8 There is great hate against the watchman of Ephraim, the people of my God; as for the prophet, there is a net in all his ways, and hate in the house of his God.
Give ear to this, O priests; give attention, O Israel, and you, family of the king; for you are to be judged; you have been a deceit at Mizpah and a net stretched out on Tabor.
Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the children of Israel: so give ear to the word of my mouth, and give them word from me of their danger.
Then the captain whose arm was supporting the king said to the man of God, Even if the Lord made windows in heaven, would such a thing be possible? And he said, Your eyes will see it, but you will not have a taste of the food.
Then Elisha made a prayer to the Lord, saying, Lord, let his eyes be open so that he may see. And the Lord made the young man's eyes open; and he saw that all the mountain was full of horses and carriages of fire round Elisha. Now when the Aramaeans came down to Elisha, he made a prayer to the Lord saying, Lord, make this people blind. And he made them blind at Elisha's request.
And while they were putting a dead man into the earth, they saw a band coming; and they put the man quickly into the place where Elisha's body was; and the dead man, on touching Elisha's bones, came to life again, and got up on his feet.
The watchmen who go about the town came by me; to them I said, Have you seen him who is my heart's desire?
And I put watchmen over you, saying, Give attention to the sound of the horn; but they said, We will not give attention.
Then I said, Ah, Lord God! see, the prophets say to them, You will not see the sword or be short of food; but I will give you certain peace in this place.
The visions which your prophets have seen for you are false and foolish; they have not made clear to you your sin so that your fate might be changed: but they have seen for you false words, driving you away.
It is because of the sins of her prophets and the evil-doing of her priests, by whom the blood of the upright has been drained out in her.
The best of them is like a waste plant, and their upright ones are like a wall of thorns. Sorrow! the day of their fate has come; now will trouble come on them.
If I had not done among them the works which no other man ever did, they would have had no sin: but now they have seen, and they have had hate in their hearts for me and my Father.
Because of what you have done, the disease of Naaman the leper will take you in its grip, and your seed after you, for ever. And he went out from before him a leper as white as snow.
And the Lord said, How? And he said, I will go out and be a spirit of deceit in the mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Your trick will have its effect on him: go out and do so.
And he took Elijah's robe, which had been dropped from him, and giving the water a blow with it, said, Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah? and at his blow the waters were parted this way and that; and Elisha went over.
Then he went out to the spring from which the water came, and put salt in it, and said, The Lord says, Now I have made this water sweet; no longer will it be death-giving or unfertile.
But now, get me a player of music, and it will come about that while the man is playing, the hand of the Lord will come on me and I will give you the word of the Lord: and they got a player of music, and while the man was playing, the hand of the Lord was on him. And he said, The Lord says, I will make this valley full of water-holes. For the Lord says, Though you see no wind or rain, the valley will be full of water, and you and your armies and your beasts will have drink. And this will be only a small thing to the Lord: in addition he will give the Moabites into your hands. And you are to put every walled town to destruction, cutting down every good tree, and stopping up every water-spring, and making all the good land rough with stones. Now in the morning, about the time when the offering was made, they saw water flowing from the direction of Edom till the country was full of water.
Now a certain woman, the wife of one of the sons of the prophets, came crying to Elisha and said, Your servant my husband is dead; and to your knowledge he was a worshipper of the Lord; but now, the creditor has come to take my two children as servants in payment of his debt. Then Elisha said to her, What am I to do for you? say now, what have you in the house? And she said, Your servant has nothing in the house but a pot of oil. Then he said, Go out to all your neighbours and get vessels, a very great number of them. Then go in, and, shutting the door on yourself and your sons, put oil into all these vessels, putting on one side the full ones. So she went away, and when the door was shut on her and her sons, they took the vessels to her and she put oil into them. And when all the vessels were full, she said to her son, Get me another vessel. And he said, There are no more. And the flow of oil was stopped. So she came to the man of God and gave him word of what she had done. And he said, Go and get money for the oil and make payment of your debt, and let the rest be for the needs of yourself and your sons.
So he went in, and shutting the door on the two of them, made prayer to the Lord. Then he got up on the bed, stretching himself out on the child, and put his mouth on the child's mouth, his eyes on his eyes and his hands on his hands; and the child's body became warm. Then he came back, and after walking once through the house and back, he went up, stretching himself out on the child seven times; and the child's eyes became open. And he gave orders to Gehazi, and said, Send for the Shunammite. And she came in answer to his voice. And he said, Take up your son. And she came in, and went down on her face to the earth at his feet; then she took her son in her arms and went out.
But his servant said, How am I to put this before a hundred men? But he said, Give it to the people for food; for the Lord says, There will be food for them and some over.
Then he went down seven times into the waters of Jordan, as the man of God had said; and his flesh became like the flesh of a little child again, and he was clean.
But if, because I am untrue, God being seen to be true gets more glory, why am I to be judged as a sinner?
And Zedekiah, the son of Chenaanah, made himself horns of iron and said, The Lord says, Pushing back the Aramaeans with these, you will put an end to them completely.
Then at the time of the offering, Elijah the prophet came near and said, O Lord, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be seen this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things by your order. Give me an answer, O Lord, give me an answer, so that this people may see that you are God, and that you have made their hearts come back again. Then the fire of the Lord came down, burning up the offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and drinking up the water in the drain. And when the people saw it, they all went down on their faces, and said, The Lord, he is God, the Lord, he is God.
Now send, and get Israel together before me at Mount Carmel, with the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal who get their food at Jezebel's table.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Hosea 9
Commentary on Hosea 9 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 9
In this chapter,
Hsa 9:1-6
Here,
Hsa 9:7-10
For their further awakening, it is here threatened,
Hsa 9:11-17
In the foregoing verses we saw the sin of Israel derived from their fathers; here we see the punishment of Israel derived to their children; for, as death entered by sin at first, so it is still entailed with it. We may observe, in these verses,