Second Greater Division: Jehovah’s Controversy With Israel
In this second or remaining part, Hosea 4 begins to set out the ground of complaint against the sons of Israel. They are called to hear Jehovah; for He “hath a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land” (v. 1). It is well to note this. In the hypocrite or the theorist there may be a certain knowledge without good fruit; but, in those who are simple and real, knowledge of God cannot be separated from holy and righteous ways, as practical evil goes with ignorance of God. As the first verse puts their state negatively, in the second we have the positive wickedness charged home with amazing energy: “Swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, burst out, and blood [lit. bloods] toucheth on blood” (v. 2). There was to the prophet nothing else. Profanity against God, corruption and violence among men, filled the scene; and this in the land where Jehovah’s eyes rested continually, whence He had destroyed the former inhabitants because of their iniquities. “Therefore shall the land mourn, and every one that dwelleth therein shall languish, with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven; yea, the fishes of the sea also shall be taken away” (v. 3). God marked His sense of all by desolation in the lower creation, down to those which might seem farthest from the control or influence of man. Such was the havoc and misery under God’s hand through Israel’s sin. “Yet let not man strive, and let not man reprove; for Thy people [are] as they that strive with the priest” (v. 4). It was vain for man to speak now: God must take in hand a people who were like such as rejected him who spoke and judged in His name. Therefore was their destruction imminent, and would it be unceasing, “thou” and “the prophet” and “thy mother”—all, root and branch. “Therefore shalt thou fall in the day, and the prophet also shall fall with thee in the night, and I will destroy thy mother” (v. 5).
People and Priests Being Indiscriminately Corrupt
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I also will reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to Me: because thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I too will forget thy children” (v. 6). The true meaning seems to be Israel’s loss of their relative nearness to God as His people (Ex. 19), not to such sons of Aaron as might pander to irregularities in worship or connive at sin. Not individuals but “My people” are in question; as those who bring priests into the verse seem to see in the following clause. We shall hear of priests presently. Here it is the people. “As they increased, so they sinned against Me: I will change their glory into shame. They eat up the sin [perhaps sin-offering] of My people, and long after [lift up their soul to] their iniquity. Therefore it shall be, like people, like priest; I will visit upon him his ways, and make his doings to return to him” (vss. 7-9). Here imperceptibly we come from the people to the priest, who are singularly identified, as in wickedness so in punishment, in the latter clauses of verse 9—not “them” but “him.” They were alike evil. No class was exempt from pollution: people and priests were indiscriminately corrupt. From their position, the priests might be more guilty than the people; but they were all morally at one. But God would not fail in judgment.
Idolatry Worst in God’s People
“For they shall eat, and not have enough: they shall commit lewdness, and shall not increase: because they have left off to take heed to Jehovah. My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their staff declareth unto them: for the spirit of lewdness hath caused them to err, and they have gone lewdly from under their God” (vss. 10-12). Thus, moral laxity and indulgence play into the hands of idolatry, as Satan takes advantage of the passions to hold men in his religious toils. Hence, we see how well the expression for uncleanness morally suits the heart’s going after false gods. “They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and offer incense on the hills, under the oak and the poplar and the terebinth, because their shade is good therefore your daughters commit lewdness, and your daughters-in-law commit adultery: I will not punish your daughters when they commit lewdness, nor your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery; for they themselves go aside with harlots, and sacrifice with prostitutes” (literally, consecrated to this demoralizing false worship, which made their debasement a religious duty and a gain): “therefore the people not understanding shall be cast headlong” (vss. 13-14).
When Let Alone, the People Are Abandoned to Sin
Whatever their faults and ways against each other, deepest of all was their sin against Jehovah their God. And this furnishes the opportunity and necessity for the warning that they must lose their priestly character as a nation; that is, their distinctive nearness in relation to God. Further, let their ruin be a call to Judah to beware. This brings us face to face with the actual state of Israel when Hosea was on the earth. “Though thou, Israel, play the harlot, yet let not Judah offend; and come not ye unto Gilgal, neither go ye up to Beth-aven” (v. 15). The allusion is to the notorious idolatry of Israel and its chief seats, where God had once given the nation to judge their own evil, or near the spot where their father, prince with God, received promises of grace from Himself. It was now, however, not Bethel (house of God) but the neighboring pollution, Beth-aven (house of vanity). “Nor swear, Jehovah liveth” (v. 15), thus adding insult against Jehovah to the injury done towards His truth; for idolatry is in no way mitigated, but the less excusable in him who even outwardly owns His name. This very recognition, and the attempt to mingle Jehovah with what was contrary to Jehovah, form the gravamen of their guilt, and its exact measure and worst aggravation at that epoch in the sight of God. The same principle applies now. To accredit with faith an offender is no ground whatever to count his sin less but rather more heinous. For there cannot be a more immoral or destructive principle than to allege the fact or hope of one’s Christianity as a reason for slurring over his sin: on the contrary moral judgment and separation would be but due to the name of God, not to say in love to his soul whose deliverance and restoration we desire. For we have to do with God’s will and ways; according to which a man’s faith and confession of the Lord’s name should be the ground of discipline, never of tolerating his sin. But latitudinarian laxity characterizes these days, and is, under the show of grace, real evil in God’s sight.
Take notice of another solemn principle in verse 17 after warning Judah from the sad ruin of Israel: a desolate land of exile was before them. “Ephraim is joined to idols [lit. toils]: let him alone” (v. 17). God chastises as long as there is the smallest feeling; but when He ceases to deal with the guilty, all is over, morally speaking. When to Ephraim or any other He gives such rest as this, it is because hope is abandoned, and the evil is allowed to run its course unchecked. “Their drink is turned; her rulers greatly love infamy:” (vs. 18), that is, they give themselves to nothing else than that which is, and brings, inevitable shame. “The wind hath bound her up in its wings, and they shall be ashamed of their sacrifice” (vs. 19). They refused to learn of God in peace and righteousness, and must be given up to the winds, dispersed afar off by their enemies, and there be humbled, seeing they refused it in their own land.