They shall return to the land of Egypt, and Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me. The sword rages in their cities, it consumes their oracle-priests, and devours because of their schemes. My people are bent on turning away from me. To the Most High they call, but he does not raise them up at all. (Hosea 11: 5-7)

They will return to slavery under Assyria and the sword will kill because they are not in relationship with God. The people make their own plans and set their own purposes without seeking God's intention.

In most translations verse seven is footnoted, "meaning of the Hebrew is uncertain." We might add that Hosea's meaning seems contradictory. This chapter is written as a divine soliloquy with God engaged in internal argument.

How can I give you up, 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. I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath. (Hosea 11: 8-9)

Yet we know that the northern kingdom was destroyed. The Assyrian sword did rage and the ten tribes were lost in exile. Awful punishment was experienced. We can argue if the cause was God, the Assyrians, or the choices of Ephraim, but disaster came.

Is my disaster a disaster for God? One of my son's first disasters - at age three or four - was losing his toy bear at a hotel. We never found it. I still feel pangs of empathy and loss. But even given my son's deep sadness and my own sympathetic response, the loss of a toy cannot be meaningfully defined as a disaster.

When Admah, Zeboiim, Sodom, and Gomorrah were destroyed (Genesis 19) the survivors were shocked. The sense of loss and empathy was profound, even for an evil people. But if God loves the dead and receives the dead and redeems the dead, is it a disaster? If confusion, violence, and perpetual unhappiness is ended, resolved, and replaced with clarity, peace, and love is this punishment?

It depends on what is real and what is unreal.