Hosea 2:13

"And I will visit upon her the days of the Baalim, unto which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgat me, saith Jehovah."

"Saith Jehovah ..." Note the last words first! It is not Hosea, but the eternal God who delivers the prophecy of these pages. Hosea only spoke as he was moved by the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:21).

"I will visit upon her the days of the Baalim ..." "It is the cult of Baal which is Israel's harlotry."[36] There is a picture in this verse of what went on in the worship of Baal. Sensuous women ornamented themselves with jewels and offered themselves to all who desired them, a couple of raisin cakes being the customary price!

"And forgat me ..." This is another citation of the whore's guilt; and, as noted by Mays, it is "a summary of the guilt of Israel."[37] In the large frame of reference, all sins are variations on the theme of forgetting God. Selfishness is forgetting God in others. Pride is the absence from the thoughts of any awareness of God. Worry is the sin of forgetting God's providence. Envy is the sin of forgetting God in the blessings which we already have. Thus, selfishness, pride, worry, and envy are all variations of the prior sin of forgetting God. One must forget God first, before these evils can find a dwelling place in his heart. From the Book of Deuteronomy, God had thundered the quadruple warning, "Beware, lest thou forget Jehovah thy God!" (Deuteronomy 6:12; 8:11, etc.); but Israel had refused to heed it. "She was now completely devoted to the Baals, and at that time was not even trying to worship God with Baalistic rites."[38] God was left completely out of their thoughts. (See more on this under Hosea 13:6.)