Israel’s Unfaithfulness Condemned
“ Hosea, say to your brothers, ‘Ammi ,’ and to your sisters, ‘Ruhamah .’
2 “Contend with your mother ; acontend,For she is bnot my wife and I am not her husband;And have her remove her marks of cprostitution from her faceAnd her adultery from between her breasts Is 50:1Ezek 23:45; Hos 2:5; 4:5Is 50:1Jer 3:1, 9, 133 Or I will strip her anakedAnd expose her as on the bday she was born,And cmake her like a wildernessAnd make her like a parched landAnd slay her with dthirst.Jer 13:22; Ezek 16:7, 22, 39Ezek 16:4Is 32:13, 14; Hos 13:15Jer 14:3; Amos 8:11-134 “Also, I will have no mercy on her children,Because they are the achildren of prostitution.Jer 13:145 “For their mother has aplayed the prostitute;She who conceived them has acted shamefully,For she said, ‘bI will pursue my loversWho cgive me my food and my water,My wool and my flax, my doil and my refreshing drinks.’Is 1:21; Jer 2:25; 3:1, 2; Hos 3:1Jer 44:17, 18; Hos 2:12Hos 2:86 “Therefore, behold, I the LORD God will ahedge up her way with bthorns;And I will build a wall against her shutting off her way so that she cannot find her cpaths.Job 19:8; Lam 3:7, 9Hos 9:6; 10:8Jer 18:157 “She will passionately apursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;And she will seek them, but will not find them.Then she will say, ‘Let bme go and return to my cfirst husband,For it was dbetter for me then than now!’Hos 5:13Luke 15:17, 18Jer 2:2; 3:1; Ezek 16:8; 23:4Jer 14:22; Hos 13:6
8 “For she has anot noticed nor understood nor realized that it was bI the LORD God who gave her the grain and the new wine and the oil,And lavished on her silver and gold,Which they used for Baal and made into his image.Is 1:3Ezek 16:199 “Therefore, I will return and atake back My grain at harvest timeAnd My new wine in its season.I will also take away My wool and My flaxGiven to cover her nakedness.Hos 8:7; 9:210 “And now I will auncover her lewdness and shameIn the sight of her lovers,And no one will rescue her from My hand.Ezek 16:3711 “I will also aput an end to all her rejoicing,Her bfeasts, her cNew Moons, her Sabbaths,And all her festivals.Jer 7:34; 16:9Hos 3:4; Amos 5:21; 8:10Is 1:13, 1412 “I will adestroy her vines and her fig treesOf which she has said, ‘These are my wagesWhich my lovers have given me.’And I will bmake them a forest,And the canimals of the open country will devour them.Jer 5:17; 8:13Is 5:5; 7:23Hos 13:813 “And I will punish her for the feast adays of the Baals,When she used to boffer sacrifices and burn incense to themAnd cadorn herself with her earrings and nose rings and her jewelry,And follow her lovers, so that she dforgot Me,” says the LORD.Hos 4:13; 11:2Jer 7:9Ezek 16:12, 17; 23:40Hos 4:6; 8:14; 13:6
Restoration of Israel
14 “Therefore, behold, I will allure IsraelAnd abring her into the wilderness,And I will speak tenderly to her to reconcile her to Me.Ezek 20:33-3815 “Then I will give her her avineyards from there,And make bthe Valley of Achor a door of hope and expectation anticipating the time when I will restore My favor on her.And she will csing there and respond as in the days of her youthAs in the dday when she came up from the land of Egypt. Ex 15:2; Josh 7:24-26Ezek 28:25, 26Josh 7:26Jer 2:1-3; Ezek 16:8-14Hos 11:1; 12:9, 13; 13:416 “It shall come about in that day,” says the LORD,“That you will call Me aIshi And will no longer call Me Baali .This was a loaded term meaning “owner,” “lord,” or “husband,” and as “lord” it also became a word for pagan gods. Some or perhaps most of the idolatry in which Israel engaged probably were attempts to represent the true God as an idol, such as a Baal.Is 54:5; Hos 2:717 “For aI will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth,So that they will no longer be mentioned or remembered by their names. Ex 23:13Ex 23:13; Josh 23:7; Ps 16:418 “And in that day I will make a covenant for IsraelWith the aanimals of the open countryAnd with the birds of the heavensAnd with the creeping things of the ground.And I will babolish the bow and the sword and banish war from the landAnd will make them clie down in safety.Job 5:23; Is 11:6-9; Ezek 34:25Is 2:4; Ezek 39:1-10Lev 26:5; Jer 23:6; Ezek 34:2519 “And I will abetroth you to Me forever;Yes, I will betroth you to Me in brighteousness and in justice,In lovingkindness and loyalty, and in compassion.Is 62:4, 5Is 1:27; 54:6-820 “I will betroth you to Me in stability and in faithfulness.Then you will aknow the LORD and respond with loving faithfulness.Jer 31:33, 34; Hos 6:6; 13:4
21 “It will come about in that day that I will respond,” says the LORD.“aI will respond to the heavens which ask for rain to pour on the earth, and they will respond to the earth which begs for the rain,Is 55:10; Zech 8:12; Mal 3:10, 1122 And the aearth shall respond to the grain and the new wine and the oil which beg it to bring them forth,And they will respond to Jezreel My Israel, who will now be restored.Jer 31:12; Joel 2:1923 “I will asow her for Myself in the land.bI will also have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy;And cI will say to those who were dnot My people,‘You are My people,’And they will say, ‘You are my God!’” 1+@Pet 2:9, 10Jer 31:27Hos 1:6Rom 9:25; 1 Pet 2:10Hos 1:9