Hosea 7:7

7 Murderous and volcanic, they incinerate their rulers. Their kings fall one by one, and no one pays any attention to me.

Hosea 7:7 Meaning and Commentary

Hosea 7:7

They are all hot as an oven
Eager upon their idolatry, or burning in their unclean desires after other men's wives; or rather raging and furious, hot with anger and wrath against their rulers and governors, breathing out slaughter and death unto them: and have devoured their judges;
that stood in the way of their lusts, reproved them for them, and restrained them from them; or were on the side of the king they conspired against, and were determined to depose and slay: all their kings have fallen;
either into sin, the sin of idolatry particularly, as all from Jeroboam the first did, down to Hoshea the last; or they fell into calamities, or by the sword of one another, as did most of them; so Zachariah by Shallum, Shallum by Menahem, Pekahiah by Pekah, and Pekah by Hoshea; see ( 2 Kings 15:1-38 ) . So the Targum,

``all their kings are slain:''

[there is] none among them that calleth unto me;
either among the kings, when their lives were in danger from conspirators; or none among the people, when their land was in distress, either by civil wars among themselves, or by a foreign enemy; such was their stupidity, and to such a height was irreligion come to among them!

Hosea 7:7 In-Context

5 On the royal holiday the princes get drunk on wine and the frenzy of the mocking mob.

6 They're like wood stoves, red-hot with lust. Through the night their passion is banked; in the morning it blazes up, flames hungrily licking.

7 Murderous and volcanic, they incinerate their rulers. Their kings fall one by one, and no one pays any attention to me.

8 "Ephraim mingles with the pagans, dissipating himself. Ephraim is half-baked.

9 Strangers suck him dry but he doesn't even notice. His hair has turned gray - he doesn't notice.