Hosea 2:16
In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call Me 'my Husband,' and no longer call Me 'my Master.'
Sermons
Hosea's Marriage FigureW. Robertson Smith, LL. D.Hosea 2:16
Husband or Lord: God Translated by Love or by FearGeorge Hutcheson.Hosea 2:16
Our Name for GodR. Tuck, B. A.Hosea 2:16
AllurementJ. Orr Hosea 2:14-18
Israel's RestorationC. Jerdan Hosea 2:14-20














Still continuing his reference to the early history of the chosen people, Hosea assures to the penitent and contrite the blessings of Divine favor, promising to returning Israel" the valley of Achor for a door of hope." As Achor was near Jericho - upon the threshold of the land of promise - the possession of this fertile valley was the earnest of the full and hoped-for inheritance. Entrance upon this was, as it were, passing through the door into the land flowing with milk and honey.

I. MERCIES FOR THE PRESENT.

1. The vineyards represent the possessions end privileges of God's people. They contrast with the dry and thirsty wilderness. They abound with proofs of God's care, with provision for man's wants. God gives his beloved all things richly to enjoy.

2. The songs are songs of deliverance, such as Israel sang upon the Red Sea shore; they are songs of rejoicing over enemies vanquished, safety experienced, fellowship in Divine favor.

II. PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE. It is well to enter at the open door; but the open door admits to the apartments of the house or palace. A guest does not enter by the door in order to remain standing in the hall; he is welcomed to the family hearth, and the society and enjoyments of the abode of his host. Thus, when God opens to his people a door, it, is a door of hope. What they are is a promise of what they shall be, and what they have is an earnest of what is provided for them in the future. Through the vale of Achor they enter into the land of promise; and its abundance is to them the assurance of an unfailing and perennial bounty. Hope extends to every stage of the earthly pilgrimage and warfare; there is progress and victory before the Lord's people. And hope stretches away to the infinite hereafter, which affords for its anticipations a boundless and immortal scope.

APPLICATION. The door of hope is by the gospel set open before every hearer of the gospel. What encouragement we have to enter in and to possess the land! - T.

And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call Me Ishi; and shalt call Me no more Baali.
In looking at the allegory of Jehovah's marriage with mother Israel, or with the mother-land, we must begin by considering the current ideas which served to suggest such a conception. Alike in Israel, and among its heathen neighbours, the word Baal, that is Lord or Owner, was a common appellative of the national deity. Instead of the proper names compounded with Jehovah, which are common from the time of Elijah, we frequently find in Old Israel forms compounded with Baal which are certainly not heathenish. When we meet with a son of Saul named Ish-Baal, a grandson Meri-Baal, both names meaning "Baal's man," while David in like manner gives to one of his sons the name of Beeliada, "Baal knoweth," we may be sure that Baal is here a title of the God of Israel. In Hosea's time the worshipping people still addressed Jehovah as Baali, "my Lord," and the Baalim of whom he often speaks (Hosea 2:13; Hosea 13:1, 2) are no other than the golden calves, the recognised symbols of Jehovah. Now, among the Semites, the husband is regarded as the lord or owner of his wife (1 Peter 2:6), whom, in fact, according to early law, he purchases from her father for a price (Exodus 21:8; Exodus 22:17). The address Baali is used by the wife to her husband, as well as by the nation to its God, and so in an early stage of thought, when similarities of expression constantly form the basis of identifications of idea, it lay very near to think of the God as the husband of the worshipping nationality, or of the mother-land. It is not at all likely that this conception was in form original to Hosea, or even peculiar to Israel; such developed religious analogy as that which makes the national God not only father of the people, but husband of the land, their mother, has its familiar home in natural religions. In these religions we find similar conceptions, in which, however, as in the case of the fatherhood of the Deity, the idea is taken in a crass physical sense. Marriage of female worshippers with the godhead was a common notion among the Phenicians and Babylonians, and in the latter case was connected with immoral practices akin to those that defiled the sanctuaries of Israel in Hosea's days. It even seems possible to find some trace in Semitic heathenism of the idea of marriage of Baal with the land which he fertilises by sunshine and rain. Semitic deities are conceived as productive powers, and so form pairs of male and female principles. Heaven and earth are such a pair, as is well known from Greek mythology; and though Baal and Ashtoreth are more often represented as astral powers (Sun and Moon, Jupiter and Venus), it is certain that fertitising showers were one manifestation of Baal's life-giving power. Even the Mohammedan Arabs retained the name of Baal (ba'l) for land watered by the rains of heaven. The land that brings forth fruit under these influences could not fail to be thought of as his spouse; and, in fact, we have an Arabic word (athary) which seems to show that the fertility produced by the rains of Baal was associated with the name of his wife Ashtoreth. If this is so, it follows that in point of form the marriage of Jehovah with Israel corresponded to a common Semitic conception, and we may well suppose that the corrupt mass of Israel interpreted it in reference to the fertility of the goodly land, watered by the dews of heaven (Deuteronomy 11:11), on principles that suggested no higher thoughts of God than were entertained by their heathen neighbours.

(W. Robertson Smith, LL. D.)

Albeit the names Baali and Ishi both signify " my husband," though the first chiefly a husband under the notion of authority, and the second of love; and albeit Baali may be said of God, yet since it had been abused, and given to idols, He will have it no more used. Doctrine —

1. When the Lord delivereth, and is kind to His people, it is their duty to prove their thankfulness by embracing of Christ, and cleaving to Him and His pure service.

2. The Lord will be unto His people what a faithful husband is to his wife, and they are allowed to expect it, and in the faith thereof, to profess and avow Him, in the exercise of true religion. "Thou shalt call Me Ishi," or avow Me for thy husband, as thou art warranted to do.

3. The Lord is so tender of the matter of His worship and service, that He will allow no mixture in it, nor halting between it and idolatry.

(George Hutcheson.)

When the relations of husband and wife are simply outward and formal, and maintained only upon necessity of law, words of endearment do not come into use, and can only be insincere when they are used. The formal "my lord" suits the conditions. And the same thing is true when sin has broken off relations. The fear that separates makes such a name as Baali suffice. But when love keeps up gracious relations, words of endearment come naturally into use. Love in loving, and in using loving names, finds employ. Our relation to God is revealed by our name for Him.

(R. Tuck, B. A.)

People
Hosea, Ishi, Jezreel, Zephaniah
Places
Egypt, Jezreel, Valley of Achor
Topics
Affirmation, Ba'al, Baali, Declares, Husband, Ishi, Longer, Master, Me'my, Pass, Says
Outline
1. The idolatry of the people.
6. God's judgments against them.
14. His promises of reconciliation with them.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Hosea 2:16

     1210   God, human descriptions
     6755   union with Christ, nature of
     7021   church, OT anticipations
     7031   unity, God's goal
     8136   knowing God, effects

Hosea 2:14-16

     1349   covenant, at Sinai
     5676   divorce, in OT

Hosea 2:14-20

     1085   God, love of
     6730   reinstatement

Hosea 2:16-20

     5717   monogamy

Library
The Valley of Achor
'I will give her ... the valley of Achor for a door of hope.'--HOSEA II. 15. The Prophet Hosea is remarkable for the frequent use which he makes of events in the former history of his people. Their past seems to him a mirror in which they may read their future. He believes that 'which is to be hath already been,' the great principles of the divine government living on through all the ages, and issuing in similar acts when the circumstances are similar. So he foretells that there will yet be once
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Unknown Giver and the Misused Gifts
"For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax."--Hosea 2:8-9. In reading any of the records concerning the people of Israel and the people of Judah, one stands amazed at two things, and scarcely knows which to wonder at most. The first thing which causes astonishment is the great
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 38: 1892

27TH DAY. Everlasting Espousals.
"He is Faithful that Promised." "And I will betroth thee unto Me for ever."--HOSEA ii. 19. Everlasting Espousals. How wondrous and varied are the figures which Jesus employs to express the tenderness of His covenant love! My soul! thy Saviour-God hath "married thee!" Wouldst thou know the hour of thy betrothment? Go back into the depths of a by-past eternity, before the world was; then and there, thine espousals were contracted: "I have loved thee with an everlasting love." Soon shall the bridal-hour
John Ross Macduff—The Faithful Promiser

"I Know, O Lord, that Thy Judgments are Right, and that Thou in Faithfulness Hast Afflicted Me. " -- Psalm 119:75.
"I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she shall sing there." -- Hosea 2:14,15. "I know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are right, and that Thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me." -- Psalm 119:75. I will love Thee, O Lord, my strength -- Thee shall my rescued heart embrace; Thy love, in all its breadth and length, Shall be my peaceful dwelling place. Whom have
Miss A. L. Waring—Hymns and Meditations

The Secret of his Pavilion
Gerhard Ter Steegen Hos. ii. 14 Allured into the desert, with God alone, apart, There spirit meeteth spirit, there speaketh heart to heart. Far, far on that untrodden shore, God's secret place I find, Alone I pass the golden door, the dearest left behind. There God and I--none other; oh far from men to be! Nay, midst the crowd and tumult, still, Lord, alone with Thee. Still folded close upon Thy breast, in field, and mart, and street, Untroubled in that perfect rest, that isolation sweet. O God,
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen, Suso, and Others

And After. (xxx, xxxi, xxxix-Xliv. )
There are two separated accounts of what befel Jeremiah when the city was taken. Ch. XXXIX. 3, 14 tells us that he was fetched from the guard-court by Babylonian officers,(609) and given to Gedaliah, the son of his old befriender Ahikam, to be taken home.(610) At last!--but for only a brief interval in the life of this homeless and harried man. When a few months later Nebusaradan arrived on his mission to burn the city and deport the inhabitants Jeremiah is said by Ch. XL to have been carried off
George Adam Smith—Jeremiah

And that this Race was to Become an Holy People was Declared in the Twelve...
And that this race was to become an holy people was declared in the Twelve Prophets [283] by Hosea, thus: I will call that which was not (my) people, my people; and her that was not beloved, beloved. It shall come to pass that in the place where it was called not my people, there shall they be called sons of the Living God. (Hos. ii. 23, i. 10) This also is that which was said by John the Baptist: That God is able of these stones to raise up sons to Abraham. For our hearts being withdrawn and taken
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching

Entire Sanctification in Prophecy.
The Major Prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel. The twelve prophetic books in the Old Testament following the book of Daniel are called the Minor Prophets. In the writings of both classes we find many allusions and predictions as to the entire sanctification of believers in the gospel dispensation and under the reign of Messiah or Christ. The sixth chapter of Isaiah is usually regarded as his call to the prophetic office. Whether this be so or not, it records a very wonderful experience
Dougan Clark—The Theology of Holiness

The Prophecy of Obadiah.
We need not enter into details regarding the question as to the time when the prophet wrote. By a thorough argumentation, Caspari has proved, that he occupies his right position in the Canon, and hence belongs to the earliest age of written prophecy, i.e., to the time of Jeroboam II. and Uzziah. As bearing conclusively against those who would assign to him a far later date, viz., the time of the exile, there is not only the indirect testimony borne by the place which this prophecy occupies in
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

The Controversy Concerning Fasting
"And John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting: and they come and say unto Him, Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but Thy disciples fast not?" MARK 2:18 (R.V.) THE Pharisees had just complained to the disciples that Jesus ate and drank in questionable company. Now they join with the followers of the ascetic Baptist in complaining to Jesus that His disciples eat and drink at improper seasons, when others fast. And as Jesus had then replied, that being a Physician,
G. A. Chadwick—The Gospel of St. Mark

'Fruit which is Death'
'Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images. 2. Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty: He shall break down their altars, He shall spoil their images. 3. For now they shall say, We have no king, because we feared not the Lord; what then should a king do to us? 4. They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant: thus
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Wilderness State
"Ye now have sorrow: But I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you." John 16:22. 1. After God had wrought a great deliverance for Israel, by bringing them out of the house of bondage, they did not immediately enter into the land which he had promised to their fathers; but "wandered out of the way in the wilderness," and were variously tempted and distressed. In like manner, after God has delivered them that fear him from the bondage of sin and Satan;
John Wesley—Sermons on Several Occasions

How the Rude in Sacred Learning, and those who are Learned but not Humble, are to be Admonished.
(Admonition 25.) Differently to be admonished are those who do not understand aright the words of the sacred Law, and those who understand them indeed aright, but speak them not humbly. For those who understand not aright the words of sacred Law are to be admonished to consider that they turn for themselves a most wholesome drought of wine into a cup of poison, and with a medicinal knife inflict on themselves a mortal wound, when they destroy in themselves what was sound by that whereby they ought,
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

Of Inward Silence
Of Inward Silence "The Lord is in His Holy Temple, let all the earth keep silence before him" (Hab. ii. 20). Inward silence is absolutely indispensable, because the Word is essential and eternal, and necessarily requires dispositions in the soul in some degree correspondent to His nature, as a capacity for the reception of Himself. Hearing is a sense formed to receive sounds, and is rather passive than active, admitting, but not communicating sensation; and if we would hear, we must lend the ear
Madame Guyon—A Short and Easy Method of Prayer

"Thou Shalt Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. "
From this Commandment we learn that after the excellent works of the first three Commandments there are no better works than to obey and serve all those who are set over us as superiors. For this reason also disobedience is a greater sin than murder, unchastity, theft and dishonesty, and all that these may include. For we can in no better way learn how to distinguish between greater and lesser sins than by noting the order of the Commandments of God, although there are distinctions also within the
Dr. Martin Luther—A Treatise on Good Works

Nature of Covenanting.
A covenant is a mutual voluntary compact between two parties on given terms or conditions. It may be made between superiors and inferiors, or between equals. The sentiment that a covenant can be made only between parties respectively independent of one another is inconsistent with the testimony of Scripture. Parties to covenants in a great variety of relative circumstances, are there introduced. There, covenant relations among men are represented as obtaining not merely between nation and nation,
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting

Of Rest in the Presence of God --Its Fruits --Inward Silence --God Commands it --Outward Silence.
The soul, being brought to this place, needs no other preparation than that of repose: for the presence of God during the day, which is the great result of prayer, or rather prayer itself, begins to be intuitive and almost continual. The soul is conscious of a deep inward happiness, and feels that God is in it more truly than it is in itself. It has only one thing to do in order to find God, which is to retire within itself. As soon as the eyes are closed, it finds itself in prayer. It is astonished
Jeanne Marie Bouvières—A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents

The Beginning of Justification. In what Sense Progressive.
1. Men either idolatrous, profane, hypocritical, or regenerate. 1. Idolaters void of righteousness, full of unrighteousness, and hence in the sight of God altogether wretched and undone. 2. Still a great difference in the characters of men. This difference manifested. 1. In the gifts of God. 2. In the distinction between honorable and base. 3. In the blessings of he present life. 3. All human virtue, how praiseworthy soever it may appear, is corrupted. 1. By impurity of heart. 2. By the absence of
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion

Covenanting According to the Purposes of God.
Since every revealed purpose of God, implying that obedience to his law will be given, is a demand of that obedience, the announcement of his Covenant, as in his sovereignty decreed, claims, not less effectively than an explicit law, the fulfilment of its duties. A representation of a system of things pre-determined in order that the obligations of the Covenant might be discharged; various exhibitions of the Covenant as ordained; and a description of the children of the Covenant as predestinated
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting

The Gospel Feast
"When Jesus then lifted up His eyes, and saw a great company come unto Him, He saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread that these may eat?"--John vi. 5. After these words the Evangelist adds, "And this He said to prove him, for He Himself knew what He would do." Thus, you see, our Lord had secret meanings when He spoke, and did not bring forth openly all His divine sense at once. He knew what He was about to do from the first, but He wished to lead forward His disciples, and to arrest and
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII

The Worst Things Work for Good to the Godly
DO not mistake me, I do not say that of their own nature the worst things are good, for they are a fruit of the curse; but though they are naturally evil, yet the wise overruling hand of God disposing and sanctifying them, they are morally good. As the elements, though of contrary qualities, yet God has so tempered them, that they all work in a harmonious manner for the good of the universe. Or as in a watch, the wheels seem to move contrary one to another, but all carry on the motions of the watch:
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

The Prophet Hosea.
GENERAL PRELIMINARY REMARKS. That the kingdom of Israel was the object of the prophet's ministry is so evident, that upon this point all are, and cannot but be, agreed. But there is a difference of opinion as to whether the prophet was a fellow-countryman of those to whom he preached, or was called by God out of the kingdom of Judah. The latter has been asserted with great confidence by Maurer, among others, in his Observ. in Hos., in the Commentat. Theol. ii. i. p. 293. But the arguments
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

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