Hosea 3
CokeCHAP. III. By the expiation of an adulterer, is shewed the desolation of Israel before their restoration. Before Christ 786.
Hosea 3:1
Hosea 3:1. Beloved of her friend, &c.— Given to wickedness, and an adulterer. A different woman is here meant from that which he had before espoused. The first denoted the infidelity of the kingdom of Israel, and God’s divorce of them. He abandoned them to the enemy, and permitted them to be carried into captivity. This marks out the state of this spouse, divorced, but not continuing in the practice of idolatry.
This was the disposition of the Jews during the Babylonish captivity; snatched, as it were, by force, from the objects of their impure love, they continued in their exile, almost equally separated from their God and their idols: but with this difference, that their God did in some sense retain towards them as a nation sentiments of affection, expecting on their part true repentance. It has generally been thought, that the ancient idolaters used to offer flaggons of wine to the gods, and that the prophet alludes to this at the end of the verse. The words seem in general to express their leaving the service of God, and making themselves like idolatrous people, in following after bodily delights and pleasures; as drunkenness, gluttony, and the like, which the service of those idols did not only permit, but require. See Calmet, and Pococke.
Hosea 3:3
Hosea 3:3. Thou shalt abide, &c.— By these conditions which the prophet makes with the woman whom he was to take, that she should humble herself, and not run about after others, as formerly, but remain sequestered and solitary, and that for many days, &c. must be meant, with respect to Israel, that God, though he separate himself for a long time from them, and humble them by reducing them to a low condition, and restraining them from their idolatry and former luxury; yet will not so utterly reject them, but that he will in due time, upon their repentance, again receive them. So will I also be for thee: that is, though he thus require her to sit solitary and sequestered, yet his care shall not be withdrawn from her. He will all the while bear a kindness and respect to her, that he may at length, upon her true contrition, enlarge her. See Pocoke.
Hosea 3:4-5
Hosea 3:4-5. For the children of Israel shall abide, &c.— This threatening was fulfilled upon the ten tribes, when they were carried captive by Salmaneser; but was fulfilled in a remarkable manner upon the whole nation at the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus; for from that time they have had neither republic nor civil government of their own, but live every where like so many exiles. They have had neither priests nor sacrifices, their temple being destroyed, where only they were permitted to offer sacrifices. It is added in the next verse, that, touched with a true remorse for their former errors, especially that of rejecting the Messiah, and desirous of being instructed in the knowledge of truth, Israel should return, and seek the Lord, and David their king; that is to say, the Messiah, by the confession of the Chaldee itself. And indeed there can be no doubt that Jesus Christ is the grand literal object of this prophesy; and that it also refers to the final restoration of the Jews. See Jeremiah 23:5.