The Gospel of Hosea, Ch. 4: Yahweh Makes His Case
The Gospel of Hosea, Ch. 4: Yahweh Makes His Case.
“Israelites, hear the words of Yahweh, for He has brought charges against you…” (Hosea 4:1a).
A Courtroom Setting. Here in chapter 4 we find Hosea standing up with his people and yelling out “Hear ye! Hear ye! Hosea here is offering a summary of the Lord’s case against Israel as He finds them guilty of all charges. The Lord is bringing His lawsuit against His chosen people and offers evidence by listing their sins against God’s law. Yahweh is the prosecuting attorney, and His letter of indictment is centered on the many ways Israel has broken their holy covenant relationship with God.
“… There is no faithfulness or truth (’emeth’), there is no steadfast mercy or lovingkindness (‘hesed’), and there is no meaningful knowledge (‘yada’) of Me in your land.” (Hosea:1b).
The Big Three. Hosea begins the outline of the charges by listing the three main headings under which all the crimes can be grouped. Each of these three are stressed later in Hosea: knowledge in chapters 4-6; mercy in chapters 6-11; and faithfulness/truth in chapters 11-14. Remember Yahweh is the judge in this setting, not the defendant. God has completely remained loyal to the covenant promises and done His part by displaying all three holy qualities towards Israel. But Israel is the one being charged with these crimes, because they have ignored or outright rejected the holy covenant established with Yahweh since they became His chosen people. Since these three qualities have been highlighted in importance by Hosea and by Yahweh, they deserve some attention:
(1.) “Emeth” = In Hebrew, “faithfulness” and “truth” are interchangeable, and the literal meaning is: True to His word; steadfast loyalty; trustworthy; truthful about promises; reliable; constant and dependable; act in good faith; certain in commitment; His word is His bond. The Hebrew word used is emeth, which means faithfulness, truth, certainty, stability, trustworthiness. The fact that the Hebrews saw truth and faithfulness as interchangeable points to God’s character, that He is true to His word, true to His nature, that God keeps truth certainly and with stability and trustworthiness. God is literally, truly faithful, and His true and faithful nature becomes part of our character as we live into His Spirit’s transformation of us while acquiring the mind of Christ.
(2.) “Hesed” = A Hebrew word for mercy used a number of times in Hosea, and is often translated as lovingkindness, indicating an eternally steadfast love, covenant faithfulness, unfailing loyalty, love-in-action. Hesed has so many dimensions that it is much easier to describe than define. Hesed may be the most important word in the Hebrew Bible, because it is considered a summary word for all of God’s character traits, the driving force behind all He does. There is no one translation of hesed that is perfect or says it all. Hesed is a covenant word, a relationship word, and celebrates God’s commitment to remaining true to his merciful promises out of sheer love. “Hesed” is used over 120 times in the book of Psalms alone, and a grand total of 250 times in the Hebrew Bible.
(3.) “Daath” = The word knowledge here in verse 1 is the noun form of its verb “yada,” a key idea throughout the book of Hosea… Knowledge of God. The Hebrew word “yada” is dropped 25 times in the book, and if we don’t understand what the Bible means by “know” or “knowledge,” we are missing the heartbeat of our relationship with God. The Bible has a lot to say about the meaning of know, including the usual suspects: memory of a fact or event; possession of a technical skill; a perception of a piece of reality; an intuitive awareness; a mastery of a particular subject; an understanding of something; a personal familiarity with something. That’s all good. Nothing new there. But now the fun begins… The Hebraic-Christian understanding of “know” is not at all limited to an intellectual or mental knowledge. To know someone in the Biblical sense is to experience that person in a deeply intimate way. “Know” is a relationship word and involves knowledge that comes from personal experience. To know involves a deeply personal union with a truth or a person. In the Hebrew and Christian mind, we don’t really know something until it becomes a part of us, something that changes us in some way. To truly know something is to be able to live it out, to experience participation with that which is known. Knowing something involves a heartfelt focus, an intense investment. To know something is to care for it, to give oneself over to it. To know someone in the Biblical sense is to literally participate in a profound relationship with that person, to establish an ongoing union with someone, to be personally invested to an intimate degree with a person. A spiritual relationship with God seems best understood in the context of “knowledge” in the biblical sense, a deep union involving spiritual relations between God and the believer. In the same way that Adam and Eve “knew” each other physically, God wants to “know” us spiritually, and for us to know Him at that same level. To walk with the Lord is to grow in our “knowledge” of Him, to experience spiritual relations with Him in an intimate way. In fact, to know God in the way He want us to know Him means to have an ongoing spiritual union with God that involves, not physical “carnal knowledge,” but spiritual knowledge.
A Nasty List of Crimes. And now Hosea dives into some specific ways that Israel has broken God’s law. Clearly, the Ten Commandments were not exactly on the top of their minds, because they were violating pretty much every moral boundary God had established since day one. Yahweh’s catalogue of charges against Israel included… cursing at others, lying and deception, breaking promises, murdering, stealing, widespread promiscuity and adultery, violent bloodletting everywhere He looked…” (4:2). It appears that Israel, spiritually speaking, was running on fumes, and that moral anarchy ruled their society. Even the land was in mourning for the people’s shortcomings. God predicts that every acre in Israel is grief-stricken and will wither away, and even the wild animals, the birds, and the fish are going to waste way.
The Priests and the Prophet are Guilty as Sin. Hosea didn’t mince his words here… “Don’t point your finger at someone else and try to pass the blame! My complaint, you priests, is with you! My people are destroyed for lack of experiential knowledge of Me. They do not even know who I am! Since you have refused to let them know Me personally, I will refuse you as priests…. You have exchanged your glorious God for shameful gods, Yahweh’s spiritual weight for Baal’s complete emptiness.” (4:4-7). Yahweh’s lawsuit did not even come close to letting the religious leaders off the hook for Israel’s spiritual predicament. The priests and the false prophets have ignored God’s teaching and covenant agreement, so God will ignore Israel. Hosea charged the priests with everything from ignorance to greed, from neglect to violence, from disobedience to acting without moral conscience. Yahweh made it clear that it was the so-called leadership, or lack thereof, which have led the people of Israel into sin.
Shameless Gluttons. “The priests lead my people into sin so they can eat more of their sin offerings. So the priests are glad when the people continue to sin, for the more they sin, they better they are fed!” (4:8). How low can the priests go? Every time a person brings a sin offering to a priest, he would not only charge a fee, but also eat the meat offered in sacrifices. The priest knew that it was acceptable in the law of Moses to eat the meat of the animal that was sacrificed after the animal’s fat had been burned away on the altar. The meat was choice lamb or goat, so the more the people sinned, the greater would be the priest’s banquet. If a person was very poor, the sin offering consisted of a large portion of fine flour with which to make quality bread. Evidently, after the priest had enjoyed his fill of the delicious meat and bread, he would sell it to the hungry or give it to his relatives for them to enjoy. Yahweh hated the idea of the priests becoming profiteers from what is the holiest of sacrificial offerings and in the process indirectly encouraging his people to sin.
The Heart of the Matter: Idolatry. The core issue is underlined here. The Israelites seek revelation from a block of wood and a divining rod, and their spiritual adultery has led them astray from Yahweh. Israel has broken the covenant and deserted their God, just like Gomer had betrayed Hosea. Their worship of false gods involves incense, and sex, sex, and more sex, everywhere and anywhere… in the shrines, on the mountains, on the hilltops, under every sacred tree where they can appeal to the fertility gods “under pleasant shade.” (4:12-14). Hosea closes this section up with a summary statement… “O foolish people! You refuse to understand, so you will be trampled and destroyed! For anyone without basic discernment and moral intelligence is doomed and will come to ruin!” (4:14).
Don’t Go There! Hosea then warns the Israelites not to even think about visiting two particular sites in Israel that have been transformed from a blessed place of holy worship to an abominable site of pagan idolatry… Gilgal and Bethel (4:15):
(1.) Gilgal. This was one of the most momentous holy sites in Jewish history, just over the border into the Promised Land and near their first conquest, the walled city of Jericho. Joshua led this new generation into the land of Canaan and decided to gather everyone together to get organized about two miles from Jericho. They are all waiting for marching orders from Joshua. So after placing stones from the Jordan at their campsite in memory of God’s miracle at the river, God has something important to say to Joshua and to all the Jews at this critical hour. With the whole nation of Israel gathered there, God thundered these momentous words with profound authority, “Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you!” (Joshua 5:9). God is saying here that He has rolled away the heavy weight of shame, guilt, disdain; the disgrace that was the Jewish experience in Egypt. God has rolled all that away. So no longer do they have the mentality of being a slave, of being hindered or held back, of being in bondage. No longer do they have to feel scorned as when they were slaves. This new Jewish generation are to live in freedom. They are now intended to enjoy life without the burden of slavery, or the shame of being owned, or the despair they experienced in history. As a sign of this renewal, to confirm it and etch it into the psyche of every Jew, the entire nation of Israel celebrated Passover right then, right there, for the first time in 40 years. They remembered together the passing over of death and judgment in Egypt, the lamb’s blood on the doorposts, Pharaoh’s release, and God’s salvation. They celebrated this Old Testament sacrament to renew their old relationship with God. Everyone in the spiritual nation of Israel now knows… no more business as usual; we have turned a corner; we are a renewed people. God has rolled away the reproach of Egypt, the disgrace of bondage, the humiliating shame of being dehumanized, hindered from being fully human. This famous place of renewal was named Gilgal, because that Hebrew word evidently sounds like “rolling.” Gilgal became their military base camp, as well as the headquarters for worship as a nation. Gilgal came to represent a nation-changing renewal as they entered the Promised Land. Gilgal signified where God rolled away their history of slavery in Egypt. Gilgal was where there was a national healing of memories. And yet, and yet, by the time of Hosea, Gilgal had become a sex shrine, and place of cultic worship and pagan idolatry. So Hosea is telling the Israelites… Don’t even consider visiting Gilgal because of what it has turned into. It was once a blessed place of holy worship, and you have turned it into something abominable.
(2.) Bethel. This famous holy site which means “House of God” was used as an important place of worship since the days of Abraham and Jacob. God’s covenant with Jacob was established at Bethel (Genesis 28:15), and God even asked Jacob to live there for a time (Gen. 35:1), and changing Jacob’s name to Israel (Gen. 35:9-15). Since Bethel, earlier known as Luz, was one of the highest places in Israel, with an elevation of almost 3,000’, it was very busy in Hebrew history as a common worship site. Bethel is mentioned 60 times in the Hebrew Bible, with only Jerusalem mentioned more. During the time of the Judges, the Ark of the Covenant was housed there, which made it an important worship center for faithful Jews. Most biblical archeologists now believe that Bethel was about 10 miles north of Jerusalem, in the hill country of Samaria. But it didn’t take long for Bethel to take a drastic turn from being famous to infamous, from being a time-honored thin place to a spiritual death trap. Soon after Solomon, Jeroboam foolishly decided to establish Bethel as a pagan worship site, even going so far as to set up a golden bull there (1 Kings 12:28). Tragically, Bethel remained a pagan site for a long time, and was denounced by one prophet after another, such as Amos, Hosea and Jeremiah. Eventually, the heroic reformer King Josiah destroyed that pagan site literally and completely. Josiah left no doubt as to what he thought of Bethel’s turn to paganism… He executed all the pagan priests there, exhumed the bodies of the dead priests and burned their bones to ash on their altars, broke the stones of the pagan altars into pieces, and had those very pieces ground into dust! (2 Kings 23). Bethel became nothing but a memory, faded away in biblical history, and is not even mentioned in the New Testament. Hosea mocked what Bethel had turned into by nicknaming it “Beth-Aven.” In other words, Hosea is chastising the Israelites by telling them they have turned the sacred “House of God” into a “House of Evil and Nothingness.”
The Prosecutor’s Closing Statement. Before declaring that Israel’s sex-worship will finally leave them all shamefully impotent and spiritually unfruitful, and after Hosea called Israel as stubborn as a mule, he asked a rhetorical question of them… Do you really expect God to pasture you in a broad meadow like an obedient lamb? The implication is that, like a stubborn mule, God is going to tie Israel up to the nearest tree in order to keep them from wandering away permanently, which is what the coming Assyrian invasion and exile is all about. At that time, says Yahweh, your drunken orgy will be over, no longer will you be able to delight in your unfaithfulness, preferring disgrace to honor. No longer will you enjoy your affectionate friendship with shame. And then Hosea shows a little more of his poetic side when he closes the chapter with, “Israel will be swept away on the wings of the wind.” (4:19). Another way of saying this is, “A mighty wind will wrap Israel in its wings.” In other words, the time is coming soon, about twenty years to be exact, when Israel will be surrounded, exiled, and totally ruined. God’s whirlwind of wrath is just over the horizon, and the Assyrian forces will sweep in and leave nothing behind.