Hosea 1:2

At the beginning of Hosea’s ministry, Yahweh commanded him to take a wife of harlotry and to have children of harlotry. The reason the Lord gave for this unusual command was that the land of Israel (i.e., the people of the Northern Kingdom, cf. Hosea 4:1) were committing flagrant harlotry in the sense that they had departed from the Lord to pursue other loves. The Lord used personification to picture the land (i.e., the people of the land) as a woman acting as a prostitute.

Students of this book have understood the phrase "a wife of harlotry" (Heb. ’esheth zenunim) to mean one of four things. These major views fall into two groups: non-literal and literal interpretations.

First, some believe the text means that God gave Hosea a vision or that He told him an allegory in which his wife was or would become a harlot. [Note: E. J. Young, Introduction to the Old Testament, pp. 245-46.] This view avoids the moral problem of God commanding His prophet to marry a woman who was already or would become a harlot. However, there is no indication in the text that this was a visionary experience or an allegorical tale, and there are many details that point to it being a real experience. For example, Hosea recorded the name of his wife and her father’s name (Hosea 1:3). He also named the exact amount that he paid for her (Hosea 3:2).

Second, some interpreters believe that Hosea’s wife became "a wife of harlotry" because she was already or became a worshipper of a false god; her harlotry was spiritual rather than physical. A related view is that she was a spiritual harlot merely by being an Israelite since the Israelites had been unfaithful to Yahweh. [Note: Stuart, pp. 26-27.] Again the details of the story as it unfolds argue for literal sexual unfaithfulness.

Third, it is possible that Hosea’s wife was sexually promiscuous before he married her. [Note: Keil, 1:29, 37; T. E. McComiskey, "Hosea," in The Minor Prophets, pp. 11-17; J. L. Mays, Hosea: A Commentary, p. 26; Longman and Dillard, p. 402; and Warren W. Wiersbe, "Hosea," in The Bible Exposition Commentary/Prophets, p. 316.] Some have even suggested that she may have been a temple prostitute. One writer suggested that she had participated in a Canaanite rite of sexual initiation in preparation for marriage, but this would not likely have made her a harlot. [Note: Wolff, pp. 14-15.] If the Lord meant that Hosea was to marry a harlot, it would have been more natural for Him to say "take to yourself a harlot" (Heb. zonah) or "prostitute." The biggest problem with this view is ethical. It seems very unlikely that God would command His prophet to marry a woman who was already a harlot.

Fourth, the preferred view seems to be that Hosea’s wife became unfaithful to him after they got married, and that Yahweh told him that she would do this before they got married. [Note: Andersen and Freedman, p. 162; Harper, p. 207; Wood, "Hosea," p. 166; idem, The Prophets . . ., p. 279; Robert B. Chisholm Jr., Handbook on the Prophets, p. 337; Freeman, pp. 181-82; and Kaiser, p. 197.] Similarly, God told Moses that Pharaoh would harden his heart and not allow the Israelites to leave Egypt before Moses first went into Pharaoh’s presence (Exodus 3:19). This view posits a situation that was most similar to the relationship that existed between Yahweh and Israel, which Hosea’s marital relations illustrated (cf. Hosea 2:2; Hosea 2:4; Hosea 4:12; Hosea 5:4). Israel became unfaithful to Yahweh after previous faithfulness; Israel was not unfaithful when Yahweh married her (at Sinai). She was a brand new bride freshly redeemed out of Egyptian slavery (cf. Jeremiah 2:2-3). This parallelism suggests that the woman whom Hosea loved again (ch. 3) was Gomer, his original wife. Another view is that two wives are involved, one in chapter 1 and a different one in chapter 3. Discussion of this issue follows under chapter 3.

Another difficulty is the meaning of "children of harlotry." Were these children that Gomer already had? [Note: Keil, 1:29.] Were they children that Hosea would have by Gomer that would prove unfaithful like their mother? [Note: Wood, "Hosea," p. 171.] Or were they born to Hosea and Gomer after she became unfaithful? [Note: McComiskey, pp. 15-16.] Probably the phrase means "children of a wife who is marked by harlotry." [Note: Andersen and Freedman, p. 168; and Kaiser, p. 197.] It seems to me that the children in view were the children born to Hosea and Gomer, and they became known as children of harlotry when their mother became a harlot.

"In ancient Israelite society harlots were chiefly foreigners." [Note: McComiskey, p. 19.]