Hosea 11:1

Here we find,

I. God very gracious to Israel. They were a people for whom he had done more than for any people under heaven, and to whom he had given more, which they are here, I will not say upbraided with (for God gives, and upbraids not), but put in mind of, as an aggravation of their sin and an encouragement to repentance. 1. He had a kindness for them when they were young (Hos 11:1): When Israel was a child then I loved him; when they first began to multiply into a nation in Egypt God then set his love upon them, and chose them because he loved them, because he would love them, Deu 7:7, Deu 7:8. When they were weak and helpless as children, foolish and froward as children, when they were outcasts, and children exposed, then God loved them; he pitied them, and testified his goodwill to them; he bore them as the nurse does the sucking child, nourished them, and suffered their manners. Note, Those that have grown up, nay, those that have grown old, ought often to reflect upon the goodness of God to them in their childhood. 2. He delivered them out of the house of bondage: I called my son out of Egypt, because a son, because a beloved son. When God demanded Israel's discharge from Pharaoh he called them his son, his first-born. Note, Those whom God loves he calls out of the bondage of sin and Satan into the glorious liberty of his children. These words are said to have been fulfilled in Christ, when, upon the death of Herod, he and his parents were called out of Egypt (Mat 2:15), so that the words have a double aspect, speaking historically of the calling of Israel out of Egypt and prophetically of the bringing of Christ thence; and the former was a type of the latter, and a pledge and earnest of the many and great favours God had in reserve for that people, especially the sending of his Son into the world, and the bringing him again into the land of Israel when they had unkindly driven him out, and he might justly never have returned. The calling of Christ out of Egypt was a figure of the calling of all that are his, through him, out of spiritual slavery. 3. He gave them a good education, took care of them, took pains with them, not only as a father or tutor, but, such is the condescension of divine grace, as a mother or nurse (Hos 11:3): I taught Ephraim also to go, as a child in leading-strings is taught. When they were in the wilderness God led them by the pillar of cloud and fire, showed them the way in which they should go, and bore them up, taking them by the arms. He taught them to go in the way of his commandments, by the institutions of the ceremonial law, which were as tutors and governors to that people under age. He took them by the arms, to guide them, that they might not stray, and to hold them up, that they might not stumble and fall. God's spiritual Israel are thus supported. Thou has holden me by my right hand, Psa 73:23. 4. When any thing was amiss with them, or they were ever so little out of order, he was their physician: "I healed them; I not only took a tender care of them (a friend may do that), but wrought an effectual cure: it is a God only that can do that. I am the Lord that healeth thee (Exo 15:26), that redresseth all thy grievances." 5. He brought them into his service by mild and gentle methods (Hos 11:4): I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love. Note, It is God's work to draw poor souls to himself; and none can come to him except he draw them, Joh 6:44. He draws, (1.) With the cords of a man, with such cords as men draw with that have a principle of humanity, or such cords as men are drawn with; he dealt with them as men, in an equitable rational way, in an easy gentle way, with the cords of Adam. He dealt with them as with Adam in innocency, bringing them at once into a paradise, and into covenant with himself. (2.) With bands of love, or cartropes of love. This word signifies stronger cords than the former. He did not drive them by force into his service, whether they would or no, nor rule them with rigour, nor detain them by violence, but his attractives were all loving and endearing, all sweet and gentle, that he might overcome them with kindness. Moses, whom he made their guide, was the meekest man in the world. Kindnesses among men we commonly call obligations, or bonds, bonds of love. Thus God draws with the savour of his good ointments (Sol 1:4), draws with lovingkindness, Jer 31:3. Thus God deals with us, and we must deal in like manner with those that are under our instruction and government, deal rationally and mildly with them. 6. He eased them of the burdens they had been long groaning under: I was to them as those that take off the yoke on their jaws, alluding to the care of the good husbandman, who is merciful to his beast, and will not tire him with hard and constant labour. Probably, in those times, the yoke on the neck of the oxen was fastened with some bridle, or headstall, over the jaws, which muzzled the mouth of the ox. Israel in Egypt were thus restrained from the enjoyments of their comforts and constrained to hard labour; but God eased them, removed their shoulder from the burden, Psa 81:6. Note, Liberty is a great mercy, especially out of bondage. 7. He supplied them with food convenient. In Egypt they fared hard, but, when God brought them out, he laid meat unto them, as the husbandman, when he has unyoked his cattle, fodders them. God rained manna about their camp, bread from heaven, angels' food; other creatures seek their meat, but God laid meat to his own people, as we do to our children, was himself their caterer and carver, anticipated them with the blessings of goodness.

II. Here is Israel very ungrateful to God.

1. They were deaf and disobedient to his voice. He spoke to them by his messengers, Moses and his other prophets, called them from their sins, called them to himself, to their work and duty; but as they called them so they went from them; they rebelled in those particular instances wherein they were admonished; the more pressing and importunate the prophets were with them, to persuade them to that which was good, the more refractory they were, and the more resolute in their evil ways, disobeying for disobedience-sake. This foolishness is bound in the hearts of children, who, as soon as they are taught to go, will go from those that call them.

2. They were fond of idols, and worshipped them: They sacrificed to Baalim, first one Baal and then another, and burnt incense to graven images, though they were called to by the prophets of the Lord again and again not to do this abominable thing which he hated. Idolatry was the sin which from the beginning, and all along, had most easily beset them.

3. They were regardless of God, and of his favours to them: They knew not that I healed them. They looked only at Moses and Aaron, the instruments of their relief, and, when any thing was amiss, quarrelled with them, but looked not through them to God who employed them. Or, When God corrected them, and kept them under a severe discipline, they understood not that it was for their good, and that God thereby healed them, and it was necessary for the perfecting of their cure, else they would have been better reconciled to the methods God took. Note, Ignorance is at the bottom of ingratitude, Hos 2:8.

4. They were strongly inclined to apostasy. This is the blackest article in the charge (Hos 11:7): My people are bent to backsliding from me. Every word here is aggravating. (1.) They backslide. There is no hold of them, no stedfastness in them; they seem to come forward, towards God, but they quickly slide back again, and are as a deceitful bow. (2.) They backslide from me, from God, the chief good, the fountain of life and living waters, from their God who never turned from them, nor war as a wilderness to them. (3.) They are bent to backslide; they are ready to sin; there is in their natures a propensity to that which is evil; at the best they hang in suspense between God and the world, so that a little thing serves to draw them the wrong way; they are forward to close with every temptation. It also intimates that they are resolute in sin; their hearts are fully set in them to do evil the bias is strong that way; and they persist in their backslidings, whatever is said or done to stop them; and yet, (4.) "They are, in profession, my people. They are called by my name, and profess relation to me; they are mine, whom I have done much for and expect much from, whom I have nourished and brought up, as children, and yet they backslide from me." Note, In our repentance we ought to lament not only our backslidings, but our bent to backslide, not only our actual transgressions, but our original corruption, the sin that dwells in us, the carnal mind.

5. They were strangely averse to repentance and reformation. Here are two expressions of their obstinacy: - (1.) They refused to return, Hos 11:5. So much were they bent to backslide that, though they could not but find, upon trial, the folly of their backslidings, and that when they forsook God they changed for the worse, yet they went on frowardly. I have loved strangers, and after them I will go. They were commanded to return, were courted and entreated to return, were promised that if they would they should be kindly received, but they refused. (2.) Though they called them to the Most High. God's prophets and ministers called them to return to the God from whom they had revolted, to the most high God, from whom they had sunk into this wretched degeneracy; they called them from the worship of the idols, which were so much below them, and the worship of which was therefore their disparagement, to the true God, who was so much above them, and the worship of whom was therefore their preferment; they called them from this earth to high and heavenly things; but they called in vain. None at all would exalt him. Though he is the most high God they would not acknowledge him to be so, would do nothing to honour him nor give him the glory due to his name. Or, They would not exalt themselves, would not rise out of that state of apostasy and misery into which they had precipitated themselves; but there they contentedly lay still, would not lift up their heads nor lift up their souls. Note, God's faithful ministers have taken a great deal of pains, to no purpose, with backsliding children, have called them to the Most High; but none would stir, none at all would exalt him.

III. Here is God very angry, and justly so, with Israel; see what are the tokens of God's displeasure with which they are here threatened. 1. God, who brought them out of Egypt, to take them for a people to himself, since they would not be faithful to him, shall bring them into a worse condition than he at first found them in (Hos 11:5): "He shall not return into the land of Egypt, though that was a house of bondage grievous enough; but he shall go into a harder service, for the Assyrian shall be his king, who will use him worse than ever Pharaoh did." They shall not return into Egypt, which lies near, where they may hear often from their own country, and whence they may hope shortly to return to it again; but they shall be carried into Assyria, which lies much more remote, and where they shall be cut off from all correspondence with their own land and from all hopes of returning to it, and justly, because they refused to return. Note, Those that will not return to the duties they have left cannot expect to return to the comforts they have lost. 2. God, who gave them Canaan, that good land, and a very safe and comfortable settlement in it, shall bring his judgments upon them there, which shall make their habitation unsafe and uncomfortable (Hos 11:6): The sword shall come upon them, the sword of war, the sword of a foreign enemy, prevailing against them and triumphing over them. (1.) This judgment shall spread far. The sword shall fasten upon their cities, those nests of people and store-houses of wealth; it shall likewise reach to their branches, the country villages (so some), the citizens themselves (so others), or the bars (so the word signifies) and gates of their city, or all the branches of their revenue and wealth, or their children, the branches of their families. (2.) It shall last long: It shall abide on their cities. David thought three months flying before his enemies was the only judgment of the three that was to be excepted against; but this sword shall abide much longer than three months on the cities of Israel. They continued their rebellions against God, and therefore God continued his judgments on them. (3.) It shall make a full end: It shall consume their branches, and devour them, and lay all waste, and this because of their own counsels, that is, because they would have their own projects, which God therefore, in a way of righteous judgment, gave them up to. Note, The confusion of sinners is owing to their contrivance. God's counsels would have saved them, but their own counsels ruined them.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Hos 11:1 When Israel [was] a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.

Ver. 1. When Israel was a child, then I loved him] On, because Israel was a child I loved him. Young things are lovely; young children especially, for their innocence and ignoscence. Some sense it thus, Israel was a child, and had nothing of worth or lovely in him; yet I loved him freely, Deu 7:7 Hos 10:9, called him out of Egypt, out of the iron furnace, led him through the deep, as a horse in the wilderness, Isa 63:13, possessed him of the promised land. Out of which though I shall shortly cast him for his ingratitudes, yet there is hope of his restoration, by the Messiah my Son, whom when I have called out of Egypt, he shall gather together again the dispersed of Israel, and bring life and immortality to light by the gospel. The foundation of which restoration he here maketh to be his own free grace. He hath holpen his servant (or his child, του παιδας, Luk 1:53) Israel, in remembrance of his mercy. "God so loved the world, that be gave his only begotten Son," &c., Joh 3:16. Here then beginneth our prophet’s first evangelical sermon, as Tarnovius observeth, who also readeth the text thus: Albeit Israel was a child, such a forlorn outcast child, as is described Eze 17:1-24 Eze 23:1-49, yet I loved him, and adopted him for my son; not for any defect on my part (for I had an only begotten Son, in whom I am well pleased), or for any desert on his part, for I found him in his blood, in his blood, in his blood, when I cast my skirt of love over him, and said unto him, Live, Eze 16:6. Yea, and for his salvation’s sake, I have called, that is, I have decreed to call, out of Egypt (whither he fled from Herod, and where he abode two or three years at least) my child Jesus, whose office it is to "save his people from their sins," Mat 1:21. And although I might justly have deprived them of such a Saviour for ever, because when he came to his own, his own received him not (yea, rejected him to whom their own signs given to Herod did so aptly and evidently agree), yet out of Eygpt, to show the constancy of my love to Israel, have I called (by mine angel, as Jacob by a messenger called his wives to him into the field, Gen 31:4) my Son Christ, Mat 2:23, who is God’s Son, first, by eternal generation, Pro 8:22-23; secondly, by personal union, Psa 2:7. And thus God called out of Egypt, first Israel his people, and then Christ, the head of his people; in whom at length this prophecy was fulfilled.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hos_11:1

When Israel was a child.

The national unit

The meaning is not, necessarily, when Israel was an infant, a child in mere years, but when Israel was a child in spirit, docile, simple of mind, sincere of purpose, true in worship. When Israel lifted his eyes heavenward, and sought for Me, then I stooped over him as a man might stoop over his child to lift him into his arms, and press him closely to his heart. There is a unit of the individual; let us take care lest we rest there, and so miss the ever-enlarging revelation of the Divine purpose in human history. There is not only a unit of the individual, there is a unit of the nation. Israel is here spoken of as if he were one man, a little child; though a million strong in population, yet there was in the million a unit. This is one aspect of Divine providence. We must not regard nations as if they ceased to have status and responsibility, name and destiny before God. A nation is one, a world is one, the universe is one. What does God know of our little divisions and distributions into pluralities and relationships? The nation may have a character. The Church is one, and has a reputation and influence. So we come upon the Divine handling of great occasions. The Lord is not fretted by details. All the details of His providence come out of and return to one great principle of redeeming Fatherhood. The locks are innumerable; the key is one, and it is in the Fathers hand. Let Him hold it. (Joseph Parker, D. D.)

Gods love to us the pattern of our love to others

The leading topic of this chapter appears to be the calling of the people of Israel out of the prison-house of Egypt. It gives a gracious account of our heavenly Fathers love, and a fearful picture of mans ingratitude. Under figures and emblems there is a lively representation of Gods dealings with His redeemed ones--with the Israel that now is, not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. The call of Israel from Egypt, as typical of Christ and of His people, is our subject. It is typical of us, as we are called from sin to the holiness of the heavenly Canaan.

I. Gods love to Christ, as a child, manifested to us by His calling Him from egypt. In the fulness of time the beloved of the Father became flesh, and dwelt among us. But no sooner did He appear than His life was threatened. The child was borne for safety into Egypt. In due time Christ was called out of Egypt, brought again to the Holy Land, there to exercise His ministry and perform the will of God.

II. Gods love to us, whilst we were yet at a distance from Him. We who are redeemed are loved with the self-same love with which God loved His only begotten Son.

II. The effect which the possession of this love will naturally produce in our hearts. It will produce love to others. What should be the effect of Gods love in our minds? A disinterested love to our fellow-creatures. Thus shall we have a scriptural evidence that we are of the spiritual Israel, whom God hath loved and called out of Egypt. (G. C. Tomlinson.)

A typical portrait of a people

I. A highly favoured people.

1. God loved them.

2. God emancipated them.

3. God educated them.

4. God healed them.

5. God guided them.

6. God relieved them.

7. God fed them.

II. A signally ungrateful people.

1. They disobeyed, Gods teaching.

2. They gave themselves to idolatry.

3. They ignored God s kindness.

4. They persistently backslided.

III. A righteously punished people. The judgment would be--

1. Extensive; and

2. It should continue; and

3. It should be destructive.

Is not this history of this people typical? Do not they represent especi ally the peoples of modern Christendom, highly favoured of God, signally ungrateful to God, and exposed to punishment from God? (Homilist.)

Backsliding

1. This is the great sin of the visible Church, to which she hath a strong inclination naturally, even in her best frame.

2. Mens hanging sometimes in suspense, and having some inclinations to return, will neither double out their point against the power of corruption within them, nor will it extenuate their backsliding.

3. The great backsliding of Gods people is their backsliding from God and communion with Him; which draweth on all other apostasies and defections.

4. It is of the Lords great mercy that He ceaseth not to follow backsliders with messages from His Word. (George Hutcheson.)

A fivefold view of Gods love

1. It is adopting love. God loved Israel in Egypt, Israel in captivity, Israel among the brick-kilns, and called him His son. It is by no merit or righteousness of our own that we are made sons of God. We become children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Gods love is adopting love. God delights in adopting children, and giving them the spirit of adoption, and taking them to the home of the ransomed family.

2. It is a tender love. The Lord describes the manner of a mother teaching her babe to walk. I taught Ephraim to go. The Omnipotent became as a nurse to Israel. When difficulties arose He bore him in His arms as a man doth bear his little child. And the heavenly Father is ever the same.

3. His inviting love. Called My son out of Egypt. We know how cruel Pharaoh was, and how hard were his taskmasters. But there was One who loved them, who said, I have heard their cry, and have come down to help them. His fiery cloudy pillar was the symbol of his inviting love.

4. It is weeping love. God mourns over their iniquities. Gods love as weeping love was displayed by The Man of Sorrows, whose grief was for the hardness of mens hearts, and whose hot tears over Jerusalem were because she knew not the things which belonged to her peace.

5. His incarnate love. The cords of a man. Incarnate love is the magnet by which souls are drawn to God. The Word was made flesh begins the story of redemption. Christ became man, to stand in mans place and deal with God in mans behalf, and to be able to enter into our feelings and fears as a merciful and compassionate High Priest. (A. Clayton Thiselton.)

Mingled severity and mercy

The scope of this chapter is to clear God from severity, and to upbraid Israel for ungrateful and stubborn carriage, against mercies and means, and yet to promise mercy to the remnant, to His elect ones. At the close of the preceding chapter there were dreadful threatenings against Israel, that the mothers should be dashed in pieces upon their children, and the king utterly cut off. But does not this argue God to be a God of rigid severity? Where is the mercy, goodness, and clemency of God towards His people? God says, For all this I am a God of mercy and goodness, for I have manifested abundance of mercy already, and am ready still to manifest more; but you have been a stubborn and a stout-hearted people against Me. From this general scope observe--

1. God stands much upon the clearing of Himself to be a God of love and mercy. Whatsoever becomes of the wicked, yet God will make it clear before all the world that He is a God of much mercy. God takes it very ill that we should have any hard thoughts of Him; let us not be ready to entertain such thoughts of God, as if He were a hard master. When Israel was a child. That is, at his first beginning to be a people, in his young time, My heart was towards him. When he knew little of Me. When he could do little for Me. When there was much vanity and folly in him, as there are generally in children. When he was helpless and succourless, and knew not how to provide for himself. The love of God to Israel is expressed in these three particulars.

(1) God entered into a covenant with him.

(2) Thou becamest Mine, that is, I had separated thee for Myself, and took thee for a peculiar one to Me, and intended special mercy and goodness to thee.

(3) I confirmed all this by an oath, I sware unto thee. Observe--

2. It is the privilege of the Church and of the saints to be beloved of God. God loves His people; this is their privilege, He loves them with a special love.

3. It is a great aggravation to sin, to sin against love.

4. It is very useful to call to mind Gods old love.

5. All Gods old mercies remain engagements to duty and aggravations to sin.

6. Let not our hearts sink in despairing thoughts, though we see that we are able to do but little for God, and though we are unworthy of His love.

7. Gods love begins betimes to His people; let not His peoples love be deferred too long. (Jeremiah Burroughs.)

Gods love for the Church

1. Gods love to the Church is her first and great privilege, which prevents her in her lowest condition, when she is unworthy and base. When Israel was a child, witless and worthless, then I loved him. And this is the fountain of all Gods bounty to him.

2. The Lord will make His love to His people conspicuous in their preservation in a low condition, and under much trouble, when He seeth it not fit to deliver them from it.

3. The Lord also will magnify His deliverance from trouble and bondage, not only spiritual, but outward also, in so far as is for their good.

3. As the Lord doth ofttimes manifest His love, and put special honour on His people, by putting them to sufferings and trouble, so He will specially make His delivering of them proclaim His love and estimation of them, and His peculiar interest in them. (George Hutcheson.)

And called My son out of Egypt.

And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh, Thus saith the Lord, Israel is My son, even My first-born; and I say unto thee, Let My son go, that he may serve Me. On these words Hoseas reference rests. The people of Israel are to God as a son to a father; even as a first-born son. That is why He has come down to deliver them. We speak of the purposes of God, as though God had formed some complex schemes at an early period in the worlds history, and now He must work these schemes out. But the God of the Bible is no scheme-maker. He is a Father--we are His sons. It is Israels cry that has brought Jehovah down to deliver them. He is the Father of the fatherless. He hears the cry of the afflicted. But though God is moved by love, He does all things in order. He pities His people before their cry has ascended to Him; but He waits for that cry before He comes down to deliver them. For He will not deliver the unwilling or the proud. So He waits. And He came to the right person. He will do His work by means of a man, and He knows the man to do it. Moses brought Israel out of Egypt. Jehovah, that is the name of Israels Father and Deliverer. I am that I am is practically the translation of Jehovah. It is a somewhat cold name to us, because we know the tenderer name of Father. Hoseas reference looks forward as well as backward; it looks before and after. Hosea saw that his words had a fuller meaning than could be filled by the people of Israel. He saw that they carried a promise which had not been performed even in his day. Like Abraham, he saw Christs day afar off, and was glad. (James Hastings, M. A.)

The flight into Egypt

How can Matthew speak of these words as a prophecy, and of the sojourn of the Divine babe in Egypt as a fulfilment of their prophecy? It has been said that Matthew uses Hoseas words, so to speak, rhetorically or classically, declaring that the story of the infant Jesus in Egypt was a fine instance of Hoseas saying. Or it may be answered that the literal Israel was the type of the spiritual Israel. At all events, the Divine Man was Himself the true, ideal Israel, and as such Jehovah did call Him when a child out of Egypt. Once more, it may be answered, in a more general way, that the present is ever the fruit of the past and the seed of the future. Events are born of events, as successive parts of plants are born of preceding parts; the parts are different, but they are radically only repetitions of the original seed. History repeats itself. The historic is ever the prophetic. Particularly is it true in a case of special Divine election, like that of the Jewish nation, that history will be prophecy. The fulfilments of the prophetic Scriptures, like waves of the sea, are ever-multiplying and enlarging concentric circles. And Jesus Christ is evermore the final and crowning fulfilment. The Divine Man is the universal pleroma--alike the radiant point and the circumference of all things. As God called out of Egypt His son, so out of Egypt does He call His Church. It was literally true of some of the most eminent of the fathers,--Tertullian, Origen, Athanasius, Cyprian. It is spiritually true of all Gods people. (G. D. Boardman.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hos 11:1. When Israel was a child, &c. — “The Israel of this chapter is the whole people, composed of the two branches, Judah and the ten tribes. But the house of Israel is the kingdom of the ten tribes, as distinct from the other branch.” — Horsley. By the time of Israel’s childhood is meant the patriarchal age, and the time of their continuance under the Egyptian bondage. Then I loved him — Manifested a tender and paternal affection to him, increasing him in numbers, wealth, and honour. And called my son out of Egypt — Namely, by Moses, whom God commanded to acquaint the Israelites that they must remove out of Egypt. Israel is called God’s son, and his firstborn, Exo 4:22-23; and therein was an eminent figure of the Messiah, in whom all God’s promises were fulfilled. This prophecy, therefore, is applied by St. Mat 2:15, to our Lord’s return out of Egypt, after his being taken thither by his parents in his infancy, and kept there some time for fear of Herod. And the strict, literal sense of the words, more properly belongs to him than to Israel. And this is observable in many other prophecies, which can but improperly be applied to those of whom they were at first spoken; and, taking them in their strict, literal sense, are only fulfilled in Christ: see particularly Psa 22:16; Psa 22:18. “Although the son,” says Bishop Horsley, “here immediately meant, is the natural Israel, called out of Egypt by Moses and Aaron; there can be no doubt that an allusion was intended by the Holy Spirit to the call of the infant Christ out of the same country. In reference to this event, the passage might be thus paraphrased: ‘God in such sort set his affection upon the Israelites, in the infancy of their nation, that, so early as from their first settlement in Egypt, the arrangement was declared of the descent of the Messiah from Judah, and of the calling of that son from Egypt.’”

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

THE FATHER’S LOVE FOR THE PRODIGAL SON, Hos_11:1-11.

Once more the prophet reverts to the early history of Israel (compare Hos_9:10; Hos_10:9). He points out how great, strong, and tender has been the divine love (Hos_11:1; Hos_11:3-4), and how unappreciative and ungrateful the chosen people (Hos_11:2; Hos_11:7); hence justice demands the execution of judgment (Hos_11:5-6). But Israel is still the son of Jehovah, and the divine compassion goes out for the prodigal (Hos_11:8); therefore the punishment will be tempered by mercy; and after the judgment has accomplished its disciplinary purpose, Israel will be restored to the divine favor (Hos_11:9-11). Hos_11:12 (in Heb_12:1) is connected more closely with chapter 12.

1. A child — The childhood of Israel is the earliest stage of its national existence, here identified with the stay in Egypt (compare Hos_2:3; Hos_9:10).

I loved him — Or, I began to love him (compare Hos_9:15).

Called my son out of Egypt — Literally, called for my son, that is, to be my son. Out of all the nations of the earth Jehovah selected Israel to sustain filial relations to him. Other passages (Exo_4:22; Deu_14:1, etc.) imply that Jehovah regarded Israel as his son even while in Egypt, not that he called him from Egypt to become his son. This seeming difference of conception has led commentators to propose various emendations. The simplest, supported in part by LXX., is to omit the preposition le. With this omission the text reads, “I called my son.” It should be noted, however, that, especially in later Hebrew, the preposition le is used to introduce the direct object (G.-K., 117n). Following this rule even the present text might be read, “I called my son.” 1b is interpreted as Messianic in Mat_2:15.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL NOTES.

Hos_11:1.] The prophet shows how Israel had repaid God’s love in the past with ingratitude and unfaithfulness. Child] “First-born son” (Exo_4:22), the infancy in Egypt and the wilderness; son by election. Called] Brought safely out, typical of Christ’s call (Mat_2:15), and of redemption through him.

Hos_11:2. They] Moses, Aaron, and prophets; many calls, but Israel drew back from them, went after gods.

Hos_11:3. I taught] Lit. set Ephraim on his feet (cf. Deu_1:31; Deu_8:2; Deu_8:5; Neh_9:21; Isa_63:9). God supported them as a nurse her child, gently taught them to walk, and carried them when tired (Num_11:12. See Act_13:18, marg.). Knew] Ignored God’s kindness, perceived not God’s design to restore them (Exo_15:26).

Hos_11:4. Cords of a man] Par. to “bands of love,” “cords with which men are led, more especially children that are weak upon their feet, in contrast with ropes, with which men control wild, unmanageable beasts (Psa_32:9), are a figurative representation of the paternal humane guidance of Israel” [Keil]. Take off] Heb. lift up, i.e. push the yoke higher up, to relieve oxen, that they might eat with comfort and ease. Pusey gives, “I was regarded by them as putting the yoke on, ever placing some new yoke or constraint upon them,” but the words indicate God’s continued goodness. Laid meat] Gave means of grace and manifestations of mercy in abundance; manna in the desert.

HOMILETICS

GOD’S PATERNAL CARE AND MAN’S UNGRATEFUL RETURN.—Hos_11:1-4

There is a wonderful cluster of blessings in these verses, every one of which is significant, and the whole especially puts men under deep obligation.

I. God’s great kindness. God loved, trained, and treated his people with the greatest care, though they sinned and rebelled against him. This kindness is displayed—

1. In the love of a parent towards a son. “When Israel was a child then I loved him.” (a) This love is free. God loved them not because they were better and more numerous than others. He loved them of his own free will, and chose them because he loved them (Deu_7:7-8). (b) This love is undeserved. “When a child,” wayward and self-willed, foolish and disobedient. We love children because they are like us, or because they please us. But God loves men that are unlike him in character and helpless in condition (Rom_5:6). This love is sovereign and undeserved; “for we were by nature children of wrath, even as others.” When forlorn and outcast, God loves men and adopts them into his family.

2. In the power of a redeemer to a captive. “And called my son out of Egypt.” God not only called by the voice of his servants, but gave power to obey the call. Men are called for years, but do not, are unwilling and unable to come to God. The Spirit makes us willing in the day of God’s power; reluctance is overcome; we rise and obey the call. Power in a redeemer is a necessity. We cannot trust a Saviour who cannot deliver us. But in Christ omnipotence is linked with love, power is employed for the ends of mercy and the salvation of man. Redemption from Egypt is a type of deliverance from sin, death, and hell. “For he shall save his people from their sins.”

3. In the tenderness of a nurse for a child. “I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms.” Like a mother or nurse, training a child in leading-strings, God carries men when young, upholds them when weak, and teaches them gradually and gently to walk in his commands. He takes them by their arms, lifts them up from dust and despair, and teaches them “to go” in pursuit of better things. It is the privilege of God’s people not only to be loved and delivered, but taught and guided. When weak and weary, in paths rough and dark, God is with them, leading them about, and instructing them and keeping them as the apple of his eye (Deu_32:10). “In the wilderness where thou hast seen how that the Lord thy God bare thee, as a man doth bear his son, in all the way that ye went, until ye came into this place” (Deu_1:31; Act_13:18).

4. In the skill of a physician towards the sick. “I healed them.” God’s people are not only cared for, but cured in sickness and sorrow. Sin is self-injury, but God is our happiness and health. Men inflict wounds upon heart and mind, destroy themselves, but in God is their help (Hos_13:9). God cures their sicknesses and pardons their sins, aids their infirmities and heals their diseases (Psa_103:3). No other physician can close our wounds and putrefying sores, no earthly ointment can mollify our bruises. “I am the Lord that healeth thee.”

5. In the kindness of a master towards his servants.

1. Kindness in drawing men into his service. They are alienated and distant from God, naturally ill disposed and unable to come to him. All who come are drawn, “Draw me and I will run after thee.” Compulsory piety tends to infidelity. Lord Bolingbroke was compelled to peruse volumes of controversial Divinity when far too young to understand them. This perhaps implanted in his mind seeds of aversion to the truths of the Bible. (a) This drawing is by love, “with bands of love.” Love only can draw, cruelty drives. God uses no violence nor force, never tries harsh when gentle means will do. The law affects us like frost the stream; it hardens and stagnates the soul: but the love of God, like the shining sun and the gentle shower, melts the cold and breaks the heart into gushing streams. Teachers who rule with a rod, and parents who govern with a frown, will not win affection and obedience. God draws by loving-kindness, and wins to his service by love. “I treat my enemies so well that I compel them to be my friends,” said Alexander the Great. “No cord or cable,” says Burton, “can draw so forcibly, or bind so fast, as love can do with only a silken thread.” (b) This drawing is in harmony with our moral nature. “With cords of a man.” Men are not used like dumb driven cattle, but treated as responsible and rational creatures. In the promises of the gospel, the work of the Spirit, and the character of Christ, we are looked upon as men, and not machines nor brutes. All God’s dealings are in harmony with our mental and moral constitution. “The love of Christ constraineth us” (2Co_5:14; 1Jn_4:19).

2. Kindness in refreshing men in his service. (a) God relieves in distress. “I was to them as they that take off the yoke.” Like a merciful man who regardeth the life of his beast, he eased them of their burdens, and helped them in distress. Christ delivers from the yoke of bondage, and from the hands of our enemies (Lev_26:13). (b) God provides in want. “And I laid meat unto them.” Manna from heaven, water from the rock, and “food convenient for them,” were provided for his ancient people. In Christ there is no starvation nor stint. Blessings in abundance are given through him. Pardon, peace, and joy; relief from harassing care, and rest in perfect security. “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

II. Man’s ungrateful return. God has put men under deep obligations by his goodness. If the kind deeds of men bind us to think of them and love them, how much do we owe to God, to whose ceaseless bounty we owe every comfort of life? What he bestows upon us in kindness and constant care should be given back in sacrifice, incense, and devotion. “How unsuitable it is,” says Edwards, “for us who live only by kindness to be unkind.”

I’ve heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds

With coldness still returning;

Alas! the gratitude of men

Hath oftener left me mourning.

1. They reject Divine teaching. “As they called them, so they went from them.” Moses and Aaron, prophets and apostles, were unheeded. The more they were admonished the more careless they grew; the more pressing the teacher the more refractory the taught. Foolishness is bound in the hearts of children. When they are taught to go, they go from God into ways of sin. Divine instruction is needful and constantly given, yet many turn away in contempt. Christ is preached and the gospel offered, but men go to their merchandise and their farms. “Lo, they have rejected the word of the Lord, and what wisdom is in them?”

2. They despise Divine favours. “They knew not that I healed them.” They look to men as the source of blessings, as though by their own power and goodness they procure them. Ourselves and others are thanked, and God forgotten. We do not see the end of Divine chastisement, nor acknowledge Divine goodness in our prosperity. God is constantly ignored, and wilful ignorance leads to base ingratitude. “The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib; but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider.”

3. They cling to their wicked course. “They sacrificed unto Baalam,” went from one god to another, “and burned incense to graven images.” When men forsake the true God, they cut, and grave, and adore idols of their own. This is self-abasement and self-destruction; a just ground of complaint with God, and a sad perversion in man. “I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.”

Blow, blow, thou winter wind,

Thou art not so unkind

As man’s ingratitude.

HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES

Hos_11:1. The chap. begins with love; ancient, sovereign, electing love. The next sweet word is sonship. We see immediately after in the same verse, calling, salvation, deliverance. “I called my son out of Egypt” [Spurgeon].

Hos_11:1; Hos_11:3-4. God’s children young to be cared for; weak to be strengthened; ignorant to be taught; needy to be fed; tired to be refreshed.

Holding up.

1. To teach dependence.

2. To sustain the steps.

3. To regulate the walk. God keeps from falling, lifts up when down, gently, kindly, and gradually leads along in the path of virtue. What love and care! Be not afraid to trust in God, he may chide, but will never forsake you. He keepeth the feet of his saints (1Sa_2:9). He guideth their feet in the way of peace (Luk_1:79).

Hos_11:4. Christian life a drawing from sin and the world to God, greater faith and attainments, to more intimate fellowship on earth, and heaven at length. “He did not say lead, but draw him. This violence is done to the heart, not to the body. Why marvel? Believe, and thou comest; love, and thou art drawn. Think it not a rough and uneasy violence: it is sweet, alluring; the sweetness draws thee” [Augustine]. “All the methods and parts of God’s government are twined together as twisted cords of love from God, so ordered that they ought to draw man with all his heart to love him again.”

God’s love in his word and in his providence lays us under strong obligation to duty. How thankful should we be that all things are prepared and provided for us day after day. But how aggravating that guilt which despises such love. “To sin against mercy is to sin against humanity; and as no surfeit is more dangerous than that of bread, so no judgment is more terrible than that which grows out of love felt and slighted” [Trapp].

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 11

Hos_11:1; Hos_11:4. Drew them. No being ever yet drew another to him by a display of authority and terror. God himself never drew one soul to him by the law, which is only a system of authority and terror; but by the gospel, which is his scheme of mercy and grace. The whole of Christianity may be considered an infinite expediency, devised by the only wise God, to dispossess our minds of bad and unworthy thoughts, to fix in our trembling bosoms confidence, and thus to cause us to return to him. When we wish to influence a man we reason with him, inform his mind—we argue and persuade. This is precisely the method in which God deals with us. “He works in us to will and to do of his good pleasure” [Jay].

Who overcomes

By force, hath overcome but half his foe. [Milton].

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

III. MERCY

Hosea 11

God cannot utterly destroy Israel, whom He has always loved, though they have so basely requited Him, but will again show Mercy unto them

Hos_11:1-11

1 When Israel was a youth, then I loved Him,

And out of Egypt I called my son.

2 They [the Prophets] called them; so (often) they turned away from them;

They sacrificed to the Baals,

They burnt incense to the idol-gods.

3 And I led Ephraim along,1—

He took them2 upon his arm;—

Yet they knew not that I healed them.

4 With the bands of a man I drew them,

With cords of love;

And I was towards them,

As those that would raise the yoke-strap over their jaws,

And I reached out to them to eat.3

5 They will not return to the land of Egypt,

But Assyria,4 it is their king,

For they refused to return.

6 And the sword goes its rounds in their cities,

And destroys their bars [defenses],

And devours them for their devices.

7 And my people incline to fall away from me;5

They [the Prophets] call them (to look) upwards,

All together they refuse to raise themselves.

8 How should I give thee up, Ephraim?

How should I surrender thee, Israel?

How should I make thee like Admah,

Set thee like Zeboim?

My heart is turned within me;

My repentings are kindled together.

9 I will not execute the fierceness of my anger,

I will not again destroy Ephraim:

For I am God and not man;

In the midst of thee is a Holy One,

And I will not come in wrath.

10 They will follow the Lord:

Like a lion He will roar;

Yea He will roar, and children from the sea will come trembling [hasten];

11 Will hasten like a bird from Egypt,

And like a dove from Assyria:

Then will I make them dwell in their houses, saith Jehovah.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Hos_11:1. Jehovah calls to mind the love which He had displayed to Israel ages before. But it was rewarded with unfaithfulness, and they must be the more severely punished. See Exo_4:22 f. Israel was Jehovah’s first-born son, because they were chosen as the people of his inheritance. Hence the love of God, which redeemed them from Egypt, in order to give to their fathers the Land of Promise. On the citation of this passage in Mat_2:15 f., see the Doctrinal Section.

2. They called, namely, the prophets. As the prophets called, so (כֵּן) they refused to listen—turned away from their (the prophets’) faces. בְּעָלִים, see Hos_2:15. [Henderson: “The use of the verb: to call, in the preceding verse, suggested the idea of the subsequent messages which had been delivered to the Israelites by the prophets, to which Hosea now appeals, in order to contrast with the means which had been employed for their reformation, the obstinate character of their rebellion.”—M.]

Hos_11:3. A further description of the love of God displayed towards Israel, chiefly in the march through the wilderness. He took them upon his arms. The sudden transition to the third person is to be explained from the fact that it is the prophet that is speaking in the name of Jehovah, and that this can therefore easily pass over into a discourse by Jehovah. Comp. Deu_1:31; Exo_15:26, for the same thoughts.

Hos_11:4. With bands of a man = such as those with which men, especially children, would be led, opposed to ropes, with which beasts are tied,=cords of love in the next hemistich. “This image leads on to the similar one of the yoke laid upon cattle to yoke them in for work.” In this image gentle treatment is implied; for comparison is made with one who takes the yoke, or rather the strap with which it is secured, and which passes through the month, and draws it back over the jaws so that the animal may eat conveniently. Jehovah in his conduct towards Israel is like such a gentle master. Literally: I was to them as those who raise the yoke over their jaws. But the opinion of Keil is far-fetched, who thinks that there is a definite allusion to the commands laid upon the people, which God had made light for them, partly by many displays of his mercy, and partly by the means of grace in their religion. The tert. comp. is simply the gentleness, the kind consideration shown to them in his dealings towards them. [Though, of course, this general reference includes, with other manifestations of kindness, the special application made by Keil. For the construction and rendering of the last clause, see the Grammatical Note.—M.]

Hos_11:5. They shall not return to the land of Egypt. An apparent contradiction of Hos_8:13; Hos_9:3. But, as may be seen there, Egypt is in those passages only a type of the land of bondage. But here Egypt is employed in the literal sense, just as in Hos_11:1, to which our verse alludes. “The people of Jehovah shall not return to the land from which He called them, in order that it may not seem as though the design of the exodus and the march through the desert were frustrated through their impenitence. But they shall enter into another bondage.” To return, namely, to Jehovah.

Hos_11:6. וְחָלָה, from חוּל, to describe a circle, to move in a circle, as it were, to make the rounds; spoken of a sword=to rage. Their bars, the bars of the strong cities=their gates. These will be destroyed, and the cities be captured, and laid waste. [Others, as Gesenius and Cowles, take the word in a metaphorical sense, which is frequent: rulers, defenders. But the former is preferable, as being more directly connected with the strong cities. E. V. adopts the first derived sense of the word: branches. Calvin, following the same view, interpreted branches as=villages, the branches of the cities. In this he is followed by Fausset.—M.]

Hos_11:7 returns again to the sin of the people. תָּלָא is here used intransitively: hang over, to incline. ׃ אֶל־עַל above (comp. Hos_7:16). They (the prophets) call them. יְרמֵם, here probably intransitive (the strengthened Kal)=raise themselves, strive to rise. [The passage may be thus paraphrased: “My people are bent on turning away from me. Though the prophets call upon them to look above (to the Most High), yet with one accord they refuse to raise themselves up.”—M.]

Hos_11:8. Still Jehovah cannot utterly blot out his people. The love with which He has loved them still endures and breaks forth strongly. How could I give thee up, etc. This is still at first a continuation of the threatening. Chastisement even to utter destruction, is justified=how I should, how just it would be to give thee up! But with this expression thus justifying the punishment, the threatening is exhausted and satisfied. It is just the contemplation of the great measure of the suffering which would really be deserved which leads to the feeling that such punishment, however justifiable, cannot be executed, and that it shall be restrained=I should do this, but how terrible it would be! no, it cannot be. Thus the threatening having reached its climax, brings itself to its end. Others translate: how should I?=how should it be possible, that, etc.?=I cannot do so. But then there is no transition from Hos_11:7 to Hos_11:8. [This, the most common view, is certainly correct. There is no need of any intermediate words between the threatening and the relenting. The true theory with regard to the relation between God and the people is this, that God must be considered as all the time melting with love towards the people whom He must reject. Hence the frequent and seemingly unprepared words of promise in the book, suddenly appearing after long denunciations. No transition is needed. It is supplied by that constant yearning love of which wrath and mercy are the negative and the positive poles. The other view has to encounter the very difficulty which it seeks to obviate. For the transition would only be more abrupt from the justification of extreme punishment to its abandonment; and the difficulty is greater, because such transition would occur in the middle of a verse, and not with the beginning of a new one.—M.] Like Admah,—like Zeboim: comp. Deu_29:22, where these two cities are expressly mentioned, as having been destroyed together with Sodom and Gomorrah, which in Gen_19:24 stand alone. My heart is changed within me—so that wrath has disappeared. [For a like use of the preposition עַל, comp. Jer_8:18; Ps. 42:6, 12; Psa_43:5.—M.]

Hos_11:9. I will not return to destroy Ephraim. “After my heart has been once changed with the resolve not to punish, I will not change it again.” This is supported by the consideration that God is God and not a changeable man. עיר ׃ בְּעִיר is here probably=glow, heat of wrath. [E. V. has: into the city, which would have been בָּעִיר, and which gives no pertinent sense. This rendering is now almost universally abandoned, but it is, strange to say, approved by Pusey and Fausset, the latter of whom speaks of the other translation as held “needlessly.”—M.]

Hos_11:10. The consequence of the Lord’s compassion; He will call, and the people, following Him, will return home from banishment. They shall go after the Lord. This probably involves both the changed, converted heart, and the walking in God’s ways thence resulting. Will roar like a lion. The point of comparison is not the terrifying influence of the sound, but its extent. It reaches far and near. Thus must the cry be when it calls the people to their restoration. Or is it implied that these displays of mercy towards Israel are coupled with judgments upon the heathen? Hosea does not allude to this elsewhere. Trembling will be a consequence of this call, but it implies chiefly haste united with anxiety not to neglect the summons, and therefore the eagerness of obedience. Hence also the comparison with birds.

Hos_11:11. From the sea = from the west, as well as from Egypt and Assyria. The notion is: from all quarters of the earth (comp. Isa_11:11).

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. Israel became “God’s son,” by virtue of their being chosen as God’s peculiar people, according to Exo_4:22 f. The bestowal of this privilege, confirmed by the deliverance from Egypt, and sealed by the ratification at Sinai, forms the first step in God’s redemptive work, which is completed by the incarnation of his Son for the redemption of the world. The whole development and leading of Israel as God’s people terminate upon Christ not as though Israel were begotten as the Son of God, but in such a way as that the relation which the Lord of Heaven and earth established and preserved between Himself and this people prepared and foreshadowed the union of God and Man, and laid the way for the Incarnation of his Son by training this people as a vessel of the Divine mercy. All the important events in Israel’s history bore upon this, and thereby became types and actual prophecies of the life of Him, in whom the reconciliation of God and man should be effected, and the union of God with the human race unfold itself as a Personal Unity. In this sense is the second half of Hos_11:1 quoted in Mat_2:15, as a prophecy of Christ (Keil). But here we must stop. The further remark of Keil, in justification of the reference of this passage to Christ, goes too far and is not direct, when he says that it was made “because the residence in Egypt and the leading out from it had the same significance in the unfolding of Christ’s life, as they had for the people of Israel. As Israel in Egypt, free from contact with the Canaanites, grew into a nation, so was the child Jesus concealed in Egypt from the enmity of Herod.”

2. There is here presented to Israel in an affecting manner the love with which God had assumed the care of them in their beginnings, “when they were still young,” and made them what they were. And such love is represented as being so tender, all-considerate, helpful, and advancing, that it finds its image only in the love of a father or mother to a child. Jehovah called Israel his son in their early days, when He brought them out of Egypt. Exo_4:22 f. He had always acted towards them as became that relation, and displayed to them the love of a father toward his child, even his youngest child. As Jehovah’s love and faithfulness to Israel in the years of their manhood finds its fitting symbol only in the love and faithfulness of a husband, so his love and care of Israel in their childhood is compared with the solicitous, tender love of a father. So much the more inexcusable then is the conduct of Israel towards God, the opposition which they displayed towards Him from the beginning. This base ingratitude characterized them continually, and does also in the present. Their present conduct is only the direct continuation of the former. Observe the description of such conduct of Israel toward their God in Hos_11:2 : idolatry before the very eyes of the God who had displayed such love to them; Hos_11:7 : failure to recognize God’s purposes of salvation; see also Hos_11:7; Hos_11:9. A special proof of Jehovah’s love was the sending of the prophets; they call the people upwards=that they should return to God, but they will not raise themselves; they remain below, averse from God.

3. No wonder, therefore, if a people, who reward so basely and mistake the love of God, are visited by Him with the severest judgments (comp. Hos_11:6; Hos_11:8). But retributive and punitive justice finds in our Prophet, as we may satisfy ourselves in every chapter, where accusation and threatening are pealed forth incessantly, such appalling expression, that we can no longer decline the question: “Are not these things spoken revengefully? is it not a spirit of vindictiveness that has inspired such words?” It cannot be claimed that human revenge bears any part here, for it is not the offering of personal injuries of which the prophet announces the punishment, but he is indignant in God’s behalf, over Israel’s sins against God, and announces their punishment. In this, moreover, it is to be borne in mind that the prophet was never a mere passive organ (as the mechanical inspiration theory would have it) of the prophetic utterances, that his own faculties certainly were not at the time overborne, but were elevated, and that these announcements of judgment in the midst of a ruined generation are to be regarded as energic expressions of the life of faith, faith in the Holy One of Israel. On the other hand, the subjectivity of the prophet is not to be unduly emphasized, as though his purely human feelings and emotions were really the source of these threatenings. We must hold to the truth that the prophets were heralds of that which was revealed to them by the Spirit of God (comp. Hos_6:5), and that their separate efficiency was exerted only by completely entering by faith into this divine revelation, in their affirmation of it through faith. But the question then assumes this form: Though the Prophet himself does not merit the reproach of a selfish spirit, should not this reproach so much the rather fall upon God Himself, whose (conscious) organ the prophet was? But it is evident that the retribution announced is to be sent in a spirit of strict justice; it is to be a punishment of sin justly deserved. The punishment is closely related to the sins rebuked, and in close connection with them; it is punishment and not vengeance, which usually exceeds the measure of desert. But certainly we are not merely to trace back these threatenings to a dead law of just recompense; the punishment is not merely in accordance with the moral order of the world, according to which sin is followed by its own punishment. It is a personal action, as certainly as the infliction and the threatenings proceed from a personal God. And thus the course of action is not and cannot be unaccompanied by personal “πάθος” or feeling. But this feeling is the emotion of love, love grieved, vilely disowned and rejected. It is true that it must be angry, that it cannot be content without being reciprocated, but must be most intimately stirred up, and the greater, the more deeply seated it is, the more it seeks the good of its object, the more conscious it is that it has neglected nothing, and has been to blame in nothing. For this very reason the punishment assumes the appearance of revenge, and even wears its garments, while in truth it is only sin that is meeting with its deserved punishment according to an inner necessity, and not as the consequence of arbitrary passion. And as this love of God is unselfish and pure and seeks only the good of its object, so this “revenge” of God bears, so to speak, its corrective, that is, its aim in itself. The threatening has, then, a fearfully wide range, and is uttered with a violence which has something painful in it, since the Holy God, free, on his part, from all blame and neglect, appears against the sinner, upon whom alone the responsibility lies. But He does not simply display his anger; He does not cease to love. His wrath does not find its satisfaction in itself by the punishment or destruction of the unfaithful loved one. Actual destruction, which vengeance would demand, is never undertaken. In the background of the threatenings stands the full and flowing stream of love in assurances of mercy and compassion, which, though made in expectation that the people will return, are yet made before such return takes place, and for the purpose of promoting that end. How little the Law, though proceeding from God’s well-intentioned love towards Israel, realized its aim, is manifest; Israel had completely broken the covenant founded upon it, and instead of showing themselves to be worthy of the promises attached to it, only rendered themselves amenable to the curse, which they must bear unto the uttermost. Thus love appears in the form of free grace, compassionating the unworthy and coming forth to meet them, so leading to the stand-point of the New Covenant. Hence all these promises, rising up behind the severe threatenings of judgment, are rightly to be regarded as Messianic, even though they are not outwardly marked as such. That an actual annihilation of Israel is not intended, but that the prediction of punishment—thus revealing its origin in pure love which thinks of its object alone, and thus being distinguished from all self-avenging—halts before the last step is reached, has notably been clearly expressed already by the Prophet in his reference to the “remnant” that is still left. It finds in our chapter also its clear expression in Hos_11:8. Jehovah could and should give up Israel like Admah and Zeboim (not merely destroy the kingdom, deliver it over to Assyria), but He will not do so; and just when the threatening reaches its height, the assurance of fullest mercy breaks forth, and is expressed beautifully in Hos_11:8-11. If God’s love in the beginning of his interest in Israel was something great and exalted (Hos_11:1-4), it is something greater now, as being in the form of compassion (Hos_11:9-10), in which He refuses to give up his people, all unworthy as they had become of the love He had shown them (comp. Hos_11:11). A return to Jehovah is then announced as the fruit of this compassion, and the removal of the state of subjection to punishment by a restoration to the inheritance they had trifled away is promised as its manifestation. No further description of the future deliverance is as yet given.

4. As to the fulfillment of this promise, see the remarks on chs. 1 and 2 It may suffice to repeat here that we are not to hold to any fulfillment which would contradict the actual course of God’s revelation. Hence we must not think of a future return of the external Israel into their own land from Assyria, if it were only from the consideration that Assyria exists no longer, and Israel is no longer in bondage to such a nation, and we cannot take the one (Israel, the Holy Land, the return) as literal, and the other (Assyria, captivity) as figurative. We must rather say, from the stand-point of the fulfillment of the Old “Testament, i.e., from the stand-point of the New Testament, and in accordance cordance with the actual course of events: the compassionate mercy of God towards his faithless people, which the Prophet sees win the victory over wrath, has been revealed in Christ—but still as being far greater than he sees it; what is clear to him is only the σκιὰ of that which in Christ has actually occurred, and what is still going on, in the forgiveness of sin and deliverance from its through free grace. The Prophet hopes for this in behalf of his people Israel, but only because they are God’s people. But it will be true of all who shall become God’s people too, even though they be not of Israel; they will experience this compassionate favor of God, which is essentially identical with the love, in which God has chosen to Himself a people (from the nations), and completes it so that it realizes its purpose in spite of the breach of the covenant on the part of men, manifested in opposition to the Law and apostasy from God. The voice of mercy, which shall resound so powerfully, and towards which those hasten who stand under God’s judgment, has reached far and wide the Gospel, and will again be sounded forth, when Christ shall gather his own from all ends of the earth, and portion out to them the everlasting inheritance which they had forfeited by sin.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Hos_11:1. Thou also hast experienced such love of God from thy childhood’s years, in temporal and yet more in spiritual things. This love of God is an incontestable truth. It is as important as it is necessary to be reminded of it continually.

Rieger: God delights to trace back in his Word and in man’s conscience everything to its first beginning.

[Fausset: God, by sending the Spirit of his Son into the hearts of his people (Gal_4:6) as the spirit of adoption, calls them his, while they are still in the Egypt of this world. Indeed He separates them to Himself from the womb, and calls them by his grace, as He did Paul (Gal_1:15.—M.]

Hos_11:2. Rieger: God is ever calling men back to their first love: but one goes to his farm, another to his merchandise, and most to their worldly idols.

Hos_11:3. God’s condescension to all our needs. He knows our weakness and treats us accordingly. We must be led along and taken by the arm; else we do not advance, but stumble and fall every moment.

Hos_11:4. Starke: God throws over us the cords of love even to day, when He calls us through the preaching of his Word, gives us his sacraments, promises and supplies us with every good thing, and visits us with precious afflictions: so we would pray that God would draw us further still after Himself.

Rieger: God directs us according to our weakness and the riches of his love. And when He must press us with a yoke, He gives us something with it that helps us to bear it, and leaves us at least food and clothing. And He would warn us against falling back in our pride upon our own help, and neglecting to wait for his counsel. But as Israel was always inclined to turn again to Egypt, and would seek help there against God’s judgments, so does self-sufficient man always act, resorting to everything rather than submit to the counsel of God.

[Fausset: The Son of God becomes man, in order to draw men as such by the cords of sympathy, as partaking of a common nature with us. His bands of love sit so lightly on those who wear them that they are no hindrance to us in enjoying all that is really good for us, and which God has so richly laid before us.—M.]

Hos_11:7. We are called upwards continually: and yet we will not go! All calling upward is then in vain! Our flesh draws us downwards like weight of lead, and neutralizes the drawings of the Spirit upwards.

Hos_11:8-9. Starke: God is disposed, when angry, quite differently from men. Men are intent upon vengeance, but God upon reconciliation.

Rieger: The thought that we have to do with God and not with man, makes it often difficult to our terrified conscience, to seek and believe in the forgiveness of sins. But this is merely a motive to the divine magnanimity to bestow richer favors upon us.

[Matthew Henry: Those who submit to the influence may take the comfort of God’s holiness.]

Footnotes:

[1]Hos_11:3.—תִּרְגַּלְתּי, from תִּרִגּיל= הִרְגּיל, Hiphil from רָגִל: to make to walk, to lead, construed with ל, [Comp. Jer_12:5; Jer_22:15, and see Ewald, § 122 a, Green, § 94 a. The corresponding Syriac (shargel) means: to mislead.—M.]

[2]Hos_11:3.—קָחָם Instead of לְקָחָם.

[3]Hos_11:4.—וְאַט, usually regarded as first fut. Hiphil, from נטה, instead of וָאַט=and I inclined myself. Others take it to be an adverb: softly, gently. אֵלָיו would then be best connected with it: and gently towards them, I gave them food. אוֹכיל for אַאֲכִיל.

[4]Hos_11:5.—וְאַשּׁור is adversative. הוּא emphasizes Assyria in contrast to Egypt.

[5]Hos_11:7.—מְשׁוּבָתי The suffix is here used in a subjective sense=apostasy from me.

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11:1-11 God agonized over Israel’s unfaithfulness. Despite all he had done, Israel had become a rebel. Justice required severe punishment, but the final sentence for Israel would be determined by God’s tender compassion for his people, not by an abstract principle.

11:1 my son: The Lord adopted Israel when he delivered him out of Egypt. This verse is quoted in reference to Jesus in Matt 2:15 (see study note on Matt 4:1-11).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

While the Israelites were in Egypt, and did not provoke my wrath by their malice and ingratitude.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

CHAPTER XI

This chapter gives a very pathetic representation of God's

tender and affectionate regard for Israel, by metaphors

chiefly borrowed from the conduct of mothers toward their

tender offspring. From this, occasion is taken to reflect on

their ungrateful return to the Divine goodness, and to denounce

against them the judgments of the Almighty, 1-7.

But suddenly and unexpectedly the prospect changes. Beams of

mercy break frown the clouds just now fraught with vengeance.

God, to speak in the language of men, feels the relentings of a

tender parent; his bowels yearn; his mercy triumphs; his

rebellious child shall yet be pardoned. As the lion of the

tribe of Judah, he will employ his power to save his people, he

will call his children from the land of their captivity; and,

as doves, they will fly to him, a faithful and a holy people,

8-12.

NOTES ON CHAP. XI

Verse 1. When Israel was a child] In the infancy of his political existence.

I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.] Where he was greatly oppressed; and in this I gave the proof of my love. I preserved my people in their affliction there, and brought them safely out of it.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

God here expostulates with the people of Israel for their ingratitude. The obligation of the people was twofold; for God had embraced them from the very first beginning, and when there was no merit or worthiness in them. What else, indeed, was the condition of the people when emancipated from their servile works in Egypt? They doubtless seemed then like a man half-dead or a putrid carcass; for they had no vigour remaining in them. The Lord then stretched forth his hand to the people when in so hopeless a state, drew them out, as it were, from the grave, and restored them from death into life. But the people did not acknowledge this so wonderful a favour of God, but soon after petulantly turned their back on him. What baseness was this, and how shameful the wickedness, to make such a return to the author of their life and salvation? The Prophet therefore enhances the sin and baseness of the people by this circumstance, that the Lord had loved them even from childhood; when yet, he says, Israel was a child, I loved him The nativity of the people was their coming out of Egypt. The Lord had indeed made his covenant with Abraham four hundred years before; and, as we know, the patriarchs were also regarded by him as his children: but God wished his Church to be, as it were, extinguished, when he redeemed it. Hence the Scripture, when it speaks of the liberation of the people, often refers to that favour of God in the same way as of one born into the world. It is not therefore without reason that the Prophet here reminds the people that they had been loved when in childhood. The proof of this love was, that they had been brought out of Egypt. Love had preceded, as the cause is always before the effect.

But the Prophet enlarges on the subject: I loved Israel, even while he was yet a child; I called him out of Egypt; that is, “I not only loved him when a child, but before he was born I began to love him; for the liberation from Egypt was the nativity, and my love preceded that. It then appears, that the people had been loved by me, before they came forth to the light; for Egypt was like a grave without any spark of life; and the condition this miserable people was in was worse than thousand deaths. Then by calling my people from Egypt, I sufficiently proved that my love was gratuitous before they were born.” The people were hence less excusable when they returned such an unworthy recompense to God, since he had previously bestowed his free favour upon them. We now understand the meaning of the Prophet.

But here arises a difficult question; for Matthew, accommodates this passage to the person of Christ. They who have not been well versed in Scripture have confidently applied to Christ this place; yet the context is opposed to this. Hence it has happened, that scoffers have attempted to disturb the whole religion of Christ, as though the Evangelist had misapplied the declaration of the Prophet. They give a more suitable answer, who say that there is in this case only a comparison: as when a passage from Jeremiah is quoted in another place, when the cruelty of Herod is mentioned, who raged against all the infants of his dominion, who were under two years of age,

‘Rachel, bewailing her children, would not receive consolation, because they were not,’ (Jeremiah 31:15.)

The Evangelist says that this prophecy was fulfilled, (Matthew 2:18.) But it is certain that the object of Jeremiah was another; but nothing prevents that declaration should not be applied to what Matthew relates. So they understand this place. But I think that Matthew had more deeply considered the purpose of God in having Christ led into Egypt, and in his return afterwards into Judea. In the first place, it must be remembered that Christ cannot be separated from his Church, as the body will be mutilated and imperfect without a head. Whatever then happened formerly in the Church, ought at length to be fulfilled by the head. This is one thing. Then also there is no doubt, but that God in his wonderful providence intended that his Son should come forth from Egypt, that he might be a redeemer to the faithful; and thus he shows that a true, real, and perfect deliverance was at length effected, when the promised Redeemer appeared. It was then the full nativity of the Church, when Christ came forth from Egypt to redeem his Church. So in my view that comment is too frigid, which embraces the idea, that Matthew made only a comparison. For it behaves us to consider this, that God, when he formerly redeemed his people from Egypt, only showed by a certain prelude the redemption which he deferred till the coming of Christ. Hence, as the body was then brought forth from Egypt into Judea, so at length the head also came forth from Egypt: and then God fully showed him to be the true deliverer of his people. This then is the meaning. Matthew therefore most fitly accommodates this passage to Christ, that God loved his Son from his first childhood and called him from Egypt. We know at the same time that Christ is called the Son of God in a respect different from the people of Israel; for adoption made the children of Abraham the children of God, but Christ is by nature the only-begotten Son of God. But his own dignity must remain to the head, that the body may continue in its inferior state. There is then in this nothing inconsistent. But as to the charge of ingratitude, that so great a favour of God was not acknowledged, this cannot apply to the person of Christ, as we well know; nor is it necessary in this respect to refer to him; for we see from other places that every thing does not apply to Christ, which is said of David, or of the high priest, or of the posterity of David; though they were types of Christ. But there is ever a great difference between the reality and its symbols. Let us now proceed —

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

XI.

(1) Comp. Hos_9:10 and Exo_4:22-23. In this context there cannot be a prophecy of the Christ, for obstinate conduct and rebellion would thus be involved in the prediction. It is true that Mat_2:15 quotes the passage in illustration of the fact that the true Son of God was also submitted in His youth to the hard schooling of a cruel exile. The calling out of Egypt of the Messiah gave a new indication of the cyclical character of Hebrew history. The passage helps us to understand what is meant by the formula, “that it might be fulfilled,” &c.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. When Israel was a child] i. e., in the earliest stage of Israel’s national existence, which is here dated, not, as in Hos_2:3, from the wanderings in the wilderness, but from the sojourn in Egypt. For the figure, see on ‘gray hairs’, Hos_7:9.

called my son out of Egypt] ‘Called’ him, locally, into the land of Canaan, and morally, to set an example of true religion. Comp. Exo_4:22, ‘Israel is my son, my firstborn; and I say unto thee, Let my son go, that he may serve me.’ The words are quoted in St Matthew (Hos_2:15), who renders from the Hebrew, in connexion with the sojourn of the child Jesus in Egypt. Like the portraiture of the Servant of Jehovah in the second part of Isaiah, the description of Israel as Jehovah’s Son was held to be at least in part applicable to the one perfect Israelite. The national ideal never realized in the nation was realized in the Christ. The divine purpose so often baffled in the one was completed in the other.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

When Israel was a child, then I loved him,.... Or, "for Israel was a child" (u); a rebellious and disobedient one, therefore his king was cut off in a morning, and he has been, and will be, without a king many days; yet still "I loved him": or, "though Israel was a child" (w); a weak, helpless, foolish, and imprudent one, "yet I loved him": or, "when a child"; in the infancy of his civil and church state, when in Egypt, and in the wilderness; the Lord loved him, not only as his creature, as he does all the works of his hands, but with a more special love than he loved others; choosing them to be a special people above all others; giving them his law, his statutes, and his judgments, his word and his worship, which he did not give to other nations. So he loves spiritual and mystical Israel, all the elect of God, whether Jews or Gentiles, when children, as soon as born, and though born in sin, carnal and corrupt; yea, before they are born, and when having done neither good nor evil; and so may be expressive both of the earliness and antiquity of his love to them, and of the freeness of it, without any merits or motives of theirs;

and called my son out of Egypt, not literal Israel, as before, whom God called his son, and his firstborn, and demanded his dismission from Pharaoh, and called him, and brought him out of Egypt with a mighty hand and outstretched arm; and which was a type of his calling spiritual Israel, his adopted sons, out of worse than Egyptian bondage and darkness: but his own natural and only begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ; for these words are expressly said to be fulfilled in him, Mat 2:15; not by way of allusion; or by accommodation of phrases; or as the type is fulfilled in the antitype; or as a proverbial expression, adapted to any deliverance; but literally: the first and only sense of the words respects Christ, who in his infancy was had to Egypt for shelter from Herod's rage and fury, and, when he was dead, and those that sought the life of Jesus, he was by an angel of the Lord, warning Joseph of it, called out of Egypt, and brought into Judea, Mat 2:19; and this as a proof of the love of God to Israel; which as it was expressed to him in his infancy, it continued and appeared in various instances, more or less unto the coming of Christ; who, though obliged for a while to go into Egypt, must not continue there, but must be called from thence, to be brought up in the land of Judea; to do his miracles, preach his doctrines, and do good to the bodies and souls of men there, being sent particularly to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; and, above all, in order to work out the salvation and redemption of his special people among them, and of the whole Israel of God everywhere else; which is the greatest instance of love to them, and to the world of the Gentiles, that ever was known, Joh 3:16 Jo1 2:2.

(u) "quia", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Junius & Tremellius. (w) "Quamvis sit puer", Tarnovius, Rivet.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

When Israel was a child, then I loved him - God loved Israel, as He Himself formed it, ere it corrupted itself. He loved it for the sake of the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as he saith, “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated” Mal 1:2. Then, when it was weak, helpless, oppressed by the Egyptians, afflicted, destitute, God loved him, cared for him, delivered him from oppression, and called him out of Egypt. : “When did He love Israel? When, by His guidance, Israel regained freedom, his enemies were destroyed, he was fed with “food from heaven,” he heard the voice of God, and received the law from Him. He was unformed in Egypt; then he was informed by the rules of the law, so as to be matured there. He was a child in that vast waste. For he was nourished, not by solid food, but by milk, i. e., by the rudiments of piety and righteousness, that he might gradually attain the strength of a man. So that law was a schoolmaster, to retain Israel as a child, by the discipline of a child, until the time should come when all, who despised not the heavenly gifts, should receive the Spirit of adoption. The prophet then, in order to show the exceeding guilt of Israel, says, “When Israel was a child,” (in the wilderness, for then he was born when he bound himself to conform to the divine law, and was not yet matured) “I loved him,” i. e., I gave him the law, priesthood, judgments, precepts, instructions; I loaded him with most ample benefits; I preferred him to all nations, expending on him, as on My chief heritage and special possession, much watchful care and pains.”

I called My son out of Egypt - As He said to Pharaoh, “Israel is My son, even My firstborn; let My son go, that he may serve Me” Exo 4:22-23. God chose him out of all nations, to be His special people. Yet also God chose him, not for himself, but because He willed that Christ, His only Son, should “after the flesh” be born of him, and for, and in, the Son, God called His people, “My son.” : “The people of Israel was called a son, as regards the elect, yet only for the sake of Him, the only begotten Son, begotten, not adopted, who, “after the flesh,” was to be born of that people, that, through His Passion, He might bring many sons to glory, disdaining not to have them as brethren and co-heirs. For, had He not come, who was to come, the Well Beloved Son of God, Israel too could never, anymore than the other nations, have been called the son of so great a Father, as the Apostle, himself of that people, saith, “For we were, by nature, children of wrath, even as others” Eph 2:3.

Since, however, these words relate to literal Israel, the people whom God brought out by Moses, how were they fulfilled in the infant Jesus, when He was brought back out of Egypt, as Matthew teaches us, they were?” Mat 2:15.

Because Israel himself was a type of Christ, and for the sake of Him who was to be born of the seed of Israel, did God call Israel, “My son;” for His sake only did he deliver him. The two deliverances, of the whole Jewish people, and of Christ the Head, occupied the same position in God’s dispensations. He rescued Israel, whom He called His son, in its childish and infantine condition, at the very commencement of its being, as a people. His true Son by Nature, Christ our Lord, He brought up in His Infancy, when He began to show forth His mercies to us in Him. Both had, by His appointment, taken refuge in Egypt; both were, by His miraculous call to Moses in the bush, to Joseph in the dream, recalled from it. Matthew apparently quotes these words, not to prove anything, but in order to point out the relation of God’s former dealings with the latter, the beginning and the close, what relates to the body, and what relates to the Head. He tells us that the former deliverance had its completion in Christ, that in His deliverance was the full solid completion of that of Israel; and that then indeed it might, in its completest fullness, be said, “Out of Egypt have I called My Son.”

When Israel was brought out of Egypt, the figure took place; when Christ was called, the reality was fulfilled. The act itself, on the part of God, was prophetic. When He delivered Israel, and called him His firstborn, He willed, in the course of time, to bring up from Egypt His Only-Begotten Son. The words are prophetic, because the event which they speak of, was prophetic. “They speak of Israel as one collective body, and, as it were, one person, called by God “My son,” namely, by adoption, still in the years of innocency, and beloved by God, called of God out of Egypt by Moses, as Jesus, His true Son, was by the Angel.” The following verses are not prophetic, because in them the prophet no longer speaks of Israel as one, but as composed of the many sinful individuals in it. Israel was a prophetic people, in regard to this dispensation of God toward him; not in regard to his rebellions and sins.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Away. The last kings of Israel lived in the midst of troubles. (Haydock) --- Osee, though one of the best, brought ruin on the nation. (Calmet) --- Son: Israel. But as the calling of Israel out of Egypt was a figure of the calling of Christ from thence; therefore this text is also applicable to Christ, as we learn from St. Matthew ii. 15. (Challoner) Julian pretends that the apostle has abused this text. But it speaks of both events. (St. Jerome) --- Eusebius (Dem. ix. 3.) thinks that St. Matthew refers to Balaam; (Numbers xxiv. 8.) and St. Jerome does not reject this opinion, (in Matthew ii.; Calmet) to avoid "wrangling," though he repeatedly alleges this text as a proof his version being more accurate than that of the Septuagint, which has his children. This reading the best editions retain; so that it may seem a matter of surprise, that Fabricius should give this verse as a specimen of Origen’s Hexapla, and still print my son, taking it, as he says, from the Barbarini copy, the London Polyglot, and Cave. Bib. Gr. iii. 12. The first column has the Hebrew text, and the second the same in Greek characters, &c. The reader may form a judgment of this work from the following specimen: 1. Hebrew (which we shall express) karathi bani. 2. Greek Greek: karathi bani. 3. Aquila Greek: ekalesa ton uion mou. 4. Symmachus Greek: kekletai uios mou. 5. Septuagint Greek: kekletai uios mou. 6. Theodotion Greek: kai ekalesa uion mou. If any other versions were added, to form Octapla, &c., they were placed after Theodotion, who, though prior to Symmachus, is placed after him, because his version was not so unlike that of the Septuagint, and the deficiencies were chiefly supplied from him. In the Roman and Alexandrian editions, instead of the above we find, Greek: metekalesa ta tekna autou. "I have recalled his children." (Haydock) --- This is literally spoken of Israel, (styled God’s son, Exodus iv 23.) and mystically, (Worthington) though no less (Haydock) truly, of Jesus Christ, as the inspired evangelist shews. (Worthington)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

When Israel was a child; in the infancy of Israel, which is here dated equal with his being in Egypt.

Then I loved him; manifested that tender and paternal affection which I did bear to him, increasing him in numbers, wealth, and honour.

Called my son; adopted him to be my son, and as my son provided for him, and brought him out of servitude; I so loved him as to give Egypt for his ransom, Isa 43:3.

Out of Egypt; where they had sojourned two hundred and fifteen years, and in them suffered many outrages from the Egyptians, who were their enemies, and aimed at extirpating Israel. Now, amidst such enemies, God owned them to be his sons, his eldest son, and redeemed him out of bondage, a fruit of wonderful love never to be forgotten. This in the letter and history is exceeding plain, but there is difficulty in the application of this unto Christ, and his call out of Egypt, of which many interpreters treat at large, which may not now be so much as summarily touched. It is too little to say that the evangelist doth allude to this place, Mat 2:15, and I think it is too much to say this place is cited by Matthew, as in the history of the thing, referring only to Christ being called out of Egypt; but if you will make Israel the first adopted son, type of Christ, the first-born, and the history of Israel’s coming out to be a type of Christ’s future coming out, you then give to both their proper share in these words, and the letter and history is verified in both, and the principal import of the words will refer to Christ, as principally intended in them, yet not excluding the type.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Ingratitude of Israel

Jehovah had been like a tender father and a kind master to Israel from the first, yet had they ever rejected Him and turned to idols. He cannot bear the thought of punishing them, but punish them He must. Yet punishment will be tempered with mercy, and lead at last to repentance and deliverance. The tenderness of the whole passage and the changing phases of feeling are very characteristic.

1. The allusion, of course, is to the deliverance out of the bondage of Egypt, a proof of God's fatherly love to Israel. St. Matthew refers the last clause to the recall of the Infant Jesus from Egypt: see on Mat_2:15.

2. As them] An interesting example of the terse style of Hosea. It is God who calls, but He calls by the instrumentality of others, Moses and the prophets. The call is the call out of bondage to the service of God.

3. I] RV 'Yet I.' Jehovah is here compared to a father teaching his child to walk, and carrying it when tired.

Taking.. arms] RM 'He took them,' etc. The prophet sometimes speaks as the mouthpiece of God in the first person; less frequently he speaks of God in the third.

4. Cords.. man] not with cords used in drawing a beast which is being broken in, but something more gentle, the kindly discipline needful for winning a man's allegiance. And I was.. unto them] In the evening, when work is over, the kind master takes off the yoke, gently passing it over the animal's face, and then gives it food.

5. Kindness has failed to lead them to repentance; therefore they must be purified by punishment. Not to Egypt, however, shall they go, but the Assyrians shall conquer and carry them away. Not.. into.. Egypt] In Hos_8:13; Hos_9:6 the prophet spoke of Egypt as a possible place of captivity; but now, at this later date, it was evident that Assyria was to be the instrument of God's vengeance 6. The mention of apostasy produces a severer tone of threatening. Abide on] RV 'fall upon.' His branches] RV 'his bars,' i.e. his defences, meaning either his strong cities or his nobles, on whom he depended for safety. But their evil counsellors (if we take it in the latter sense) would prove their ruin.

7. Though.. him] Though they formally called on God, they do not really exalt Him in their hearts.

8. Hosea's feeling again turns to tenderness. How can the loving Father bear to chastise His people as they deserve! Admah.. Zeboim] with reference to the destruction of the cities of the plain: cp. Deu_29:23. My repentings] RV 'my compassions.'

9. Jehovah's feelings grow stronger still. He will not punish His people.

I am God] therefore more long-suffering and less vindictive than man: cp. Psa_130:4 and Collect, 'Who declarest Thy almighty power most chiefly in showing mercy and pity.' Enter into the city] RM 'come in wrath.'

10. Hosea is confident that the people will make themselves deserving of Jehovah's love and follow Him. Roar.. lion] In Amo_3:8 the same figure is used of God's threatening through the prophet. Here it is used of His calling for His people out of captivity, the point of comparison being the earnest longing on God's part, reverential awe on man's. Shall tremble] RV 'shall come trembling.' West] i.e. Egypt, as distinctly stated in the next v.

11. They.. Egypt] Taken literally, it is in contradiction to Hos_11:5 taken together, they may be paraphrased thus: They shall not go into Egypt; and even should they go, thence will I bring them—a form of thought similar to that in Hos_9:11-12, etc. Dove] The timidity of the dove is what is probably thought of. For another use of the simile see Hos_7:11.

J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

In vers. 1-4 Jehovah enumerates the benefits conferred on Israel all along from the time of their departure out of Egypt. But parallel with this enumeration runs the history of Israel"s ingratitude.

When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. Driver uses this verse to exemplify the principle that when the reference is to what is past or certain, rather than to what is future or indefinite, we find the predicate or the apodosis introduced by W, though not with nearly the same frequency as l perfect and vav causes

(1) with subject or object pre-fixed;

(2) after time-determinations.

The life of a nation has its stages of rise, progress, and development, like the life of an individual man. The prophet goes back to that early period when the national life of Israel was in its infancy; it was then that a few patriarchs who had gone down to sojourn in Egypt were becoming a people; the predicate precedes, to emphasize, that early day when Israel became God"s peculiar people. The ray marks the apodosis recording God"s love in choosing that people, calling them into the relation of sonship, and delivering them out of Egypt. Thus Kimchi says, "When Israel was vet a child, i.e. in Egypt, then I loved him, therefore I am more angry with them than with the rest of the nations; for from their youth onward I have loved them, and delivered them out of the bands of their enemies. But when they transgress my commandments it is incumbent on me to chastise them as a man chastises his son.

(1) The people of Israel is called God"s son in consequence of God choosing them and bringing them into close relationship to himself, such as that of a son to a father. The commencement was the message to Pharaoh by Moses in the words, "Israel is my son, even my firstborn: and I say unto thee, Let my son go, that he may serve me." This sonship was solemnly ratified by the giving of the Law at Sinai; and the condition clearly stated that, in the event of their preserving the knowledge of God, fulfilling his Law, and doing his will, they would at all times enjoy Divine protection, defense, and blessing, while from generation to generation they were addressed by that honorable title.

(2) As the deliverance hem Egypt is always described as a "leading" or "bringing out," and never elsewhere as a "calling out," some expositors maintain that the words, "out of Egypt," signify from the time Israel was in Egypt, and are parallel to "when Israel was a child," both referring to time, the time of national infancy. From that period God began to manifest his love, and in its manifestation he called him by the endearing name of "son my son. The words of this verse are applied by St. Matthew to the sojourn of Jesus in Egypt. The older interpreters refer

(a) the first part of the verse to Israel and the second part typically to the history of Messiah"s childhood, in whom that of Israel reached its completeness. Rather

(b) the verse was applied typically to Israel, and to Jesus as the antitype; to the former primarily, and to the latter secondarily. Thus the head and the members are comprehended in one common prediction.

Vers. 1-4. A rich display of God"s mercy, love, and long-suffering.

One chief design of Scripture is to recommend to sinners the goodness and grace of God "The whole Scripture," says Luther, "aims especially at this, that we doubt not, but certainly hope, trust, and believe that God is gracious, merciful, and long-suffering.

I GOD"S LOVE IS UNMERITED. This is evident from the condition of Israel when he became the object of this love. That condition was one of childhood, and so of childish ignorance, of childish impotence, of childish folly; for folly is bound up in the heart of a child. Nay, if we compare Eze_16:4-8, we find the natural state of the nation to have been still worse; that wretched state is there vividly exhibited under the similitude of a poor perishing infant in the most pitiable condition. So with persons individually as well as nationally. When, to use the figure of the prophet, we were polluted, literally trodden down, and perishing in our own blood, he passed by us end looked upon us, and his tone was a tone of love.

II GOD"S LOVE IS A LOVE OF BENEVOLENCE. He calls Israel his son. The relation of a son to a father is a very near and dear one. The privilege of sonship is very great. David esteemed it no light thing to be a king"s son-in-law. How unspeakably greater it is to be a son of God by adoption as well as by creation, and thus to be an heir of glory I "Is Ephraim my dear son?" God inquires; and again he says, "I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him." But though the privilege of being a son of God is great and the dignity high, it does not necessarily exempt us from sore trials and severe sufferings; it rather secures for us such paternal chastening as for the present is not joyous but grievous, nevertheless afterward productive of the peaceable fruits of righteousness. Though Israel was God"s son, yet Israel was for years in Egypt.

III GOD"S LOVE IS A LOVE OF BENEFICENCE. God not only wishes well but does well to every son whom he receiveth into his family. Though Israel had been long in Egypt, he was not allowed to remain there. God in due time called his son out of Egypt. It was a night much to be remembered when that call reached them. God speaks the word and it is done; his call is effectual for the purpose intended. However great our distress, it only requires a word from God to relieve us; and that word is as easily spoken as the call which one man addresses to another when he would invite him from some distance to his side. Strange indeed it may appear to us that God"s people Israel had been so long left in Egypt, and equally strange it is that the dearly beloved of his soul are often delivered into the hand of their enemies. "It is a strange sight indeed to see a child of God, an heir of heaven, a co-heir with Jesus Christ, one dearer to God than heaven and earth, subject to the power, the caprice, and lusts of wicked, base, ungodly men; yea, it may be, for a time slaves to Satan.

IV GOD"S LOVE IS FREQUENTLY UNREQUITED LOVE. As God by his messengers called Israel, Israel turned his back upon those messengers and a deaf ear to their call. Nay, like disobedient children or stubborn servants, they actually turned in the opposite direction. As God"s mercy was manifested in delivering them out of the furnace of affliction and then calling to obedience; so their stubbornness appeared in, and their sin was aggravated by, their refusal to hearken to that call, and still more by their running in a direction the right opposed. Thus we read in Jeremiah, "They turned unto me the back, and not the face.

V GOD"S LOVE IS TENDER LOVE.

1. It combines the tenderness of a parent with the carefulness of a nurse. When the way was dark and obscure, he guided them as by the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. Thus he pointed out the way and showed them the direction in which they were to walk. Thus he taught them to go. When obstacles lay in the way and difficulties blocked it, he lifted them up by the arms and carried them over all hindrances. Similarly we read in Deuteronomy, "In the wilderness, where thou hast seen how that the Lord thy God bare thee, as a man doth bear his son, in all the way that ye went." Now he took them by the hand and led them again; he lifted them up and carried them in the arms, ever conducting them in the right way.

2. So with us all more or less the path in life is untrod upon; frequently we are at a standstill; often we are sorely perplexed to know which way we should go; often and often we go astray and wander from the way. Again, there are stumbling-blocks in the way, and we stumble and fall over them. What need we have to depend on Divine love all the way, ever praying, Lord, take us by the hand and lead us; Lord, hold up our goings in thy paths that our footsteps slip not; Lord, keep our feet from falling, our eyes from tears, and our soul from death"!

3. The way may be strait, as when Israel was hemmed in between mountains, the sea before them and Pharaoh"s host behind; or it may be difficult, and so steep as well as steep, it; or it may be dangerous , for in the way through the wilderness there is the place of lions" dens and the mountains of the leopards; but, notwithstanding all such drawbacks, we have reason to bless God for leading us forth by the right way. And when we are in greatest straits and the way is hardest, we have only to cry to God in our trouble; and as he led Israel of old, so will he lead us also forth by the right way. "They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble: for I am a Father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn." Thus God not only bears his people, but bears with his people; and commissions his ministering servants to do likewise, as he commanded Moses, "Carry them in thy bosom, as a nursing father beareth the sucking child.

VI GOD"S LOVE IS RESTORATIVE. In spite of all God"s love and care, we run into the way of danger through our own frowardness or folly. We stumble and fall, getting many a sore bruise and severe knock. Yet God in his love restores us; he heals us. As the child, when hurt, runs to the parent for sympathy to the mother kiss the wound and make it well; so, when unhappily we have strayed from the way, and got bruised and hurt and painfully wounded through our own willfulness, we are encouraged to return to God, and he will heal us. God might, indeed, if he dealt with us in strict justice, leave us to ourselves and to the sad consequences of our own sinful waywardness, and refuse to lead us any more. Not so, however. As he says by the Prophet Isaiah, I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him, and to his mourners.

VII GOD"S LOVE IS PERSUASIVE MORALLY, NOT MECHANICALLY. He deals with us as a rational being, treating us neither as machines nor yet as "dumb driven cattle." The lower animal must sometimes be drawn, or forced with a degree of violence; but God does not draw men in this way. In drawing them he uses neither hard cords nor iron bands. He draws us by rational means, addressing himself to our intelligence and appealing to our affections. Thus Paul says, "I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say." He draws us by persuasion and argument. He draws us with gentleness, and not by force. He employs the mildest means and the tenderest motives. He draws us in a manner suitable to the dignity of our nature. Made in the image of God, originally created in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, and still possessed of great susceptibilities, strong affections, warm emotions, and tender sensibilities, we are treated by God with a considerate regard to the high qualities with which he has endowed us. Accordingly he draws us with human cords and Divine love. The instrumentality employed is human, and the love that employs it is Divine.

VIII GOD"S LOVE IS ALLEVIATING LOVE. As the humane husbandman lightens the labor of the weary beasts, and lifts up the yoke on its jaws in order to ease it and give it some respite, so God lifts up the weight that presses on the back of poor humanity. He sustains us under our burdens, or even shares with us the load. Sometimes he removes the yoke entirely; oftener he gives respite and refreshment; always he sanctifies the load of labor, or care, or trouble, or suffering, or sorrow of whatever kind which his own hand has laid on the back of his people, and never does he lay more on them than he enables them by his grace and strength to bear.

IX GOD"S LOVE IS SATISFYING LOVE. The figure is continued in the words, "And laid meat unto them." The same kind hand that lifts up the yoke, by way of respite and relief, supplies provender for the purpose of refreshment. God laid meat before his people in the desert, when he rained down manna and sent them quails. The same bountiful Benefactor spreads a table before us daily, and makes our cup run over. Better still, and surer token of his love, is the abundant spiritual provision he has made for the souls of his people, in giving them the bread that cometh down from heaven. "We are satisfied with the goodness of his house, even of his holy temple.

HOMILIES BY C. JERDAN Ver. 1. Called out of Egypt.

These words refer primarily, of course, to the historical event of the Exodus. But they are also prophetic words, and as such they have been already verified, and still await further verification. When a stone is thrown into a pond, a series of ever-enlarging concentric rings is formed, which extend perhaps to the banks of the water; so in like manner, although the first fulfillment of a prophecy may be near at hand, the prediction may also receive various further and wider fulfillments, until at last it is completely verified, on the largest scale, at the end of the world. The words before us have several applications. They apply

I TO THE JEWISH NATION. God elected Israel as his "firstborn son" among the nations, (Exo_4:22) thus constituting the Hebrews the aristocracy of the human race. He set his love upon them when they were a community of slaves. He heard their groaning by reason of their bondage. When the people were lying like toads under the harrows of their taskmasters, he interposed to save them. He raised up Moses to be their emancipator. Jehovah wrought on their behalf the tea plagues of Egypt. He led them, by a mighty miracle, through the bed of the Red Sea, while Pharaoh and his army perished in the waters. Jehovah protected and supported and guided Israel in the wilderness. He rained bread from heaven upon them, and brought them streams also out of the rock. He kept their clothes and shoes from wearing out. He led them by the cloudy pillar. He delivered them from their enemies. He entered into covenant with them, taught them his Word and will, and brought them at last into a goodly inheritance in Canaan. No other nation ever received such marks of honor. To Israel alone "pertained the adoption". (Rom_9:4)

II TO JESUS CHRIST. Matthew says that this word of Hosea was fulfilled when the Child Jesus was brought up out of Egypt. (Mat_2:15) If Israel was "God"s son, even his firstborn," Jesus is "the only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father." The history of Israel typified and foreshadowed his career. He is the true seed of Abraham, the true Representative of the ancient Hebrew nation. "All the magnificence of prophecy, limited to Israel, would be bombast; Christ alone fulfils the idea which Israel stood for" (F.W. Robertson). The paternal love of God was exhibited more richly in the protection and deliverance of his holy Child Jesus than even in the great blessing of the Exodus. It was to avoid the danger of destruction that the infant Savior and his mother were taken down into Egypt. The Lord of heaven and earth, just now a wailing infant, must hide for a little season under the shadow of the Pyramids. By-and-by he shall be "called out of Egypt" to return to the Holy Land, and to become at length what Israel ought to have been the great Witness for God, and Teacher of his wilt to all the nations of the world.

III TO THE CHRISTIAN. Believers are all the sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ. And the redemption from Egypt was a type of deliverance through him from sin and death. Just as to the Hebrews in the time of Hosea "Egypt" stood for Assyria, or Babylon, or any land which they were to associate with a state of bondage, (Hos_8:13 Hos_9:3, Hos_9:6) so now to us Gentiles "Egypt" is the symbol of our unregenerate state, and the Egyptian bondage is a type of the bondage of sin. All men are by nature the slaves of sin, and Satan is a much harder taskmaster than the Egyptian overseers. The natural man labors helplessly under the burden of evil. But God calls his people "out of Egypt" with an effectual and a holy calling. He redeems the believer from the bondage of guilt, (Gal_3:13) from subjection to the Law, (Gal_4:5) and from the slavery of sin. (Tit_2:14) The very word "Redeemer," which is so dear to the renewed heart, was first consecrated as a sacred name at the time when God "called his Son out of Egypt." To the Christian the song of Moses is also the song of the Lamb; (Rev_15:3) and the preface to the ten commandments (Exo_20:2) expresses the most forcible and yet tender of all inducements to lead a holy life.

IV TO THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. The Church of Christ is the true Israel, God"s adopted firstborn son. And this world, in which the Church presently sojourns, may be compared to the land of bondage. It is "this present evil world;" and God"s people look to be delivered from it, just as ancient Israel expected deliverance from Egypt. The time is fast coming when the Lord Jesus shall finally redeem his people from all evil. Often in the New Testament the word "redemption" is used to denote the consummation of the Church"s hope. Jesus told his disciples that the occurrence of the signs of his second advent would announce to them that their "redemption was drawing nigh". (Luk_21:28) The whole Church is waiting for "the redemption of our body". (Rom_8:23) Here, though believers "serve the Law of God with their mind," they yet groan constantly under the burden of indwelling sin. But the hope of Israel blessed hope is that Jehovah shall "call him out of Egypt." The Lord Jesus shall one day translate his Church to heaven the land of perfect spiritual freedom and eternal joy. There bondage shall in every sense be gone forever. So long as Israel is in this world, he is "a child;" but in glory he shall become a man, and "put away childish things." God loves him now as a child; and his adopting grace is the pledge that the ransomed Church shall one day stand by the glassy sea, and sing the song of Moses and the Lamb. C.J.

Vers. 1-4. Crowned with tender mercies.

This is an extremely beautiful passage. It recalls, in a few most touching expressions, Jehovah"s love and condescension and tenderness towards his ancient people. But, alas! the very record of God"s kindness becomes the means of throwing into deeper relief the blackness of Israel"s sin.

I GOD"S KINDLY DEALINGS WITH ISRAEL. These had been manifested continually in the infancy of the nation, during its childhood, and throughout its youth and manhood. Jehovah had been to the Hebrew people:

1. A loving Father. (Ver. 1) He loved them, and chose them to be his own inheritance, He spoke of Israel as his "son," even during the bondage in Exo_4:22. He showed his fatherly love by accomplishing for his people the grand deliverance of the Exodus. And the Lord is the same still to the spiritual Israel. Those blessings which were shadowed forth in the theocratic adoption belong now to Christians. We are predestinated unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself" (Eph_1:5) The believer receives the nature of God. He bears his Name. He enjoys free access to him. He obtains needed protection and provision. He is subjected to suitable training and discipline. And he has an eternal inheritance in reversion. (1Jn_3:1, 1Jn_3:2)

2. A careful Nurse. (Ver. 3) Jehovah had himself tended his son Israel during the forty years of childhood in the Arabian desert. He bare him", (Deu_1:31) "took hint by the hand", (Jer_31:32) and tenderly supported him. As a nursing father, he had used soft and kindly leading-strings, tie knew his people"s needs. He was "touched with the feeling of their infirmities." He took upon himself the entire charge of the nation. For their schooling he gave them object-lessons setting up the tabernacle and its ritual as a spiritual "kindergarten." When they wandered from him he brought them back, and patiently "healed them" from those distresses which their apostasy had entailed. And God is the same careful Nurse to his spiritual children. He bears the believer, and bears with him. The Holy Spirit teaches the child of God "to go," and "leads him in the way everlasting." He raises him when he falls, heals his bruises, and is "a very present Help in trouble." The path of duty may lead the believer into slippery places, but "underneath are the everlasting arms". (Deu_33:27)

3. A kindly Monitor. (Ver. 4, first part) If ver. 1 refers to the Exodus, and ver. 3 to the forty years in the wilderness, ver. 4: may be applied to Jehovah"s dealings with Israel throughout his entire history as a nation. All along the Lord treated his people, not as prisoners or slaves, but as sons. He "drew them with cords of a man;" i.e. his methods of government were humane, and had their seat in reason. He drew them" with bands of love;" i.e. his arguments or influences were tender and persuasive. The mercies showered upon Israel were countless. The Divine forbearance with the people was wonderful. One special mark of God"s favor was his raising up the prophets, one after another, to "call them" (ver. 2) from their idols, and to "draw them" back to himself. And does not the Lord deal just thus with men still? His methods of touching the heart are humane and affectionate. We see the "gentleness" of God in his kindly providence, in his wonderful redemption, and in the means and motives towards holiness which he employs. He calls to the sinner, "Come now, and let us reason together". (Isa_1:18) He tells the believer that a consecrated life is "your reasonable service". (Rom_12:1)

4. A considerate Master. (Ver. 4, second part) The Lord did not act towards Israel as brute beasts are often treated by ungentle drivers. A kind farmer treats his ox humanely, both when it is treading out the corn and when it is feeding in the stall; he withdraws the muzzle, or loosens the yoke-strap, that the animal may cat with comfort. Now, God had always acted so towards the Hebrews. In the innumerable blessings which he sent them, in the means of grace which he maintained amongst them, and in the immunities which they enjoyed as his chosen people, God said to them, "My yoke is easy." So, in like manner, does the Lord still deal with his redeemed people. He "removes their shoulder from the burden," taking off the yoke of guilt, the yoke of sin, the yoke of the Law, the yoke of unrest, the yoke of fear. And he "lays meat unto them hidden manna" of his grace, and "the fatness of his house.

II ISRAEL"S VILE TREATMENT OF GOD. (Vers. 2, 3) The nation had proved altogether unworthy of its sunny and glorious past. The people had been:

1. Ungrateful. They persistently forgot both the fact of their redemption and the continued presence of their Redeemer. The prophets "called them," but in vain. God "healed them," but they ascribed their deliverances to others.

2. Unfaithful. Israel requited the tender love of Jehovah with base apostasy. They opposed and rejected him. "They turned their back unto him, and not their face". (Jer_2:27) They shamefully denied him by their sacrifices to Baal.

3. Obstinate in their wickedness. The career of the northern kingdom especially had been one of universal and continuous desertion. People and priests, princes and kings, had alike conspired to return hatred for Jehovah"s love. And now, at length, Ephraim"s hour of gracious opportunity seemed past. Only by a miracle could the avalanche of judgment be arrested. What a lesson to ourselves is unfolded in this representation of the outrageous guilt of Israel! We must beware of trusting in our national advantages or our spiritual privileges. How often have we, too, acted ungratefully and unfaithfully I God"s wonderful tender mercies are a sore aggravation of our sin. Lord, with what care hast thou begirt us round! Parents first season us. Then schoolmasters Deliver us to laws. They send us bound To rules of reason. Holy messengers; Pulpits and Sundays; sorrow dogging sin; Afflictions sorted; anguish of all sizes; Fine nets and stratagems to catch us in! Bibles laid open: millions of surprises; Blessings beforehand; ties of gratefulness; The sounds of glory ringing in our ears; Without, our shame; within, our consciences; Angels and grace; eternal hopes and fears I Yet all these fences, and their whole array, One cunning bosom sin blows quite away. (George Herbert.) C.J.

HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON Ver. 1. "When Israel was a child.

There is something wonderfully touching in this representation of God"s affection and compassion towards the nation of his choice. The father, distressed in heart because of his son"s waywardness and disaffection, recalls the period of that son"s childhood, when parental care and love watched over and upheld. and guided him. Now that Israel has done wickedly in departing from God, in the midst of deserved upbraiding and rebuke, the Lord appeals to the memory of early and better days. Israel symbolizes humanity, and Jehovah"s watchful care and tender love to Israel is representative of his feelings towards and his treatment of the children of men. Three stages are here noticeable.

I LOVE to Abraham, God had revealed himself as an attached and affectionate Friend; he was designated "the friend of God." Towards the second father of the nation, Moses, Jehovah had manifested himself in a manner remarkable for intimacy. The love which marked the call of Abraham was displayed in the treatment of his descendants. But "God is love," and mankind is the object of his fatherly regard. Love revealed in Christ appeals to our hearts. "We love him, because he first loved us.

II ADOPTION. Jehovah is represented as regarding and treating Israel as his son, as thinking with a fatherly fondness and tenderness of Israel"s early days: "When Israel was a child." It is the glory of revelation that it has taught us to look up and to say, "Our Father, which art in heaven." The effect of our Savior"s work is that his disciples may have the adoption of sons; the Spirit of God within them is the Spirit of adoption.

III DELIVERANCE. Jehovah called his son out of Egypt." A reminder of merciful interposition and mighty deliverance was a fit summons to submission and reconciliation. It is, indeed, a Divine appeal. By the memory of the great Redemption, the God of righteousness calls for our obedience and devotion. He has redeemed us that we may be a holy, filial, and devoted people, recognizing his fatherly favor, and evincing our gratitude for his delivering hand which has interposed on our behalf. T.

HOMILIES BY D. THOMAS Vers. 1-7. A typical portrait of a people.

"When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. As they called them, so they went from them: they sacrificed unto Baalim, and burned incense to graven images. I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them. I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love: and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them. He shall not return into the land of Egypt, but the Assyrian shall be his king, because they refused to return. And the sword shall abide on his cities, and shall consume his branches, and devour them, because of their own counsels. And my people are bent to backsliding from me; though they called them to the Most High, none at all would exalt him." In these verses we have three things worthy of note.

I A HIGHLY FAVORED PEOPLE. What is said here concerning the people of Israel?

1. God loved them. "When Israel was a child, then I loved him." "Thus saith the Lord, Israel is my son, even my firstborn". (Exo_4:22) The early period of the existence of the Hebrew people is frequently represented as their youth. (Isa_54:15 Jer_2:2) Why the Almighty should have manifested a special interest in the descendants of Abraham is a question which the Infinite only can answer. We know, however, that he loves all men. "God so loved the world, that he gave," etc.

2. God emancipated them. "And called my son out of Egypt." He broke the rod of their oppressor. He delivered them from Egyptian thraldom. This material emancipation of the Jews is a striking emblem of the great moral emancipation.

3. God educated them. "I taught Ephraim also to go." Some read this line, "I have given Ephraim a leader referring to Moses. Moses was only the instrument. "I taught Ephraim also to go as a child in leading-strings is taught. When they were in the wilderness God led them by a pillar of cloud.

4. God healed them. "I healed them." "I am the Lord that healeth thee". (Exo_15:26)

1. God guided them. "I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love." With human cords I drew them, with bands of love. He did not draw them by might; he attracted them by mercy.

2. God relieved them. "I was to them as they that take off the yoke, on their jaws." As the kind farmer raises from the neck and cheek of the ox the heavy yoke so as to leave him freedom to eat his food, so I raised from your neck the yoke of Egyptian bondage.

3. God fed them. "1 laid meat, unto them." He rained manna about their comp. He gave them bread from heaven, and water horn the rock. What a kind God he was to those people! And has he not been even more kind to us, the favored men of this laud and age?

II A SIGNALLY UNGRATEFUL PEOPLE.

1. They disobeyed Gods teaching. "As they called them, so they went from them." "They the lawgivers, judges, priests, prophets, whom he employed. "They went from them." That is, the people went from their Divine teachers went from them in heart.

2. They gave themselves to idolatry. "They sacrificed unto Baalim, and burned incense to graven images." Idolatry was their besetting sin. It marked their history more or less from the beginning to the end. What is idolatry but giving that love to inferior objects that is due to God and God alone?

3. They ignored God"s kindness. "They knew not that I healed them." They ascribed their restoration either to themselves or others, not to God.

4. They persistently backslided. "And my people are bent to backsliding from me." They forsake me and are bent on doing so. Such is the signally ungrateful conduct of this people.

III A RIGHTEOUSLY PUNISHED PEOPLE. "He shall not return into the land of Egypt, but the Assyrian shall be his king, because they refused to return. And the sword shall abide on his cities, and shall consume his branches, and devour them, because of their own counsels." Whilst they would not be driven back to Egypt again, judgment should overtake them even in the promised land, and the judgment would be:

1. Extensive. "On the cities," and on the "branches." The large town and the little hamlets.

2. Continuous. "Abide on his cities.

3. Destructive. "Consume his branches.

CONCLUSION. Is not the history of this people typical? Do not they represent especially the peoples of modern Christendom, highly favored of God, signally ungrateful to God, and exposed to punishment from God? D.T.

HOMILIES BY J. ORR Vers. 1-4. God"s early love for Israel.

The mind, pained by ingratitude, naturally reverts to the kindnesses formerly showered on the unworthy recipient. God hero reminds Israel of his early love to the nation how he had adopted it as his son, called it out of Egypt, taught it to go alone, drawn it with love, and bountifully provided for it. No sin is so odious as filial ingratitude. (Isa_1:3)

None is so grievous to the heart of a parent. It is this sin which God here charges on Israel.

I THE CHILDHOOD OF ISRAEL. "When Israel was a child, then I loved him" (ver. 1).

1. Israel had a childhood. Every nation has. There is a time when, in the natural development of society, the patriarchal stage passes over into the political. This time came to Israel in Egypt. The patriarchal family had grown into a horde. It had lost its domestic character, yet it had no polity. It might never have had one had the people remained in bondage. God gave them freedom, and with it nationality. Thus the nation was created.

2. The individual has a childhood. He is cast on God"s care from the Psalm. (Psa_22:9, Psa_22:10) One can sometimes almost trace a special providence in the care of children. Those who can look back on special mercies in childhood and early life are in the position of Israel here.

3. The spiritual life has a childhood. It has its feeble beginnings. There are those who are but "babes in Christ". (1Co_3:1) They are as "new-born babes," needing "the sincere milk of the Word," that they may "grow thereby". (1Pe_2:2) God is tenderly careful of such, considerate of their weakness and. watchful in their nurture.

II GOD"S LOVE TO ISRAEL IN HIS CHILDHOOD. "I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt," etc. (vers. 1, 3, 4). God"s love to Israel was shown:

1. In his adoption. He chose the nation, and called it "My son, my firstborn". (Exo_4:22) "Israel was a type of Christ, and for the sake of him who was to be born of the seed of Israel did God call Israel "My Son. In Christ the honor is extended to each individual believer. (1Jn_3:1) The relation expressed is one of peculiar endearment and of preeminent privilege. It is connected, in the case of believers, with the impartation of a new principle of life in regeneration. (1Jn_3:9) The children of believers are "holy". (1Co_7:14) God claims them in baptism as his children. The name "sons of God" shall be restored to Israel on their conversion. (Hos_1:10)

2. In calling him out of Egypt. Freedom is an attribute of God"s children. (Rom_8:21) When God made Israel his son he bound himself to deliver him. He gives freedom to all his spiritual children. The call to leave Egypt was, moreover, a proof of God"s faithfulness and love, in view of the promises made to the fathers. It bore also a prophetic character. (Mat_1:15) Egypt having, by express Divine selection, been chosen a second time as a place of refuge for God"s Son for him of whom Israel, God"s firstborn, was but a type the former call became prophetically a pledge that in this case also the Father"s summons would in due time arrive. Arrive, accordingly, it did. The word, "Out of Egypt have I called my son," found a new and higher fulfillment. On the Divine side, the fulfillment was neither unforeseen nor undesigned.

3. In training him to go alone. "I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by the arms." God gave the nation freedom. He further taught it to use its freedom. Freedom, without power to use it, is a sorry gift. In the training of Israel we observe:

(1) Wisdom. The people, as they came from Egypt, were unfit for independent national existence. They could not go alone. The bondage they had experienced had broken their manliness. They were servile, cowardly, fickle, petulant, disunited. They had to be guided at every step treated like children who cannot walk alone. But the point is, that God sought to train them to walk. It is not his wish that his children should go in leading-strings. He would train them to self-reliance. He therefore put the people in situations fitted to develop their own powers. His training was wise.

(2) Care. God was kind and tender with Israel while yet they were weak. He did not try them above what they were able. In difficult situations he brought help to them in time. He was like a nurse who stands near while the child is walking, ready to catch it if it totters, and to support it when it can walk no further. Thus God deals with all his children. (cf. 1Th_2:7) Wisdom, goodness, and care are manifest in his leading of them, especially in the beginning of their way.

4. In drawing the people with love. "I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love." The people needed to be drawn. They were often recalcitrant and ill to manage. God emphasizes here:

(1) The humanness of his drawing of them. "Cords of a man." There was a humanness in the manner of his approach to them speaking to them in human words, through human servants, and with the persuasions of human affection. The heart of God was found to be like the heart of man. The Almighty tempered his glory, and spake to Israel as Father to Son. His cords were those of a man in another sense. He drew them by rational considerations, He treated them as rational beings, and appealed to them throughout on rational grounds. God draws men in this way still. The Bible is the most human book in the world. Christ is God become man. The Spirit acts through rational motives on the will.

(2) The gentleness of his drawing of them. "Bands of love." God employed, not stern, but gentle methods to overcome the people"s refractoriness. He sought to draw them to himself by kindness. Especially in the earlier stages of the wilderness discipline do we find him making large and merciful allowances for them. The people are constantly rebelling, but seldom do we read of God so much as chiding them; he bore with them, like a father bearing with his children. He knew how ignorant they were; how much infirmity there was about them; how novel and trying were the situations in which he was placing them; and he mercifully gave them time to improve. This was the drawing of love, of which every one who knows God has also had ample experience.

5. In bountifully providing for them. "I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them." God provided for Israel all that was necessary for their sustenance, and not only thus supplied their creature wants, but was kind in his manner of doing, it. He was also the Healer of their diseases (Exo_15:26)

III ISRAEL"S REQUITAL OF THIS LOVE. (Vers. 2, 3) Israel had made God a shameful return for all his goodness to them. They:

1. Refused obedience. "As they the prophets called them, so they went from them." They flatly turned their back on duty. They went further in sin the more they were warned.

2. Dishonored God in the very article of his Godhead. "They sacrificed to Baalim, and burned incense to graven images," thus breaking the first and second commandments.

3. Renounced God as a Healer. "They knew not that I healed them". J.O. (cf. Hos_5:13)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Upbraidings, threatenings and promises mingled, ver. 1-11. A commendation of Judah, ver. 12.

Was a child - In the infancy of Israel. I loved him - Manifested my tender and paternal affection to him. Called my son - Adopted him to be my son, and as my son, provided for him, and brought him out of servitude. Out of Egypt - But Israel, the first adopted son was a type of Christ the first-born. And the history of Israel's coming out was a type of Christ's future coming out of Egypt.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

The Proof of Jehovah’s Love

v. 1. When Israel was a child, at the time of the youth of the nation, then I loved him and called My son out of Egypt, in choosing the nation for His own peculiar people. The inspired writer of the first gospel applies this statement to the return of the Christ-child from Egypt after the abrupt flight of His parents from Bethlehem. Mat 2:15.

v. 2. As they, the prophets, called them, with the Lord’s tender invitation to follow the way of salvation, so they, the children of Israel, went from them, turning away from the path of deliverance which was offered them; they sacrificed unto Baalim, the idols of the Canaanites, and burned incense to graven images, in the open practice of idolatry which the Lord had ever so severely censured.

v. 3. I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms, that is, the Lord Himself took His people in His arms to lead them safely through the dangers of the desert, Deu 1:31; but they knew not that I healed them. Cf Exo 15:26.

v. 4. I drew them with cords of a man, as with bands which support the first weak steps of a child, with bands of love, not with chains to hold them captive against their will; and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, as when a man slips back the yoke on the neck of a draft animal in order to give it the liberty to eat freely, and I laid meat unto them, gently offering them food for their souls. The entire passage refers to the many evidences of love which the Lord showed His people on the way through the wilderness and in the Promised Land.

v. 5. He shall not return into the land of Egypt, Egypt here being used in its literal sense, but the Assyrian shall be his king, Assyria being the new land of bondage, because they refused to return, because they rejected the Lord’s offers of love.

v. 6. And the sword shall abide on his cities, making the rounds in a campaign of destruction, and shall consume his branches, destroying their bars or defenses, and devour them because of their own counsels, because they were determined to leave the Lord and His ways.

v. 7. And My people are bent to backsliding from Me, they were ever inclined to fall away and to reject the Lord; though they, the prophets, called them to the Most High, pointing them upwards to the one Rock of their Salvation, none at all would exalt Him, rather, "all together they refuse to arise. " If men are lost, it is not due to a lack of love on the part of the Lord, but altogether to their own stubbornness in refusing His invitation.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hos 11:4

This is not a day for difficult doctrines, but for the simplest and humblest feelings. The appeal is not made to our understanding nor even directly to our conscience. With the cords of a man we are drawn. The human affections in which all men share, the feelings which even the poorest, the meanest, the most ignorant partake in; the pity, the tenderness, the love that can only be called forth by love—these are now the cords by which our Father draws us, the cords of a man.

I. We are sometimes cold and dead. There are times when our feelings towards God seem to lose their warmth. We can obey and we do, but we feel like servants, not like children, and we are unhappy because we cannot rouse any warmer feelings in ourselves. When this is so, where can we go but to the Cross of Christ? Can our hearts long resist the pleading of that story, or can we refuse to come when the Father begins to draw us with the cords of a man, with bands of love.

II. Perhaps under a decent exterior we hide some sinful habit which has long been eating into our souls. Our besetting sin has clung to us, and we cannot get rid of it. If this be so, yet once more let us turn to God, and gaze upon the Cross of Christ. Let us think of that sorrow which was beyond all other sorrows, and that love which caused all the sorrow. Let us look on this till our thoughts are filled with the sight, till our hearts answer to the affection which could thus suffer, till we feel the cords draw us, the cords of a man, and we sit at the foot of the Cross and never wish to leave it.

III. Or perhaps we have never really striven to serve God at all. We have lived as best suited the society in which we were, as most conduced to our own pleasure. Whenever the thought of God or conscience comes across us, we immediately find that but a dull subject to think on, and we turn to pleasanter and more exciting themes. What then shall warm our hearts but this plain story of sadness? Here shall all men find the medicine to heal their sore disease. Proud thoughts, self-conscious contentment, cannot stand here. We come as sheep that have gone astray. We hasten to the Shepherd whose voice we hear calling us from afar. He hath sought us long. We think not of the pastures, but of Him; to lie in His bosom, to be carried in His arms, to hear His words of comfort once more, to see His face, to feel that we are pressed to His heart.

Bishop Temple, Rugby Sermons, 1st series, p. 1.

Consider the place of love in the Gospel.

I. The Gospel is a revelation of love. Herein lies its power, the secret of its strength. It reveals the love of God. It tells how He, in whose Divine holiness there beats not, as in the best of us) one pulse of sympathy with evil, yet loves with an unqualified love all the souls which He has made. In the immense, immeasurable love of God there is room for all His creatures. He loves, and therefore He pleads. He loved first, and therefore He gave His Son to be the life of the fallen.

II. In addition to the revelation of love, there is, in the Gospel, an invitation of love. There is something always pathetic to the unsophisticated ear in the petition of love. Hearts athirst, hearts dried up, just for lack of love, sometimes see in the far distance, something, some one, whom they feel they could have lived and died for. Pitiable, most pitiable, when we think of it, is the wilderness of the unloved. And yet there was a love for them, would they but have had it; a love better than of son or daughter, better than of wife or husband; a love indestructible, satisfying, eternal. The place of love in the Gospel is first a revelation, and then, a permission and an invitation. (3) In the Gospel there is a communication or transmission of love. He who has been loved, and therefore loves, is bidden, by the love of God to love his brother also. And then, in that transmission, that tradition, that handing on of the love, the whole of the Gospel, its precept as its comfort—is in deed and in truth perfected. Little indeed do they know of the power of the Gospel, who think either that obedience will replace the love of God, or duty be a substitute for the love of man. Christ teaches us that both towards God and towards man love goes first and duty follows after.

C. J. Vaughan, Last Words at Doncaster, p. 87.

The words of the text suggest: (1) The humaneness of God’s discipline; (2) the importance of human relations as well as Divine.

I. The humaneness of God’s rule is seen (1) in the way in which God conceals His laws under the forms and influences of human society. Dependence—we learned the lesson when we hung upon our mother’s breast; obedience—we were broken into it by all the varied discipline of our early home; reverence—our souls learned reverence by the perception of sanctity of character in some one whom we had before learned to love; authority—we felt its constraint in human excellence before we knew the source of all authority to be in God. (2) God makes use of human influences to draw us to Himself. Among such influences are the necessary restrictions of society. (3) The sense of responsibility is another influence by which God draws men to Himself. The pressure of responsibility has made many pray who never prayed before; the human obligation has been a cord to draw to God.

II. Consider the sanctity of human relations and the way to use them. They are the temple of the living God, the channels of His grace; sacred as the form that enshrines an eternal power. To be true to all human relations is not to be godly; but God intends this to be the way to godliness. There is not a human affection that will not gain in beauty, a human obligation that will not increase in sanctity, a human life that will not bloom anew, when the End and Author of its grace and being is recognized and adored in God.

A. Mackennal, Sermons from a Sick Room, p. 49.

References: Hos 11:4.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xvi., No. 934; Ibid., Evening by Evening, p. 141. Hos 11:8.—J. Baldwin Brown, The Sunday Afternoon, p. 261. Hos 12:4.—E. Paxton Hood, Preacher’s Lantern, vol. iii., p. 346. Hos 12:10.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iv., No. 206. Hos 12:12.—Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 327. Hos 13:1.—J. A. Macfadyen, Old Testament Outlines, p. 268. Hos 13:1, Hos 13:2.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ix., p. 103. Hos 13:2.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iv., p. 185. Hos 13:5.—Ibid., Evening by Evening, p. 307. Hos 13:5-8.—Ibid., Sermons, vol. xxiv., No. 1441.

The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

THE FATHERHOOD AND HUMANITY OF GOD

Hosea 11

FROM the thick jungle of Hoseas travail, the eleventh chapter breaks like a high and open mound. The prophet enjoys the first of his two clear visions-that of the past. Judgment continues to descend. Israels sun is near his setting, but before he sinks-

"A lingering light he fondly throws

On the dear hills, whence first he rose."

Across these confused and vicious years, through which he has painfully made his way, Hosea sees the tenderness and the romance of the early history of his people. And although he must strike the old despairing note-that, by the insincerity of the present generation, all the ancient guidance of their God must end in this!-yet for some moments the blessed memory shines by itself, and Gods mercy appears to triumph over Israels ingratitude. Surely their sun will not set; Love must prevail. To which assurance a later voice from the Exile has added, in Hos_10:10-11, a confirmation suitable to its own circumstances.

"When Israel was a child, then I loved him,

And from Egypt I called him to be My son."

The early history of Israel was a romance. Think of it historically. Before the Most High there spread an array of kingdoms and peoples. At their head were three strong princes-sons indeed of God, if all the heritage of the past, the power of the present, and the promise of the future be tokens. Egypt, wrapt in the rich and jeweled web of centuries, basked by Nile and Pyramid, all the wonder of the worlds art in his dreamy eyes. Opposite him Assyria, with barer but more massive limbs, stood erect upon his highlands, grasping in his sword the promise of the worlds power. Between the two, and rising both of them, yet with his eyes westward on an empire of which neither dreamed, the Phoenician on his sea-coast built his storehouses and sped his navies, the promise of the worlds wealth. It must ever remain the supreme romance of history, that the true son of God, bearer of His love and righteousness to all mankind, should be found, not only outside this powerful trinity, but in the puny and despised captive of one of them-in a people that was not a state, that had not a country, that was without a history, and, if appearances be true, was as yet devoid of even the rudiments of civilization-a child people and a slave.

That was the Romance, and Hosea gives us the Grace which made it. "When Israel was a child then I loved him." The verb is a distinct impulse: "I began, I learned, to love him." Gods eyes, that passed unheeding the adult princes of the world, fell upon this little slave boy, and He loved him and gave him a career: "from Egypt I called" him "to be My son."

Now, historically, it was the persuasion of this which made Israel. All their distinctiveness and character, their progress from a level with other nomadic tribes to the rank of the greatest religious teachers of humanity, started from the memory of these two facts-that God loved them, and that God called them. This was an unfailing conscience-the obligation that they were not their own, the irresistible motive to repentance even in their utmost backsliding, the unquenchable hope of a destiny in their direst days of defeat and scattering.

Some, of course, may cavil at the narrow, national scale on which such a belief was held, but let them: remember that it was held in trust for all mankind. To snarl that Israel felt this sonship to God only for themselves, is to forget that it is they who have persuaded humanity that this is the only kind of sonship worth claiming. Almost every other nation of antiquity imagined a filial relation to the deity, but it was either through some fabulous physical descent, and then often confined only to kings and heroes, or by some mystical mingling of the Divine with the human, which was just as gross and sensuous. Israel alone defined the connection as a historical and a moral one. "The sons of God are begotten not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." Sonship to God is something not physical, but moral and historical, into which men are carried by a supreme awakening to the Divine love and authority. Israel, it is true, felt this only in a general way for the nation as a whole; but their conception of it embraced just those moral contents which form the glory of Christs doctrine of the Divine sonship of the individual. The belief that God is our Father does not come to us with our carnal birth-except in possibility: the persuasion of it is not conferred by our baptism except in so far as that is Christs own seal to the fact that God Almighty loves us and has marked us for His own. To us sonship is a becoming, not a being-the awakening of our adult minds "into the surprise of a Fathers undeserved mercy, into the constraint of His authority and the assurance of the destiny He has laid up for us. It is conferred by love, and confirmed by duty. Neither has power brought it, nor wisdom, nor wealth, but it has come solely with the wonder of the knowledge that God loves us, and has always loved us, as well as in the sense, immediately following, of a true vocation to serve Him." Sonship which is less than this is no sonship at all. But so much as this is possible to every man through Jesus Christ. His constant message is that the Father loves every one of us, and that if we know that love, we are Gods sons indeed. To them who feel it, adoption into the number and privileges of the sons of God comes with the amazement and the romance which glorified Gods choice of the child-slave Israel. "Behold," they cry, "what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God." {1 John 3}

"But we cannot be loved by God and left where we are. Beyond the grace there lie the long discipline and destiny. We are called from servitude to freedom, from the world of God-each of us to run a course, and do a work, which can be done by no one else. That Israel did not perceive this was Gods sore sorrow with them. "The more I called to them the farther they went from Me. They to the Baalim kept sacrificing, and to images offering incense." But God persevered with grace, and the story is at first continued in the figure of Fatherhood with which it commenced; then it changes to the metaphor of a humane mans goodness to his beasts. "Yet I taught Ephraim to walk, holding them on Mine arms; but they knew not that I healed them"-presumably when they fell and hurt themselves. "With the cords of a man I would draw them, with bands of love; and I was to them as those who lift up the yoke on their jaws, and gently would I give them to eat." It is the picture of a team of bullocks, in charge of a kind driver. Israel are no longer the wanton young cattle of the previous chapter, which need the yoke firmly fastened on their neck, {Hos_10:11} but a team of toiling oxen mounting some steep road. There is no use now for the rough ropes, by which frisky animals are kept to their work; but the driver, coming to his beasts heads, by the gentle touch of his hand at their mouths and by words of sympathy draws them after him. "I drew them with cords of a man, and with bands of love." Yet there is the yoke, and it would seem that certain forms of this, when beasts were working upwards, as we should say "against the collar," pressed and rubbed upon them, so that the humane driver, when he came to their heads, eased the yoke with his hands. "I was as they that take the yoke off their jaws"; and then, when they got to the top of the hill, he would rest and feed them. That is the picture, and however uncertain we may feel as to some of its details it is obviously a passage-Ewald says "the earliest of all passages-in which "humane means precisely the same as love." It ought to be taken along with that other passage in the great Prophecy of the Exile, where God is described as He that led them through "the deep, as a horse in the wilderness, that they should not stumble: as a beast goeth down into the valley, the Spirit of the Lord gave him rest." {Isa_63:13-14}

Thus then the figure of the fatherliness of God changes into that of His gentleness or humanity. Do not let us think that there is here either any descent of the poetry or want of connection between the two figures. The change is true, not only to Israels, but to our own experience. Men are all either the eager children of happy, irresponsible days, or the bounden, plodding draught-cattle of lifes serious burdens and charges. Hoseas double figure reflects human life in its whole range. Which of us has not known this fatherliness of the Most High, exercised upon us, as upon Israel, throughout our years of carelessness and disregard? It was God Himself who taught and trained us then; -

"When through the slippery paths of youth

With heedless steps I ran,

Thine arm unseen conveyed me safe,

And led me up to man."

Those speedy recoveries from the blunders of early willfulness, those redemptions from the sins of youth-happy were we if we knew that it was "He who healed us." But there comes a time when men pass from leading-strings to harness when we feel faith less and duty more-when our work touches us more closely than our God. Death must be a strange transformer of the spirit, yet surely not more strange than life, which out of the eager buoyant child makes in time the slow automaton of duty. It is such a stage which the fourth of these verses suits, when we look up, not so much for the fatherliness as for the gentleness and humanity of our God. A man has a mystic power of a very wonderful kind upon the animals over whom he is placed. On any of these wintry roads of ours we may see it, when a kind carter gets down at a hill, and, throwing the reins on his beasts back, will come to its head and touch it with his bare hands, and speak to it as if it were his fellow; till the deep eyes fill with light, and out of these things, so much weaker than itself, a touch, a glance, a word, there will come to it new strength to pull the stranded wagon onward. The man is as a god to the beast, coming down to help it, and it almost makes the beast human that he does so. Not otherwise does Hosea feel the help which God gives His own on the weary hills of life. We need not discipline, for our work is discipline enough, and the cares we carry of themselves keep us straight and steady. But we need sympathy and gentleness-this very humanity which the prophet attributes to our God. God comes and takes us by the head; through the mystic power which is above us, but which makes us like itself, we are lifted to our task. Let no one judge this incredible. The incredible would be that our God should prove any less to us than the merciful man to his beast. But we are saved from argument by experience. When we remember how, as life has become steep and our strength exhausted, there has visited us a thought which has sharpened to a word, a word which has warmed to a touch, and we have drawn ourselves together and leapt up new men, can we feel that God was any less in these things, than in the voice of conscience or the message of forgiveness, or the restraints of His discipline? Nay, though the reins be no longer felt, God is at our head, that we should not stumble nor stand still. Upon this gracious passage there follows one of those swift revulsions of feeling, which we have learned almost to expect in Hosea. His insight again overtakes his love. The people will not respond to the goodness of their God; it is impossible to work upon minds so fickle and insincere. Discipline is what they need. "He shall return to the land of Egypt, or Asshur shall be his king" (it is still an alternative), "for they have refused to return" to Tis but one more instance of the age-long apostasy of the people. "My people have a bias to turn from Me; and though they" (the prophets) "call them upwards, none of them can lift them."

Yet God is God, and though prophecy fail He will attempt His love once more. There follows the greatest passage in Hosea-deepest if not highest of his book-the breaking forth of that exhaustless mercy of the Most High which no sin of man can bar back nor wear out.

"How am I to give thee up, O Ephraim?

How am I to let thee go, O Israel?

How am I to give thee up?

Am I to make an Admah of thee a Seboim?

My heart is turned upon Me,

My compassions begin to boil:

I will not perform the fierceness of Mine anger,

I will not turn to destroy Ephraim;

For God am I and not man,

The Holy One in the midst of thee, yet I come not to consume!"

Such a love has been the secret of Hoseas persistence through so many years with so faithless a people, and now, when he has failed, it takes voice to itself and in its irresistible fullness makes this last appeal. Once more before the end let Israel hear God in the utterness of His Love!

The verses are a climax, and obviously to be succeeded by a pause. On the brink of his doom, will Israel turn to such a God, at such a call? The next verse, though dependent for its promise on this same exhaustless Love, is from an entirely different circumstance, and cannot have been put by Hosea here.

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

General Information:

Yahweh is speaking of caring for Israel like a parent cares for a child.

When Israel was a young man

Yahweh is speaking about the people of Israel as if they were a young man. Yahweh is referring to when he first started his relationship with the nation. (See: Metaphor)

I called my son out of Egypt

"son" refers to the people of God the Father. AT: "I led my son out of Egypt" (See: Metaphor)

The more they were called, the more they went away from me

This can be stated in active form. AT: "The more I called them to be my people, the more they refused me" (See: Active or Passive)

translationWords

Israel

love

call

son

Egypt

turn

sacrifice

Baal

incense

false god

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

and from Egypt I called My son through My prophets to cleave to My Torah. But what did they do?...

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.