Hos 9:1 | KingComments | STEP | The prophet threatens to deport the population and their scattering. Then their worship will be over. The land will be left devastated. For the depopulation of the country, the prophet uses events that appeal to the imagination: no more birth, mother’s womb or conception and making them childless by extraditing to the murderer what is left of children. What is left is driven out of the land by God. He rejects them. The reason is given in the last verse: “Because they have not listened to Him.” God certainly has no aversion to joy. Somberness has nothing to do with God and His service. God rejoices too. He is the God who wants to fulfill His people with “all joy” ( ). But the joy of Israel is a false joy. They are like the eldest son in the parable in Luke 15. That boy also wanted to be happy, but only with his friends, without his father ( ). The joy we notice here in Israel is a joy “like the nations”. God is excluded. The prosperity that the people knew under Jeroboam II and that has become visible in an abundant harvest, they use for their own pleasures. They give them to Assyria to buy his favor. In this way they enter into an adulterous relationship. They do not realize that only God can give a solution and that human help is of no use ( ). suggests that Hosea expresses his message while the people are feasting (cf. ). Possibly it is a harvest festival, the Feast of Booth, or at least that which Jeroboam I invented as a substitute. For the announcement of the approaching judgments of God the prophets have several times made use of the great appointed festivals, because then there are many people together. Hosea must have been seen as a great killjoy there. He admonishes them to stop having fun. They rejoice like the nations, and therein lies their harlotry. Through their covenant with God they have entered into a marriage relationship with Him. Every other connection has to be renounced. At such festivals, in addition to the spiritual harlotry practiced by the people, there is often literally harlotry as well. Hosea wants to awaken them from their rush of frivolous joy, because there is no reason at all for celebrating ( ).

‏ Hosea 9:1

Introduction

The prophet threatens to deport the population and their scattering. Then their worship will be over. The land will be left devastated. For the depopulation of the country, the prophet uses events that appeal to the imagination: no more birth, mother’s womb or conception and making them childless by extraditing to the murderer what is left of children. What is left is driven out of the land by God. He rejects them. The reason is given in the last verse: “Because they have not listened to Him.”

Wrong Exultation

God certainly has no aversion to joy. Somberness has nothing to do with God and His service. God rejoices too. He is the God who wants to fulfill His people with “all joy” (Rom 15:13). But the joy of Israel is a false joy. They are like the eldest son in the parable in Luke 15. That boy also wanted to be happy, but only with his friends, without his father (Lk 15:29). The joy we notice here in Israel is a joy “like the nations”. God is excluded.

The prosperity that the people knew under Jeroboam II and that has become visible in an abundant harvest, they use for their own pleasures. They give them to Assyria to buy his favor. In this way they enter into an adulterous relationship. They do not realize that only God can give a solution and that human help is of no use (Psa 60:11b).

Hos 9:1 suggests that Hosea expresses his message while the people are feasting (cf. Hos 9:5). Possibly it is a harvest festival, the Feast of Booth, or at least that which Jeroboam I invented as a substitute. For the announcement of the approaching judgments of God the prophets have several times made use of the great appointed festivals, because then there are many people together. Hosea must have been seen as a great killjoy there.

He admonishes them to stop having fun. They rejoice like the nations, and therein lies their harlotry. Through their covenant with God they have entered into a marriage relationship with Him. Every other connection has to be renounced. At such festivals, in addition to the spiritual harlotry practiced by the people, there is often literally harlotry as well. Hosea wants to awaken them from their rush of frivolous joy, because there is no reason at all for celebrating (Jam 4:9).