Israel’s guilt and its punishment, each shown by examples. But even in this dark chapter there is a short gleam of hope (Hosea 10:12)

1. Israel is an empty vine …] Rather, Israel was a luxuriant vine, which freely put forth fruit. A development of the suggestions in Hosea 9:10; Hosea 9:16; compare with it the fuller description in Psalm 80:8-11. The ‘fruit’ spoken of is not moral, but material. The bounties of Providence were lavished upon northern Israel (comp. chap 2.), and gave ground for the expectation of Israel’s grateful obedience. The allusion will be to the prosperous reign of the second Jeroboam.

according to the multitude, &c.] Rather, as his fruit increased, he increased his altars; the better it was with his land, the better he made his (sacred) pillars. The material wealth of the country only served to strengthen and extend the idolatrous system of worship (comp. Hosea 2:8, Hosea 8:4, and note on Hosea 8:11). ‘Altars’ and (sacred) ‘pillars’ are naturally mentioned together, the ‘pillar’ (maçççbah) or consecrated stone being the recognized token of a ‘high place.’ Not only did Jacob set up such pillars at Bethel and elsewhere (Genesis 28:18; Genesis 31:45; Genesis 35:14; Genesis 35:20), but Moses himself is recorded to have built an altar with no less than twelve sacred pillars (Exodus 24:4). They were forbidden no doubt, absolutely and entirely, in Deuteronomy 16:21, but, besides the pillars of Baal (2 Kings 3:2; 2 Kings 10:26; 2 Kings 17:9), there is reason to think that those great stones spoken of in the narrative books (Joshua 24:26; 1 Samuel 6:14; 1 Samuel 7:12; 2 Samuel 20:8; 1 Kings 1:9) were really sacred pillars, though the narrator, to avoid startling his readers, denies them the name. Isaiah himself, too, speaks of a ‘pillar’, or sacred stone, as a sign, together with an altar, of the worship of Jehovah in Egypt (Isaiah 19:19). If then pillars, sacred to Jehovah, were tolerated in Judah in Isaiah’s time, much more must we suppose that they were tolerated in Israel. But why does Hosea refer to them as signs of infidelity? Because the worship of Jehovah at the high places was purely formal, and produced no moral effect upon the character (see on Hosea 8:11). In short, he is more consistent, more outspoken than Isaiah himself, who never says that the high places are occasions of sin. True, Hosea speaks of the north; Isaiah of the south.

2. Their heart is divided] viz., between Jehovah and idols. But this, which involves an alteration of the points, gives too weak a sense for such a context. It is better to keep the ordinary pointing, and render, Their heart is slippery (or deceitful; lit. ‘is smooth’; comp. Ezekiel 12:24 smooth, i.e. flattering, divination).

be found faulty] Rather, be dealt with as guilty (as Hosea 13:16).

he shall break down, &c.] The phrase is a bold one; it is literally ‘he shall break the necks of the altars’, i.e. perhaps strike off their horns (Amos 3:14), and so destroy them. ‘He’ is emphatically expressed in the Hebrew, to indicate the unseen observer of their thoughts and actions.

3. For now they shall say …] Rather, Yea then, &c. They shall come to perceive that the kings set up on their own authority (Hosea 8:4) cannot help nor deliver them.

We have no king, &c.] i.e., none worthy of the name, for a king should be judge, counseller, general; hence, they continue, and the king [whom we have], what can he do for us?

4. They have spoken words] i.e. mere ‘words of the lips’ (Isaiah 36:5, comp. Isaiah 58:13), and, as the context shows, deliberate falsehoods (comp. Isaiah 29:21).

swearing falsely in making a covenant] Better, they swear falsely, they make covenants. The ‘covenants’ spoken of are those entered into with Assyria and Egypt (Hosea 10:6, Hosea 12:2), not those of everyday life, since it is the making of covenants, and not the breaking of them, which the prophet denounces.

thus judgment springeth up as hemlock, &c.] Rather, so judgment shall spring up as the poppy. Their sins are as it were the seed from which a plant is produced as bitter and as abundant as the poppy of the fields. The plant in question (Heb. rôsh) is often referred to, and cannot be identified with precision (see on Jeremiah 8:14); most think it is some umbelliferous plant, rôsh being the common word for ‘head.’ Elsewhere its bitterness is the point of comparison (Deuteronomy 29:18; Jeremiah 9:15; Lamentations 3:19); here its abundant growth as well. Hence some have been led to render, continuing the description of the immorality of Israel, ‘and justice springs up like the poppy’, i.e., understanding the passage ironically, acts of hurtful injustice are as luxuriantly abundant as that noxious weed, comp. Amos 6:12. But the universality of the divine judgment can be as well expressed by this figure as the universality of sin, and Hosea 10:5 requires some previous reference to the punishment to explain it. The judgment began with the man who was foremost in those illegitimate covenants—with the prophet’s royal namesake (Hoshea); see 2 Kings 17:4.

5. shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven] The statement is keenly ironical. So far from being able to help their worshippers, the ‘calves of Beth-aven’ shall occasion the greatest anxiety to their worshippers. Probably however we should make a slight emendation, and render, shall bemoan the calves (yânûdû for yâgûrû); comp. the parallel clause. ‘Beth-aven’ is a contemptuous name for Bethel (see on Hosea 4:15); the ‘calves’, or more literally ‘she-calves’, may indicate what we should not otherwise have known, that Jeroboam’s ‘calf’ (or small bull) was only the chief of several of these idolatrous symbols. It should be added however that the Sept. and the Pesh. have the masc. sing. form, so that the text is not beyond dispute, especially as Hosea immediately afterwards employs pronominal suffixes of the 3rd pers. sing. masc. The feminine form in the received reading is perhaps to be explained as expressing contempt (Ἀχαιΐδες οὐκ ἔτʼ Ἀχαιοί, Il. 11. 235, has been compared); it is used nowhere else of the steer-gods.

for the people thereof, &c.] Rather, yea, his people shall mourn for it, and his priests shall tremble for it, for their glory, because it is gone into exile from them. Again keenly ironical. ‘His people’ means the steer-god’s people; Jehovah’s people they are no more: ‘Call his name Not-my-people’ (Hosea 1:9). The ‘priests’ of the idol, too, are not dignified by the title kôhǎnîm: the word used (k’mârîm, as in 2 Kings 23:5; Zephaniah 1:4) comes, directly or indirectly, from the Assyrian kamâru ‘to throw down’; it describes the priests as those who prostrate themselves in worship (Fred. Delitzsch, Assyrian and Hebrew, pp. 41, 42). Comp. below, on Hosea 11:8. ‘Their glory’, i.e. the steer-god; comp. Psalm 106:20. Literally, however, it is ‘his glory’, which might of course mean the splendid appurtenances of the worship of the steer. ‘Shall tremble’; yâgîlû borrows the sense of yâkhîlu; it seems preferred for the sake of the assonance with gâlâh (‘it is gone into exile’). Or there may be a scribe’s error in the case.

6. It shall be also] Rather, This also (viz. the steer) shall be.

for a present to king Jareb] Just as the kings of Judah repeatedly gave up the gold and silver in the temple to foreign foes. ‘King Jareb’ should rather be the fighting king (i.e. the king of Assyria, see on Hosea 5:13).

shall be ashamed of his own counsel] i.e., shall find out what a mistake it was to set up a helpless idol as the protector of the nation.

7. her king] i. e. not merely the king who happened to be on the throne, but the monarchy itself (as Hosea 10:15). Others, less probably, her idol-god (comp. Amos 5:26).

as the foam, &c.] A striking figure, and singled out for its beauty by so good a judge as Mr Ruskin, but Hosea’s is still more appropriate. Render, as a chip on the face of the water (following the Septuagint instead of the Targum), and note the contrast between the helpless fragment of wood and the irresistible power of the current.

8. The high places also of Aven] Perhaps the same as Beth-aven, i.e. Bethel (Hosea 4:15, Hosea 10:5). But ‘the high places of idolatry’ (as Aben Ezra) is an equally admissible rendering of the phrase; all the local sanctuaries of the steer-god will then be referred to. The term ‘high place’ includes both the mound and the shrine and altar erected upon it.

they shall say …] Applied proverbially by our Lord (Luke 23:30) and by St John (Revelation 6:16; Revelation 9:6).

9. thou hast sinned …] The prophet’s language is correct from his own point of view. True, Israel as a people took summary vengeance on the Benjamites for the outrage of Gibeah. But the seed of wickedness remained, and developed into evil practices worthy only of the Gibeah of old.

there they stood … did not overtake them] The passage is open to various interpretations, but the easiest is as follows,—there they stood that the war against the sons of unrighteousness might not overtake them at Gibeah. It is a historic retrospect, with an implied application to the present. Just as the Benjamites offered a stubborn resistance to the onset of the rest of Israel at Gibeah, so the Israelites now persist in their old iniquities, and defy Jehovah to put them down.

9–15. A fresh demonstration of Israel’s guiltiness. The prevalent depravity is comparable only to that of the men of Gibeah (see on Hosea 9:9). ‘The times are out of joint’; all Israel’s doings are against nature, and the retribution must be equally exceptional.

10. Jehovah’s rejoinder to this tacit challenge. It is in my desire …] Rather, When I desire, I will chastise them, and peoples (i. e. hostile armies), &c.

when they shall bind themselves, &c.] Rather, when I chastise them (or, when I bind them, or, when they shall be bound) for their two iniquities, viz. for their revolt from ‘Jehovah their God and David their king’ (Hosea 3:5). The rendering ‘furrows’ adopted in A.V. from the Targum has no support in Hebrew usage, and yields no intelligible sense. ‘Iniquities’ is the rendering of the Septuagint and the Vulgate, as well as of Hitzig, Keil, &c., though these scholars prefer the version ‘bind to’, and explain that punishment is viewed as the necessary concomitant of transgression.

11. And Ephraim, &c.] Rather, Ephraim indeed is a heifer broken in and loving to thresh, and I have spared the beauty of her neck; (but now) will I make Ephraim to draw. Israel’s punishment is enhanced by contrast with her former prosperity, which, as a mark of the Divine goodness, is compared to the consideration with which a young heifer is treated by its master. The work of treading out the corn was pleasant and easy; the heifer could eat freely as it walked without a muzzle round and round the threshing-floor (Deuteronomy 25:4). But this heifer, that is, Israel, has abused the kindness of its Lord (comp. Deuteronomy 32:15), and henceforth shall be put to the heavy labour of the field—a figure for the depressing conditions of life under a foreign master. The rendering ‘spared’ (literally, ‘passed by’) is justified by Micah 7:18; Proverbs 19:11; it adds a beautiful distinctness to the figure, for the heavy yokes used in the East not only gall the necks of the animals, but often produce deep wounds. The meaning is that Jehovah has hitherto preserved his people from the yoke of captivity; compare the different applications of the same figure in Hosea 11:4. ‘Make to draw’; lit. ‘make to ride’, but râkab, as the usage of the cognate word in Arabic shows, can have various secondary meanings. [Space forbids a record of all the explanations of this passage; none is so simple as that of Buhl given above. The objection that to ‘pass by’ is elsewhere used with reference to transgression is not conclusive; the idiom is just as applicable in the present case. There is good authority, however, for the rendering or paraphrase, ‘I mounted upon her fair neck’, though why the ‘beauty’ of the neck should be mentioned, is not clear.]

Judah shall plow] Judah, then, is also a ‘stubborn heifer’, and cannot be exempted from her sister’s punishment.

12. If only a moral miracle could take place, Israel’s calamities might yet be averted. Nor is it entirely inconceivable, for miracles, so Hosea thinks, can be wrought by an earnest resolution. Hence Hosea’s final appeal.

Sow to yourselves, &c.] Rather, Sow to yourselves according to righteousness, and ye shall reap in proportion to love; that is, Let your conduct be governed by a regard to righteousness, and it shall be recompensed in accordance with the divine love (or perhaps, see on Hosea 4:1, in accordance with the love ye have shown to one another, ‘righteousness’ being only another aspect of ‘love’ or benevolence).

Break up your fallow ground] Husbandmen in the East are indolent, and sometimes ‘sow among thorns’ (Jeremiah 4:3). The Israelites are warned against committing this fault in their spiritual husbandry. Evil habits must be broken off, and a new character formed, or it will be impossible to sow the seed of righteousness.

for it is time, &c.] There is still time to seek Jehovah, till he listen to your prayer, and rain his righteous gift of salvation upon you. For the figure of righteousness coming down from the sky, comp. Isaiah 45:8; Psalm 85:11. ‘Righteousness’ bears the meaning ‘salvation’ which it virtually has so often in the second part of Isaiah, ‘righteousness’ being the divine principle of action, ‘salvation’ the same divine principle in action.

13. How necessary is this exhortation! For hitherto the Israelites have done the exact opposite.

plowed wickedness] i.e., formed wicked plans (as Job 4:8). The word for ‘to plough’ has in fact another meaning ‘to plot.’

reaped iniquity] Better, reaped injustice—i. e. the injustice of oppressors, which, being retributive, is, from the higher point of view, substantial justice. The tense is the prophetic perfect.

the fruit of lies] To ‘lie’ is sometimes = to disappoint (as Hosea 9:2), and probably this is the meaning here, viz. that the consequence of Israel’s present policy shall be the disappointment of all his expectations. ‘Fruit’ implies that that policy has been one of ‘lying’, i.e. treason both to earthly kings and to Jehovah (comp. Hosea 11:12, Hosea 12:1; Isaiah 28:15).

in thy way] i.e. in thy policy. But there is a reading of earlier date than the Massoretic, viz. in thy chariots (comp. Hosea 14:3; Isaiah 2:7) which, as it harmonizes better with the rest of the clause, is undoubtedly preferable. For few scholars will maintain that the ἐν ἁμαρτήμασι of the Vatican MS. of the Septuagint is more original than the ἐν ἅρμασι of the Alexandrine and other MSS. (confirmed by St Jerome and the Syro-Hexaplar text). The Vatican reading can easily be explained; the scribe wished to harmonize the translation with the reading ‘in thy way’ found by him in his Hebrew Bible.

14, 15. In a few words the prophet describes the crash of Israel’s ruin (comp. Hosea 13:16).

Therefore] The prophet simply connects the judgment by an ‘and’; but the next verse clearly shows that sequence is here identical with consequence.

a tumult] i.e., the tumult, or, more exactly, the ‘roar’, of an advancing army (as in Isaiah 17:12).

among thy people] Rather, against thy peoples. The tribes of Israel are called peoples, as in Deuteronomy 33:3.

as Shalman spoiled Beth-arbel, &c.] It would seem that the prophet refers to some event of recent times which took place in the immediate neighbourhood of Ephraim. Beth-arbel will then be, not the Assyrian Arbela, but either the place so called on the west of the lake of Tiberias, or more probably that near Pella, on the east of the Jordan. Who Shalman was, is altogether uncertain. Schrader thinks that he was either Shalmaneser III., who made an expedition to the ‘cedar country’ (Lebanon) in 775 b.c., and to Damascus in 773–2, on which occasions he may have penetrated into the Transjordanic country, and destroyed the last-mentioned Arbela, or else a Moabitish king Salamanu, mentioned by Tiglath-Pileser as his tributary, who, like other Moabitish kings, very possibly made incursions into the land of Israel. It is against the former view that the abbreviation Shalman nowhere else occurs, and that ‘king’ or ‘king of Assyria’ is not added. But the latter view, though plausible (the Hebrew word is strictly, not Shalman, but Shalěman), is not the only possible one. The Septuagint renders ‘prince Salaman,’ which, if we may take it as a variant, will point rather to a general (= ‘prince of the host’) than to a king. The name occurs again on a Palmyrene inscription, so that there may have been several other Shalmans. The barbarities attending the capture of Beth-arbel seem to have made a deep impression on the Israelites; Mr Huxtable aptly reminds us of the horrors of the sack of Magdeburg. Comp. 2 Kings 8:12; Psalm 137:8-9. [The Septuagint, the Syro-Hexaplar, the Old Latin, and the Vulgate, followed by Bishop Horsley and the Jewish scholar Abraham Geiger, suppose a reference to Zalmunna (Σαλμανά, Salmana) who was slain by Gideon or Jerubbaal according to Judges 8. This hint will enable the reader to understand the singular renderings of these ancient versions.]

15. So shall Beth-el, &c.] Such is the awful judgment of which the idolatry of Bethel is the cause.

your great wickedness] Lit., ‘your wickedness of wickedness’, with which some compare the phrases ‘song of songs’, ‘holy of holies.’ But it is more natural to suppose that the word ‘wickedness’ was written twice over by accident.

in a morning] Rather, in the dawn. The meaning is that when the morning-grey appears, the king will be found to be cut off. All has happened as quickly as time seems to have passed when we awake (comp. Psalm 90:6, ‘they become as a sleep’).