Hos 11:8-12 | Clarke | STEP | Verse 8 How shall I give thee up - See the notes on , where we have similar words from similar feeling. Mine heart is turned within me - Justice demands thy punishment; Mercy pleads for thy life. As thou changest, Justice resolves to destroy, or Mercy to save. My heart is oppressed, and I am weary with repenting - with so frequently changing my purpose. All this, though spoken after the manner of men, shows how merciful, compassionate, and loath to punish the God of heaven is. What sinner or saint upon earth has not been a subject of these gracious operations?

Hosea 11:8-12

Verse 8

How shall I give thee up - See the notes on Hos 6:4, where we have similar words from similar feeling.

Mine heart is turned within me - Justice demands thy punishment; Mercy pleads for thy life. As thou changest, Justice resolves to destroy, or Mercy to save. My heart is oppressed, and I am weary with repenting - with so frequently changing my purpose. All this, though spoken after the manner of men, shows how merciful, compassionate, and loath to punish the God of heaven is. What sinner or saint upon earth has not been a subject of these gracious operations? Verse 9

I will not execute - Here is the issue of this conflict in the Divine mind. Mercy triumphs over Judgment; Ephraim shall be spared. He is God, and not man. He cannot be affected by human caprices. They are now penitent, and implore mercy; he will not, as man would do, punish them for former offenses, when they have fallen into his hand. The holy place is in Ephraim, and God is in this holy place; and he will not go into the cities, as he did into Sodom and Gomorrah, to destroy them. Judgment is his strange work. How exceedingly affecting are these two verses! Verse 10

They shall walk after the Lord - They shall discern the operations of his providence, when,

He shall roar like a lion - When he shall utter his majestic voice, Cyrus shall make his decree. The people shall tremble - be in a state of commotion; every one hurrying to avail himself of the opportunity to return to his own land. Verse 11

They shall tremble as a bird - Those of them that are in Egypt shall also be called thence, and shall speed hither as a bird. Those in Assyria shall also be called to return, and they shall flee as doves to their windows. All shall, in the fullness of time, return to their own land. And,

I will place them in their houses, saith the Lord - They shall have their temple once more, and all their holy ordinances. Verse 12

Ephraim compasseth me about with lies - I think this verse does not well unite with the above; it belongs to another subject, and should begin the following chapter, as in the Hebrew.

Judah yet ruleth with God - There is an allusion here to Gen 32:24, where Jacob having "wrestled with the Angel," had his name changed to Israel, one that rules with God. That glory the Israelites had lost by their idolatry; but Judah still retained the true worship, and alone deserved the name of Israel.

Bp. Newcome translates this clause thus: - "But hereafter they shall come down a people of God, even a faithful people of saints."

Even allowing this to be the most correct view of the original, I do not see what we gain by this change.