Immediately after the death of Jeroboam, it soon became apparent on which side the truth lay. There followed an interregnum of from eleven to twelve years.^[1] After the termination of it, Zachariah, the son of Jeroboam, succeeded to the throne; but he was murdered by Shallum, after a short reign of six months, 2 Kings xv. 10. Shallum, after he had reigned only one month, was slain by Menahem, ver. 14. Menahem reigned ten years at Samaria. Under him, the catastrophe was already preparing which brought the kingdom to utter destruction. He became tributary to the Assyrian king Pul, vers. 19-21. He was succeeded by his son Pekahiah, in the fiftieth year of Uzziah. After a reign of two months, he was slain by Pekah, the son of Remaliah, who held the government for twenty years (ver. 27), and, by his alliance with the kings of Syria against his brethren the people of Judah (comp. Is. vii.), hastened on the destruction of Israel. The Assyrians, under Tiglathpileser, called to his assistance by Ahaz, even at that time carried away into captivity part of its citizens,—the tribes who lived on the other side of the Jordan. In the fourth year of Ahaz, Pekah was slain by Hoshea, who, after an interregnum of eight years, began to reign in the twelfth year of Ahaz, xvii. 1. He became tributary to Shalmaneser; and the end of his government of nine years was also the end of the kingdom of the ten tribes. His having sought for an alliance with Egypt drew down, upon himself and his people, the vengeance of the king of Assyria.

We have already proved that the historical references in the prophecies of Hosea extend to the time when the last king of Israel attempted to secure himself against Asshur, by the alliance with Egypt. It is very probable that the book was written at that time. At the time when the sword of the Lord was just being raised to inflict upon Israel the death-blow, Hosea wrote down the sum and substance of what he had prophesied during a long series of years, beginning in the last times of Jeroboam, when, to a superficial view, the people were in the enjoyment of the fullest prosperity. When at the threshold of their final fulfilment, he condensed and wrote down his prophecies, just as, in the annus fatalis, the fourth year of Jehoiakim, Jeremiah, according to chap. xxv., gave a survey of what he had prophesied over Judah during twenty-three years.

In the prophecies of Hosea, as in those of Amos, the threatening character prevails. The number of the elect in Israel was small, and the judgment was at hand. In Jeremiah and Ezekiel, too, the prophecies, previous to the destruction, are mainly minatory. It was only after the wrath of God had been manifested in deeds, that the stream of promise brake forth without hindrance. Hosea, nevertheless, does not belie his name, by which he had been dedicated to the helping and saving God, and which he had received, non sine numine. (הושע, properly the Inf. Abs. of ישע, is, in substance, equivalent to Joshua, i.e., the Lord is help.) Zeal for the Lord fills and animates him, not only in the energy of his threatenings, but also in the intensity and strength of his conviction of the pardoning mercy and healing love of the Lord, which will, in the end, prevail. In this respect, Hosea is closely connected with the Song of Solomon—that link in the chain of Holy Scripture into which he had, in the first instance, to fit. There are in Hosea undeniable references to the Song of Solomon. (Compare my Comment. on the Song of Solomon, on chap. i. 4, ii. 3.) It is certainly not by accident that the brighter views appear with special clearness at the beginning, in chap. i. 3 (compare ii. 1-3, 16-25 [i. 10, ii. 1, 14-23], iii. 5), and at the close, xiv. 2-10 (1-9), where the fundamental thought is expressed in ver. 4 (3): "For in Thee the fatherless findeth mercy." But even in the darker middle portions, they sometimes suddenly break through; compare v. 15, vi. 3, where the subject is: "He teareth and He healeth us; He smiteth and He bindeth up;" vi. 11, where, after the threatening against Israel, we suddenly find the words: "Nevertheless, O Judah! He grants thee a harvest, when I (i.e., the Lord) return to the prison of My people." (Judah is here mentioned as the main portion of the people, in whom mercy is bestowed upon the whole, and in whose salvation the other tribes also share.) Compare also xi. 8-11, where we have this thought: After wrath, mercy; the Covenant-people can never, like the world, be altogether borne down by destructive judgments; xiii. 14, where the strong conviction of the absolutely imperishable nature of the Congregation of the Lord finds utterance in the words, "I will ransom them from the hand of hell; I will redeem them from death: O death! where is thy plague? O hell! where is thy pestilence? repentance is hid from Mine eyes." Simson is perplexed "by the sudden transition of the discourse, in this passage, from threatening to promise,—and this without even any particle to indicate the mutual relation of the sentences and thoughts." But the same phenomenon occurs also in vi. 11 (compare Micah ii. 12, 13), where, likewise, several expositors are perplexed by the suddenness and abruptness of the transition. It is explained from the circumstance, that behind even the darkest clouds of wrath which have gathered over the Congregation of the Lord, there is, nevertheless, concealed the sun of mercy. In the prophets, it sometimes breaks through suddenly and abruptly; but in this they are at one with history, in which the deepest darkness of the night is oftentimes suddenly illuminated by the shining of the Lord: "And at midnight there was a cry made: Behold, the bridegroom cometh."

The sum and substance of Hosea's prophetic announcement is the following:—Israel falls, through Asshur: Judah, the main tribe, shall be preserved from destruction in this catastrophe. (The prophet's tender care for Judah is strikingly brought out in his exhortation to Israel, in iv. 15, that they should desist from their compromises in religion, and that, if they chose to commit sin, they should rather desert the Lord altogether, lest by their hypocrisy Judah also should be seduced and infected.) But at a later period, Judah too is to fall under the divine judgment (ii. 2 [i. 11], where it is supposed that Judah shall also be carried away into captivity; v. 5: "Israel and Ephraim fall by their iniquity, Judah also falleth with them;" v. 12: "I am unto Ephraim as a moth, and to the house of Judah as rottenness;" compare also xii. 1, 3), although the immediate instruments of the judgment upon Judah are not mentioned by Hosea. But the judgments which the two houses of Israel draw upon themselves by their works (ii. 2 [i. 11], iii. 5, indicate that even Judah will, at some future time, rebel against the house of David) shall be followed by the deliverance to be accomplished by grace. Judah and Israel shall, in the future, be again gathered together under one head, ii. 2 (i. 11); a glorious king out of David's house not only restores what was lost, but also raises the Congregation of the Lord to a decree of glory never before conceived of, iii. 5: "Afterwards shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God, and David their King, and shall fear the Lord and His goodness in the latter days."

The peculiarity of the Messianic prophecies of Hosea, as compared with those of the time of David and Solomon, consists in the connection of the promise with threatenings of judgments, and in the Messiah's appearing as the light of those who walk in the deepest darkness of the divine judgments. It was necessary that this progress should have been made in the Messianic announcements, before the breaking in of the divine judgments; for, otherwise, the hope of the Messiah would have been extinguished by them, because it was but too natural to consider the former as, in fact, an annihilation of these dreamy hopes. But now there was offered to the elect a staff on which they might support themselves, and walk with confidence through the dark valley of the shadow of death.

The Book of Hosea may be divided into two parts, according to the two principal periods of the prophet's ministry,—under Jeroboam, when the external condition was as yet prosperous, and the bodily eye did not as yet perceive anything of the storms of divine wrath which were gathering,—and under the following kings, down to Hosea, when the punishment had already begun, and was hastening, by rapid strides, towards its consummation.—Another difference, although a subordinate one, is this:—that the first part, which comprehends the first three chapters, contains prophecies connected with a symbol, while the second part contains direct prophecies which have no such connection. A similar division occurs in Amos also,—with this difference, that there, the symbolical prophecies form the conclusion. The first part may be considered as a kind of outline, which all the subsequent prophecies served to fill up; just as may the 6th chapter in Isaiah, and the first and second in Ezekiel. We shall give a complete exposition of this section, as it will afford us a vivid view of the whole position of Hosea, and as it is just there that the Messianic announcement meets us in its most developed form.

THE SECTION CHAP. I.-III.

The question which here above all engages our attention, and requires to be answered, is this: Whether that which is reported in these chapters did, or did not, actually and outwardly take place. The history of the inquiries connected with this question is found most fully in Marckius's "Diatribe de uxore fornicationum," Leyden, 1696, reprinted in the Commentary on the Minor Prophets by the same author. The various views may be divided into three classes.

1. It is maintained by very many interpreters, that all the events here narrated took place actually and outwardly. This opinion was advanced with the greatest confidence by Theodoret, Cyril of Alexandria, and Augustine from among the Fathers of the Church; by most interpreters belonging to the Lutheran and Reformed Churches (e.g. Manger); most recently, by Stuck, Hofmann (Weissag u. Erf. S. 206), and, to a certain extent, by Ewald also, who supposes "a free representation of an event actually experienced by the prophet."

2. Others consider it as a parabolical representation. Thus does Calvin, who expressly opposes the supposition not only of an external, but also of an internal event. He explains it thus: "When the prophet began to teach, he commenced thus: The Lord has placed me here as on a stage, that I might tell you, I have taken a wife," etc. Entirely similar was the opinion of the Chaldee Paraphrast, by whom the words, "Go," etc., are thus paraphrased: "Go and prophesy against the inhabitants of the adulterous city." Of a like purport is the view held, from among recent interpreters, by Rosenmüller, Hitzig ("that which the prophet describes as actual, is only a fiction"), Simson and others. The strange opinion of Luther, which, out of too great respect, was adopted by a few later theologians (Osiander, Gerhard, Tarnovius), is only a modification of this. It is to the effect, that the prophet had only ascribed to his own chaste wife the name and works of an adulteress, and, hence, had performed with her, before the people, a kind of play. (Compare, against this view, Buddeus, de peccatis typicis in the Misc. s. t. i. p. 262.) The same opinion is expressed by Umbreit: "His own wife is implicated in the general guilt, and hence she is a representative of the whole people." In opposition to this view, compare Simson's Commentary.

3. Others suppose that the prophet narrates events which took place actually, indeed, but not outwardly. This opinion was, considering the time at which it was advanced, very ably defended by Jerome in Epist. ad Pammachium, and in his commentary on chap. i. 8. According to Rufinus, all those in Palestine and Egypt who respected the authority of Origen, asserted that the marriage took place only in spirit. The difficulties attaching to the first view were made especially obvious by the ridicule of the Manicheans (Faustus and Secundinus in Augustine, t. vi. p. 575) on this narrative. The most accomplished Jewish scholars (Maimonides in the More Nebuch. p. ii. c. 46, Abenezra, Kimchi) support this opinion. Some new arguments in defence of it have been adduced by Marckius.

Of these three views:—actually and outwardly; neither outwardly nor actually; actually, but not outwardly,—the second must be at once rejected. Those who hold it supply, "God has commanded me to tell you." But there is not the slightest intimation of such an ellipsis; and those interpreters have no better right to supply it in this, than in any other narrative. There is before us action, and nothing but action, without any intimation whatsoever that it is merely an invention.

But the following arguments are decisive in favour of the third, and against the first view.

1. The defenders of an outward transaction rely, in support of their view, upon the supposition, that their interpretation is most obvious and natural;—that they are thus, as it were, in the possession of the ground, and in a position from which they can be driven only by the most cogent reasons;—that if the transaction had been internal, it would have been necessary for the prophet to have expressly marked it as such. But precisely the reverse of all this is the case. The most obvious supposition is, that the symbolical action took place in vision. If certain actions of the prophets, especially seeing, hearing, and their speaking to the Lord, etc., must be conceived of as having taken place inwardly, unless there be distinct indications of the opposite, why not the remainder also? For the former presupposes that the world in which the prophets move, is altogether different from the ordinary one; that it is not the outward, but the spiritual world. It is certainly not a matter of chance, that the seeing in the case of the prophets must be understood spiritually; and if there be a reason for this, the same reason entitles us to assert that the walking, etc., also took place inwardly only. By what right could we make any difference between the actions of others, described by the prophet, and his own? Vision and symbolical action are not opposed to each other; the former is only the genus comprehending the latter as a species. By this we do not at all mean to assert, that all the symbolical actions of the prophets took place in inward vision only. An inward transaction always lay at the foundation; but sometimes, and when it was appropriate, they embodied it in an outward representation also (1 Kings xx. 35 seq., xxii. 11; Jer. xix. xxviii.; and a similar remarkable instance from modern times, in Croesi Hist. Quakeriana, p. 13). For this very reason, however, this argument cannot be altogether decisive by itself; but it furnishes, at least, a presumptive proof, and that by no means unimportant. If regularly and naturally the transaction be internal only, then the opposite requires to be proved in this case. If this had been admitted, no attempt would have been made elsewhere also, e.g., Is. xx., by false and forced interpretations to explain away the supposition of a merely internal transaction.

2. No one will certainly venture to assert that a merely internal transaction would have missed its aim, since there exists a multitude of symbolical actions, in regard to which it is undeniable, and universally admitted, that they took place internally only. For the inward action, being narrated and committed to writing, retained the advantage of vividness and impressiveness over the naked representation of the same truth. Sometimes, in the case of actions concentrated into a single moment, this advantage may be still further increased by the inward transaction being represented outwardly also. But, here, just the opposite would take place. We have here before us a symbolical transaction which, if it had been performed outwardly, would have continued for several years. The separation of the single events would have prevented its being taken in at a single view, and have thus deprived it of its impressiveness. But, what is still more important, the natural substratum would have occupied the attention so much more than the idea, that the latter would have been thereby altogether overlooked. The domestic affairs of the prophet would have become the subject of a large amount of tittle-tattle, and the idea would have been remembered only to give greater point to the ridicule.

3. The command of God, when considered as referring to an outward transaction, cannot be, by any means, justified. This is most glaringly obvious, if we understand this command, as several do, to mean that the prophet should beget children with an unchaste woman, and without legitimate marriage. Every one will sympathize with the indignation expressed by Buddeus (l. c. p. 206) against Thomas Aquinas, who, following this view, maintains that the law of God had been, in this special case, repealed by His command. God Himself cannot set us free from His commands; they are an expression of His nature, an image of His holiness. To ascribe arbitrariness to God in this respect, would be to annihilate the idea of God, and the idea of the Law at the same time. This view, it is true, is so decidedly erroneous as to require no further refutation; but even the opinion of Buddeus and others presents insurmountable difficulties. They suppose that the prophet had married a woman who was formerly unchaste. In opposition to this, Calvin very strikingly remarks: "It seems not to be consistent with reason, that God should spontaneously have rendered His prophet contemptible; for how could he ever have appeared in public after such ignominy had been inflicted upon him? If he had married such a wife, as here described, he ought rather to have hidden himself all his lifetime than have assumed the prophetic office." In Lev. xxi. 7 the law forbids the priests to take a wife that is a whore, or profane. That which, according to the letter, referred to the priests only, is applicable, in its spirit, to the prophets also,—yea, to them in a higher degree, as will be seen immediately, when the ordinance is reduced to its idea. The latter is easily inferred from the reason stated, viz., that the priests should be holy to their God. The servants of God must represent His holiness; they are, therefore, not allowed, by so close a contact with sin, to defile or desecrate themselves either inwardly or outwardly. Although the inward pollution may be prevented in individual cases by a specially effective assistance of divine grace, yet there always remains the outward pollution.

It is inconceivable that, at the very commencement of his ministry, God should have commanded to the prophet anything, the inevitable effect of which was to mar its successful execution. Several—and especially Manger—who felt the difficulties of this interpretation, substituted for it another, by which, as they imagined, all objections were removed. The prophet, they say, married a person who had formerly been chaste, and fell only after her marriage. This view is no doubt the correct one, as is obvious from the relation of the figure to the reality. According to ver. 2, it is to be expressed figuratively that the people went a-whoring from Jehovah. The spiritual adultery presupposes that the spiritual marriage had already been concluded. Hence, the wife can be called a whoring wife, only on account of the whoredom which she practised after her marriage. This is confirmed by chap. iii. 1, where the more limited expression "to commit adultery" is substituted for "to whore," which has a wider sense, and comprehends adultery also. The former unchastity of the wife would be without any meaning, yea, would be in direct contradiction to the real state of the case. For before the marriage concluded at Sinai, Israel was devoted to the Lord in faithful love; comp. Jer. ii. 2: "I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, thy walking after Me in the wilderness, in a land not sown." Compare also Ezek. xvi., where Israel, before her marriage, appears as a virgo intacta. But how correct soever this view may be—and every other view perverts the whole position—it is, nevertheless, erroneous to suppose that thereby all difficulties are removed. All which has been urged against the former view, may be urged here also. It might have been better for the prophet to have married one who was previously unchaste, in the hope that her subsequent better life might wipe out her former shame, than one previously chaste, who was required to become unchaste, and to remain so for a long time, because, otherwise, the symbolical action would have lost all its significance. The objection brought forward, that whatever is unbecoming as an outward action, is so likewise though it were only an internal action, can scarcely be meant to be in earnest. For, in this case, every one knew that the prophet was a mere type; and, with regard to his wife, this circumstance was so obvious, that mockery certainly gave way to shame and confusion. But a marriage outwardly entered into is never purely typical. It has always its significance apart from the typical import, and must be justifiable, independently of its typical character. Ridicule would, in this case, have been not only too obvious, but to a certain extent also well founded.

4. If the action had taken place only outwardly, it would have been impossible to explain the abrupt transition from the symbolical action to the mere figure, and again to the entirely naked representation as we find it here, and vice versa. In the first chapter, the symbolical action is pretty well maintained; but in the prophecy ii. 1-3 (i. 10-ii. 1), which belongs to the same section, it is almost entirely lost sight of. As the corporeal adultery, and rejection in consequence of it, were to be the type of the spiritual adultery and rejection, so the receiving again of the wife, rejected on account of her faithlessness, but now reformed, was to typify the Lord's granting mercy to the people. But of this, not a trace is found. And yet, we are not at liberty to say that the ground of it lies in a difference betwixt the type and the thing typified,—in the circumstance that the wife of the prophet did not reform. If there existed such a difference, the type could not have been chosen at all. The contrary appears also from ii. 9 (7).—In the whole second section, ii. 4-25 (ii. 2-23), regard is indeed had to the symbolical action; but in a manner so free, that it dwindles away to a mere figure, from behind which the thing itself is continually coming into view. In chap. iii. the symbolical action again acquires greater prominence. These phenomena can be accounted for, only if the transaction be viewed as an inward one. In the case of an outward transaction, the transition from the symbolical action to the figure, and from the figure to the thing itself, would not have been so easy. The substratum of the idea is, in that case, far more material, and the idea itself too closely bound to it.

5. When the transaction is viewed as an outward one, insurmountable difficulties are presented by the third chapter; and the argument drawn from this would, in itself, be quite sufficient to settle the question: "Then the Lord said unto me. Go again, love a woman beloved of her friend and an adulteress." Interpreters who have adopted that view, find themselves here in no little embarrassment. Several suppose that the woman, whom the prophet is here commanded to love, is his former wife, Gomer,—with her he should get reconciled. But this is quite out of the question. In opposition to it, there is, first, the indefinite signification by אשה; then, in ver. 2, there is the purchase of the woman,—which supposes that she had not yet been in the possession of the husband; and, further, the words, "beloved of her friend, and an adulteress," can, according to a sound interpretation, mean only, "who, although she is beloved by her faithful husband, will yet commit adultery;" so that, if it be referred to the reunion with Gomer, we should be compelled to suppose that, after being received again, she again became unfaithful,—and in favour of this opinion, no corresponding feature can be pointed out in the thing typified. Lastly,—The word "love" cannot mean "love again," "restitue amoris signa." For the love of the prophet to his wife must correspond with the love of God to the people of Israel. That this love, however, cannot be limited to the love which God will show to the Congregation after her conversion, is seen from the additional clause, "And they turn themselves to other gods, and love grape-cakes." Hence it appears that the love of God continues even during the unfaithfulness, and consequently, also, the love of the prophet, by which it is typified.—Equally untenable is the other opinion, that the prophet is here called upon, by his entering into a new marriage, to prefigure the relation of God to the Covenant-people a second time. In that case, it is supposed either that Gomer had been rejected, because she would not return, or that she had died. In either case, however, she would not have been chosen by God to be a type of the people of Israel. The ground of this choice can be no other than the correspondence with the antitype. But this would be wanting just in the most important point. If the ungodly part of the nation were not to be deprived of all hope, nor the pious of all consolation, it was of special importance to point out that even the rejected congregation would receive mercy; that the Lo-Ruhamah should be the Ruhamah. Just the reverse of all this, however, would, according to this view, have been typified. Two different women would, quite naturally, suggest the thought of two different nations. Moreover, the non-conversion of Gomer would be in direct opposition to the prophet's own expressions. There cannot be any doubt, that her relation to the prophet still lies at the foundation of the description in ii. 4 seqq. For they are her three children whose former names, announcing disaster, are changed, in ver. 25 (23), into such as are significant of salvation. In vers. 4-6 (2-4) the whole relation, as previously described, is presupposed. But now, she who, in ver. 9 (7), says, "I will go and return to my first husband, for then was it better with me than now," is the same who said in ver. 7 (5), "I will go after my lovers that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax." To the same result we are also led by the showing of mercy to her children, announced in the first section, ii. 1-3 (i. 10-ii. 1), where the prophet alludes to their names; and still more distinctly in the second section; compare ver. 25 (23). But now, the showing of mercy to the children cannot be conceived of without the conversion of the mother, and mercy being subsequently shown to her also. As they are to be rejected on account of the unfaithfulness of the mother (compare ii. 6 [4], and, specially, the כי at the commencement of ver. 7), so the ground of their being received into favour can only be the faithfulness of the mother. Being begotten in adultery, they stand in connection with the prophet only through the mother; as soon as he has rejected the mother, he has nothing further to do with them.—The supposition that Gomer had died, is evidently the result of an embarrassment which finds itself compelled to invent such fictions.—Finally,—Several interpreters, after the example of Augustine, suppose that no marriage at all is here spoken of, but only a certain kindness which the prophet should manifest to some woman, in order to encourage her conversion. But this opinion is contradicted by these circumstances:—that the prophet's love towards the woman must necessarily be of the same extent, and of the same nature, as the love of God towards the people of Israel, since the אהב and the כאהבת exactly correspond with each other; that only conjugal love is suitable to the image; that this view falls, of itself, to the ground when רֵעַ is referred to the prophet, as it must be; that, in such circumstances, no satisfactory account can be given of the purchase of the woman, etc. To all these suppositions there is, moreover, the common objection that, according to them, no account can be given of the omission of very important circumstances which the prophet leaves to his hearers and readers to supply from the preceding symbolical action. Two things only are pointed out, viz., the appropriation of the woman by the prophet, ver. 2, and the course which he pursues for her reformation, ver. 3. Every intervening circumstance—the criminal, long-continued unfaithfulness of the wife—is passed over in silence. If we suppose an outward action, this circumstance cannot be accounted for. For we are not at liberty to draw, from the first case, any inference bearing upon the second. The latter would again have required a complete account. But if we suppose an inward transaction, everything is easily explained. The question as to whether it was Gomer, or some other person, does not come up at all. If Gomer was only an ideal person, that which applied to her was equally applicable to the second ideal wife of the prophet; since both typified the same thing, and without having an independent existence of their own, came into consideration as types only. Thus, very naturally, the second description was supplemented from the first, and the prophet was allowed abruptly to point out those circumstances only which were of special importance in the case before him.

6. If the whole be viewed as an outward transaction, there arises a difficulty, by no means inconsiderable, as regards the children mentioned in chap. i. These had been begotten in adultery. Even although the mother did reform, they could yet never be considered by the prophet as, in the full sense, his own. There would then arise a great difference between the type and the thing typified. But if we suppose a transaction merely inward, this difficulty vanishes. The physical impossibility then no longer comes into consideration. That which is possible in the thing typified, viz., that those who formerly were not children of God, become children of God, is transferred to the type. In point of fact, the mother does not exist beside, and apart from, the children; she stands related to them as the whole to the parts; and hence it is, that in ii. 25 (23), the mother and children are imperceptibly blended in the prophet's description.

7. We are led to the idea of a mere inward transaction by the symbolical names of the first wife, and of her father. On the other hand, if such a symbolical signification could not be proved, this might be used as an argument for the literal interpretation,—although, indeed, it would be only a single argument which would be obliged to yield to other counter-arguments. For it may well be conceived that the prophet, in order to give to the inward transaction more of the appearance of an outward one, should have chosen names usual at that time; just as, in a similar manner, poetry would not be satisfied with invented names used only in certain formulas and proverbs, but makes use of names which would not, at once, be recognised by every one as mere fictions.—גֹּמֶר can only mean "completion" in the passive sense. For Segolate-forms in o are only used to express passive and intransitive notions, and the verb גמר is found in the signification "to be completed," in Ps. vii. 10, xii. 2. The sense in which the woman, the type of the Israelitish people, is called completion,—i.e., one who, in her whoredom, had proceeded to the highest pitch,—is so obvious from the context, as to render nugatory the argument which Maurer (p. 360) has drawn from the omission of express statements on this point, in order thereby to recommend his own interpretation, which is altogether opposed to the laws of the language. A significant proper name can, in any case, convey only an allusion; but such an allusion was here quite sufficient, inasmuch as the mention of the wife's whoredom had preceded. Compare, moreover, Zech. v. 5-11, where the thought, that Israel had filled up the measure of their sins, is represented by a woman sitting in an Ephah. Hofmann explains the name Gomer by "end," "utmost ruin:" "By luxury, Israel has become wanton, and hence it must come to an end, to utter ruin." But this interpretation is at variance with the context, from which it must necessarily be derived; for it is not the punishment, but the guilt which is spoken of in the context. גמר, "Completion" (compare the גמיר, "perfectus," "absolutus," in Ezra vii. 12), is equivalent to אשת זנונים, "a wife of whoredom." The בת דבלים can only mean, "daughter of the two fig-cakes," = filia deliciarum = deliciis dedita. The word "daughter" serves to indicate every relation of dependence and submission: Gesenius, Thesaurus, p. 220. Fig-cakes were considered as one of the greatest dainties; compare Faber on Harmar. i. p. 320 ff. Sensuality was the ground of the Israelites' apostasy from the severe and strict religion of Jehovah to the idolatry of their neighbours, which was soft, sensual, and licentious. The occasion which had called it forth with their neighbours was one which rendered them favourably disposed towards it. The masculine form can offer no difficulty as to the derivation from דבלה, "fig-cake;" for the masculine form of the plural occurs also in 1 Sam. xxv. 18; 1 Chron. xii. 40. As little difficulty can arise from the Dual form, which may be explained from the circumstance that fig-cakes commonly consisted of a double layer of figs, or of double cakes (Hesych. παλάθη—which Greek word is a corruption of the Hebrew דבלה—ἡ τῶν σύκων ἐπάλληλος θέσις), and the Dual is used in reference to objects which are commonly conceived of as a whole, consisting of two parts, even when several of them are spoken of. That this explanation of the Dual is correct, is proved from the circumstance, that it occurs also as the name of a Moabitish town, Beth-Dibhlathaim, Jer. xlviii. 22, and Dibhlathaim, Num. xxxiii. 46, which, probably, was famous for its fig-cakes.—There existed another special reason for the prophet's choosing the Dual in the masculine form, viz., that there was the analogy of other proper names of men—as Ephraim, etc.—in its favour; and such an analogy was required,—for, otherwise, the name would not have been, as it was intended to be, a riddle. Our whole exposition, however, which was already in substance, although without proper foundation and justification, advanced by Jerome, is raised above the condition of a mere hypothesis, by its being compared with chap. iii. There, the words, "They turn themselves to other gods, and love grape-cakes," are a mere paraphrasis of "Gomer Bath Dibhlaim." It scarcely needs to be remarked, that the difference betwixt grape-cakes and fig-cakes does not here come into consideration at all, inasmuch as both belonged to the choicest dainties; and it is as evident, that "to love," and "to be the daughter of," express the same idea. But if thus the symbolical signification of the name be established, the correctness of the supposition of a merely internal transaction is established at the same time. The symbolical names of the children alone could not have furnished a sufficient foundation for this supposition. Against this an appeal might, with the most perfect propriety, have been made to Shear-Jashub, and Maher-shalal-hash-baz, neither of whom can, by any means, have been an ideal person. The prophet gave them these names; but the matter is quite different in the case of the wife, who already had her name when the prophet took her. All that we can grant to Hofmann is, that such a providential coincidence was possible; but probable it could be, only if other decisive arguments favoured the view of the transaction having been an outward one. If the name were not symbolical—if it belonged to the real wife of the prophet, it cannot be easily explained, why he did not afterwards mention the name of his second wife also, but content himself with the general term, "a wife."

8. A main argument against the literal interpretation is further furnished by iii. 2. The verse is commonly translated: "And then I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and an homer of barley, and a lethech of barley;" and is explained from the custom prevalent in the East of purchasing wives from their parents. But it is very doubtful whether the verb כרה has the signification "to purchase." There is no necessity for deviating from the common signification "to dig," in Deut. ii. 6: "And water also ye shall dig from them for money, and drink" (compare Exod. xxi. 33); the existing wells were not sufficient for so great a multitude, compare Gen. xxvi. 19, 21, 22. To this philological reason, we must further add, that the circumstance would be here altogether destitute of significance, while every other feature in the description is full of meaning. We base our interpretation upon the supposition, already sufficiently established by J. D. Michaelis, that the whole purchase-money amounted to thirty shekels, of which the prophet paid one-half in money, and the other half in the value of money. According to Ezek. xlv. 11, the homer contained ten ephahs, and a lethech was the half of an homer. We have thus fifteen pieces of silver, and also fifteen ephahs; and the supposition is very probable that, at that time, an ephah of barley cost a shekel,—the more so, as according to 2 Kings vii. 1, 16, 18, in the time of a declining famine, and only relative cheapness, two-thirds of an ephah of barley cost a shekel. We are unable to say with certainty, why one-half was paid in money, and the other half in natural productions; but a reason certainly exists, as no other feature is without significance. Perhaps it was determined by custom, that the sum by which servants were purchased was paid after this manner. The lowness of their condition was thereby indicated; for barley, vile hordeum, was, in all antiquity, very little esteemed. Upon this estimate of it was based its use at the jealousy offering (Num. v. 11 seqq.; compare Bähr's Symb. ii. S. 445), and the symbolical use of the barley-bread in Judg. vii. 13. The statement of the sum leads us, involuntarily, to think of slaves or servants. It is the same sum which was commonly given for a man-servant, or a maid-servant, as is expressly mentioned in Exod. xxi. 32; compare the remarks on Zech. xi. 12. And this opinion is confirmed by the use of ואכרה. The ears of a servant who was bound to his master to perpetual obedience, were bored; compare Exod. xxxi. 5, 6; Deut. xv. 17, where it is added: "And also unto thy maid-servant thou shalt do likewise." In conformity with the custom of omitting the special members of the body, in expressions frequently occurring, it is said simply "to bore." The meaning then is: I made her my slave. It was not a free woman, then, whom the prophet desired in marriage, but a servant, whom he was obliged, previous to marriage, to redeem from servitude; who was therefore under a double obligation to him, and over whom he had a double claim. The reference to the thing to be typified is quite apparent. It was not a free, independent people whom the Lord chose, but a people whom He was obliged first to redeem from vile servitude, before He entered into a nearer relation to them. This redemption appears, throughout, as a ransoming from the house of bondage,—and the wonderful dealings of the Lord, as the price which He paid. Compare, e.g., Deut. vii. 8: "But because the Lord loved you, and because He kept His oath which He had sworn to your fathers, He has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed thee (ויפדך) from the house of bondmen (מבית עבדים), from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt." See also Deut. ix. 26. It is upon this redemption that the exhortation to the people is founded—that, as the Lord's servants, they should serve Him alone; comp., e.g., the introduction to the Decalogue. Thus, we have here also a feature so evidently typical, so plainly transferred from the thing typified to the type, that we cannot any longer think of an outward transaction. This argument, however, is, in the main point, quite independent of the philological interpretation of כרה. Even if it be translated "I bought her to me," the circumstance, notwithstanding, always remains, that the wife was redeemed from slavery, unless there be a denial of the connection of the sum mentioned with Exod. xxi. 32, and Zech. xi. 12, where the thirty pieces of silver likewise appear as the estimate of a servant's value; and this circumstance evidently suggests the inward character of the transaction.

The first germs of the representation of God's relation to Israel under the figure of marriage, are found so early as in the Pentateuch, Exod. xxxiv. 15, 16; Lev. xx. 5, 6, xvii. 7; Num. xiv. 33—where idolatry, and apostasy from the Lord in general, are represented as whoredom—Deut. xxxii. 16, 21; compare the author's Dissertations on the Genuineness of the Pent. vol. i. p. 107 ff.; and commentary on the Song of Solomon, S. 261. But it was only through the Song of Solomon that it became quite a common thing to represent the higher love under the figure of the lower. It is not through accident that this representation appears so prominent just in Hosea, where it not only pervades the first three chapters, but returns continually in the second part also. Hosea, being one of the oldest prophets, was specially called to fit, as a new link, into the Song of Solomon, which was the last link in the chain of Sacred Literature. There are, moreover, in the details, other undeniable references to the Song of Solomon, which coincide with this connection with it, as regards the fundamental idea. The basis, however, for this whole figurative representation is Gen. ii. 24, where marriage appears as the most intimate of all earthly relations of love, and must, for this very reason, have a character of absolute exclusiveness.

CHAP. I.-II. 3 (II. 1).

The section chap. i.-iii. is distinguished from the other prophecies by this,—that, in it, the relation of the Lord to the people of Israel Is represented, throughout, under the figure and symbol of marriage, whilst this same mode of representation is soon relinquished wherever else it occurs in the book. By this closer limitation, the objections of Böckel and Stuck to the common division of the collection into two parts, are set aside. This first portion may be divided into three parts, which are, in one respect, closely connected, as is shown by the Fut. with the Vav Conv. in iii. 1, and likewise by the fact that this chapter requires to be supplemented from the two preceding ones, while, in another respect, they may be considered as wholes, complete in themselves. They do not, by any means, so distribute the contents among themselves, as that the first describes the apostasy; the second, the punishment; and the third, the return and restoration; but each of them contains all these three features, and yet in such a manner, that here the one feature, and there the other, is more fully expanded; so that the whole description is complete, only when all the three parts are taken together. In the portion now before us, the covenant relation into which the Lord entered with Israel is typified by a marriage which the prophet contracted at the command of the Lord; the apostasy of the people, and especially of the ten tribes, to whom the prophet was sent in the first instance, is typified by the adultery of the wife, by the divine punishment, and the unpropitious names which he gives to the children born by the adulterous wife. In chap. ii. 1-3, there follows the announcement of salvation more directly, and only with a simple allusion to the symbol.

Ver. 1. "The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel. Ver. 2. At the beginning when the Lord spake to Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea: Go take unto thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms; for the land is whoring away from the Lord."

דִּבֶּר is never a noun—not even in Jer. v. 13—but always the 3d pers. Pret. Piel. The status constr. תחלת is explained by the fact, that the whole of the following sentence is treated as one substantive idea: the beginning "of the Lord hath spoken," etc., for "the beginning of speaking." יום דבר יהוה, the day of "the Lord spoke," instead of, "the day on which the Lord spoke." Similar constructions occur also in Is. xxix. 1, and Jer. xlviii. 6.—The Fut. with Vav Conv., ויאמר, "and then He spoke," carries forward the discourse, as if there had preceded: the Lord began to speak to Hosea. There is here a constructio ad sensum. It is intentionally, and in order the more distinctly to point out the idea of the beginning, that the prophet has made use of the noun תחלת, not of the verb. The construction of דבר with ב, with the signification "to speak to some one," may be explained thus:—that the words are, as it were, put into the mind of the hearer in order that they may remain there. Several interpreters erroneously translate, "spoke through:" others, following Jerome (the last is Simson), "spoke in;" as if thereby the act of speaking were to be designated as an inward one. The difference between outward and inward speaking disappears in the vision; and, for this reason, we cannot imagine that there is any intention of here noticing it particularly. Everything which takes place in the vision is substantially, indeed, internal, but in point of form it is external. Moreover, דבר with ב several times occurs in other passages also, where the signification, "to speak to some one," is alone admissible. Thus 1 Sam. xxv. 39, where Simson's explanation, "David sent and ordered to speak about Abigail," is set aside by ver. 40. The analogy of the construction of the verbs of hearing and seeing with ב is likewise in favour of our explanation.^[1]—A wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms. The wife belongs to whoredoms in so far as she is devoted to them; the children, in so far as they proceed from them. For we cannot suppose that the children themselves are described as given to whoredom. Such a thought would here be altogether out of place. For whoredom is here only the general designation of adultery, as, by way of applying it to the case in question, it is immediately subjoined, "away from Jehovah." The subject of consideration is only the relation of the wife and children to the prophet, as the type of the Lord; and with this view, it is only the origin of the children from an adulterous wife which can be of importance. That this alone is regarded, appears from ii. 6 (4), compared with ver. 7 (5). That the children, as children of whoredoms, deserve no compassion, is founded upon the fact that their mother plays the harlot. אשת זנונים is stronger than זונה; it expresses the idea that the woman is given, soul and body, to whoredoms. The same emphasis is expressed also by the analogous designations: man of blood, of deceit, etc.—Calvin says, "She is called a wife of whoredoms, because she was long accustomed to them, gave herself over to the lusts of all indiscriminately, did not prostitute herself once, or twice, or to a few, but to the debauchery of every one." It is not without reason that "take" is connected with the children also. The prophet shall, as it were, receive and take, along with the wife, those who, without his agency, have been born of her. It is self-evident, and has been, moreover, formerly proved, that we cannot speak of children who were previously born of the prophet's wife; but that, on the contrary, the children are they whose birth is narrated in ver. 4 seqq. And that we cannot consider these children as children of the prophet, as is done by several interpreters (Drus.: "Accipe uxorem et suscipe ex eâ liberos"), is obvious from their being designated "children of whoredoms;" from the word "take" itself, which is expressive of the passive conduct of the prophet; from the fact that, in the subsequent verses, the conceiving and bearing of the wife are alone constantly spoken of, but never, as in Is. viii. 3, the begetting by the prophet; and, finally, from the relation of the type to the thing typified. By the latter, it is absolutely required that children and mother stand in the same relation of alienation from the legitimate husband and father. The words in ver. 3, "She bare him a son," are not indeed in opposition to it, for these words are only intended to mark the deceit of the wife who offers to her husband the children begotten in adultery, as if they were his, and, at the same time, to bring out the patience and forbearance of the husband who receives them, and brings them up as if they were his, although he knows that they are not. In like manner, the Lord treated, for centuries, the rebellious Israelites as if they were His children, and granted to them the inheritance which was destined only for the children, along with so many other blessings, until at length He declared them to be bastards, by carrying them away into captivity. The last words state the ground of the symbolical action. The causal כי is explained from the fact that the import of a symbolical action is also its ground. The Inf. absol. preceding the tempus finitum gives special emphasis to the verbal idea. The prophet thereby indicates that, in using the expression "to whore," he does so deliberately, and because it corresponds exactly to the thing, and wishes us to understand it in its full strength and compass. In calling the thing by its right name, he silences, beforehand, every attempt at palliating and extenuating it. Of such palliations and extenuations the Jews had abundance. They had not the slightest notion that they had become unfaithful to their God, but considered their intercourse with idols as trifling and allowable attentions which they paid to them.—Manger understands by whoredoms, their placing, at the same time, their confidence in man; but from what follows, where idolatry alone is constantly spoken of, it is obvious that this is inadmissible. If this special thing be reduced to its idea, it is true that trusting in men is, then, not less comprehended under it than idolatry, inasmuch as this idea is the turning away from God to that which is not God. And, from this dependence of what is special upon the idea, it follows that the description has its eternal truth, and does not become antiquated, even where the folly of gross idolatry has been long since perceived.—הארין, the definite land, the land of the prophet, the land of Israel.—Concerning the last words, Ps. lxxiii. 27 may be compared, where זנה מן occurs with a similar signification. This phrase contains an allusion to the common expression, "to walk with, or after, God;" compare 2 Kings xxiii. 3. According to Calvin, the spiritual chastity of the people of God consists in their following the Lord.

Ver. 3. "And he went and took Gamer the daughter of Dibhlaim, and she conceived and bare him a son."

Many interpreters suppose that, by the three children, three different generations are designated, and the gradual degeneracy of the people, which sinks deeper and deeper. But this opinion must certainly be rejected. There is no gradation perceptible. On the contrary, the announcement of the total destruction of the kingdom of Israel is connected immediately with the name of the first child, ver. 4. Nor is it legitimate to say, as Rückert does, that the three children are a designation of the "conditions" in which the Israelites would be placed in consequence of their apostasy from the Lord. For, how could mercy be shown to conditions? The right view rather is, that the wife and children are both the people of Israel, viewed only in different relations. In the first designation, they are viewed as a unity; in the latter, as a plurality proceeding from, and depending upon, this unity. The circumstance that the prophet mentions the birth of children at all, and the birth of three only, is accounted for by their names. The children exist only that they may receive a name. The three names must, therefore, not be considered separately, but must be viewed together. In that case they present a corresponding picture of the fate impending upon Israel. The circumstance that the mother and sons are distinguished in Hosea, rests upon the Song of Solomon. (Compare the more copious remarks in my commentary on the Song of Sol. iii. 4: "By the mother, the people is designated according to its historical continuity,—by the daughter or sons, according to its existence at any moment.")

Ver. 4. "And the Lord said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little (while), and I visit the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel."

The name "Jezreel" is, by most expositors, explained in this passage as meaning: "God disperses." This they maintain to be its real signification, according to the etymology, and that all the rest is only an allusion. But this exposition is erroneous, as Manger has correctly perceived. For, 1. No instance occurs where the verb זרע has this signification. When applied to men, it is always used only in a good sense: compare ii. 25, Ezek. xxxvi. 9, and the subsequent remarks on Zech. x. 9. The idea of scattering is not at all the fundamental one; so that the signification, to disperse, is much further from the fundamental signification than might, at first sight, appear. 2. The subsequent words must be considered as an explanation of the name Jezreel, as is obvious from the corresponding explanations of the names Lo-Ruhamah in ver. 6, and Lo-Ammi in ver. 9, which are intimately connected with these names. But in this explanation, not even a single word is said on the subject of the dispersion of the people of Israel. The circumstance that, in this explanation, Jezreel occurs as a proper name, without any regard being paid to its appellative signification^[2]—an allusion to which occurs only in the announcement of the salvation—shows that here too it must be viewed in the same way. The correct view is this. Jezreel was the place where the last great judgment of God upon the kingdom of Israel had been executed. The apostasy from the Lord, and the innocent blood of His servants, shed by Jezebel and the whole house of Ahab, had been there avenged upon them by Jehu, the founder of the dynasty which was reigning at the time of the prophet. At the command of God, Jehu is anointed as king by one of the sons of the prophets sent by Elisha, 2 Kings ix. In vers. 6-9 the Lord says to him through the latter: "I anoint thee king over the people of the Lord, over Israel. And thou shalt smite the house of Ahab thy master; and I avenge the blood of My servants the prophets, and the blood of all the servants of the Lord at the hand of Jezebel, and the whole house of Ahab shall perish. And I give the house of Ahab like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah." The execution corresponded with the command. When Jehu approached Jezreel, Joram the son of Ahab went out against him, and met him in the portion of Naboth the Jezreelite, ver. 21. Appealing to the declaration of the Lord, "Surely I have seen the blood of Naboth, and the blood of his sons, and I will requite thee in this portion of ground" (ver. 26), Jehu orders the corpse of the slain king to be cast thither. At Jezreel, Jezebel too found a disgraceful death. Thither, as to the central point of vengeance, were sent the heads of the seventy royal princes, who had been slain, x. 1-10, and there Jehu slew all that remained of the house of Ahab, ver. 11.—The royal house, and, along with it, all Israel, are now anew to become a Jezreel; i.e., the same divine punitive justice which, at that time, was manifested at Jezreel, is to be exhibited anew. The reason why this should be, is stated in the explanation. The house of Jehu, and all Israel, shall become a Jezreel, in as far as punishment is concerned, because they have become a Jezreel with respect to guilt, and because, as in former times at Jezreel, so now again, blood that has been shed cries to the Lord for vengeance. Where a new carcase is, there the eagles must anew be gathered together.—It must have, already appeared from this, how we understand the words, "I visit the blood of Jezreel," used in the explanation of the name of Jezreel, in the verse under consideration. According to the prophet's custom of designating, by the name of an old thing, any new thing which is substantially similar to it, the new guilt is marked by the name of the old; and it is marked as blood, because the former guilt was pre-eminently blood-guiltiness;^[3] and as the blood of Jezreel, because the former blood-guiltiness had been especially contracted there, and it was there where the punishment was executed. The deep impression, which just this mode of representation must have produced, must not be overlooked. The sins formerly committed at Jezreel were acknowledged as such by the whole people, and especially by the royal house, whose whole rights were based upon this acknowledgment. The recollection of the fearful punishment was still in the minds of all; but they did not by any means imagine that they were implicated in the same guilt, and had to expect the same punishment. That which they considered as already absolutely past, the prophet, by a single word, brings again into the present, and the immediate future. By a single word of dreadful sound he terrified and aroused them out of their self-deception (which will not recognise its own sin in the picture of the sins of others), and out of their carnal security. Entirely analogous are 2 Kings ix. 31, where Jezebel says to Jehu, "Hast thou peace, Zimri, murderer of his master?" which Schmid well explains by—"It is time for thee to desist, that thou mayest not experience the same punishment as Zimri;" Zech. v. 11, where the prophet mentions Shinar as the place of Israel's future banishment; and x. 11, where he calls their future oppressors by the names of Asshur and Egypt, and describes a new passing through the Red Sea. In Revelation, the degenerate church is called by the names of Sodom and Egypt (xi. 18); the true Church, by Jerusalem; Rome, by Babylon.—The explanation which we have given will be its own defence against the current, and evidently erroneous, expositions. Many interpreters understand, by the blood of Jezreel, the slaughter of the family of Ahab which was accomplished there by Jehu. It is, indeed, quite correct to say that a deed objectively good does not thereby become one which is subjectively so. That which has been willed and commanded by God may itself become an object of divine punishment, if it be not performed from love and obedience to God, but from culpable selfishness. But that Jehu was actuated by motives so bad, is sufficiently obvious from the circumstance, that he himself did the very thing which he had punished in the house of Ahab. Calvin rightly remarks: "That slaughter is, as far as God is concerned, a just vengeance; but, as far as Jehu is concerned, it is open murder." But yet, this deed cannot be regarded as the principal crime of Jehu and his family. We must not overlook other crimes far more heinous, and consider the guilty blood shed by them as the sole ground of their punishment. That this was indeed considered as guilt, but only as a lower degree of it, is clearly seen from 1 Kings xvi. 7, where destruction is announced to Baasha, who had destroyed the house of Jeroboam I., "on account of all the evil which he did in the sight of the Lord, in provoking Him to anger with the works of his hands, so that he may be like the house of Jeroboam, and because he killed him." The main crime is, that Baasha had become like the house of Jeroboam. What he perpetrated against this house is the minor crime, and becomes a crime only through the former.—It is worthy of notice that "the blood of Jezreel" exactly corresponds, according to our explanation, with the expression, "so that he may be like the house of Jeroboam." It may be further noticed, that, in the deed of Jehu, every better feeling cannot be excluded. If the command of God had been used by him merely as a pretext, we could not account for the praise and the promises given to him on account of this very deed, 2 Kings x. 30. It is true that the limitation of the promise shows that pure motives alone did not prevail with him.^[4]—"The bloody deed to which the house of Jehu owed its elevation" nowhere else appears as the cause of the catastrophe which befell this house. That which he had done against the house of Ahab, whose sins were crying to heaven for vengeance far more than those of Baasha, is, in 2 Kings x. 30, 31, represented as his merit. His guilt consisted in his not departing from the ways of Jeroboam, and in his making Israel to sin. It is this guilt alone which, in the Book of Kings, is charged against all the members of his family,—against Jehoahaz, the son of Jehu, in 2 Kings xiii. 2; against Jehoash, in 2 Kings xiii. 11; against Jeroboam, in 2 Kings xiv. 24; against Zechariah, under whom the catastrophe took place, in 2 Kings xv. 9: "And he did that which was evil in the eyes of the Lord, as his fathers had done, and departed not from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who had made Israel to sin." According to the context, we must, in the first place, think of the religious guilt; the blood of Jezreel, in the verse under consideration, must correspond with the whoredoms in ver. 2.—Moreover, the extension of the punishment to all Israel could not, according to this explanation, be understood; for the deed was only that of Jehu and his assistants. How, then, could not only the house of Jehu be punished, but also the kingdom of the house of Israel be destroyed, and its bow broken in the valley of Jezreel?

According to another interpretation still more prevalent, "the blood of Jezreel" denotes "all the evil deeds committed by the Israelitish kings in Jezreel." But this interpretation is sufficiently invalidated by the single circumstance, that the residence of the family of Jehu, which, after all, alone comes into consideration in this place, was, from the very beginning, not Jezreel, but Samaria; compare 2 Kings x. 36, xiii. 10, xiv. 23.

Two particulars are contained in the announcement of punishment. First,—The whole house of Jehu, and then all Israel, are to become a Jezreel as regards punishment, as they are even now in point of guilt; and, in this announcement, the significant paronomasia must not be overlooked between Israel—the designation of the dignity of the people, and Jezreel—that which is base in deeds and condition. Calvin makes prominent the last-mentioned feature only: "You are," he explains, "a degenerate people, you differ in nothing from your king Ahab." We cannot, however, follow him in this explanation; the words, "I cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel," cannot, as several interpreters suppose, mean merely, "I will put an end to the dominion of the family of Jehu over Israel." That these words rather announce the cessation of every native regal government, and hence of the entire national independence, is so evident, that it stands in need of no proof. Both of these features are, in their fulfilment, separated indeed by a long period of time (see the Introduction); but they are nevertheless closely connected. With the ruin of the house of Jehu, the strength of the kingdom of Israel was broken; from that time it was only a living corpse. The fall of the house of Jehu was the beginning of the end,—the commencement of the process of putrefaction. The omission, in the inscription, of all mention of any of the kings after Jeroboam, coincides with the circumstance that the fall of the house of Jehu is connected with the fall of the kingdom. With regard, however, to the former event, Hosea had an earlier prophecy before him. It had been prophesied to Jehu (2 Kings x. 30) that his children should sit on the throne until the fourth generation. Now, since Jeroboam was the great-grandson of Jehu, the glory of this family must come to an end with his son. But at no period did the house of Jehu, and the kingdom of Israel, seem to be so far from destruction as under the reign of Jeroboam; and, hence, it was time that the forgotten prophecy should be revived, and, at the same time, expanded.

Ver. 5. "And it shall come to pass at that day, that I break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel."

Of this, Calvin gives the following paraphrase: "Ye are puffed up with pride; ye oppose your fierceness to God, because ye excel in weapons and strength; because ye are warlike men, ye believe that God can do nothing against you. But surely your bows shall not prevent His hands from destroying you."—In the valley of Jezreel, Israel shall become, as to punishment, what they already are, as to guilt, viz., a "Jezreel." The verse is a further expansion of the last words of the preceding one, to which the words, "at that day," refer. He whose bow is broken is defenceless and powerless; compare Gen. xlix. 24; 1 Sam. ii. 4; Jer. xlix. 35. It is evident that we can here think only of the defeat of Israel by the Assyrians, the consequence of which was the total overthrow of the kingdom of Israel. But it is not to be overlooked, that the Assyrians, who in the second section of Hosea are frequently mentioned in express terms, as the instruments of God's punishment, are not spoken of at all as such in the first section, which belongs to the reign of Jeroboam. Amos likewise abstains from mentioning any name of the enemies. The Assyrians had not at that time appeared on the historical horizon. But the prophecy was to evince itself as such, by the fact of the announcement of the judgment at a time when its instruments were not as yet prepared; just as Elijah, in 1 Kings xviii. 41, hears the rushing of the rain before there was even a cloud in the sky.—We are not told in the historical books at what place Israel was defeated by the Assyrians. Jerome, in his remarks on our passage, says that it took place in the valley of Jezreel. It is very probable, however, that this is only an inference clothed in the garb of history. But even apart from the passage under review, the matter is very probable. The valley of Jezreel or Esdrelon "is the largest, and at the same time the most fertile, plain of Palestine. The brook of Kishon, which is, next to Jordan, the most important river of Palestine, waters and fructifies it, and, with its tributaries, flows through it in all directions." (Ritter, S. 689.) In all the wars which were carried on within the territories of the ten tribes, especially when the enemies came from the North, it was the natural battle-field. "It was, in the first centuries, the station of a legion (μέγα πεδίον λεγεῶνος); it is the place where the troops of Nebuchadnezzar, Vespasian, Justinian, the Sultan Saladdin, and many other conquering armies were encamped, down to the unsuccessful expedition of Buonaparte, whose success in Syria here terminated. Clarke found erected here the tents of the troops of the Pacha of Damascus. In later times, it was the scene of the skirmishes between the parties of hostile hordes of Arabs and Turkish pachas. In the political relations of Asia Minor, it is to this locality that there must be ascribed the total devastation and depopulation of Galilee, which once was so flourishing, full of towns, and thickly populated." (Ritter, Erdk. 1 Ausg. ii. S. 387.) We may add, that, in the same plain also, the battle was fought in which Saul and Jonathan perished (for the plain of Esdrelon is bounded on the south-east by the mountains of Gilboa), and so likewise was the battle between Ahab and the Syrians. To it also belonged the plain near the town of Megiddo, where Josiah, in the battle against Pharaoh-Necho, was mortally wounded. Compare Rosenmüller, Alt. ii. 1, p. 149.

Ver. 6. "And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And He said to him, Call her name Lo-Ruhamah (i.e., one who has not obtained mercy): for I will not continue any more to have mercy upon the house of Israel; for I will take away from them."—Interpreters ask why the second child was a female; and this question is by no means an idle one, since the prophet everywhere else adheres closely to the subject-matter, and adds no feature, merely for the sake of giving vividness to the picture. We cannot for a moment suppose, as Jerome and others do, that the female child denotes a more degraded generation. For why, then, is the third again a male child? The supposition proceeds from the altogether unfounded notion that the three children denote different generations. The reason must, on the contrary, be sought for in the name. Schmid says: "It seems to have reference to the weakness of the sex. For the female sex finds greater sympathy than the male." The verb רחם does not denote any kind of love, but only the love of him who is high to him who is low, of the strong to the weak; and hence the LXX., whom Peter follows in 1 Pet. ii. 10 (οὐκ ἠλεημένη), render the word more accurately than Paul, in Rom. ix. 25 (οὐκ ἠγαπημένη). Hence it is never used of man's love to God, but only of the love of God to man,—of His mercy. The only passage which seems to contradict this, Ps. xviii. 2, is not to the purpose, as, there, the Kal is used. But the female sex, being weaker, stands in greater need of the compassion of men, than does the male. Is. ix. 16. The female child places the neediness and helplessness of the people in more striking contrast with the refusal of help from Him who alone can bestow it. The רחמה is either Participle in Pual which has cast off the מ, or the 3d fem. Pret. in pause; thus Cocceius, who explains it by: "She has not obtained mercy." It is in favour of the latter view, that according to Ewald, § 310 b, לא does not often stand before a Participle. The words, "I will not continue," refer to the former great manifestations of divine mercy, and especially the last under Jeroboam, which the people still, at that time, enjoyed; compare 2 Kings xiii. 23: "And the Lord was gracious unto them, and had mercy upon them, and turned towards them because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not destroy them, neither cast them from His presence." Upon this contrast, also, rests the mild expression, "I will not have mercy,"—an expression which, in virtue of this contrast, becomes stronger than any other. Several interpreters here lay peculiar stress upon the circumstance, that "the house of Israel" is spoken of. This, the kingdom of Israel, they say, as an independent state, is given over to everlasting destruction; it is only single individuals who shall obtain mercy after they have joined the house of David. But the supposition that "house of Israel" is used in this sense, is altogether unfounded. The house is equivalent to the family; and the prophets speak of "a house of Israel" after the destruction, no less than before it. The words in ii. 6 (4), "I will not have mercy upon her children," and the circumstance that she who is here called Lo-Ruhamah is afterwards called Ruhamah, also militate against referring "house of Israel" to the state. The right view rather is, that the denial of mercy must not be understood absolutely, but relatively. It is not for ever that mercy shall be denied to them, but for a time,—until God's punitive justice shall have been satisfied. Just as Israel shall not always remain Jezreel, Lo-Ammi shall, at some future time, become again Ammi.—The last words are, by the greater number of recent interpreters, almost unanimously explained: "That I should forgive them." But, in that case, we can perceive no reason why the Inf. abs. should be placed before the tempus finitum. Why should the verbal idea here be rendered so emphatic? In addition to this, the extreme feebleness of the sense would be remarkable. Nothing would be said that would not be already implied in the words, "I will not continue any more to have mercy." But, on the other hand, we obtain a very suitable sense if we translate thus: "I will take away from them." The object is not mentioned, just because every thing is to be understood. The prominence given to the verbal idea is then accounted for from its being contrasted with the having mercy, which implies giving. There is then, moreover, a very striking contrast with the standing phrase נשא עון ל, or also simply נשא ל: I shall take away from them, not, however, as hitherto, their guilt (compare Amos vii. 8), but all that they have. Calvin had previously directed attention to the circumstance that the following verse also is in favour of the translation by tollere: "Servare et tollere inter se opponit propheta." Chap. v. 14 may also be compared, where נשא is used in a similar manner, the object being likewise omitted: "I will tear and go away, I will take away, and there is none that delivereth."