Hosea 13:3

3 Therefore, they will disappear like the morning mist, like dew in the morning sun, like chaff blown by the wind, like smoke from a chimney.

Hosea 13:3 Meaning and Commentary

Hosea 13:3

Therefore they shall be as the morning cloud
Which, however promising it is, soon disappears when the sun is risen; signifying that the idolatrous Israelites, king, priests, and people, should be no more; their kingdom would cease, all their riches and wealth would depart from them, and they and their children be carried captive into a strange land: and as the early dew it passeth away;
as soon as the heat of the sun is felt, when the earth is left dry; so these people, though they seemed to be in great prosperity, and to be very fruitful in children, and in substance, and promised themselves much more; yet in a little time their land would become desolate, and they stripped of all that was dear and valuable to them these metaphors are used in ( Hosea 6:4 ) ; as the chaff [that] is driven with a whirlwind out of the floor;
signifying that these idolatrous people were like chaff, fight and empty, useless and unprofitable, fit for nothing but burning; and that they would be driven out of their own land through the Assyrian, that should come like a whirlwind with great three and power, as easily and as quickly as chaff is drove out of a threshing floor of corn with a strong blast of wind; see ( Psalms 1:5 ) ( Jeremiah 4:11-13 ) ( Daniel 2:35 ) ; and as the smoke out of the chimney;
which rises up in a pillar, and is so on dissipated by the wind, or dissolved into air; and is no sooner seen but it disappears; see ( Psalms 68:2 ) . All these similes show how easily, suddenly, and quickly, the destruction of this idolatrous nation would be brought about.

Hosea 13:3 In-Context

1 When the tribe of Ephraim spoke, the people shook with fear, for that tribe was important in Israel. But the people of Ephraim sinned by worshiping Baal and thus sealed their destruction.

2 Now they continue to sin by making silver idols, images shaped skillfully with human hands. “Sacrifice to these,” they cry, “and kiss the calf idols!”

3 Therefore, they will disappear like the morning mist, like dew in the morning sun, like chaff blown by the wind, like smoke from a chimney.

4 “I have been the LORD your God ever since I brought you out of Egypt. You must acknowledge no God but me, for there is no other savior.

5 I took care of you in the wilderness, in that dry and thirsty land.