Wine and new wine take away the understanding. My people consult a piece of wood, and their divining-rod gives them oracles. For a spirit of whoredom has led them astray, and they have played the whore, forsaking their God. They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and make offerings upon the hills, under oak, poplar, and terebinth, because their shade is good. Therefore your daughters play the whore, and your daughters-in-law commit adultery. I will not punish your daughters when they play the whore, nor your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery; for the men themselves go aside with whores, and sacrifice with temple prostitutes; thus a people without understanding comes to ruin. (Hosea 4: 11-14)

I am inclined to distraction, superstition, and illusions.

A few minutes after I have completed this study and meditation I will consult my horoscope.

Later today I will attend church. There I will participate in rituals that are pleasant to me. I will enjoy the company of friends and neighbors. I will not necessarily open my heart and mind to God.

This week most of my time and energy will be spent seeking to seduce others to some action. The action could, perhaps, be beneficial to them. I am more certain it will be beneficial to me.

The spirit of zanuwn - harlotry, self-indulgence, and whore-mongering - has led me astray.

My life is ta'ah. I am wandering. I am staggering like a drunk. I lack direction.

Prophets show the way. Teachers explain how. God provides. But I must choose.

The more they increased, the more they sinned against me; they changed their glory into shame. They feed on the sin of my people; they are greedy for their iniquity. And it shall be like people, like priest; I will punish them for their ways, and repay them for their deeds. They shall eat, but not be satisfied; they shall play the whore, but not multiply;because they have forsaken the Lord to devote themselves to whoredom. (Hosea 4: 7-11)

I will punish them.

The Hebrew verb is paqad. Punish is a possible translation. Other translations are even more common.

The verb can also mean to be appointed, visited, attended to, or gathered. The most common translation is numbered.

Repay them for their deeds.

The Hebrew verb is shuwb. The verb is used 625 times in the Bible. In the New American Standard translation repay is used only five times.

Much more common is to understand shuwb as meaning bring back, or return, or recover, or restore, or bring.

What is God's intention?

When they were young my children sometimes felt they were being punished when my intention was only to be very seriously engaged with them.

Above is The Punishment of the Thieves by William Blake.

Yet let no one contend, and let none accuse, for with you is my contention, O priest. You shall stumble by day; the prophet also shall stumble with you by night, and I will destroy your mother. My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children. (Hosea 4: 4-6)

God's people are destroyed by lack of knowledge. The Hebrew can also be translated as "God's people are cut-off by lack of discernment."

The Hebrew da'ath is much more than what we usually mean by knowledge. When we say someone is smart, we do not automatically mean someone is wise.

To have da'ath is to be perceptive, skilled, knowledgable, discerning, and wise. It is not just to know the parts, but to understand the whole.

The priests are accused of having rejected da'ath. The priests have misled the people. Both priests and people are in need of redemption.

Historical and archeological evidence suggests priests of the Northern Kingdom were receptive to external cultural and religious influence.

Any close reading of scripture acknowledges a diverse religious heritage. Much of what we think we know of God has its origins outside scripture.

What is essential to our understanding of God? How do we discern God's intention? How do we distinguish God's preference from our own preferences?

Hear the word of the Lord, O people of Israel; for the Lord has an indictment against the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or loyalty, and no knowledge of God in the land. Swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out; bloodshed follows bloodshed. Therefore the land mourns, and all who live in it languish; together with the wild animals and the birds of the air, even the fish of the sea are perishing. (Hosea 4: 1-3)

The Lord has a riyb 'im. The Lord has an indictment against, a quarrel with, or a pleading among the inhabitants of the land. The meaning depends on context.

In this context evidence is cited. There is an absence of 'emeth (stablity, reliability, or faithfulness), an absence of checed (goodness, love, or kindness), and an absence of da'ath (discernment, wisdom, or knowledge) of God.

The pleading suggests that due to the absense of the preceding characteristics specific problems have emerged. These include 'alah (swearing or cursing), kachash (lies or deception), ratsach (assasination or murder), ganab (stealthy behavior or stealing), and na'aph (adultery or idolatry).

The context suggests a cause and effect relationship. The absence of certain qualities has resulted in specific outcomes.

The problems are not presented as a form of external punishment, but rather as the natural outcome of behavior and choice.

The Lord said to me again, ‘Go, love a woman who has a lover and is an adulteress, just as the Lord loves the people of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes.’ So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer of barley and a measure of wine. And I said to her, ‘You must remain as mine for many days; you shall not play the whore, you shall not have intercourse with a man, nor I with you.’ For the Israelites shall remain many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or teraphim. Afterwards the Israelites shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; they shall come in awe to the Lord and to his goodness in the latter days. (Hosea 3: 1-5)

Hosea is instructed to love Gomer. But he will not have sexual relations with her. This is a love - 'ahab - that is especially restrained.

It is an analogy for the relationship between the Israelites and God.

God does and will continue to love the Israelites. But certain gifts of love will be withdrawn until an authentic love for God has been renewed.

Love without sex is complicated, even more complicated than sex without love.

Sex can be a celebration - even a consecration - of human love. But the Israelites have been unfaithful and indiscriminate in their intimacy.

Rather than consecration they chose variation. Instead of love they chose self-indulgence.

Sensuality differs from loving intimacy. The Israelites have developed a fetish for raisin cakes. God seeks to replace the fetish with the wholeness of reciprocal affection and relationship.

Above is Intimacy by Vlad Gansovsky

On that day I will answer, says the Lord, I will answer the heavens and they shall answer the earth; and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil, and they shall answer Jezreel; and I will sow him for myself in the land. And I will have pity on Lo-ruhamah, and I will say to Lo-ammi, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’ (Hosea 2: 21-23)

The heavens ask God. The earth asks the heavens. What is the question?

The grain, new wine, and oil ask the earth. They answer the first born son of the prophet.

What was his question?

What is the question that you fear to ask? What is the question that you burn to ask?

Only by asking can there be a response. In asking we acknowledge our needs.

In opening to God's response we fulfill a critical role in the reconciliation of creation with the Creator.

Ask and listen.

For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be mentioned by name no more. I will make for you a covenant on that day with the wild animals, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground; and I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land; and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will take you for my wife for ever; I will take you for my wife in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy. I will take you for my wife in faithfulness; and you shall know the Lord. (Hosea 2: 17-20)

Israel has pursued the wrong purposes. Gomer has chosen the wrong masters. Each has exchanged ultimate value for ephemeral value.

These choices will not produce happy results. Sooner or later these choices will bring trouble. But God is working to seduce Israel and Gomer away from these poor choices.

God will convert the Valley of Achor (trouble) into a door of hope. God will even use the troubles as part of the seduction.

When the ephemeral is put away and the ultimate is embraced then God's intention will be realized: a harmonious relationship with the natural world and no war between men.

In accepting God's intention as our purpose we will experience the fruits of righteousness, justice, love, mercy and faith.

"Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. "In that day," declares the Lord, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master. I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips; no longer will their names be invoked." (Hosea 2: 14-17)

I once urged business colleagues to seduce clients. The response was not enthusiastic, especially from my female colleagues.

God will allure Israel. The Hebrew is pathah. It means to seduce, to persuade and - depending on context - it can mean to deceive.

It also means to make open and spacious. In the the 25th Psalm we are told, "With patience a ruler may be persuaded (pathah), and a soft tongue breaks the bone."

Seduction certainly involves opening the mind and heart of another. Whether this is good or bad depends on what is to be achieved with the opening.

God intends to open the heart of Israel to experience whole and fulfilling love. She will no longer call to Baali (master) but to Ishi (husband, partner, even servant).

Above is cover art for a CD of music by Daniel Cain.

I will put an end to all her mirth, her festivals, her new moons, her sabbaths, and all her appointed festivals. I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, of which she said, ‘These are my pay, which my lovers have given me.’ I will make them a forest, and the wild animals shall devour them. I will punish her for the festival days of the Baals, when she offered incense to them and decked herself with her ring and jewellery, and went after her lovers, and forgot me, says the Lord. (Hosea 2: 11-13)

The passage highlights two forms of idolotry. The first is the worship of Ba'al. Several ancient Semitic gods could be referred to as Ba'al. Gomer was probably a cult prostitute attached to the worship of the Sidonian Ba'al introduced to Israel by King Ahab's marriage to Jezebel, a princess of Sidon.

This Ba'al was a god of sun, rain and fertility. He was engaged in an ongoing struggle with a god of darkness, drought, and death. Cult prostitutes were understood as receiving from their sexual partners donations of life giving energy which strengthened Ba'al in his struggle for good.

But this is not the only form of idolotry. Gomer perceives that she has earned and owns her vines and fig trees. She has earned and owns her ring and jewellry. She pursues her lovers, not her God. Gomer has mistaken her freedom of choice as an autonomy of existance.

Idolatry is easily understood as the worship of "graven images." It is sometimes suggested that God was offended by the competition. More accurately, God attempts to dissuade us from valuing what has no value. God is trying to coach us away from shadows to substance, from the non-existant to what is fundamentally real.

We seldom bow to Ba'al. But we often pursue illusions. We often act as if we have earned what we have received as a gift. We often extend great value to what is ephemeral and essentially worthless. We often seek jewellry instead of seeking an authentic relationship with God.

She did not know that it was I who gave her the grain, the wine, and the oil, and who lavished upon her silver and gold that they used for Baal. Therefore I will take back my grain in its time, and my wine in its season; and I will take away my wool and my flax, which were to cover her nakedness. Now I will uncover her shame in the sight of her lovers, and no one shall rescue her out of my hand. (Hosea 2: 8-10)

If God is the source of all that we need, why do we so often seek elsewhere?

Because we do not recognize God as the source. Or because we resist dependence on God. Or because we do trust God to provide.

Or because we do not know what we need.

We often perceive a need for silver, gold, grain, wine, wool, and flax. We fail to recognize our even greater need for water. We mistake what we want for what we need.

We may not realize what we take for granted until it goes missing.

For she said, ‘I will go after my lovers; they give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.’ Therefore I will hedge her way with thorns; and I will build a wall against her, so that she cannot find her paths. She shall pursue her lovers, but not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them. Then she shall say, ‘I will go and return to my first husband, for it was better with me then than now.’ (Hosea 2: 5-7)

Are our difficulties caused by God? Are the hedges and thorns of our lives a form of divine discipline?

This is a reasonable reading of Hosea and many of the prophetic writings.

But I wonder: Does God intervene to complicate our ill-chosen path or is our path difficult because it is ill-chosen?

When I was young I spent many days walking a wilderness. After a few years the best animal paths and open fields were well known.

But occasionally I chose the adventure of some clearly difficult and unknown way. Twice I became seriously lost.

I did not blame the wilderness for the difficulty. I recognized the difficulty was the consequence of my own decisions.

Above is The Thorny Path and the Water of Light by Michael Avlaris.

Upon her children also I will have no pity, because they are children of whoredom. For their mother has played the whore; she who conceived them has acted shamefully. For she said, ‘I will go after my lovers; they give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.’ Therefore I will hedge her way with thorns; and I will build a wall against her, so that she cannot find her paths. She shall pursue her lovers, but not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them. (Hosea 2: 4-7)

The English word lover and the Hebrew word 'ahab each require context. Both signal a deep desire for something, but the nature of the desire and its object requires knowing more.

Each can be used to describe how we love food, or drink... or wisdom.

Each can describe our relationship with God and God's relationship with us.

Each can refer to two people in love with each other.

The Hebrew can encompass love for family and friends. The English has largely lost this meaning. But it once could mean the same.

Depending on context each word can imply a secretive, titillating, illicit relationship.

To be a lover - or 'ahab - can simply mean to engage in sexual intercourse or other sexual acts.

In every case the verb can be the same. But the meaning of the verb can only be derived from understanding the intention, purpose, or attitudes of the lovers.

Say to your brother, Ammi, and to your sister, Ruhamah. Plead with your mother, plead—for she is not my wife, and I am not her husband—that she put away her whoring from her face, and her adultery from between her breasts, or I will strip her naked and expose her as in the day she was born, and make her like a wilderness, and turn her into a parched land, and kill her with thirst. (Hosea 2: 1-3)

The negations are removed. It is not Lo-ammi nor Lo-Ruhamah. The children now are Kindred and Mercy.

The scene evoked might be taken from a soap opera. The father asks the children to intercede with the mother. He no longer has any influence on her.

But then his pleading becomes a rage. Unless she stops her whoring and adultery she will suffer hard consequences.

Whoring is the Hebrew zanuwn. Whore, harlot, and prostitute are all correct translations. But this was a term used in particular for "cult prostitute."

Na'aphuwph is adultery, but in the Hebrew Scripture this is much more often used to describe idolotry than sexual relations with a married person.

The language of Hosea uses terms of sexual infidelity and indulgence to deal with issues of religious idolotry and secular distraction.

Yet the number of the people of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which can be neither measured nor numbered; and in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people’, it shall be said to them, ‘Children of the living God.’ The people of Judah and the people of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head; and they shall take possession of the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel. (Hosea 1: 10-11)

The bow of Israel shall be broken at Jezreel, yet great shall be the day of Jezreel.

The people of Israel have forsaken God and God shall no longer be with them, yet they shall be called Children of the living God.

It is as if God had married a whore, yet the promise to Abraham will be fulfilled and descendents of Israel shall be beyond measure.

What is beyond redemption shall be redeemed. That which has been rejected will be embraced. That which is dead shall live.

Our logic, our justice, and our understanding does not limit the love of God.

Above is Hosea, Gomer, and the children from a medieval manuscript.

And the Lord said to him, ‘Name him Jezreel; or in a little while I will punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. On that day I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.’ She conceived again and bore a daughter. Then the Lord said to him, ‘Name her Lo-ruhamah, for I will no longer have pity on the house of Israel or forgive them. But I will have pity on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the Lord their God; I will not save them by bow, or by sword, or by war, or by horses, or by horsemen.’ When she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived and bore a son. Then the Lord said, ‘Name him Lo-ammi, for you are not my people and I am not your God.’ (Hosea 1: 4-9)

The prophet and the prostitute have three children. The first-born son is named "God Scatters Seeds." The daughter is named "No Mercy." The second son is named "Not My People."

God had entered into covenant with the descendents of Jacob. God has remained in covenant, but the people have not been faithful. They were as spiritual whores. The covenantal union has had paradoxical outcomes.

Jezreel is also the name for the most fertile valley in all of Israel. Here seeds are scattered and a great harvest is gathered. Yet Hosea warns that in that valley God will soon scatter the seeds of Israel in defeat.

Lo-ruhamah is a neologism. It appears nowhere else. Lo means not, without, or before. Ruhamah is a form of racham: to love, to empathize, to be compassionate. Love and its negation are each present.

Lo-ammi is also an invented word. Am or ammiy is one's kindred, creatures, people, the nation to whom one belongs. It has the same effect as saying, "You are my family...Not!" in the argot of recent youth culture.

The names given the progeny reflect the conflicted nature of an inescapable yet troubled relationship.

The word of the Lord that came to Hosea son of Beeri, in the days of Kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah of Judah, and in the days of King Jeroboam son of Joash of Israel. The Family of Hosea. When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, ‘Go, take for 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 daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. (Hosea 1: 1-3)

It is early in the 8th Century before Christ. The southern kingdom of Judah and the northern kingdom of Israel have been separated for over two hundred years.

In Israel it is a period of considerable prosperity and peace. The Assyrian Empire, to the North and East, is languishing under weak rulers. In Egypt the 23rd Dynasty is engaged in a quarter-century long civil war. Jeroboam is the 14th King of Israel and will reign for forty-one years.

Hosea is a contemporary of Isaiah. Isaiah is focused on Judah. Hosea is a native of Israel and directs his prophecy at the elite of the northern kingdom.

Hosea is directed to marry a daughter of zanuwn - harlotry, whoredom, adultery - also meaning over fed, self-indulgent, and a sensual glutton.

The marriage can be seen as symbolizing God's own marriage to the whore Israel. Hosea marries Gomer, a well known prostitute. Her name can mean complete failure or final perfection.