- Adam Clarke
- Keil-Delitzsch
- Jamieson-Fausset-Brown
- John Gill
- Tyndale
Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
Days of Baalim - To visit signifies to inflict punishment; the days are taken for the acts of idolatrous worship committed on them; and Baalim means the multitude of false gods worshipped by them. Baal was a general name for a male idol, as Astarte was for a female. Baalim includes all the male idols, as Ashtaroth all those that were female. But the species of idol was often designated by some adjunct; as Baal-Zebub, Baal-Peor, Baal-Zephon, Baal-Berith, etc.
Her earrings - נזמה nizmah, signifies rather a nose jewel. These are worn by females in the East to the present day, in great abundance.
And her jewels - וחליתה vechelyatah, rings, armlets, bracelets, ankle-rings, and ornaments of this kind.
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
In this way will the Lord take away from the people their festivals of joy. Hos 2:13. "And I visit upon her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, and adorned herself with her ring and her jewels, and went after her lovers; and she hath forgotten me, is the word of Jehovah." The days of the Baals are the sacred days and festive seasons mentioned in Hos 2:13, which Israel ought to have sanctified and kept to the Lord its God, but which it celebrated in honour of the Baals, through its fall into idolatry. There is no ground for thinking of special feast-days dedicated to Baal, in addition to the feasts of Jehovah prescribed by the law. Just as Israel had changed Jehovah into Baal, so had it also turned the feast-days of Jehovah into festive days of the Baals, and on those days had burned incense, i.e., offered sacrifice to the Baals (cf. Hos 4:13; Kg2 17:11). In Hos 2:8 we find only הבעל mentioned, but here בּעלים in the plural, because Baal was worshipped under different modifications, from which Beâlı̄m came to be used in the general sense of the various idols of the Canaanites (cf. Jdg 2:11; Kg1 18:18, etc.). In the second hemistich this spiritual coquetry with the idols is depicted under the figure of the outward coquetry of a woman, who resorts to all kinds of outward ornaments in order to excite the admiration of her lovers (as in Jer 4:30 and Ezek. 22:40ff.). There is no ground for thinking of the wearing of nose-rings and ornaments in honour of the idols. The antithesis to this adorning of themselves is "forgetting Jehovah," in which the sin is brought out in its true shape. On נאם יהוה, see Delitzsch on Isa 1:24.
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary
days of Baalim--the days consecrated to the Baals, or various images of Baal in different cities, whence the names Baal-gad, Baal-hermon, &c.
decked herself with . . . earrings--rather, "nose-rings" (Isa 3:21; Eze 16:12, Margin), with which harlots decked themselves to attract admirers: answering to the ornaments in which the Israelites decked themselves on the idols' feasts.
forgat me--worse than the nations which had never known God. Israel wilfully apostatized from Jehovah, whom she had known.
John Gill Bible Commentary
And I will give her vineyards from thence,.... Either from the wilderness into which she is brought; or from the time of her being brought there, allured and spoke comfortably to; which are put for all temporal blessings, and as emblems of spiritual ones: and so from the time that the Lord deals thus graciously, as before expressed, he gives more grace, larger measures, and continual supplies of it, and withholds nothing good, comfortable, and useful to them: the Vulgate Latin version renders it, "her vinedressers"; and the Targum, her governors:
and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; this valley was so named from Achan, who was stoned in it in the days of Joshua; who is by Josephus (s), Theodoret (t), and others, called Achar, and so in Ch1 2:7 and the signification of its name is the valley of trouble, because that he both troubled Israel by his evil actions, which brought them into distress; and because he was here troubled himself, being here punished for his sin, Jos 7:24. Jerome (u) says it lies to the north of Jericho, and is still called by its old name by the inhabitants of it. Some take it to be the same with the valley of Engedi, which it is certain was near Jericho. Now as the valley of Achor was at the entrance of the Israelites into the land of Canaan, and gave them hope of possessing the whole land; so what the people of God enjoy at first conversion lays a foundation for hope of eternal glory and happiness; as the Lord's being given them as their portion, Christ as their Saviour, and all things freely with him; the Spirit and his grace as the earnest and pledge of the eternal inheritance: grace and glory are so strictly connected, that the one is a door of hope to the other.
And she shall sing there; either in the wilderness, where the Lord speaks comfortably to her; or in the vineyards she has from thence; alluding to the songs of joy at the time of vintage, or pressing of the grapes: or in the valley of Achor, there rejoicing in hope of the glory of God, singing the songs of electing, redeeming, pardoning, and justifying grace:
as in the days of her youth, as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt: as when the people of Israel were first brought into their civil and ecclesiastic state, which were the days of their youth as a people; and that was when they came out of Egypt, and had passed the Red sea, at the shore of which they sung; and to which is the allusion here; see Exo 15:1 this passage is applied to the times of the Messiah in the Talmud (w).
(s) Antiqu. l. 5. c. 1. sect. 10, 14. (t) Comment. in loc. (u) De locis Hebr. fol. 88. B. tom. 3. (w) T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 111. 1.
Tyndale Open Study Notes
2:13 While the Israelites were worshiping Canaanite gods, they forgot the Lord. For Hosea, to forget is not a lapse of memory, but the opposite of knowing the Lord (see 8:14; 13:6; Job 8:12-13). Had Israel truly known the Lord, they would never have indulged in Baal worship.
