Israel is reproved and threatened for their impiety and idolatry. 1. Empty vine. In the Scriptures, God’s people are frequently compared to a vine (Ps. 80:8; Isa. 5:1–7; Jer. 2:21; Matt. 21:33–41).
The vine depicted here is not without fruit, but the fruit produced is for itself. From the standpoint of the owner the vine may be called “empty,” for he receives nothing from it. So with Israel. The Lord did not receive the fruit due Him from the nation for which He had done so much (see on Isa. 5:1–7).
Hos 10:1 Israel was a spreading vine; he brought forth fruit for himself. As his fruit increased, he built more altars; as his land prospered, he adorned his sacred stones.
Brought forth fruit. While in name and profession the people of Israel were the people of God, in practice they did not yield the fruits of righteousness. They deserved the same judgment Jesus placed upon the barren fig tree (see Matt. 21:18, 19).
For himself. Few men can stand prosperity. Instead of being led by God’s goodness and benefits to a sincere repentance of sin and a closer walk with their Maker, they are prone to forget Him.
The fruits of their blessings are selfishly kept for self and are not given back to Him. Thus God is often defrauded of the fruits men owe Him. It is a great abuse of God’s goodness to refuse to share our blessings with others.
Build more altars. The Hebrew word translated “increased” comes from the same root as does the word translated “multitude.” The thought is that precisely according to the increase of their blessings was the increase of their apostasy.
This presents what has just been given in symbols, the large growth of Israel’s apostasy. The increase of population and material prosperity (see on ch. 2:8; PK 286) resulted in an increase in the number of idolatrous altars.
Sacred stones. Heb. maṣṣeboth, “pillars” (see on Hosea 3:4; cf. 1 Kings 14:23).
Hos 10:2 Their heart is deceitful, and now they must bear their guilt. The LORD will demolish their altars and destroy their sacred stones.
Israel added the service of idols to that of the Lord (see 2 Kings 17:32, 33,41), and this half worship of Himself God could not tolerate (see Matt. 6:24). It is only when we come to God with the whole heart that He can do for us what He wills (see Prov. 23:26; Jer. 29:11–14).
Deceitful. “slippery.” Break down. A single word in Hebrew meaning literally, “to break the neck of,” a word commonly used in a ritualistic sense (see Ex. 13:13; 34:20; Deut. 21:4, 6). In these words Hosea declares that the means of sinning shall be taken from the transgressors and destroyed, their altars broken down and their images spoiled.
Hos 10:3 Then they will say, “We have no king because we did not revere the LORD. But even if we had a king, what could he do for us?”
Now. Either when the people see the destruction before their eyes or when they are in captivity. No king. As a result of their rejection of the Lord and its accompanying chastisements, Israel would be brought to see and feel that the kings appointed through their own self-will (see on ch. 8:4) would be unable to protect or help them (see on ch. 3:4).
This may also refer to Israel’s rejection of the Lord in His double capacity as their God and as their King. This rejection, which began to some extent with the choosing of Saul (see 1 Sam. 8:7), ultimately resulted in spiritual disaster and material distress, and finally in utter ruin.
Hos 10:4 They make many promises, take false oaths and make agreements; therefore, lawsuits spring up like poisonous weeds in a plowed field.
Israel’s faithlessness in Hosea’s day was pronounced in several respects: (1) forsaking the Lord by idolatry, (2) disloyalty to their sovereign, and (3) falsehood and dishonor in dealing with their fellow men in general.
After entering into an agreement with the Assyrian king Shalmaneser V, they deceitfully made a covenant with So, king of Egypt (see 2 Kings 17:4).
Thus, at one and the same time they acted as covenant breakers and they disobeyed God’s command forbidding covenants with foreigners (see Ex. 23:32; 34:12; Deut. 7:2), and so were untrue to men and untrue to God.
Lawsuits spring up.
The context seems to indicate that “judgment” here refers to that official “justice” in the land which was a perversion and a mockery of true justice (see Amos 5:7; 6:12). This perverted judgment is like poiseness weeds which springs up so readily and abundantly. Hemlock. Heb. ro’sh, “a bitter and poisonous herb” (see on Ps. 69:21). The word is also used for the poison of serpents (Deut. 32:33; Job 20:16).
Hos 10:5 The people who live in Samaria fear for the calf-idol of Beth Aven. Its people will mourn over it, and so will its idolatrous priests, those who had rejoiced over its splendor, because it is taken from them into exile.
Samaria. The capital and leading city of the northern kingdom.
Calf-idol. Heb. ‘egloth, “young cows,” or “heifers.” Elsewhere in Hosea the idolatrous calves are designated by the Hebrew masculine form.
Probably the word is in the feminine gender for the purpose of expressing contempt for the images that Jeroboam I set up. The use of the feminine form may also imply the weakness of these gods; for, instead of these calves helping the people, the people were afraid that these calves would be taken away captive.
Beth-aven. Literally, “the house of evil power,” or “the house of wickedness” (see on ch. 4:15). Bethel, “the house of God,” once a place of sacred memory because of its association with the patriarch Jacob, later became one of the two centers of idolatrous calf worship (1 Kings 12:26–33).
Hos 10:6 It will be carried to Assyria as tribute for the great king. Ephraim will be disgraced; Israel will be ashamed of its foreign alliances.
This verse explains the preceding verse. Israel’s national god, the calf, will be carried to Assyria as one of the spoils of war. In ancient times victory over a nation was counted as a victory over its gods (see 1 Kings 20:23, 28; 2 Kings 18:28–35).
King Jareb. See on ch. 5:13. There is no specific reference to the fulfillment of this prophecy of the carrying away into Assyria of this golden calf, but we may rest assured that the Assyrians would not permit such an object of value to remain unmolested in Bethel.
Alliances. Perhaps a reference to the evil policy of Jeroboam I that had as its purpose the separation of Israel from Judah (see 1 Kings 12:26–30).
Hos 10:7 Samaria’s king will be destroyed, swept away like a twig on the surface of the waters. The figure emphasizes the lightness, instability, and helplessness of the king in whom the people trusted.
Hos 10:8 The high places of wickedness will be destroyed— it is the sin of Israel. Thorns and thistles will grow up and cover their altars. Then they will say to the mountains, “Cover us!” and to the hills, “Fall on us!”
By sacrificing to the Lord on these high places instead of in Jerusalem, the only place for religious service according to the law (see Deut. 12:1–14), the people began their departure from God.
Later, because of increasing apostasy, these high places witnessed the most abominable idolatries and shamefully sinful practices (see on Hosea 4:13).
Thorns.
A striking picture of total desolation. So overwhelmed will the people be with distress and dismay, that in despair and desperation they will desire prompt death. Rather than behold further such heart-rending scenes, rather than endure any longer such calamities, they prefer being buried under mountains or hills.
Significantly, our Lord used similar words in predicting the miseries connected with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in A.D. 70 (Luke 23:30), as also did John in picturing men’s despair at the end of the world (Rev. 6:16, 17).
Is it not infinitely better to pray to Jesus now to “cover” our transgressions with the blood of His atonement than through neglect of this to have to cry to the mountains and hills at last to fall on us and cover us?
Our sincere prayers to Jesus now will surely be heard, but the prayers to the mountains and hills then will be in vain.
Hos 10:9 “Since the days of Gibeah, you have sinned, Israel, and there you have remained. Will not war again overtake the evildoers in Gibeah?
This sin of Gibeah had become proverbial.
Hos 10:10 When I please, I will punish them; nations will be gathered against them to put them in bonds for their double sin.
The instruments of God’s punishment will be the foreign invaders (see on Isa. 7:20). Just as the other tribes were gathered against the tribe of Benjamin at Gibeah to destroy it, so now against the ten tribes will be gathered divers peoples and nations to destroy Israel.
The numbers gathered against Israel will be as overwhelming as that of all the tribes against the one small tribe of Benjamin (see Judges 20).
God’s people had thrown off the light and easy yoke of God (see on Matt. 11:29, 30), and bound themselves in their own ways of sin. In that sin destruction would overtake them.
Hos 10:11 Ephraim is a trained heifer that loves to thresh; so I will put a yoke on her fair neck. I will drive Ephraim, Judah must plow, and Jacob must break up the ground.
Heifer. Heb. ‘eglah (see on v. 5). Ephraim is here likened to a heifer trained to tread out corn. Oxen were employed in ancient (and modern) times in threshing grain, either by treading with their feet or by drawing a threshing sledge or cart over it.
Also, they were not muzzled (see Deut. 25:4), so were left free to snatch at times a mouthful of corn. Such was Israel’s history. She had been placed in the Promised Land in easy, comfortable circumstances, like a heifer threshing, that was allowed to eat at pleasure.
Tragically, these material comforts that should have drawn her close to her Creator, made her sinfully self-sufficient and rebellious (see on Deut. 32:15).
Fair neck. A change has come; the Assyrian yoke is about to be placed upon Israel’s fair neck. Make Ephraim to ride. That is, use Ephraim for riding or for pulling a vehicle. Plow. Burdensome and distasteful labor will now be imposed. Judah, because of her sins, also is to share the toil, having to do the heavy work of plowing; and Jacob, probably used here in the sense of the ten northern tribes, will break the clods.
Once free, Ephraim is now subdued and made to wear the yoke of hard service. 12. Sow … in righteousness. Literally, “for righteousness,” or “to righteousness”; Israel is to sow seed from which righteousness is to spring forth. The admonition here given again reflects the meaning of the name Jezreel (see on chs. 1:4; 2:23).
The heifer (v. 11) illustrates the condition into which Israel had come because of sin; here the prophet pictures what the Lord desires Israel to be through the obedience of faith.
Using figures drawn from agricultural life (vs. 12, 13), Hosea presents the call to repentance and to the reformation that true repentance brings. God assures His people that if they will conform their lives to His will, and treat their fellows justly, they shall receive their reward (see Ps. 19:11; Prov. 11:18), a reward far greater than the total of the good deeds they might do, just as the farmer who sows a bushel of wheat reaps from it many more bushels in the harvest (see Mark 10:28–30).
Even though we may sow the seed of righteousness in tears, the comforting promise remains that we shall reap in joy (see Ps. 126:5, 6). Mercy. Heb. chesed (see Additional Note on Psalm 36). Compare the meaning of the name Lo-ruhamah (see on Hosea 1:6; 2:23).
Break up the ground. This is a divine plea for a reformation in life, for the rooting out of the weeds of sin, as the farmer runs his plow through the fallow, uncultivated field and breaks it up that the ground may be ready for the sowing of the seed.
Israel is urged to purge out all apostasy in worship, all iniquity in living, and to return to the Lord with sincerity of heart. Too long had Ephraim’s land lain waste and wild in sin.
This must now give way to divine cultivation for the rooting out of the weeds and roots of national, social, and individual evils. Spiritual renewal and radical religious reform are imperative.
This strong plea indicates that the door of mercy was still open for possible repentance on the part of Israel. However, the sad fact remained that the nation was so hardened in sin that this plea would be in vain (see on ch. 4:17). Nevertheless, the straight messages of Hosea were not wholly in vain, for they probably helped many an individual soul to remain true in this time of crisis (see PK 292).
Hos 10:12 Sow righteousness for yourselves, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the LORD, until he comes and showers his righteousness on you.
Seek the Lord. Should they do so, God would again own them as His people (see on chs. 1:9; 2:23). Rain righteousness. See on Isa. 45:8.
Hos 10:13 But you have planted wickedness, you have reaped evil, you have eaten the fruit of deception. Because you have depended on your own strength and on your many warriors,
The former conduct of the people of Israel had been the opposite of that which they are now exhorted to display (see v. 12). The evil they sowed had already yielded the inexorable harvest of iniquity (see Job 4:8; Prov. 22:8). Their confidence in the wisdom of their own ways betrayed them into disaster and war (see Prov. 14:12).
Fruit of deception. Through hypocrisy and idolatry Israel had lied against God. Now the fruit of this dishonesty would be disillusionment, the smoke and ashes of sheer disappointment and nothingness.
Israel forsook God’s way of righteousness to follow their own ways of iniquity. By trusting in the vain help of Egypt and Assyria they made flesh their arm, and so departed from the Lord (see on Jer. 17:5).
Hos 10:14 the roar of battle will rise against your people, so that all your fortresses will be devastated— as Shalman devastated Beth Arbel on the day of battle, when mothers were dashed to the ground with their children.
The harvest is ready, the tumult of war and destruction is on its way.
Shalman. Considered variously to be a shortened form of Shalmaneser V, king of Assyria; a reference to Shallum, who murdered Zachariah the son of Jeroboam II and ruled over Israel for only one month, and in turn was murdered by his successor (see 2 Kings 15:8–15); or Salamanu, a Moabite king.
Beth-arbel. Heb. beth ‘arebe’l, “the house of Arebel.” This may have been Arbela (modern Irbid), mentioned in 1 Macc. 9:2, in Galilee, in the tribe of Naphtali, or it may have been another Irbid east of Jordan.
Interestingly enough, the LXX reads “the house of Jeroboam,” which would be a reference to the murder of Zachariah by Shallum, which ended the family of Jeroboam II.
The Assyrians were known to be very cruel in war (see on ch. 9:13).
Hos 10:15 So will it happen to you, Bethel, because your wickedness is great. When that day dawns, the king of Israel will be destroyed.
The impending captivity was traceable to the iniquities of the people. As the principal place of calf worship, Bethel was the sinful reason for many of their approaching calamities.
Day dawns. As the morning speedily ushers out the stars of night, so the king (most likely Hoshea, the last king of Israel) would be speedily cut off, and the northern kingdom quickly come to its end.