Hosea 9:2

Hos 9:2 The floor and the winepress shall not feed them, and the new wine shall fail in her.

Ver. 2. The floor and the winepress shall not feed them] Culpam poena premit comes, Punishment attendeth sin at the heels. They had abused their plenty, and ascribed it to their idols; therefore shall they be cut short either in their store, as Hab 3:6; Hab 3:10; Hab 2:16, or in their strength, as Hos 4:10; Hos 8:7. {see Hos 2:8-9, with the notes} One way or other their hopes shall be frustrated, the creature shall lie to them, and not answer their expectation.

The new wine shall fail in her] Mustum mentietur ei: see the like phrase, Hab 3:17 Isa 58:11 Job 41:6 : they shall come to the grain floors and winepresses, as men come to a lottery with heads full of hopes; but depart disappointed, with their hearts full of blanks. As they have lied to God (idolatry is nothing else but a large lie), and dealt deceitfully with him in the covenant, so shall all things lie to them, and not answer their hopes. Look how a certain prince paid a false traitor, who for a sum of money had betrayed his country to him, in false coin; so shall it fare with such as falsify with God; he will blast their hopes, and curse their blessings, cut them short in the height of their expectancies, strike them in the things that their hearts are most set upon, the new wine shall lie to them, and so set them a howling, Joe 1:5.

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.

2. Faithlessness to Jehovah will be punished by a withdrawal of the divine gifts (Hos_2:9).

Wine press — The Hebrew word denotes not the press in which the grapes are pressed out, but the receptacle into which flows the juice after the grapes are crushed (see on Joe_2:24). Threshing floor — where the grain is stored as well as threshed out — and winepress stand for grain and wine.

New wine — See on Hos_4:11.

Feed them — LXX., with a change of one consonant, “know them.”

Fail in her — Better R.V., “fail her,” that is, Israel. The change to a feminine pronoun would have to be explained by the representation of Israel as a harlot (Hos_4:19). It should be noted, however, that all the versions read the plural, as in the first clause. Changes from the second person (Hos_9:1) to the third person (Hos_9:2) are not uncommon in prophetic discourse. For the thought compare Amo_5:11; Isa_5:10.

The manner in which Jehovah will execute the judgment is indicated in Hos_9:3. Israel is to be removed from the land.

Egypt — See on Hos_8:13. The other power upon which Israel relies for help, Assyria (Hos_7:11; Hos_8:9), will also be a means of Israel’s destruction.

Jehovah’s land — The land in which Israel now dwells. So long as primitive religious conceptions prevailed in Israel Palestine was thought to be the land of Jehovah in much the same sense in which Moab was the land of Chemosh or Ammon the land of Milcom (Jdg_11:23-24). Outside of Israel Jehovah was powerful only as he went to the assistance of his people Israel against another people and its deity. Even to David exile from the land meant inability to worship Jehovah (1Sa_26:19; compare Jon_1:3). The eighth century prophets had a broader conception of Jehovah; he controlled other nations as well as Israel (Amo_1:3 to Amo_2:3; Amo_9:7), though they never ceased to believe that Jehovah had a peculiar interest in the Hebrews. Nevertheless, in several places passages are found which imply that the common people continued to cling to the narrower view. Thus may be explained the latter part of this verse.

Unclean things [“food”] — Not food which was per se ceremonially unclean, but food which was unclean because the land in which it was eaten was unclean (Amo_7:17; Eze_4:13); and the land was unclean because Jehovah could not properly be worshiped there (compare 2Ki_5:17).

To a people so scrupulous about the fulfillment of the ceremonial requirements one of the greatest calamities of life in exile would be the inability to continue properly the external forms of worship. This calamity the prophet brings before them in vivid colors in Hos_9:4. Whether the prophet himself shared the common notion, or whether he simply used these expressions because they would present the climax of calamity to the minds of those whom he was anxious to influence, is not made clear; that Hosea conceived of the sway of Jehovah as extending over nations outside of Israel cannot be doubted. Offer [“pour out”] wine offerings to Jehovah — Drink offerings will cease (see on Joe_1:9).

Neither shall they (the wine offerings) be pleasing unto him — Margin of R.V., which connects the words differently, reproduces more accurately the Hebrew, “neither shall their sacrifices be pleasing unto him.” This presupposes the bringing of sacrifice, only it will not be acceptable to Jehovah. But the first as well as the last clause of the verse states that certain offerings shall be discontinued. The same is implied in the whole verse; Hos_3:4, also teaches that sacrifice is to be entirely discontinued in exile. To remove this apparent contradiction scholars generally accept the emendation first suggested by Kuenen, and read, with a change of one single consonant, “neither shall they prepare for him their sacrifices.”

Their sacrifices shall be unto them as the bread of mourners — That is, unclean. The bread of mourning is the bread eaten during the seven days of mourning (Deu_26:14) and at funeral meals. Everyone coming near a dead person is unclean for seven days (Num_19:14), and everything such an unclean person touches, even his food, becomes unclean (Num_19:22); anyone eating this unclean food shares the uncleanness.

Their bread for their soul — The last word means also appetite, so R.V., “shall be for their appetite”; sometimes it is even used in the place of the pronoun — “for themselves.” Whichever rendering is adopted, the thought remains the same. Part of the bread (or food) was presented to Jehovah in the form of first fruits, offerings, or tithes, and thus it assisted in securing the divine favor; a part was used to satisfy the hunger of the owner. In the exile there will be no sanctuary, and offerings cannot be brought; the food cannot be used to secure or maintain the divine favor; it serves only to satisfy physical hunger.

House of Jehovah — Any sanctuary consecrated to Jehovah.

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

9:2 As punishment for their prostitution, the Lord would so reduce the Israelites’ harvests that they would go hungry (cp. Hag 1:3-11).

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

These outward things that thou seekest, shall be taken from thee.

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

(Hos 2:9, Hos 2:12).

fail--disappoint her expectation.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

God now denounces such a punishment as the Israelites deserved. They had been drawn away, as we have said, from the pure worship of God by allurements; they hoped for more profit from superstitions. Hence God shows, that he would on this account punish them by taking away from them their wine and corn, as we have already noticed in Hosea 2: for it is the only way by which the Lord restores men to a sane mind, or at least renders them inexcusable, to deprive them of his blessings. The harlot, as long as gain is to be had, as long as she surpasses all honest and chaste matrons in her dress and mode of living, is pleased with herself and blinded by her own splendour; but when she is reduced to extreme want, when she sees herself to be the laughing-stock of all, and when she drags a miserable life in poverty, she then sighs and owns how infatuated she had been in leaving her husband. So the Lord now declares by his Prophet, that he would thus deal with the Israelites, that they might no longer please themselves with such delusions.

Hence he says, The floor and the wine-press shall not feed them, and the new wine shall disappoint them, (mentietur illis — shall lie to them;) — that is, the vineyards shall not answer their expectation. It is the same as though he said, “As these men regard only their stomach, as they deem nothing of any moment but provision, therefore the floor and the wine-press shall not feed them; I will deprive them of their support, that they may understand that they in vain worship false gods.” Let us take a common similitude: We see some boys so disingenuous as not to be moved either by disgrace or even by stripes; but as they are subject to the cravings of appetite, when the father deprives them of bread, they nearly lose all hope. Stripes do no good, all warnings are slighted; but when the boy who loves excess sees that bread is denied him, he finds out that his father’s displeasure ought to be feared. Thus God corrects men addicted to excessive indulgence; for they are so insensible, that no other remedy can do them any good.

We now, then, apprehend the meaning of the Prophet. He first reproaches the Israelites for loving a reward, for hastening after fictitious gods, that they might glut themselves with great abundance of things: but when the Lord saw that they had become stupefied in their fatness, he said, “I will deprive them of all their provisions; neither wine nor wheat shall be given them; this want will at length drive them to repentance.” We hence see how the Lord deals with men according to their disposition. And his manner of speaking ought to be noticed; he says, that neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them. He does not say, that the fields shall be barren; he does not say, that he would send hail or storm; but he says, that neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them; and further, that the new wine shall disappoint them; that is, when they shall think themselves to be blessed with all plenty, when the harvest shall appear abundant, and when they shall have already, by anticipation, swallowed up the large produce of their vineyards, all this shall come to nothing; for neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them; nay, the very wine which they thought to have been prepared shall disappoint them. It follows —

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.

(2) Winepress.—Read wine-vat (with margin), into which the tîrôsh, new wine (“ grape-juice “), flowed from the winepress. (Comp. Isa_5:2.) For “fail in her” read deceive her, with LXX. and Vulgate.

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

2. the winepress] Rather, the vat (within the press) into which the grape-juice or the oil flowed; comp. Joe_2:24.

shall fail in her] Rather, shall fall her (lit. ‘shall lie unto her’, as Hab_3:17). There is a good various reading (supported by the versions and by the Babylonian codex) ‘in them’, but the same interchange of pronouns occurs in Hos_4:19. Idolatrous Israel is personified as a harlot. Wine-drinking was, in fact, so closely connected with the customs of idolatry (comp. Jdg_9:27; Amo_2:8), that the Nazirites bound themselves by a vow of ‘total abstinence’ (Num_6:3).

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.

The floor and the winepress shall not feed them,.... Though their expectations from their worship of idols were large, they should find themselves mistaken; for there would not be a sufficiency of corn on the floor, nor of wine in the press, to supply them with what was necessary for their sustenance; either through a blight upon their fields and vineyards, or through the invasion of an enemy, treading them down, and spoiling and foraging them: or else supposing a sufficient quantity of corn and wine got in; yet those blessings should be either turned into curses, or carried off by the enemy, that they should do then, no good; or if they enjoyed them, yet they should receive no nourishment from them; but should become lean, and look like starved and famishing creatures in the midst of plenty; by all which it would appear that their idols could neither give them a sufficiency of provisions, nor make those nourishing to them they had:

and the new wine shall fail in her; in the congregation or land of Israel: or, "shall lie to her" (s); shall not answer their expectations, but disappoint and deceive them; whereas they expected great plenty from the promising prospect of the vines, these by one means or another should be destroyed, so that they would yield but little, and balk them; see Hab 3:17.

(s) "mentietur in ea", Pagninus, Montanus, Zanchius; "mentietur isti", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Liveleus, Schmidt.

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

The floor and winepress shall not feed them - God turneth away wholly from the adulterous people, and telleth others, how justly they shall be dealt with first for this. “Because she loved My reward, and despised Myself, the reward itself shall be taken away from her.” When the blessings of God have been abused to sin, He, in mercy and judgment, takes them away. He cut them off, in order to show that He alone, who now withheld them, had before given them. When they thought themselves most secure, when the grain was stored on the floor, and the grapes were in the press, then God would deprive them of them.

And the new wine shall fail in her, or shall fail her - Literally, “shall lie to her.” It may be, he would say, that as Israel had lied to his God, and had “spoken lies against Him” Hos 7:13, so, in requital, the fruits of the earth should disappoint her, and holding out hopes which never came to pass, should, as it were, lie to her, and in the bitterness of her disappointment, represent to her her own failure to her God. The prophet teaches through the workings of nature, and gives, as it were, a tongue to them .

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

Deceive. The grapes shall yield no wine. (Calmet) --- Spem mentita seges. (Horace ii. ep. 2. and 3. ode 1. and 16.)

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).

The floor; the corn which is gathered into the floor and that is threshed there, that plenty which these sottish idolaters have, and think they have it from their idols, the bread they eat. For here the floor is put for the corn, and the bread made of it.

The wine-press, by the same figure, put for the wine that is pressed out in it; though there is great plenty, and the vats overflow as well as the press full.

Shall not feed them; all this plenty shall not nourish and strengthen them. Since they think their idols give them their corn and wine, let them give also, what I will not give, a blessing on these that they may support and refresh them; they shall be lean and half-starved in their plenty unless their idols can do this for them, i.e. bless their food.

Them, who seek to idols for corn and wine, and praise their idols as givers of it. These I will blast, their provision shall be as theirs, Hag 1:6.

The new wine shall fail in her; or lie unto her, or fail her expectation. Samaria and all Israel expect a fair and full vintage, but they expect it from their idols, which are a doctrine of lies, and in this, as in all other, will lie.

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

The floor and the wine-press shall not feed them, and the new wine shall fail in her. Thus Israel was not to enjoy the blessings of the harvest; the corn and oil and new wine, or corn and wine, would not prove as abundant as they expected or plenty would be succeeded by scarcity; or, rather, the people would be prevented enjoying the abundant produce of their land in consequence of being carried away captive to Assyria, as seems implied in the following verse. The floor and press whether wine-prom, or rather oil-press, as the mention of new wine follows are put for their contents by a common figure of speech. The expression, "fail in her," is literally, "lie to her," and has many parallels; as, "The labor of the olive shall fail margin, "lie," and Horace"s "fundus mendax," equivalent to "a farm that belies his hopes."

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

The floor - The corn which is gathered into the floor. The wine- press - The wine that is prest out in it. Shall not feed - Shall not nourish and strengthen the idolaters. Shall fail - Samaria and all Israel expect a full vintage, but they expect it from their idols, and therefore shall be disappointed.

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