousness, and been carried off as a slave. From this wretched state, with all the tenderness of his nature, he bought her, and gave her one more chance of recovery, by living with him, though apart. No one who has observed the manner in which individual experience often colours the general religious doctrine of a gifted teacher can be surprised at the close con nection that exists between the life of Hosea and the mission to which he was called. In his own grief for his own great calamity--the greatest that can befall a tender human soul--he was taught to feel for the Divine grief over the lost opportunities of the nation once so full of hope. (Dean Stanley.)
Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms.
Gods strange command to Hosea
Holy Scripture relates that all this was done, and tells us the birth and names of the children, as real history. As such, then, we must receive it. We must not imagine things to be unworthy of God, because they do not commend themselves to us. God does not dispense with the moral law, because the moral law has its source in the mind of God Himself. To dispense with it would be to contradict Himself. But God, who is the absolute Lord of all things which He made, may, at His sovereign will, dispose of the lives or things which He created. Thus, as Sovereign Judge, He commanded the lives of the Canaanites to be taken away by Israel, as, in His ordinary providence, He has ordained that the magistrate should not bear the sword in vain, but has made him His minister, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. So, again, He, whose are all things, willed to repay to the Israelites their hard and unjust servitude, by commanding them to spoil the Egyptians. He who created marriage, commanded to Hosea whom he should marry. The prophet was not defiled, by taking as his lawful wife, at Gods bidding, one defiled, however hard a thing this was. He who remains good, is not defiled by coming in contact with one evil; but the evil, following his example, is turned into good. But through his simple obedience, he foreshadowed Him, God the Word, who was culled the friend of publicans and sinners; who warned the Pharisees, that the publicans and harlots should enter into the kingdom of God before them; and who now vouchsafes to espouse, dwell in, and unite Himself with, and so to hallow, our sinful souls. The acts which God enjoined to the prophets, and which to us seem strange, must have had an impressiveness to the people, in proportion to their strangeness. The life of the prophet became a sermon to the people. Sight impresses more than words. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.)
Scripture picture--teaching
in modern times picture-teaching is almost confined to work among children, because education and culture have made adults capable of apprehending plain statements, and even elaborate arguments. In child-conditions of nations child methods of instruction were wisely employed. And it is well for preachers to bear in mind that a large proportion of those whom they address are as incapable of following argument as children, and therefore need the pictorial, dramatic, and illustrative methods of instruction. It is even more to the point to observe that the dramatic acting out of representative and suggestive scenes, has always been, and still is, one of the most effective methods of moral instruction. What we have in Hosea, whether what is stated concerning him be regarded as history or vision, is a dramatising of the history of the nation of the Ten Tribes in its relation to God figured as its husband. The facts of individual experience are these. Hosea takes as wife a woman who had gone astray. All his love and care fail to recover her and settle her in her home-life. Presently the old wilfulness revives, and she breaks away from home, to live again a life of sinful indulgence, and come under burdens of pain and slavery. Spite of it all, Hosea is willing, if she will give up her sins, to receive her back, and give her the old place in home and love. The individual represents the national. The Ten Tribes wilfully broke away under Jeroboam I. determined to live an independent life of self-willedness, which always means a life of sin. God graciously took this nation as His, and strove with tending, patience, gentleness, and love to win it as His own. But it was in vain. The nation again and again broke away from God, dishonoured Him, and at last in its seemingly outward prosperity, under Jeroboam II., broke away entirely from Him. Nevertheless, patient mercy still pleads. Only now there is the intimation that it is the nation s last chance. Hosea, then, in his ways with his wife is to represent Gods ways with the nation. In telling how he thought and felt, and what he did, and was willing to do, Hosea revealed to the people the thought and hope and anxiety of God concerning them.
I. In taking the kingdom of Israel as His, God did not take a chaste nation. Under Jeroboam I. the nation broke away from its home, and duty, and right relations. It was a soiled, wilful nation. Nevertheless, and as such God took it for His own.
II. While calling it his own, God did everything that love and care could do to win the nation wholly for Himself and righteousness. Pathetic is the tender love of Hosea, as representing the patience, gentleness, and love of God.
III. The old wilfulness will not be subdued, and at last it broke out again, leading to worse sins than at first. Compare the moral and social life of Israel under Jeroboam I. and Jeroboam II.
IV. Divine severities must attend on Divine love when moral conditions become so utterly hopeless. And yet how evident it becomes, that judgment is Gods strange work, and mercy His delight! (J. Burroughs.)
Mysterious commands--
In the Memorial Hall at Harvard University there is a wonderful array of beautiful sentences frescoed on the walls in various colours, but they are all in Latin. And it is said that some of the workmen did not know the meaning of the sentences they painted, but could only put the letters and the colours on the walls as they were told, without understanding the wondrous meaning wrapped up in them. So we are often writing our lives in an unknown tongue; we can only do as we are bidden. (Christian Age.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv2–3 Hos_1:2. By] Lit. in Hosea, the preposition expresses close…
HOMILETICS
CRITICAL NOTES.—
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Hos_1:2. By] Lit. in Hosea, the preposition expresses close relationship with another; cf. Num_12:6; Num_12:8; Heb_2:1. First in us and then through us is the Divine order; personal enlightenment and then public service. Wife of whore.] A vision, some; externally acted, others; taken in a real sense by most interpreters. The plural indicates not merely incidental, but continual and manifold acts [Pusey]. Take] i.e. marry one whose livelihood is gained by prostitution, and whose whole element is whoredom. Cf. men of blood, Psa_5:7; man of sorrows, Isa_53:3. This is a symbol of Israel in its state of idolatry. Land] Israel, indirectly Judah, wife and children, equally grieved the husband and father, Eze_16:8; Eze_16:15. Committed] is whoring, whoring away, from Jehovah, lit. from after Jehovah; the composite preposition denoting more than absence from God, signifies opposed to walking with him; the breaking of the marriage vow, cut off from loving relationship (Psa_73:27).
THE SYMBOLIC MARRIAGE.—Hos_1:2
Whether this be regarded as a real and external transaction, or a spiritual scenery, or allegorical description, all agree in taking it as a type of God’s dealings with unfaithful Israel. Divine truth was to be acted, embodied in sensible signs and prophetic life. Hosea commanded to marry a prostitute and beget children, whose names, called by God himself, were to set forth the evils of departure from him.
I. A type of Israel’s fallen condition. It was the chosen people, specially created and brought into covenant relation to God. This relation, often represented under the figure of marriage, they vowed to keep. But the contract was broken, they had fallen away from God, and gone a whoring after other gods. Idolatry was not accidental, but prevalent; the whole land was polluted, and the sin national. The idolatry of foreign nations was regarded as an abomination, but the sin of Israel a more glaring enormity and greater moral guilt. Three things are condemned in Scripture as idolatry.
1. The worshipping of a false god;
2. the worshipping of the true God through an image;
3. the indulgence of those passions which draw the soul from God. Israel were guilty of the first in bowing the knee to Baal, and of the second in setting up the golden calves. Men now often guilty of the third. Lust, covetousness, and pleasure allure their hearts, and they set up gold, honour, popular applause, and worldly distinction, and cry, “These be thy gods.”
II. A type o God’s love to sinners.
1. Love to the unfaithful. Israel had fallen, but God loved her with a tender love, and sought to restore her to himself. Many have made a profession, Christians have left their first love, broken their engagement with God, and fallen into disgrace. Love is wounded, and deeply wounded, at such treatment, but it remains love, cannot suffer apostasy from him, and seeks to restore and save. “Thou hast left thy first love. Remember, therefore, from whence thou art fallen, and repent and do the first works.”
2. Love to the unworthy. We shrink from the unchaste and condemn the outcast, but they are not beyond hope. The drunkard, the thief, and the idolater are renewed and restored to God, formed into a church, and sanctified for his service. “Love,” it has been said, “descends more abundantly than it ascends. The love of parents for their children has always been far more powerful than that of children for their parents; and who among the sons of men ever loved God with a thousandth part of the love which God has manifested to us?”
III. A type of moral life unstained by surrounding evils. The prophet was holy, separated from sinners, and dared not associate with adulterers.
1. In the family was a “wife of whoredoms” and “children of whoredoms.”
2. In the land corruption and abominations were prevalent. What a trial of patience! What a test of character this would be! Christians are often so placed, but must be “the salt of the earth,” preserve from corruption, and incite men to live godly in dangers by which they are surrounded. Even in Sardis were a few who had not defiled their garments. “To keep himself unspotted from the world.”
IV. A type of parental sin portrayed in children’s character. Parents leave behind them legacies of guilt and shame; contaminate their offspring by their influence and example. Children inherit the lands and the lusts of their ancestors, and are often cursed with the consequences of parental folly. Drunkenness, debauchery, and adultery entail on human life their ruinous and loathsome effects. Men transmit to remote posterity guilt and misery, and God visits “the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.” This should excite pity for children and caution in parents for their solemn charge and responsibility.
HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES
Go, take, Hos_1:3.—
1. A people sunk into sin and idolatry need desperate and extraordinary efforts to save them.
2. Men employed in saving them must deny themselves, and adopt the means God directs. Hosea takes a strange wife. Ezekiel loses his own, Eze_24:16-17. Our will must be merged into God’s. “This figure was proposed to the people that they might perceive in the looking-glass of this allegory, first, their duty towards God; second, their disloyalty; thirdly, their penalty for the same” [Trapp].
Idolatry is spiritual whoredom. It defiles the soul, God’s bridal-bed. It breaks the marriage-knot, and discovenants. It enrageth God, who in this case will take no ransom. It subjecteth men to the deepest displeasure of God, it besots them and unmans them [Trapp].
Children of whoredom. The sins of parents also descend in a mysterious way on their children. Sin is contagious, and unless the entail is cut off by grace, hereditary [Pusey].
Depart from God.—I. God is the great end of life. Man restless and insufficient without God. Natural bodies seek a natural resting-place; sensitive creatures seek good adapted to their rank and being: so the soul longs for God. Echoes of God resound through its depths, and it is made to turn instinctively towards Himself. Some have found and walk with God, like Enoch; some walk near to him and others are far from him. “Without God in the world.” God should be the supreme object of life and affection. This pursuit should be earnest and continued. “My soul followeth hard after (is glued) to thee.” The renewed soul is acquainted with God, and follows him with intensity of feeling and desire. When the Christian has lost God, he never rests satisfied until he has found him again. When he has found and enjoys him he longs to enjoy him more. And though he can never attain to God in perfection, yet he follows on, first, as a necessary discipline, and then as a necessary preparation for the future. “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.”
II. Departure from God is idolatry. Sin hinders and indisposes in the pursuit after God. It is a violation of his law and rejection of his love and authority. It renounces all subjection to him, and casts him off entirely. This is, to prefer the creature to the Creator, in whom all joys and blessings consist. If we seek anything out of God, we turn from following him, and take something else to be our god. This is to make an idol, and prefer emptiness and vanity. An idol is nothing. Men have many idols. When they do not worship God, they worship themselves, their fellow-creatures, their works, and their substance. It is not necessary that each one should sing a psalm and offer a prayer to deify self. The outward life is a psalm, and the inward life a prayer. Man cannot dethrone God in heart and life without putting an idol in his place. “Little children, keep yourselves from idols.”
III. This departure involves others in its consequences. Every individual is a centre of moral influence. Every word and deed sends forth more than electric fluid. He may choose what he will do, but having done, he cannot stay the consequences of the act. Kings and priests, ministers and parents, influence others for good or evil, produce effects which do not terminate on themselves, but extend to society, and are transmitted to posterity as mighty, indestructible forces of existence. “When one member suffers, all suffer with it.” By neglect of duty, wrong example, and leading others into sin we injure our fellow-creatures, and leave an active influence, which does not cease when we repent or die. Wealth, language, and customs influence the health and morals of society. And as the seed sown will produce the harvest, so licentiousness and idolatry sow their fruits in families, churches, nations, and fill “the earth with violence.” “The land hath committed great whoredom.”
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v9 my people
my people
"My people" is an expression used in the O.T. exclusively of Israel the nation. It is never used of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Mat 2:6.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv3, 6, 8 Gomer ... Diblaim
Gomer ... Diblaim
These are names of people. (See: How to Translate Names)
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the house of Jehu
Here "house" means "family," including Jehu's descendants. (See: Metaphor)
the house of Israel
This expression refers to kingdom of Israel. (See: Metaphor)
the bow of Israel
Here "bow" refers to the power of the army. AT: "the military power of Israel" (See: Metonymy)
translationWords
Hosea
son
Yahweh
name
Jezreel
punish
house
Jehu
bloodshed
kingdom
Israel
bow and arrow
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 1:2–3:5 This section describes a small segment of the…
1:2–3:5 This section describes a small segment of the prophet’s life, focusing on his unhappy marriage and illuminating God’s painful relationship with Israel, his chosen people.
1:2-3 a prostitute: Some have found it impossible to believe that God would command a prophet to marry a prostitute. As a result, there is a long tradition of interpreting this passage symbolically. Many in the early church believed that the marriage did not actually take place. They thought that this passage was an allegory in which Hosea represented the Lord and Gomer represented Israel. Today, most interpreters regard the marriage as a real one, but they differ in their ideas about Gomer’s occupation prior to the marriage. Some suggest that Gomer was an ordinary prostitute, while others suggest that she was one of the sacred prostitutes involved in Canaanite fertility worship. Another possibility is that Gomer was a young woman who had not previously participated in illicit sexual activity, but whom God knew to be predisposed toward adultery and prostitution.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.