1 And the Lord said to me, Give your love again to a woman who has a lover and is false to her husband, even as the Lord has love for the children of Israel, though they are turned to other gods and are lovers of grape-cakes.
The start of the word of the Lord by Hosea: And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take for yourself a wife of loose ways, and children of the same, for the land has been untrue to the Lord. So he took as his wife Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she gave birth to a son.
Truly, as a wife is false to her husband, so have you been false to me, O Israel, says the Lord.
Go, and give out these words to the north, and say, Come back, O Israel, though you have been turned away from me, says the Lord; my face will not be against you in wrath: for I am full of mercy, says the Lord, I will not be angry for ever. Only be conscious of your sin, the evil you have done against the Lord your God; you have gone with strange men under every branching tree, giving no attention to my voice, says the Lord. Come back, O children who are turned away, says the Lord; for I am a husband to you, and I will take you, one from a town and two from a family, and will make you come to Zion;
They say, If a man puts away his wife and she goes from him and becomes another man's, will he go back to her again? will not that land have been made unclean? but though you have been acting like a loose woman with a number of lovers, will you now come back to me? says the Lord. Let your eyes be lifted up to the open hilltops, and see; where have you not been taken by your lovers? You have been seated waiting for them by the wayside like an Arabian in the waste land; you have made the land unclean with your loose ways and your evil-doing. So the showers have been kept back, and there has been no spring rain; still your brow is the brow of a loose woman, you will not let yourself be shamed. Will you not, from this time, make your prayer to me, crying, My father, you are the friend of my early years?
Have no joy, O Israel, and do not be glad like the nations; for you have been untrue to your God; your desire has been for the loose woman's reward on every grain-floor. The grain-floor and the place where the grapes are crushed will not give them food; there will be no new wine for them.
It is not possible for you, at the same time, to take the cup of the Lord and the cup of evil spirits; you may not take part in the table of the Lord and the table of evil spirits.
Then do not go after false gods, as some of them did; as it is said in the holy Writings, After resting and feasting, the people got up to take their pleasure.
And Jesus said to him, Friend, do that for which you have come. Then they came and put hands on Jesus, and took him.
So this is what the Lord has said: I have come back to Jerusalem with mercies; my house is to be put up in her, says the Lord of armies, and a line is to be stretched out over Jerusalem.
Who is a God like you, offering forgiveness for evil-doing and overlooking the sins of the rest of his heritage? he does not keep his wrath for ever, because his delight is in mercy. He will again have pity on us; he will put our sins under his feet: and you will send all our sins down into the heart of the sea. You will make clear your good faith to Jacob and your mercy to Abraham, as you gave your oath to our fathers from times long past.
But as for me, I am looking to the Lord; I am waiting for the God of my salvation: the ears of my God will be open to me.
Drinking wine in basins, rubbing themselves with the best oils; but they have no grief for the destruction of Joseph.
How may I give you up, O Ephraim? how may I be your saviour, O Israel? how may I make you like Admah? how may I do to you as I did to Zeboim? My heart is turned in me, it is soft with pity.
So early on the day after they got up and made burned offerings and peace-offerings; and took their seats at the feast, and then gave themselves to pleasure.
Is Ephraim my dear son? is he the child of my delight? for whenever I say things against him, I still keep him in my memory: so my heart is troubled for him; I will certainly have mercy on him, says the Lord.
In that day a man's heart will be turned to his Maker, and his eyes to the Holy One of Israel. He will not be looking to the altars, the work of his hands, or to the wood pillars or to the sun-images which his fingers have made.
See! as the eyes of servants are turned to the hands of their masters, and the eyes of a servant-girl to her owner, so our eyes are waiting for the Lord our God, till he has mercy on us.
Again and again he made them free; but their hearts were turned against his purpose, and they were overcome by their sins. But when their cry came to his ears, he had pity on their trouble: And kept in mind his agreement with them, and in his great mercy gave them forgiveness. He put pity into the hearts of those who made them prisoners.
Even then, in your great mercy, you did not put an end to them completely, or give them up; for you are a God of grace and mercy.
Even when they had made for themselves an ox of metal, and said, This is your God who took you up out of Egypt, and had done so much to make you angry; Even then, in your great mercy, you did not give them up in the waste land: the pillar of cloud still went before them by day, guiding them on their way, and the pillar of fire by night, to give them light, and make clear the way they were to go.
And he gave to every man and woman among all the people, among all the masses of Israel, a cake of bread and a measure of wine and a cake of dry grapes. Then all the people went away, every man to his house.
So they put away the strange gods from among them, and became the Lord's servants; and his soul was angry because of the sorrows of Israel.
For you are a holy people to the Lord your God: marked out by the Lord your God to be his special people out of all the nations on the face of the earth. The Lord did not give you his love or take you for himself because you were more in number than any other people; for you were the smallest of the nations:
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Hosea 3
Commentary on Hosea 3 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 3
God is still by the prophet inculcating the same thing upon this careless people, and much in the same manner as before, by a type or sign, that of the dealings of a husband with an adulterous wife. In this chapter we have,
Hsa 3:1-5
Some think that this chapter refers to Judah, the two tribes, as the adulteress the prophet married (ch. 1:3) represented the ten tribes; for this was not to be divorced, as the ten tribes were, but to be left desolate for a long time, and then to return, as the two tribes did. But these are called the children of Israel, which was the ten tribes, and therefore it is more probable that of them this parable, as well as that before, is to be understood. Go, and repeat it, says God to the prophet; Go yet again. Note, For the conviction and reduction of sinners it is necessary that precept be upon precept, and line upon line. If they will not believe one sign, try another, Ex. 4:8, 9. Now,