Deliverance of the Jews HOSEA. from the Syrians foretold. A. M. 3219. 9 Then said God, Call his name || people, there it shall be said unto A. M. 3219. 5 Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, them, Ye are m the sons of the and I will not be your God. living God. B. C. 785. and destitute of any better guide than natural reason and heathen philosophy. The deportation of the ten tribes, by which they were reduced to this miserable condition, and deprived of what remained to them, in their worst state, of the spiritual privileges of the chosen race, was, in St. Jerome's notion of the prophecy, the weaning of Lo-ruhamah. The child, conceived after Lo-ruhamah was thus weaned, must typify the people of the kingdom of Judah, in || the subsequent periods of their history. Or rather, this child typifies the whole nation of the children of Israel, reduced, in its external form, by the captivity of the ten tribes, to that single kingdom. The sex represents a considerable degree of national strength and vigour, remaining in this branch of the Jewish people, very different from the exhausted state of the other kingdom previous to its fall. Nor have the two tribes ever suffered so total an excision. The ten were absolutely lost in the world soon after their captivity. They have been nowhere to be found for many ages, and know not where to find themselves; though we are assured they will be found of God, in the day when he shall make up his jewels. But the people of Judah have never ceased totally to be. In captivity at Babylon they lived a separate race, respected by their conquerors. From that captivity they returned. They became an opulent and powerful state; formidable at times to the rival powers of Syria and Egypt; and held in no small consideration by the Roman people, and the first emperors of Rome. And even in their present state of ruin and degradation, without territory, and without a polity of their own, such is the masculine strength of suffering with which they are endued, they are still extant in the world as a separate race, but not as God's people, otherwise than as they are reserved for signal mercy. God grant it may be in no very distant period! But at present they are by x, Lo-ammi, not my people. And so they have actually been more than seventeen centuries and a half; and to this condition they were condemned, when this prophecy was delivered. That these are typified by the child Lo-ammi, appears from the application of that name, in the tenth verse, to the children of Israel generally; whence it seems to follow, that the degenerate people of Judah were implicated in the threatenings contained in the former part of the chapter. But in those threatenings they cannot be implicated, unless they are typified in some one, or more, of the typical children. But B. C. 785. 11 Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land: for great shall be the day of Jezreel. Chapter ii. 23.— m John i. 12; 1 John iii. 1.- Isa. xi. 12, 13; Jer. iii. 18; Ezek. xxxiv. 23; xxxvii. 16-24. they are not typified in Jezreel; for the Jezreel is no object of wrath or threatening: not in Lo-ruhamah; for Lo-ruhamah typifies the kingdom of the ten tribes exclusively: of necessity, therefore, in Lo-ammi."-Bishop Horsley. Verse 10. Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea-Though God casts off the ten tribes, yet he will, in due time, supply their loss, by bringing in great numbers of true Israelites into the church, not only of the Jews, but also of the Gentiles, and making them, who before were strangers to the covenants of promise, fellowheirs with the Jews, Rom. ix. 25, 26; 1 Pet. ii. 10. "I think," says Bishop Horsley, "this is to be understood of the mystical Israel; their numbers, consisting of myriads of converts, both of the natural Israel, and their adopted brethren of the Gentiles, shall be immeasurably great." And in the place where it was said, Ye are not my people, &c.— "That is, at Jerusalem, or at least in Judea, where this prophecy was delivered, and where the execution of the sentence took place: there, in that very place, they, to whom it was said, Ye are no people of mine, shall be called, the sons of the living God. This must relate, at least principally, to the natural Israel of the house of Judah; for to them it was said, Ye are no people of mine. And since they are to be acknowledged again as the children of the living God, in the same place where this sentence was pronounced and executed, the prophecy clearly promises their restoration to their own land." Verse 11. Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together-When the fulness of the Gentiles is come in, this will be a means of converting the Jews, and bringing them into the church. And when converts of the house of Judah shall have obtained a resettlement in the holy land, then a general conversion shall take place of the race of Judah, and the race of the ten tribes. They shall unite in one confession, and in one polity; and appoint themselves one head—The Lord Christ, called David their king, (chap. iii. 5,) shall become the chief and head of his church, composed of Judah and Israel, of Jews and Gentiles. This head is indeed appointed and set up over the church by God, Psa. ii. 6; Eph. i. 22. But the saints are said to appoint Christ their head, when they choose him and embrace him for their sovereign; when, with the highest estimation, most vigorous affections, and utmost endeavours of unfeigned obe Deliverance of the Jews CHAPTER II. from the Assyrians foretold. which is made to these prophecies by St. Peter, in his first epistle, (chap. ii. 10,) is not properly a citation of any part of them, but merely an accommodation of the expressions, not my people, my people, not having obtained mercy, having obtained mercy, dience, they set him up in their hearts, and serve || the Gentiles too, Rom. ix. 24." "The allusion him in their lives, giving him the pre-eminence in all things. And they shall come up out of the land, &c.—That is, from all parts of the earth, to Jerusalem, there to join in the same way of worship (as once the twelve tribes did, before the schism under Jeroboam) with the Christian Church, and so pro-to the case of the Hebrews of the Asiatic dispersion, ceed on the way to the kingdom of heaven. Jerusalem being situated upon an eminence, and in the heart of a mountainous region, which rose greatly above the general level of the country to a great distance on all sides, the sacred writers always speak of persons going to Jerusalem, as going up. For great shall be the day of Jezreel―That is, of the seed of God: see note on verse 4. "Great and happy shall be the day, when the holy seed of both branches of the natural Israel shall be publicly acknowledged of their God, united under one head, their King Messiah, and restored to the possession of the promised land, and to a situation of high preeminence among the kingdoms of the earth.” before and after their conversion." Bishop Horsley, who adds, "it is surprising that the return of Judah from the Babylonian captivity should ever have been considered, by any Christian divine, as the principal object of this prophecy, and an event in which it has received its full accomplishment. The fact is, that this proph cy has no relation to the return from Babylon in a single circumstance. What was the number of the returned captives, that it should be compared to that of the sands upon the sea-shore? The number of the returned, in comparison of the whole captivity, was nothing. And how was Zorobabel (under whom the Jews returned from Babylon) one head of the rest of Israel, as well as of Judah? To interpret the prophecy in this manner is to make it little better than a paltry quib It must be observed here, that although this is an express prophecy of the final conversion and restoration of the Jews, it contains also a manifest allu-ble; more worthy of the Delphic tripod, than of sion to the call of the Gentiles. For, "the word the Scripture of truth." Very judicious, upon this Jezreel, though applied in this passage to the devout subject, are the remarks of the learned Houbigant part of the natural Israel, by its etymology is capa- The prophet, in the tenth verse, passes from threatble of a larger meaning, comprehending all, of every enings to promises, which is the manner of the race and nation, who, by the preaching of the gos- prophets, that the Jews might not think that, after pel, are made members of Christ, and the children the accomplishment of the threatenings, God would of God. All these are a seed of God, begotten of concern himself no more about their nation. Those him by the Spirit to a holy life, and to the inherit- || promises seem to respect the final condition of the ance of immortality. The words Ammi and Ruha- Jews, when they should collect under one head, the mah, (my people and beloved,) and their opposites, Messiah; that it might properly be said of them, Lo-ammi and Lo-ruhamah, (not my people and not Ye are children of the living God. It is difficult to beloved,) are capable of the same extension; the accommodate the words of this passage to the retwo former to comprehend the converted, the two turn from the Babylonian captivity. Those Jews, latter the unconverted, Gentiles. In this extent they who returned from Babylon, were not so much as seem to be used chap. ii. 23, which appears to be a one-hundredth part of the whole Jewish race; so prophecy of the call of the Gentiles, with manifest little were they to be compared with the sands of allusion to the restoration of the Jews." Accord- the sea: nor did they appoint themselves one head. ingly we find these prophecies of Hosea cited by Zorobabel was indeed their leader, but not their sinSt. Paul, to prove the indiscriminate call to salvation | gle leader; and their form of government henceforboth of Gentiles and Jews. He affirms, that God ward was not monarchical, but an aristocracy. Nor has called us [that is, Christians] vessels of mercy had they kings till the very last, when they were afore prepared unto glory, & povov e Iovdauwv aλλa become unworthy to be called children of the living kai ež ε0vwv, not of the Jews only, but moreover of || God.". CHAPTER II. In this chapter, (1,) God charges the Israelites with their idolatries, their forgetfulness of him, and their obligations to him, 1, 2, 5, 8. (2,) He threatens to take from them that abundance of outward mercies wherewith they had served their idols, and to abandon them to certain ruin, 3–7, 9–13. But, (3,) He promises, at last, to return to them in mercy, after they should be gathered from their dispersions, 14; to cure them of their wonted idolatry and wickedness, 7, 16, 17; and, for their complete safety, to render them his people, and make them share the blessings of his covenant, 18-20, 23; and bestow upon them all necessary benefits and comforts, temporal and spiritual, 15, 21, 22. 3. 853 NOTES ON CHAPTER II. enemies, and carry them away naked into captivity, Verses 1, 2. Say to your brethren-Many inter- (see verse 9,) in as forlorn and desolate a condition as preters consider this verse as being connected with they were in during their bondage in Egypt. And the preceding chapter, thus: When that general make her as a wilderness-A state of captivity is restoration of the Jewish nation shall take place, fitly compared to being placed in a wilderness, in you may change your language in speaking to those want of common necessaries: compare Ezek. xix. of your brethren and sisters whom I had before dis- 13. "It may seem harsh," says Bishop Horsley, owned, and you may call them Ammi, my people,"to say of a woman that she shall be laid waste like and Ruhamah, she that hath obtained mercy. The a wilderness, and reduced to the condition of a prophet alludes to the 6th and 9th verses of the pre- ⠀⠀ parched land. But it is to be observed that the alleceding chapter. Other expositors, however, with gorical style makes an intercommunity of attributes more apparent reason, consider this verse as con-between the type and the thing typified. So that nected with the following words, and translate it when a woman is the image of a country or of a thus: "Ye that are my people, and have obtained church, that may be said of a woman, which, in mercy, speak to your brethren and sisters, and plead unfigured language, might be said of the country, or with your mother," &c. "Although the Israelites, the church, which she represents. The country in the days of Hosea, were in general corrupt, and might literally be made a waste wilderness, by unaddicted to idolatry; yet there were among them, fruitful seasons, by the devastations of war, or of in the worst times, some who had not bowed the knee noxious vermin: a church is made a wilderness to Baal. These were always Ammi and Ruhamah; and a parched land, when the living waters of the God's own people, and a darling daughter. God Spirit are withheld." commissions these faithful few to admonish the inhabitants of the land in general, of the dreadful judg-|| ments that would be brought upon them by the gross idolatry of the Jewish Church and nation;" and to reprove, and use their best endeavours to reform that general corruption which the nation had contracted by its idolatry; whereby the people had broken the covenant God had made with them, and had caused a separation, or divorce, between him and them. Let her therefore put away her whoredoms, &c.—Let her leave off her idolatries. These are often expressed in the Scriptures by the fondness and caresses which pass between unchaste lovers. Verse 3. Lest I strip her naked, &c.-The punishment frequently inflicted upon harlots was, to strip them naked and expose them to the world. The punishment of adulteresses among the Germans is thus described by Tacitus, "Accisis crinibus nudatam coram propinguis expellit domo maritus." Or the allusion may be to the ignominy which brutal conquerors sometimes inflicted on the captives they took in war, by stripping them of their clothing and causing them to travel in that condition, exposed to the inclemency of the weather, and, which was yet worse, to the intolerable heat of the sun: see note on Isaiah iii. 17. Thus God threatens to deal with the Israelites: to deliver them into the hands of their Verses 4, 5. And I will not have mercy on her children, &c.-As an injured husband has no regard for the children which his wife has had by another man; so neither will I have pity on thy children which are trained up to practise thy idolatries. For they be the children of whoredoms-Spurious children, not knowing their father: so those might fitly be called who worshipped a plurality of gods; for by worshipping a multiplicity of them, they declared plainly, that they did not know to whom their worship was due, or who was their Creator or original Father. For their mother hath played the harlot— This proves the truth of the above charge, and justifies the severity of the punishment. She that conceived them hath done shamefully-Hath acted like an impudent and shameless harlot, sinning openly and avowedly. She said, I will go after my lovers By lovers here, are meant, first, The idols, with whom the Israelites committed spiritual adultery: see Jer. iii. 1; and then the idolatrous nations, whose alliance the Israelites courted, and, in order thereto, practised their idolatries: the word may be understood here in both senses; for they ascribed all the plenty they enjoyed chiefly to the favour of the idol-gods which they worshipped, Jer. xliv. 17; and then they placed their trust and confidence in the confederacies they had made with their neighbour. CHAPTER II. A. M. 3220. 6 Therefore, behold, I will hedge m ing idolaters; and thought the peace and plenty they possessed were very much owing to their alliance and protection. threatened with ruin. B. C. 784. 9 Therefore will I return, and Ptake A. M. 3220. away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness. 10 And now a will I discover her 8 lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of my hand. 11 I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast-days, her new-moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. they made Baal, Chap. viii. 4.――p Verse 3.- shall invade her and destroy them, or unfavourable seasons shall entirely blast them, or other causes prevent her enjoying them; and will recover my wool and my flax-Will take back again the proper materials I gave for clothing her. This verse, according to Bishop Horsley, speaks "of calamities already begun, and the next describes the progress and increase of them. It appears from all the prophets, and particularly from Amos and Joel, that the beginning of judgment upon this refractory, rebel vermin, producing a failure of the crops, dearth, murrain of the cattle, famine, and pestilential diseases." 99 idols, and in making images of false gods to worship instead of me. Therefore-Or, for the punishment of her ingratitude; will I take away my corn in the Verses 6, 7. Therefore I will hedge up thy way time thereof-I will change my manner of acting with thorns, &c.-That is, with difficulties and dis- toward her, and deprive her of the good things she tresses; and make a wall-Hebrew, 777), a stone || hopes infallibly to enjoy. At the time when she exfence. I will effectually block up her way, and sur-pects to reap the fruits of the earth, her enemies round her with great calamities. That she shall not find her paths—That she shall not know which way to turn to extricate herself from them. And she shall follow after her lovers-She shall seek for help of her idols, and her idolatrous allies, but shall receive none. Or, as Archbishop Newcome paraphrases the words, "For some time she shall remain addicted to her Egyptian and Syrian idols, and to all her former idolatrous and immoral practices: but without carrying her evil wishes into execution." She shall seek them, but not find them-A prover-lious people, was in unfruitful seasons, and noxious bial expression denoting lost labour. She shall seek for favour and succour at her lovers' hands, but all in vain, they shall all forsake her, and change their ancient love into mortal hatred. "It is the usual practice of the devil and his instruments," says an oldness, &c.-The folly and wickedness of her idolawriter, "to bring men into the briers and thorns, and there to leave them to shift as they can. Thus the Pharisees dealt by Judas; What is that to us, say they, see thou to that: they left him when they had led him to his ruin." God deals very differently with his people. As in very faithfulness he afflicts them, that he may be true to their best interests: so when they follow hard after him, and seek him as David did, they are sure to find him; if they search for him with all their heart, Jer. xxix. 13. When they meet with disappointments it is in mercy, and they are chastened of the Lord, that they may not be condemned with the world. Then shall she say, I will return to my first husband, &c.-Her afflictions will bring her to a sense of her duty, and of the happiness she enjoyed as long as she cleaved steadfastly unto Jehovah the true God. Verses 8, 9. For she did not know-Or, as Bishop Horsley renders it, But she would not know, that I gave her corn, &c.-She did not, or would not consider that all the necessaries she enjoyed, as well as her riches and ornaments, were my gifts, which yet she ungratefully employed in the service of her Verses 10, 11. And now will I discover her lewd tries shall appear by the punishments which I will inflict upon her, which shall be so remarkable that they shall be taken notice of by the idolatrous nations round about her, which have pretended a friendship for her, and promised her great assistance and prosperity if she would worship the same gods that they worshipped; but neither they nor any of their false gods shall save her from the calamities I will bring upon her. And I will cause all her mirth to cease-The mirth and jollity of Israel were greatly damped when Tiglath-pileser took Ijon and other cities, and subdued Gilead and Galilee, and all the land of Naphtali, and carried the people away captive to Assyria, which he did but a few years after this prophecy was uttered. And surely all their joy must have ceased about ten or twelve years after, when Samaria was taken, and Hosea and all Israel made captives. Her feast-days, her new-moons, &c.-Though apostate Israel was fallen to idolatry, and had renounced the true worship of God, yet by this verse it appears they retained many of the rites and ceremonies that were used in Judah, or else they set up others like them. But God here threatens Promises HOSEA. of mercy. A. M. 3220. 9 t B. C. 784. 12 And I will destroy her vines, || her jewels, and she went after her A. M. 3220. and her fig-trees, whereof she hath lovers, and forgat me, saith the LORD. said, These are my rewards that my lovers have 14 Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and given me and "I will make them a forest, bring her into the wilderness, and speak and the beasts of the field shall eat them. 10 comfortably 11 unto her. 13 And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her ear-rings and Heb. make desolate. Verse 5.-" Psa. lxxx. 12, 13; Isa. v. 5. Ezek. xxiii. 40, 42.—y Ezek. xx. 35. 15 And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days 10 Or, friendly. - Heb. to her heart. Josh. vii. 26; Isa. that in their captivity they should have no opportu-it terrifies not the soul, like the law, with severe denity to celebrate them. nunciations of punishment; but although it reproves sin, it declares that God is ready to pardon sinners for the sake of his Son; and holds forth the sacrifice of the Son of God that the souls of sinners may be assured that satisfaction has been made by that to God." And I will give her her vineyards from thence-Or, from that time, as the word may be rendered: then I will restore her vineyards and fruitful fields which I had taken from her, verse 12: or, from that place; or, in consequence of these things; in which senses also the original word is used. God declares that from and through the wilderness lies the road to a rich, fruitful country; that is, that the calamities of the dispersion, together with the soothing intimations of the gospel, by bringing the Jewish race to a right mind, will be the means of reinstating them in that wealth and prosperity which God hath ordained for them in their own land. And the valley of Achor-Or, of trouble, or tribulation, as the Hebrew word Achor signifies; for a door of hope-The passage alludes to "the vale near Jericho, where the Israelites, first setting foot within the holy land, were thrown into trouble and consterna Verses 12, 13. And I will destroy her vines-Those blessings, or fruits of the earth, which she has attributed to her false gods, I will give to the beasts of the field to eat, making the whole land only a wilderness for beasts. Among other objects of their false worship, the Israelites worshipped the celestial luminaries, and, it is likely, attributed the fruits of the -earth to them, as self-sufficient, or producing them by their own power, and not as mere instruments in the hands of Jehovah. And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim-I will punish her for all the idolatries she has committed from the days of Jeroboam, who first set up the worship of false gods: see chap. xiii. 1. The chief god of every country was called by the name of Baal, which means lord: so Baal-peor was the god of the Moabites, Baal-zebub was the god of Ekron, (2 Kings i. 2,) Baal-berith the god of the Phenicians, Judges viii. 33. These several deities are in the plural number called Baalim, lords; for they had lords many, 1 Cor. viii. 5. And she decked herself with her ear-rings-She put on the richest ornaments on their idolatrous festivals. Verses 14, 15. Therefore, behold, I will alluretion by the daring theft of Achan. In memory of her-As there is a plain alteration of the style here from threatenings to promises, so the first word of this verse should be translated nevertheless, or notwithstanding. And bring her into the wilderness -Or, after I have brought her into the wilderness. The state of the Jews in captivity is elsewhere expressed by a wilderness state: see note on Ezek. xx. 35. It probably means here the dispersion of the ten tribes, after their first captivity by Shalmaneser, 2 Kings xvii. 6. And speak comfortably to her-In these words, and the preceding, I will allure her, there is an allusion to the practice of fond husbands, who, forgetting past offences, use all the arts of endearment to persuade their wives, who have parted from them, to return to them again. So God will use the most powerful persuasions to bring the Israelites to the acknowledgment of the truth, notwithstanding all their former abuses of the means of grace. The Hebrew here, 7, is literally, I will speak to her heart, that is, speak what shall touch her heart, in her outcast state in the wilderness of the Gentile world, by the proffers of mercy in the gospel. "For the doctrine of the gospel," says Luther on this place, "is the true soothing speech, with which the minds of men are taken. For which, and of the tragical scene exhibited in that spot, in the execution of the sacrilegious peculator and his whole family, the place was called the vale of Achor, Josh. vii. And this vale of Achor, though a scene of trouble and distress, was a door of hope to the Israelites under Joshua; for there, immediately after the execution of Achan, God said to Joshua, Fear not, neither be thou dismayed, (chap. viii. 1,) and promised to support him against Ai, her king, and her people. And from this time Joshua drove on his conquests with uninterrupted success. In like manner the tribulations of the Jews, in their present dispersion, shall open to them the door of hope." And there-That is, in the wilderness, and in the vale of tribulation, under those circumstances of present difficulty, mixed with cheering hope; she shall sing as in the days of her youth-She shall express her joy in God, as her forefathers did after their deliverance at the Red sea; when God espoused them for his peculiar people, and entered into a covenant with them at mount Sinai, where they solemnly promised an entire obedience to him. And, or rather, even, as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt-"This perpetual allusion to the exodus," or coming out of Egypt, "to the cir |