Hosea 10-12

     Among the comments made at Bible Study last night? Things haven’t changed that much!

     Also discussed was the difficulties of translation and how much language changes. There are also a few words in ancient Hebrew that no one has a clue about. Yet the grace-filled reality is the fact that God still speaks to us through these books, even if some points are a little obscure.
     Chapter 10 begins with one of the points of obscurity. It says that Israel is either a rank vine or a luxuriant one. Israel is therefore either a rank vine producing bad fruit or a luxuriant vine producing good fruit that is used for the wrong purpose. Perhaps, in the wonderful double meanings of ancient near eastern thought, levels of both images were being communicated.
     There is irony in verse 3, for the statement that Israel has no king because they haven’t acknowledged God, and still questioning what God will do for them. Hosea proceeds to say that the problem too much talk, too many oaths and treaties and lawsuits. These and false gods are what the people turn to. The punishment will be the war and loss. false images will be carred to Assyria (idols, being made with gold and or silver were taken in war as tribute, both as a way of “hah, I’ve captured your god,” and because the metals were valuable). In the end, everything Israel has built and relied upon will come to nothing. It will be like chasing the wind.
     Israel (Ephraim) is like a heifer broken in, but whoonly wants to do the easier job of threshing corn, but none of the productive owrk of harrowing and sowing. Hosea advices sowing justice and seeking the lord, but instead Israel has plowed wickedness and reaped mischief.
     What follows is a graphic description of some of the horrors of war. Because Israel has depended on military might, this will be the outcome.
     Chapter 11, however, begins with beautiful, if somewhat wistful, images of God as the parent loving the child. In old testament law, a parent could, conceivably, bring a disobedient son before the elders with a possible sentence of death for his rebelliousness. (It is hard to imagine this happening very often). But this gives greater poignancy to the statement “How can I give you up?” and “I am God and not a man.” For God’s love is not bound by human limitation.
     Hosea, in reviewing Hebrew history (in what we call chapter 12) has an unusual view of Jacob the patriarch. The gook of Genesis and tradition tends to view him more postively. Yet Jacob in Hosea’s view has acted badly. Though the chapter returns to Jacob, there seems to be some isolated sentences of prophesy that have been inserted here by the editor. The twelfth chapter concludes with the awareness that Israel pretty much deserves anything it gets.
     The alternating contrasts of threat and of God’s yearning could have a number of explanations, among them Hosea’s own journey of swinging between despair, anger and love for his wife. He clearly and desperately wants his people to pay attention, but they think everything is all right and continue relying upon earthly kings and earthly powers.
      A question that arises, then, is what do we trust today that doesn’t merit our reliance upon it? When do we turn to the parent love of God?