Hosea 11: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

God speaks as a parent who raised Israel from childhood, taught Ephraim to walk, and fed him, while the people kept turning away to the Baals. Because they refused to return, Assyria will rule them and the sword will strike their cities. Then God asks how he can give Ephraim up, says his heart is turned within him, and declares he will not carry out the full heat of his anger, because he is God and not a man. The chapter closes with the people coming back trembling from Egypt and Assyria to their homes, and with Ephraim's lies set against Judah's faithfulness.

Claim by Claim

1. 11:1
   • When Israel was a boy, God loved him.
   • God called his son out of Egypt.
2. 11:2
   • They called to them, and they went away from before them.
   • It is unclear who the callers are and who went away.
   • They sacrificed to the Baals.
   • They burned incense to carved images.
3. 11:3
   • God taught Ephraim to walk.
   • God took them by their arms.
   • They did not know that God healed them.
4. 11:4
   • God drew them with human cords.
   • God drew them with ropes of love.
   • God was to them like those who lift the yoke off their jaws.
   • God extended food to them.
5. 11:5
   • He will not return to the land of Egypt.
   • Assyria will be his king.
   • The reason is that they refused to return.
6. 11:6
   • A sword will whirl against his cities.
   • The sword will destroy the bars of his gates.
   • The sword will devour them.
   • This happens because of their own counsels.
7. 11:7
   • God's people are bent on turning away from him.
   • They call them upward, to the Most High.
   • No one at all exalts him.
8. 11:8
   • God asks how he can give Ephraim up.
   • God asks how he can hand Israel over.
   • God asks how he can make Israel like Admah.
   • God asks how he can treat Israel like Zeboiim.
   • God's heart is turned over within him.
   • God's compassions are kindled together.
9. 11:9
   • God will not carry out the burning of his anger.
   • God will not turn back to destroy Ephraim.
   • God is God and not man.
   • God is the Holy One in Israel's midst.
   • God will not enter into the city.
10. 11:10
    • They will walk after the LORD.
    • He will roar like a lion.
    • When he roars, the children will come trembling from the west.
11. 11:11
    • They will come trembling like a bird out of Egypt.
    • They will come trembling like a dove out of the land of Assyria.
    • God will settle them in their houses.
    • The LORD said this.
12. 11:12
    • Ephraim surrounds God with lies.
    • The house of Israel surrounds God with deceit.
    • Judah still rules with God.
    • Judah is faithful with the holy ones.

Words Worth Explaining

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

11:1

"Out of Egypt" points back to the exodus, when the Israelites left slavery in Egypt generations earlier. Calling Israel God's "son" and "child" is a family image for that beginning: the nation is spoken of as a single boy being raised.

11:2

The Baals were the local gods of Canaan, worshiped for rain and good harvests. "Baal" means "lord" or "owner"; the plural is used because most towns had their own version. Burning incense and offering sacrifices were the ordinary acts of worship at their shrines.

11:3

Ephraim was the largest tribe of the northern kingdom, and Hosea uses the name for that whole kingdom, the ten northern tribes, whose capital was Samaria. Throughout this chapter "Ephraim" and "Israel" mean the same nation, addressed by two names.

11:4

A yoke is the wooden bar fastened over the neck of an ox or donkey to harness it to a plow or cart. The picture is of an owner easing the harness up off the animal's jaws so it can reach its food, then bending down to feed it by hand. "Cords such as people use" contrasts with the ropes used on animals: he led them with human ties, not livestock tackle.

11:5

Assyria was the dominant empire of the region in Hosea's day, based in what is now northern Iraq; it destroyed the northern kingdom and deported its population in 722 BC. The Hebrew here is ambiguous: the same short word can mean "not" or can mark a question, so the line reads either "He will not go back to Egypt" or "Will he not go back to Egypt?" Translations split over which is meant.

11:6

City gates were secured by heavy wooden or metal bars laid across them; breaking the bars meant the city had fallen. The Hebrew word also means "limbs" or "branches", which is why some translations speak of branches being cut off instead.

11:7

The second half of this verse is one of the most damaged and disputed sentences in the book; the Hebrew can be read as "though they call him upward, no one raises him at all" or as God refusing to lift them up. Translations differ widely, and none is certain.

11:8

Admah and Zeboim were two small cities near Sodom and Gomorrah, destroyed with them in the account in Genesis. Naming them is a way of naming total, irreversible destruction. "My heart turns over inside me" translates a Hebrew phrase for being overturned or churned up; the same verb is used elsewhere of a city being overthrown.

11:9

The last line is uncertain. The Hebrew says literally "I will not come into a city", which may mean coming against a city as an attacker, or may be an unusual word meaning "in fury". Both readings are represented in modern translations.

11:10

A lion's roar here is a summons rather than a threat: the scattered people hear it and come. "From the west" is literally "from the sea", the Mediterranean lay west of Israel, so "the sea" simply meant that direction.

11:11

Egypt and Assyria are named as the two places Israelites had fled or been carried off to. The trembling is the fluttering, startled movement of birds, not fear of God.

11:12

In Hebrew Bibles this verse is numbered 12:1, so verse numbers in this part of Hosea run one behind English editions. Judah was the separate southern kingdom, with its capital at Jerusalem. The line about Judah is disputed: the verb can mean "walks with" or "rules with", but also "roams" or "is unruly toward", so the sentence reads either as praise of Judah or as a further accusation. The last word is plural in Hebrew, "holy ones", which may be a plural of majesty for God himself or may refer to heavenly beings.