Hosea 11:5-9

5-7. All this loving-kindness Israel met with shameful ingratitude; therefore judgment, in the form of an exile, will surely come (Hosea 8:13; Hosea 9:3).

He [“they”] shall not return into… Egypt An evident contradiction of Hosea 8:13; Hosea 9:3-6; Hosea 11:11. What we would expect is, “they shall return to Egypt.” LXX. removes this difficulty by connecting the word translated not with the preceding sentence and rendering it for him, which involves the change of one consonant without affecting the pronunciation; but this creates a grammatical difficulty in the preceding clause. Another attempt to remove the difficulty is to read 5a as a rhetorical question: “Shall they not return?” This implies the answer, “They surely shall return.” A rhetorical question, however, seems out of place, and a more natural way out of the difficulty is to omit the negative. Assyria is, as in the other passages, joined with Egypt.

But Hebrew, “and.” The exile will come because Israel failed to turn to Jehovah in repentance and obedience (compare Amos 4:6 ff.).

Hosea 11:7 is the natural continuation of 5b, Hosea 11:6 of 5a. Some omit Hosea 11:6 as a later insertion, but without sufficient reason; nevertheless it is possible that the text has suffered in transmission. Hosea 11:6-7 contain an emphatic and explanatory reiteration of the thought of Hosea 11:5.

Sword The symbol of war (Ezekiel 14:17).

Abide on [“fall upon”] The literal rendering is stronger, rage in, or, whirl about in.

Branches Better R.V., “bars.” Defenses in general (compare Amos 1:5). The meaning of the Hebrew word used here is not quite certain.

Because of their own counsels Compare Hosea 10:6. Modern commentators, almost without exception, consider the text of Hosea 11:7 hopelessly corrupt. The Hebrew is awkward and obscure, and the ancient versions differ both from the Hebrew and from one another. If the text is correct the translations of A.V. and R.V. are on the whole as satisfactory as any; however, the translation of 7b may be improved by reading: “Though they call them upward, none at all will lift himself up.” There is a complete moral apathy, no one even attempts to mend his ways; and this apathy is due to the spirit of apostasy which has taken complete possession of them.

They The prophets.

Called them The people.

To the most High To higher things in morals and religion, It is not necessary even to enumerate the different attempts to improve the text of Hosea 11:7. The reconstruction by Harper may serve as an illustration of the radical character of some of these proposed emendations: “And my people having wearied me with their rebellions, unto the yoke (that is, captivity) Jehovah will appoint them, since he has ceased to love them.”

Justice demands the casting off of Israel. Will the divine love and compassion permit it? Hosea 11:8 pictures the struggle between love and justice. The result is, in a sense, a compromise. Judgment will indeed be executed, but instead of annihilating the nation it will serve to purify it. The judgment having accomplished its disciplinary purpose, Jehovah will visit his people with salvation.

How Introduces an exclamation, not a question.

Give thee up To destruction. The parallel clause is a repetition of the same thought, for the sake of emphasis.

Admah… Zeboim Two cities near Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 10:19; Genesis 14:8), which, according to Deuteronomy 29:23, were destroyed with the cities of the Plain. In Genesis 19:0 nothing is said concerning their overthrow (but compare Genesis 11:25).

Mine heart is turned In sympathy and sorrow (Lamentations 1:20).

My repentings Better, R.V., “my compassions.”

Are kindled together Are thoroughly aroused. G.A. Smith, “my compassions begin to boil.” The same author calls this “the greatest passage in Hosea deepest, if not highest, of his book the breaking forth of that exhaustless mercy of the Most High which no sin of man can bar back nor wear out.”

The outcome of the struggle is expressed in Hosea 11:9.

Not return (or, turn) to destroy Ephraim Though judgment is decreed it will not be executed in the fierceness of the divine wrath. Having chosen and trained Israel for his own purpose, Jehovah cannot now turn around and undo all his former work. Why?

I am God, and not man Jehovah is, “in the grandeur of his covenant steadfastness and long-suffering, removed to an infinite height above the vacillations and impatience of man.” The covenant was intended to be an everlasting covenant, and to it Jehovah must remain faithful.

Holy One Consequently free from the resentments of vengeance. The prophetic conception of the divine holiness is admirably expressed in the words of Kirkpatrick: “Primarily the Hebrew root from which the word is derived seems to denote separation. It represents God as distinct from man, separate from the creation which he has called into existence. Then, since limit is the necessary condition of created things, and imperfection and sinfulness are the marks of humanity in its fallen state, the term grows to denote the separation of God from all that is limited, imperfect, and sinful. But it does not rest here in a merely negative conception. It expands so as to include the whole essential nature of God in its moral aspect.… His purity and his righteousness, his faithfulness and his truth, his mercy and his loving-kindness, nay, even his jealousy and his wrath, his zeal and his indignation these are the different rays which combine to make up his holiness.”

In the midst of thee These words affirm the close relation existing between Jehovah and Israel (compare Isaiah’s “the Holy One of Israel”).

I will not enter into the city A meaningless sentence. R.V., giving an entirely different meaning to the last word, reads “I will not come in wrath” (compare Jeremiah 15:8), which is to be preferred. Some, changing one letter, read, “I will not come to consume.”

Hosea 11:8-9 are in the highest degree anthropomorphic; but it is not proper to infer from this poetic portrayal that Hosea thought of Jehovah as being fickle, and subject to the same mental or spiritual processes as man. He simply attempted to describe vividly and forcibly the love and compassion of Jehovah, the depth of which had been impressed upon him by his own domestic experience; and this he could do only by comparing divine emotions with human emotions, and describing them in language familiar to his hearers.