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From: Hosea 8:4-7, 11-13

Kings and princes condemned

[4] They made kings, but not through me.
They set up princes, but without my knowledge.
With their silver and gold they made idols
for their own destruction.
[5] l have spurned your calf, O Samaria.
My anger burns against them.
How long will it he
till they are pure [6] in Israel?

A workman made it;
it is not God.
The calf of Samaria
shall be broken to pieces.
[7] For they sow the wind,
and they shall reap the whirlwind.
The standing grain has no heads,
it shall yield no meal;
if it were to yield,
aliens would devour it.

Israel ruined by relying on foreign help

[11]Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning,
they have become to him altars for sinning.
[12] Were I to write for him my laws by ten thousands,
they would be regarded as a strange thing.
[13] They love sacrifice;
they sacrifice flesh and eat it;
but the Lord has no delight in them.
Now he will remember their iniquity,
and punish their sins;
they shall return to Egypt.

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Commentary:

8:1-14. This passage begins and ends with imperatives (v. 1; cf. 9:1). The first stanza (vv. 1-7) gives God’s order to Hosea to be his herald (to blow the trumpet or horn), to warn against impending danger: a vulture is hovering over “the house of the Lord”, probably a reference to the shrine at Bethel (v. 1). The people respond (“My God”: v. 2) and back their cry for help by saying that he should hear them because they acknowledge him as their God: “we Israel know thee.”

But the Lord, through the prophet, says that that is not so: Israel does not know him, for it has “spurned the good” (v. 3). The prophet denounces two sins here: they have acted without reference to God, by appointing kings “but not through me” (v. 4); and they have made idols of silver and gold (the golden calf of Samaria gets special mention: vv. 4-5). These are grievous sins; therefore, having sown the wind, “they shall reap the whirlwind”, to quote the proverb, and a short wisdom maxim tells them what punishment awaits them (vv. 6-7).

The punishment announced in v. 7 (being “devoured by aliens”) has already befallen Israel in the first verse of the second stanza (vv. 8-14), which denounces foreign pacts (vv. 9-10) and the idolatry that Israel falls into as a consequence of them (vv. I l-13). The prophet begins by saying that the alliances that Israel tries to make with foreign powers, involving probably tribute to the king of Assyria (vv. 8-10), will be to no avail. What these three verses seem to be saying is thatIsrael now tries to make alliances that are at odds with its true nature: inevitably, they will take its freedom away. The oracle goes on to denounce the effects that these pacts will have on worship of the Lord: there will he an increased number of places of worship but, because Canaanite rites will he mixed in with Yahwist ones, the religious services, far from expiating sins, will multiply them (v. 11). Moreover, even the offerings that they do make to the Lord will not be pleasing to him, for they will not he backed up by fulfilment of the Law of the Lord (vv. 12-13). The same point is being made as in 6:6: “Outward sacrifice, to he genuine, must be the expression of spiritual sacrifice: ‘The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit ...‘ (Ps 51:19). The prophets of the Old Covenant often denounced sacrifices that were not from the heart or not coupled with love of neighbour” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2100). So, the prophet sees that Israel needs to he cleansed; hence the threat that “they shall return to Egypt”, that is, become enslaved once again.

The last verse re-introduces the idea of “forgetting God”. By building palaces and fortresses, Israel is showing that he “has forgotten his Maker”, that is, does not put his trust in him: if Assyria “devours” part of the nation’s land (vv. 8-9), the fire of God will “devour” the strongholds, on which it had relied (v. 14). “Forgetting God” is a favourite theme of Hosea’s (cf. 2:13; 4:6), but the threat of destruction by fire is repeated a number of times in Amos (cf. Amos 1:4, 7, 10, 12; 2:5).