John Calvin Commentary Hosea 3:2-5

"So I bought her to me for fifteen [pieces] of silver, and a homer of barley, and a half-homer of barley; and I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be any man`s wife: so will I also be toward thee. For the children of Israel shall abide many days without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without pillar, and without ephod or teraphim: afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek Jehovah their God, and David their king, and shall come with fear unto Jehovah and to his goodness in the latter days." — Hosea 3:2-5 (ASV)

These verses have been read together, for in these four the Prophet explains the vision presented to him. He says, first, that he had done what God had commanded him, which was conveyed to him by a vision, or in a typical form, so that by such a display he might impress the minds of the people: I bought, he says, a wife for fifteen pieces of silver, and for a homer of barley and half a homer; that is, for a homer and a half.

He tells us in this verse that he had bought the wife whom he was to take for a small price. By the fifteen pieces of silver and the homer and a half of barley, her abject and mean condition is set forth, I have no doubt. Servants, we know, were valued at thirty shekels of silver when hurt by an ox (Exodus 21:32). But the Prophet gives for his wife fifteen pieces of silver, which seemed a contemptible gift.

But then the Lord shows that, though He would only scantily support His people in exile, they would still be dear to Him. This is like a husband who loves his wife even though he does not indulge her when that would be inadvisable. Indeed, as is well known, too much indulgence has often corrupted those who have gone astray.

When a husband immediately pardons an adulterous wife, receives her with a smiling face, and fawningly humbles himself by laying aside his own right and authority, he acts foolishly and by his lack of seriousness ruins his wife. But when a husband forgives his wife, yet strictly confines her within the range of duty and restrains his own feelings, such a moderate course is very beneficial and shows great prudence in the husband, who, though not cruel, is still not carried away by foolish love.

This, then, is what the Prophet means when he says that he had given for his wife fifteen pieces of silver and a homer and a half of barley. Respectable women, indeed, did not live on barley. The Prophet then gave his wife not wheat flour, nor the fine flour of wheat, but dark bread and coarse food. Indeed, he gave her barley as her allowance, and in a small quantity, so that his wife would have only a scanty living. Thus, we now understand the Prophet’s meaning.

Some suggest a contrary interpretation: that the Lord would splendidly and sumptuously support the wife who had been adulterous. However, this view does not at all harmonize with the Prophet’s design, as we have already seen. Besides, the words themselves lead us in another direction. Jerome, as is his custom, engages in elaborate allegorizing.

He says that the people were bought for fifteen pieces of silver because they came out of Egypt on the fifteenth day of the month. Then he says that, as the Hebrew homer contains thirty bushels, they were bought for a homer and a half (which is forty-five bushels), because the law was proclaimed forty-five days later. But these are childish trifles.

Therefore, let the simple view I have given be sufficient for us—that God, though He did not immediately favor her with the honor of a wife and liberal support, yet did not cease to love her. Thus we see the minds of the faithful were sustained to bear their calamities patiently, for it is an immeasurable consolation to know that God loves us. If a testimony regarding His love does not moderate our sorrows, we are very hard-hearted and ungrateful.

The Prophet then more clearly proves in these words that God loved His people, though He seemed to be alienated from them. He might have wholly destroyed them; yet He supplied them with food in their exile. The people indeed lived in the greatest hardship; all delicacies were no doubt taken from them, and their fare was very poor and very scanty. But the Prophet forbids them to measure God’s favor by the smallness of what was given them, for though God would not immediately receive an adulterous wife into favor, He still wished her to continue as His wife.

Hence he adds, I said to her, For many days you shall wait for me, and you shall not become wanton, and you shall not be for any man. That is, ‘You shall remain a widow, for it is for this reason that I still keep you: to find out whether you will sincerely repent. I would not, indeed, be too easy toward you, lest I should corrupt you by indulgence. I shall see what your conduct will be; in the meantime, you must continue a widow.’

This, then, was God’s small favor that remained for the people—a sort of widowhood. God might, indeed, as we have said, have utterly destroyed His people. But He mitigated His wrath and only punished them with exile, and in the meantime, proved that He was not forgetful of His banished people. Though He then only bestowed some scanty allowance, He still did not wholly deprive them of food, nor allow them to perish through want. This treatment, then, is in reality set forth by this representation: that the Prophet had instructed his wife to remain single.

He says, And I also will be for you. Why does he say, I also? A wife, already joined to her husband, has no right to pledge her faith to another. The Prophet thus shows that Israel was held bound by the Lord, so that they might not seek another connection, for His faith was pledged to them. Hence he says, “I also will be for you”; that is, ‘I pledge My faith to you, or, I declare Myself your husband. But another time must be awaited; I still defer My favor and suspend it until you give proof of true repentance.’

“I also,” he says, “will be for you”; that is, ‘You shall not be a widow in vain; if you complain that wrong is done to you because I forbid you to marry anyone else, I also bind Myself in turn to you.’ Now, then, the mutual compact between God and His people is evident. Therefore, although a state of widowhood is full of sorrows, the people ought not to succumb to grief but to keep themselves exclusively for God until the time of their full and complete deliverance, because He says that He will remain true to His pledge. “I will then be yours; though at present I do not admit you into the honor of wives, I will not yet wholly repudiate you.”

But how does this view harmonize with the first prediction, according to which God seems to have divorced His people? Their consistency can be easily explained. The Prophet indeed said that the body of the people would be alienated from God, but here he addresses the faithful only. Lest the minds of those who could be healed should despond, the Prophet sets before them this comfort which I have mentioned: that though they were to continue, as it were, single, yet the Lord would remain, as it were, bound to them, so as not to adopt another people and reject them. But we shall soon see that this prediction regards in common the Gentiles as well as the Jews and Israelites.

He afterwards adds, For many days the children of Israel shall abide. He says, “for many days,” so that they might prepare themselves for long endurance and not be dispirited through weariness, even though the Lord should not soon free them from their calamities. “Though your exile then should be long,” he says, “still cherish strong hope in your hearts, for so long a trial of your repentance must necessarily be made. Just as you have very often pretended to return to the Lord, and soon after your hypocrisy was discovered, and then you became hardened in your willful obstinacy, it is therefore necessary that the Lord should subdue you by a long chastisement.” Hence he says, The children of Israel shall abide without a king and without a prince.

But it may still be further asked: What is the number of the days of which the Prophet speaks? For the definite number is not stated here, and we know that the exile appointed for the Jews was seventy years (Jeremiah 29:10). But the Prophet seems here to extend his prediction further, even to the time of Christ.

To this I answer that here he refers simply to the seventy years. However, at the same time, we must remember that those who did not return from exile were supported by this promise and hoped in the promised Mediator. But the Prophet does not go beyond that number, afterwards specified by Jeremiah.

It is not surprising that the Prophet had not computed the years and days, for the time of the captivity—that is, of the last captivity—had not yet come. Shortly after, indeed, four tribes were led away, and then the ten, and the whole kingdom of Israel was destroyed; but the final ruin of the whole people was not yet so near.

It was therefore not necessary to compute the years then; instead, he speaks of a long time indefinitely. He speaks of the children of Israel and says, They shall abide without a king and without a prince. And since they placed their trust in their king and thought themselves happy in having this one distinction—a powerful king—he says, “They shall abide without a king, without a prince.”

He now explains their widowhood without analogies. Hence he says they shall be without a king and a prince; that is, there shall be among them no kind of civil government. They shall be like a mutilated body without a head, and so it happened to them in their miserable dispersion.

He says, And without a sacrifice, and without a statue. The Hebrews often take מצבה, metsabe, in a bad sense, though it generally means a statue, just as a monument over a grave is called מצבה, metsabe. But the Prophet seems to speak here of idols, for he afterwards adds תרפים, teraphim; and teraphim were no doubt images (Genesis 31:19–30) which the superstitious used while worshipping their fictitious gods, as we read in many places. The king of Babylon is said to have consulted the teraphim; it is said that Rachel stole the teraphim; and shortly after, Laban calls the teraphim his gods.

But the Hebrews speak foolishly when they say that these images were made according to a constellation and that they afterwards uttered words. All this has been invented, and we know what liberty they take in inventing fables. The meaning is that God would take away from the people of Israel all civil order and then all sacred rites and ceremonies, so that they might remain as a widow and at the same time know that they were not utterly rejected by God without hope of reconciliation.

It is asked why “ephod” is mentioned, for the priesthood continued among the tribe of Judah, and the ephod, it is well known, was a part of the priestly garments. To this I answer that when Jeroboam introduced false worship, he employed this strategy: to make religion among the Israelites nearly like true religion in its outward form. For it seems to have been his purpose that it should vary as little as possible from the legitimate worship of God; hence he said,

‘It is grievous and troublesome for you to go up to Jerusalem; therefore, let us worship God here’ (1 Kings 12:28).

But he pretended to change nothing; he would not appear to be an apostate, departing from the only true God. What then? “God may be worshipped by us here without trouble, for I will build temples in several places and also erect altars. What prevents sacrifices from being offered to God in many places?” There is therefore no doubt that he made his altars according to the form of the true altar and also added the ephod and various ceremonies, so that the Israelites might think that they still continued in the true worship of God.

But it follows, Afterwards the children of Israel shall return and seek Jehovah their God, and David their king. Here the Prophet shows by the fruit of their chastisement that the Israelites had no reason to murmur or cry out against God, as if He treated them with too much severity. For if He had stretched out His hand to them immediately, there would have been no repentance in them. But when thoroughly cleansed by long correction, they would then truly and sincerely confess their God.

Thus, we see that this comfort is set forth as arising from the fruit of chastisement, so that the Israelites might patiently bear the temporary wrath of God. Afterwards, he says, they shall return; as if he said, “They are now led headlong into their impiety, and they can by no means be restrained except by this long endurance of evils.”

They shall therefore return, and then they will seek Jehovah their God. The name of the only true God is set here in opposition, as before, to all Baalim. The Israelites, indeed, professed to worship God; but Baalim, we know, were at the same time in high esteem among them. These were so many gods that had crept into the place of God and extinguished the pure worship of Him. Hence the Prophet does not simply say, “They shall seek God,” but they shall “seek Jehovah their God.”

And there is an implied reproof here in the word אלהים, Elohehem (their God). For it intimates that they were drawn aside into ungodly superstitions, that they were without the true God, and that no knowledge of Him existed among them, even though God had offered Himself to them. Indeed, He had intimately associated with them and raised them, as it were, in His bosom, as a father raises his own children. Hence the Prophet indirectly upbraids them for this great wickedness when he says, They shall seek their God.

And who is this God? He is Jehovah Himself. Until now they had formed vain gods for themselves. And though, he says, they had been deluded by their own devices, they shall now know the only true God, who from the beginning revealed Himself to them as their God. He afterwards adds a second clause regarding King David, but I cannot finish the subject now.

Prayer:

Grant, Almighty God, that as You often justly hide Your face from us, so that on every side we see nothing but evidence of Your dreadful judgment—O grant that we, with minds raised above the scene of this world, may at the same time cherish the hope which You constantly set before us. May we feel fully persuaded that we are loved by You, however severely You may chastise us. And may this consolation so support and sustain our souls that, patiently enduring whatever chastisements You may lay upon us, we may ever hold fast the reconciliation which You have promised to us in Christ Your Son. Amen.

[Exposition continues from previous day's lecture]

We now have to consider the second clause, regarding King David. The Prophet tells us that when the Israelites are moved with the desire of seeking God, they shall also seek David their king. They had, as is well known, departed from their allegiance to him, though God had set David over the whole people for this purpose: that they might all be happy under his power and dominion, and remain safe and secure, as if they saw God with their own eyes, for David was, as it were, the angel of God. Thus, the revolt of the people, or of the ten tribes, was like a renunciation of the living God. The Lord said to Samuel,

‘You they have not despised, but rather Me,’
(1 Samuel 8:7).

This must have been much more the case with regard to David, whom Samuel, by God’s command, had anointed, and whom the Lord had honored with so many splendid commendations. They could not have cast away his yoke without, as it were, openly rejecting God Himself. Hence Hosea, speaking of the people’s repentance, distinctly mentions this for good reason: that they shall return to David their king. For they could not sincerely and from the heart seek God without subjecting themselves to that lawful authority to which they had been bound—not by men, nor by chance, but by God’s command.

It is indeed true that David was then dead, but Hosea here sets forth, in the person of one man, that everlasting kingdom which the Jews knew would endure as the sun and moon. For this remarkable promise was well known to all of them:

‘As long as the sun and moon shall shine in heaven, they shall be faithful witnesses to Me, that the throne of David shall continue’ (Psalms 72:5, 18).

Hence, after the death of David, the Prophet shows here that his kingdom would be forever, for he survived in his children. And, as is evident, they commonly called their Messiah the son of David. We must now necessarily come to Christ, for Israel could not seek their king, David, who had been long dead, but were to seek that King whom God had promised from the posterity of David.

This prophecy, then, no doubt extends to Christ. And it is evident that the only hope of the people being gathered was this: that God had testified that He would give a Redeemer.

Thus, we now see what the Prophet had in view: the Israelites had become degenerate, and by their perfidy, they ceased to be the true and genuine people of God as long as they continued alienated from the family of David. The Prophet, speaking of their full restoration, now joins David with God, for they could not be restored to the body of the Church without uniting with the Jews in honoring one and the same head. But we must, at the same time, remember that the king whom the Prophet mentions is not David, who had been long dead, but his son, to whom the perpetuity of his kingdom had been promised.

This doctrine is especially useful to us, for it shows that God is not to be sought except in Christ the Mediator. Whoever, then, forsakes Christ, forsakes God Himself; for as John says,

‘He who does not have the Son does not have the Father’
(1 John 2:23).

And the matter itself proves this, for God dwells in inaccessible light; how great, then, is the distance between us and Him? Unless Christ, then, presents Himself to us as a mediating person, how can we come to God? Only then do we truly begin to seek God when we turn our eyes to Christ, who willingly offers Himself to us. This is the only way of seeking God properly.

Some, with greater subtlety, contend that Christ is Jehovah because the Prophet says that He is to be sought in the same way as God is sought. By the word “seeking,” the Prophet indeed means that the Israelites had no other way of being safe and secure than by fleeing under the guardianship and protection of their legitimate king, whom they knew to have been divinely ordained for them. This, then, would not be sufficient to confute the Jews. I interpret the passage more simply, as meaning that they would seek their God in the person of the king, whose hand and efforts God intended to employ in the preservation of the people.

It further follows, And they shall fear Jehovah and His goodness in the last day. The verb פחד, peched, sometimes means to dread, to be frightened as those are who are so terrified as to lose all courage. But in this place, it is to be taken in a good sense, to fear, as is evident from the context. Then he says, They shall fear God and His goodness.

The Israelites had previously shaken off the yoke of God, for it was a proof of wanton contempt in them to build a new temple, to devise a new religion at their own will, and, in a word, to allow themselves unbridled licentiousness. Hence he says, they shall in the future begin to fear God and shall continue in His service.

And he adds, and His goodness, by which he means that God would not be dreaded by them, but that He would sweetly draw them to Himself, so that they might obey Him spontaneously, freely, and even joyfully. And doubtless, God only then makes us truly fear Him when He gives us a taste of His goodness.

For God’s majesty strikes terror into us, and we, in the meantime, seek hiding places. If it were possible for us to withdraw from Him, each of us would gladly do so. But fleeing from Him is not worshipping God with due honor. It is, then, a sense of His goodness that leads us reverentially to fear Him. ‘With You,’ says David, ‘is forgiveness, that You may be feared’ (Psalms 130:4).

For unless people know God to be ready to be at peace with them and feel assured that He will be propitious to them, no one will seek Him, and no one will fear Him. Without knowing this, we could not but wish His glory to be abolished and extinguished, and for Him to be without authority, lest He should become our judge. But everyone who has tasted God’s goodness so conducts himself as to obey God.

What the Prophet then means when he says, They shall then fear God, is this: that they shall understand that they were miserable as long as they were alienated from Him, and that true happiness is to submit to His authority.

But further, this goodness is to be referred to Christ. Some take טובו, tubo (His goodness), for glory, as in Exodus 33 ; but the connection of this passage requires the word to be taken in its proper sense. And God’s goodness, we know, is so exhibited to us in Christ that not a particle of it is to be sought for anywhere else, for from this fountain we must draw whatever pertains to our salvation and happiness in life. Let us then know that God cannot be worshipped by us from the heart unless we behold Him in the person of His Son and know Him to be a kind Father to us. Hence John says,

‘He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father’
(John 5:23).

Lastly, he adds, In the extremity of days. For the Prophet wished again to remind the Israelites of what he had said before: that they needed long affliction, by which God would gradually reform them. He then shows that their perverseness was such that they would not soon be brought to a right mind, but that this would be in the extremity of days.

At the same time, he relieves the minds of the godly, so that they might not grow faint through weariness. For though they were not at first to taste of God’s goodness, the Prophet reminds them that there was no reason to despair, because the Lord would manifest His goodness in the extremity of days. We may add that this “extremity of days” had its beginning at the return of the people.

When liberty was granted to the Jews to return to their own country, it was the extremity or fullness of days of which the Prophet speaks. But a continued progression from the people’s return to the coming of Christ must at the same time be understood, for the Lord then more fully performed what He declares here by His Prophet. Hence everywhere in Scripture, especially in the New Testament, the manifestation of Christ is placed in the last times. This chapter is now explained. The fourth now follows.