Hosea 1: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

God tells the prophet Hosea to marry a woman who is unfaithful, as a living picture of Israel turning away from the LORD. Hosea marries Gomer, and their three children are given names that carry God's message to the nation: Jezreel, Lo-ruhamah ("not pitied"), and Lo-ammi ("not my people"). The chapter announces the end of Jehu's royal line and of Israel's kingdom, along with mercy for Judah. It closes with a promise that Israel will one day be countless, called sons of the living God, and joined again with Judah under one leader.

Claim by Claim

1. 1:1
   • The word of the LORD came to Hosea.
   • Hosea was the son of Beeri.
   • This word came in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
   • This word came in the days of Jeroboam son of Joash, king of Israel.
2. 1:2
   • This was the beginning of the LORD's speaking through Hosea.
   • The LORD spoke to Hosea.
   • The LORD told Hosea to go and take for himself a wife of harlotry.
   • The LORD told Hosea to take children of harlotry.
   • The LORD said the land had committed great harlotry.
   • The LORD said the land was turning away from the LORD.
3. 1:3
   • Hosea went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim.
   • Gomer conceived.
   • Gomer bore Hosea a son.
4. 1:4
   • The LORD said to Hosea to name the son Jezreel.
   • The LORD said that in a little while He would punish the house of Jehu for the bloodshed at Jezreel.
   • The LORD said He would put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel.
5. 1:5
   • The LORD said that on that day He would break the bow of Israel.
   • The LORD said this breaking would happen in the valley of Jezreel.
6. 1:6
   • Gomer conceived again.
   • Gomer bore a daughter.
   • God told Hosea to name her Lo-ruhamah, meaning she is not shown mercy.
   • God said He would no longer have mercy on the house of Israel.
   • God said something further about Israel that is stated ambiguously: either that He would utterly take them away or that He would not at all forgive them.
7. 1:7
   • The LORD said He would have mercy on the house of Judah.
   • The LORD said He would save the house of Judah by the LORD their God.
   • The LORD said He would not save them by bow.
   • The LORD said He would not save them by sword.
   • The LORD said He would not save them by battle.
   • The LORD said He would not save them by horses.
   • The LORD said He would not save them by horsemen.
8. 1:8
   • Gomer weaned Lo-ruhamah.
   • Gomer conceived.
   • Gomer bore a son.
9. 1:9
   • God said to name the son Lo-ammi, meaning not my people.
   • God said they are not His people.
   • God said He will not be their God.
10. 1:10
    • The number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea.
    • That sand cannot be measured.
    • That sand cannot be numbered.
    • In the place where it was said to them, You are not my people, it shall be said to them, You are the sons of the living God.
11. 1:11
    • The children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together.
    • They shall appoint for themselves one head.
    • They shall come up out of the land.
    • The day of Jezreel shall be great.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

1:1

"The LORD" in capitals stands for the personal name of Israel's God, four Hebrew consonants usually written YHWH; Jewish readers said "the Lord" aloud instead, and English translations follow that custom. The kings listed set the date: after Solomon the nation had split into two states, Judah in the south with its capital at Jerusalem, and Israel in the north with its capital at Samaria. Hosea worked in the north, but the chapter dates itself mainly by southern kings, covering roughly 750 to 700 BC. Jeroboam son of Joash (Jeroboam II) ruled the north during its last prosperous years.

1:2

In the prophets, selling oneself for sex is the standard figure of speech for a nation abandoning its own God for other gods, and the Hebrew word covers both the literal act and the image. Readers have argued since ancient times over whether Hosea was told to marry an actual prostitute, a woman who would later become unfaithful, or whether the marriage is a narrated parable; the Hebrew leaves it open. "Children who come from that unfaithful life" translates a phrase that can mean children born of her prostitution or simply children who belong to a nation described as unfaithful.

1:4

Jezreel is a city and the broad valley beside it in northern Israel, and the name means "God sows." "The blood of Jezreel" refers to the massacre by which Jehu seized the northern throne about a century earlier, killing the previous royal house at Jezreel (2 Kings 9-10). "The family of Jehu" means his dynasty, still on the throne in Hosea's day in the person of Jeroboam II. Naming a child after the site of that bloodbath would land roughly the way naming a child after a notorious atrocity would now.

1:5

"Break the bow" is a standard idiom for destroying a nation's military power, not a statement about one weapon. The Valley of Jezreel is the wide plain cutting across northern Israel, flat, fertile, and the country's main battlefield, where armies had fought for centuries.

1:6

Hebrew names carried plain meanings, and prophets sometimes gave their children names that functioned as walking public announcements. Lo-ruhamah is not a normal name but a sentence: "she is not pitied." The second half of the verse is difficult Hebrew and translators divide: it may mean "I will certainly not forgive them," or "I will utterly take them away," or "that I should in any way forgive them."

1:7

Bow, sword, horses and riders are the ordinary instruments of ancient warfare; horses and chariotry were the expensive elite arm that only a strong state could field. The line contrasts rescue by military force with rescue without it.

1:8

Weaning in this culture came at roughly two or three years, and was often marked by a family celebration. The detail signals the passage of several years between the second and third child.

1:9

Lo-ammi is again a sentence rather than a name: "not my people." The two phrases here reverse the standard formula of the agreement between God and Israel, "you shall be my people and I will be your God." The Hebrew of the second half is unusual and literally reads something like "I am not 'I am' to you," echoing the divine name given to Moses in Exodus 3:14.

1:10

"As many as the sand on the seashore" repeats the wording of the promises made to Abraham and Jacob about their descendants; it was a fixed phrase for an uncountable multitude. "The living God" was a common way of distinguishing Israel's God from carved images, which could not act.

1:11

"One leader" translates a word meaning "head," here a single ruler over both kingdoms instead of the two rival kings they then had. "Come up out of the land" is deliberately open in Hebrew: it can mean coming up out of the land they were exiled to, coming up from the earth, or taking possession of the land, and it echoes the language used of coming up out of Egypt. "The day of Jezreel" turns the name of verse 4 around, since Jezreel means "God sows" as well as naming the place of slaughter.