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HOSEA

The first of the 12 Minor Prophets. Attributed to Hosea ben Beeri, the book condemns the inhabitants of northern Israel for their infidelity to Yahweh during the years of that nation’s decline and fall (ca. 745-721 b.c.e.).

Text

With the possible exception of the book of Job, the text of Hosea is among the most difficult in the entire OT. Translations of the book vary widely depending on text-critical and philological judgments. It has been argued that much of the difficulty in the text is due to Hosea’s use of a now obscure northern Israelite dialect. There is much to commend this position, especially since Hosea is the only writing prophet to have come from Israel. However, there is no other northern Israelite text tradition with which Hosea may be compared. Thus, while many proposed translations of Hosea are highly suggestive, they remain provisional attempts to understand an obscure text.

Literary Structure

The book is divided into two main sections, chs. 1–3 and 4–14. The first three chapters revolve around the relationships between Hosea and his wife and Yahweh and his people. The remaining chapters contain oracles which depict the deterioration of Israelite culture and society.

The entire book illustrates a remarkable freedom with respect to prophetic forms and genres. Chs. 1–3 exemplify this freedom, containing a 3rd person narrative (ch. 1), an oracle (ch. 2), and an autobiographical account (ch. 3). Yet this formal variety achieves metaphorical unity as the accounts of Hosea’s marriage become the frame for exploring the state of Yahweh’s relationship with Israel. Formal variety characterizes the remaining chapters as well. Typical prophetic judgment speeches are rare; instead there is a profusion of other prophetic forms, among them summonses to battle, calls to worship, and announcements of grievances.

Compositional History

The prevailing view is that the book went through an extended process of collecting, editing, and reshaping by Judean redactors. However, there is little agreement as to how such a process might be detected in the final form of Hosea. Nor has it been explained why the book’s linguistic peculiarities would have remained intact after so much Judean editing. Nevertheless, it is assumed that certain features of the book attest to successive generations of Judean interest in the prophet’s message to northern Israel.

One such feature is the superscription, which mentions the reigns of four Judean kings first and then one Israelite king, Jeroboam II. Since Hosea’s ministry was to northern Israel, this focus on the regnal eras of the Judean kings has tended to support the claim that the book was redacted for a Judean audience. Other references to Judah seem to confirm the hypothesis that a later, possibly Josianic, redactor was responsible for this superscription.

However, while the superscription presupposes a date after the fall of the northern kingdom, the lack of reference to Israelite kings after Jeroboam II need not imply that the editors were addressing a strictly Judean audience. Instead, the editors may have used the superscription to continue Hosea’s attack on Israelite politics which, Hosea asserted, had installed kings entirely apart from the will of God (8:4; 13:11). Since no Israelite king had the legitimation of Yahweh, there was no Israelite king after Jeroboam II.

A second feature often discussed as evidence of redactional history is the presence of eschatological elements. Each of the first three chapters ends with a vision of restoration after judgment (1:10-11[MT 2:1-2]; 2:14-23[16-25]; 3:5); similarly, 11:1-9; 14:1-9 offer a possibility of restoration and reconciliation. Where some scholars view these eschatological promises as later additions, others interpret them as an outgrowth of Hosea’s understanding of Yahweh’s commitment to Israel.

The lack of scholarly agreement on these features of the book illustrates the uncertainty of attempts to discern layers of tradition in the book of Hosea. It can be said with some certainty that the book sounds a call to repentance amid the chaos of a disintegrating nation, whose polity and cult can no longer shelter it from its own lies. That the book applies the lesson to Judah is also evident (11:12[12:1]).

Hosea, His Wife, and Social Location

Two aspects of Hosea’s life, his marriage and social location, are often highlighted in critical discussions. Information about the former is usually derived from chs. 1 and 3, while information about the latter is scattered throughout the book in references to the prophets (4:5; 6:5; 9:7-9; 12:10-11, 13[11-12, 14]).

The biographical interpretation of chs. 1 and 3 is a recent development. Traditional Jewish and Christian interpretations viewed these chapters as visions: Hosea dreamed his marriage in much the same way that Ezekiel dreamed of a bodily translation from Babylonia to Jerusalem (Ezek. 8:1). In the past century, however, an interest in defining the Near Eastern background of Baal worship forced a more literalistic reading of these chapters. Two questions then emerged: what sort of prostitute was Gomer, and how might Hosea’s experience of his marriage have led to a deeper understanding of Yahweh’s disappointment with Israel?

Gomer’s harlotry became understood as a form of cultic prostitution. Since the god Baal was a fertility god, it was argued, Israelites would have participated in rituals which would ensure such fertility. Such rituals, it was supposed, involved some form of sympathetic magic. It was therefore suggested that Israelite men and women took on the roles of the gods and goddesses and ritually enacted some form of sexual union. A variety of interpretations of Gomer’s participation in the cult were then offered: in some reconstructions, she was a cult prostitute; in others, an ordinary Israelite girl whose participation in the sexual rites was a one-time event. In either case, Gomer’s harlotry acquired religious as well as symbolic significance: not only was she straying from her husband, but she quite literally exemplified Israel’s apostasy from Yahweh.

Although this interpretation gave a religious motivation to Gomer’s harlotry, it was problematic on both literary and historical grounds. On the literary level, it became difficult to understand how Hosea’s marriage to a known prostitute would symbolize Yahweh’s commitment to Israel, who had been faithful at least at the beginning. On the historical level, there is no evidence that cultic prostitution was practiced, in Israel or elsewhere. In Hosea, the woman’s seeking her lovers is a metaphorical, if pejorative, manner of describing her worship of gods other than Yahweh. Moreover, there is no evidence that such sexual rites were practiced in neighboring Canaanite religions.

Given the mixed result of these efforts to interpret chs. 1 and 3 in concrete historical and biographical terms, it seems wise to return to a symbolic reading of these chapters. Their focus is theology, not biography.

Discussions of Hosea’s social location are even more tenuous, resting on ambiguous texts referring to the work of the prophets. In the 1950s Hans Walter Wolff argued that these texts established Hosea’s social location as a member of the class of nĕḇîʾîm, whom he further identified as a group of levitical priests opposed to the established cult. This hypothesis linked Hosea to the tradition of northern Israelite prophecy and also established his lineage in the development of Deuteronomistic theology.

Despite the popularity of Wolff’s thesis, it is more likely that Hosea condemned the prophets. He located them squarely in the cult (4:5); furthermore, he asserted that they were the means whereby Yahweh worked an ambiguous judgment not unlike that effected through the lying prophets of 1 Kgs. 20 (6:4-5; 9:7-9; 12:10[11]). Far from seeing himself as one of them, Hosea condemned them along with all of the other leaders of Israelite society.

Hosea’s own social location is now uncertain. It is worth noting that he is not identified as a prophet in the superscription; nor, as noted earlier, does his use of prophetic forms follow normally expected conventions of prophetic speech.

Message

The superscription places the ministry of Hosea in the latter half of the 8th century. Although the allusions to historical events are vague, scholars now generally agree that certain oracles in the book reflect the prosperity of the reign of Jeroboam II (ca. 745), the tensions of the Syro-Ephraimitic War (734-32; cf. 5:8–6:10), and the diplomatic turmoil of the 720s (7:11; 11:5-7).

The oracles reflect an understanding of Yahwistic religion in which Yahweh is viewed as the guarantor of the gifts of the land. Hosea traces this understanding back to the promise to Jacob at Bethel (12:4-5[5-6]), as well as to the election and conquest traditions (11:1; 13:4-5). Israel appeals to Yahweh as its patron deity (“my God”) particularly in times of national distress (8:2; 9:17).

Hosea accuses the people of a promiscuous reliance on other “saviors” as well. Frantic political maneuvers as well as the worship of other gods expose Israel’s expression of faith in Yahweh as a shallow attempt to secure its safety through whatever means possible.

The primary issue in Hosea, then, is the nature of the relationship between Yahweh and people. Familial metaphors — father and son (11:1-4), husband and wife (chs. 1–3) — imply that more is involved than a contractual, covenantal relationship. What is missing is knowledge of God — a knowledge which comes from being in genuine relationship with God and which results in obedience to God’s will. This knowledge is lacking because there is no loyalty (ḥeseḏ). Israel comes to Yahweh for the things she wants from him; but she does not come to him for his own sake. Given the prominence of familial metaphors, one might argue that the basis of Yahweh’s complaint against Israel is not that Israel has broken the covenant, but that it has rebelled against more fundamental, indeed primal commitments.

Consequently, all of Israelite culture crumbles. Since Israel makes kings, but not through Yahweh, there are no kings (1:1). Altars do not remove guilt but rather increase it (8:11). Prophets lead the people into danger, and priests fail to show them the right way (9:7-9; 4:1-4). Israelite culture thus becomes a mirror of what passes for Israelite devotion, and both turn out to be hollow, false, and doomed to fail.

Nevertheless, Hosea suggests that the seed of renewal is in the relationship itself. When Israel’s devotion to Yahweh corresponds to Yahweh’s exclusive commitment to Israel, then the gifts of the land will once again flourish. Hosea demands of Israel exclusive worship of Yahweh, and in return promises an everlasting covenant of prosperity, fertility, and peace.

Bibliography. F. I. Andersen and D. N. Freedman, Hosea. AB 24 (Garden City, 1980); A. Brenner, ed., A Feminist Companion to the Latter Prophets (Sheffield, 1995); G. I. Davies, Hosea. NCBC (Grand Rapids, 1992); M. S. Odell, “Who Were the Prophets in Hosea?” HBT 18 (1996): 78-95; H. W. Wolff, Hosea. Herm (Philadelphia, 1974).

Margaret S. Odell

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

HOSEA

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)