Hosea 7:1-10

1 "Whenever I want to heal my people Israel and make them prosperous again, all I can see is their wickedness and the evil they do. They cheat one another; they break into houses and steal; they rob people in the streets.

2 It never enters their heads that I will remember all this evil; but their sins surround them, and I cannot avoid seeing them."

3 The Lord says, "People deceive the king and his officers by their evil plots.

4 They are all treacherous and disloyal. Their hatred smolders like the fire in an oven, which is not stirred by the baker until the dough is ready to bake.

5 On the day of the king's celebration they made the king and his officials drunk and foolish with wine.

6 Yes, they burned like an oven with their plotting. All night their anger smoldered, and in the morning it burst into flames.

7 "In the heat of their anger they murdered their rulers. Their kings have been assassinated one after another, but no one prays to me for help."

8 The Lord says, "The people of Israel are like a half-baked loaf of bread. They rely on the nations around them

9 and do not realize that this reliance on foreigners has robbed them of their strength. Their days are numbered, but they don't even know it.

10 The arrogance of the people of Israel cries out against them. In spite of everything that has happened, they have not returned to me, the Lord their God.

Hosea 7:1-10 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO HOSEA 7

This chapter either begins a new sermon, discourse, or prophecy, or it is a continuation of the former; at least it seems to be of the same argument with the latter part of it, only it is directed to Israel alone; and consists of complaints against them because of their manifold sins, and of denunciations of punishment for them. They are charged with ingratitude to God, sinning in a daring manner against mercy, and with falsehood, thefts, and robberies, Ho 7:1; with want of consideration of the omniscience of God, and his notice of their sins, which surrounded them, Ho 7:2; with flattery to their king and princes, Ho 7:3; with adultery, which lust raged in them like a heated oven, Ho 7:4; with drunkenness, aggravated by drawing their king into it, Ho 7:5; with raging lusts, which devoured their judges, made their kings to fall, and brought on such a general corruption, that there were none that called upon the Lord, Ho 7:6,7; with mixing themselves with the nations of the earth, and so learning their ways, and bringing their superstition and idolatry into the worship of God, so that they were nothing in religion, like a half baked cake, Ho 7:8; with stupidity and insensibility of their declining state, Ho 7:9; with pride, impenitence, and stubbornness, Ho 7:10; with folly, in seeking to Egypt and Assyria for help, and not to the Lord; for which they would be taken as birds in a net, and sorely chastised, Ho 7:11,12; with ingratitude, hypocrisy, and deceitfulness; for all which they are threatened with destruction, Ho 7:13-16.

Footnotes

• [a]. [One ancient translation] burned; [Hebrew] drew near.