Hosea 2:1-10

1 "Say ye unto your brethren, `Ammi' [that is, My people], and to your sisters, `Ruhamah' [that is, Having obtained mercy].

2 "Plead with your mother, plead; for she is not My wife, neither am I her Husband. Let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts,

3 lest I strip her naked and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.

4 And I will not have mercy upon her children, for they are the children of whoredoms.

5 For their mother hath played the harlot; she that conceived them hath done shamefully. For she said, `I will go after my lovers that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.'

6 "Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.

7 And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them. Then shall she say, `I will go and return to my first husband, for then was it better with me than now.'

8 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.

9 Therefore will I return and take away My corn at the harvest thereof, and My wine in the season thereof, and will recover My wool and My flax given to cover her nakedness.

10 And now will I uncover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of Mine hand.

Hosea 2:1-10 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO HOSEA 2

This chapter is an explanation of the former, proceeding upon the same argument in more express words. The godly Israelites are here called upon to lay before the body of the people their idolatry, ingratitude, obstinacy, and ignorance of the God of their mercies; and to exhort them to repentance, lest they should be stripped of all their good things, and be brought into great distress and difficulties; all their joy and comfort cease, and be exposed to shame and contempt, Ho 2:1-13, yet, notwithstanding, many gracious promises are made unto them, of their having the alluring and comfortable word of the Gospel; of a door of hope; of salvation being opened to them; of faith in the Lord, and affection to him as their husband; of the removal of all idolatry from them; of safety from all enemies; of their open espousal to Christ; of his hearing of their prayers, and giving them plenty of all good things; and of their multiplication, conversion, and covenant relation to God, Ho 2:14-23.