Culture & Context: Hosea

Welcome to Culture and Context, a blog that will flesh out the context of the PATH journal and other content that we study here at True North.

Hosea the man and Hosea, the book. Hosea the man wrote about the life that God commanded him to live. The book of Hosea is the story of a man’s obedience to God, a sacrificial obedience that illustrated both Israel’s disobedience and God’s steadfast love for his people. But...would you obey if God told you to marry the town harlot? That was what Hosea had to do, as a way of illustrating the behavior of the nation of Israel.

The name Hosea means help or helper and is based on the Hebrew word Hoshaiah, which means helper, salvation, deliverer. Interesting fact: Hosea was Joshua’s original name (See Num. 13:8, 16). Hosea served as a prophet in Israel for 38 years, during the final generation of the Northern kingdom.

Hosea was the last prophet of the Northern Kingdom, the Kingdom of Israel with its ten tribes (the Southern Kingdom was called Judah with two tribes- Benjamin and Judah). Hosea has even been called the “death- bed prophet of Israel,” since he was the last prophet of Israel before it fell to Assyria in 722 BC.

Think of how we humans tend to be when life is peaceful and prosperous; we tend to turn away from God. Sinful humanity often exploits its prosperity by loosening its morals. Israel was no exception, as we have seen again and again. Whenever their prosperity increased, they relied less and less on God and instead turned to idol worship and sexual depravity.

Mankind’s pattern has not changed much since the days of the Northern and Southern kingdoms. In Judges each person did what they thought was right. God was not consulted, and the people would spiral down from turning their hearts away from God, or mock and scorn Him, or let pride keep them from Him. They would fall into sin, repent and then cry out to God for forgiveness. Paul wrote about the “sin spiral” in Romans:

"For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen." - Romans 1:21-25 (ESV)

Hosea’s marriage to an adulterous woman named Gomer mirrors the behavior of the Israelites: unfaithfulness, judgment and then restoration. George M. Schwab, in his introduction to the commentary of Hosea in the ESV Expository Commentary notes:

“The Book of Hosea is the most scandalous book of the Bible.” When I say this to Christians, they nod knowingly, readily accepting the premise. I suppose they are thinking of the escapades of Gomer, the prophet’s nymphomaniac wife. But that is not what I mean at all. Instead I am referring to the book’s theology. The precarious marriage of Hosea and Gomer is used to picture the broken covenant between Yahweh and Israel. The scandal is in the unbelievable lengths to which the metaphor is pushed. Like a jealous husband, Yahweh is portrayed as having conflicted thoughts. He wants to punish Israel, but he also tenderly wants to take her back.

... If one wants to read an OT book that shows the heart of God, this is the book. His people care nothing for him. If they believed their prosperity came from him, they would not mistreat their fellow Israelites to advance themselves. They would not enter into foreign treaties in order to feel secure. They would not foolishly bow down to wretched homemade gods to thank them for what their covenant Lord has given. What must Yahweh do to get their attention? What will it take to make things right? These are issues the book of Hosea explores. In doing so, it puts the passionate heart of God on clear display.”

God made a covenant with Israel in Exodus chapters 20-24. Prophets like Hosea were called to bring the people back to obedience after they broke that covenant, and to remind them of the curses and blessings that God had sworn to honor.

The first three chapters of Hosea outline God’s command for Hosea to marry Gomer, who is described as “a wife of whoredom” and to have children:

"When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the LORD said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the LORD.” So he went and took Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son." - Hosea 1:2-3 (ESV)

In chapter 2, Hosea divorces Gomer, a depiction of God’s “divorce” from Israel. The children of the marriage, a boy and a girl, represent the individual people of Israel.

In chapter 3, Hosea redeems Gomer, much as God would redeem His people from exile. Commentators have divergent opinions about God asking a prophet to marry an unfaithful woman and whether chapters 1 and 3 are literal or allegorical.

The book of Hosea then turns to a reminder of the curses that threatened those who worshiped idols rather than God.

• Israel’s apostasy (chapters 4-7)

• Israel’s punishment (chapters 8-10)

• Israel’s restoration (chapters 11-14)

Like the adulterous Gomer who broke her marriage vows, Israel broke covenant with God. He loves his children, but a holy God must punish evil. Pay attention to God’s deep emotion in verse 8: in four questions, He reveals that out of His love, He would never desert his people, despite their sin:

"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more they were called, the more they went away; they kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols. Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk; I took them up by their arms, but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of kindness, with the bands of love, and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws, and I bent down to them and fed them. They shall not return to the land of Egypt, but Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me. How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender." - Hosea 11:1-5, 8 (ESV)

Admah and Zeboiim are cities that were near Sodom and Gomorrah and were probably destroyed when during God’s judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19). Ephraim was Joseph’s son and his name came to designate the Northern Kingdom of Israel.

The theme of the book of Hosea is summed up in the last verse:

"Whoever is wise, let him understand these things; whoever is discerning, let him know them; for the ways of the LORD are right, and the upright walk in them, but transgressors stumble in them." - Hosea 14:9 (ESV)

Our takeaway? Keep covenant with God. He will forgive His children when they stray, as long as they repent and turn back to Him. But also remember that straying from God will have consequences, because a holy God cannot exist with sin. During those times when we look away from God and look at ourselves or our circumstances, we will likely suffer because of our sin. Praise God that He forgives that sin and then does not see it when He looks at us!

Works Cited

• Barton, B. B., Veerman, D., & Wilson, N. S. (1992). Romans. Tyndale House Publishers.

• Chisholm, R. B., Jr. (1985). Hosea. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures. Victor Books.

• Dake, F. J. (1991). In Dake’s Topics. WORDsearch.

• Elwell, W. A., & Comfort, P. W. (2001). In Tyndale Bible dictionary. Tyndale House Publishers.

• Schwab, G. M., Sr. (2018). Hosea. In I. M. Duguid, J. M. Hamilton Jr., & J. Sklar (Eds.), Daniel–Malachi: Vol. VII (pp. 171–260). Crossway.

• Sklar, J., Chase, M. L., Schwab, G. M., Harman, A. M., McKelvey, M. G., Rogland, M., Dempster, S. G., Timmer, D. C., Firth, D. G., DeRouchie, J. S., Stead, M., Petterson, A. R., & Ortlund, E. (2018). Daniel–Malachi: Vol. VII (I. M. Duguid, J. M. Hamilton Jr., & J. Sklar, Eds.). Crossway.

• The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2025). Crossway Bibles.