The

Prophet
Hosea
Hosea
Date: 760-720 B.C.
Prophesied To: Israel (Northern Kingdom)
Purpose:
1. To Demonstrate God's Loving
Relationship With His People
2. To Call Israel To Repentance
Contemporaries: Amos, Isaiah, Micah
 Introduction
Hosea 1:1

“The word of the LORD that came to

Hosea the son of Beeri, in the days of
Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah,
kings of Judah, and in the days of
Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of
Israel.”
He was a prophet during the
reigns of Uzziah, Jotham,
Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of
Judah
 Also, during the reign of
Jeroboam, king of Israel
Hosea is a contemporary of Isaiah.

Isaiah ministered in the southern

kingdom of Judah.
Hosea prophesied to the northern
kingdom of Israel.
It was a time of great
economic prosperity, and in
their comfort the people
had slipped into
worshipping foreign gods
instead of Yahweh.
Hosea: God as a betrayed Husband
• Hosea is from the North and preaches in
the North: Israel
• His story begins with his unhappy
marriage
• He is married to Gomer
• He loves her
• Gomer deserted Hosea for other lovers
• Hosea uses his own experience of
betrayal to criticize the unfaithful Israel
 Love Story of Hosea- Concept of hesed
Hosea’s marriage to an unfaithful woman Gomer.
When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the
LORD said to Hosea, "Go, take to yourself a wife
of harlotry and have children of harlotry, for the
land commits great harlotry by forsaking the
LORD.“ So he went and took Gomer the daughter
of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son.
(Hos 1:2-3 RSV)
Israel’s covenant
relationship with Yahweh
was like a marriage who
have abandoned their
covenant commitment.
Betrayal
• When Hosea speaks of
himself and Gomer, he is
telling Israel a parable of its
own betrayal of God
• Hosea loves Gomer as God
loves Israel
• Gomer deserted Hosea for
other lovers as Israel has
deserted God for the
Canaanite god Baal
God told Hosea to marry a
harlot and have children
with her because the land of
Israel has committed
harlotry by worshipping
other gods.
Hosea went to marry
Gomer, the daughter
of Diblaim.
Gomer means
‘complete’ or ‘perfect’
 Hosea had three
children with Gomer.
2 boys sandwiched by
a girl.
 1 Child Boy
st

Jezreel, saying,
"I will punish
Their first child
the house of
was a son and
Jehu for the
God told Hosea
blood of
to name him
Jezreel.”
(Hosea 1:4)
 2nd Child- Girl

• The second child was

a girl, and she was
named Lo-ruhamah,
meaning ‘not pitied’.
“For I will no more
have pity on the house
of Israel.“ (Hosea 1:6)
 3 Child- Boy
rd

The third child was a boy and

was named Lo-Ammi,
which means ‘Not my people’.
“For you are not my people and I
am not your God”
( Hosea 1: 9).
 3 children= 3 messages
• Hosea and Gomer have three children to whom Hosea is told to
give strange names
• The names are symbolic of how God regards the children of the
Covenant with Israel
• Jezreel (boy) meaning shameful butchery
• Implying that God will punish and destroy Israel
• Loruhamah (girl) meaning not pitied
• God will no longer have pity or forgive Israel for their mistakes
• Lo-ammi (boy) meaning not my people
• God rejects the Israelites as God’s chosen people.
In the marriage, Gomer proved
unfaithful to Hosea - she left
Hosea to pursue her lustful
desires in harlotry (2:2-5), but
Hosea continued to love her and
brought her back from harlotry.
The relationship between Hosea
and Gomer portrayed the
relationship between God and
Israel.
Gomer typified an unfaithful and
wavering Israel while Hosea
typified the merciful and loving
God
•Gomer went through many
difficulties as a divorcee. She
became aimless; she looked
for her lovers but never saw
them. Finally, she became a
slave.
The Punishment of Gomer
• Hosea takes Gomer to court where he
testifies to her unfaithfulness and
ingratitude
• He is angry and his plans for her are
harsh
• He gave her everything he had: grain,
wine, oil, silver, and gold
• Hosea will take those gifts away
• She has given some of these away to her
lovers
• He will punish her and take away
everything until she returns to him
Many years later, God told Hosea to go and
bring Gomer back to the marital home. So,
Hosea went to purchase Gomer from her
slavery. He bought her for 15 shekels of silver,
a homer and a lethech of bailey. He told her to
come back home and stop the harlotry and not
to belong to another man anymore. Hosea also
promised to be faithful to her.
• The story of Hosea and his marriage to Gomer was
similar to the relationship between God and Israel.
Yahweh had chosen Israel as a special race to be his
people and he became their God.
• Initially, their relationship was very good until Israel
started to go after gods just Gomer did. For her
behaviour, God refused to continue to be their God and
rejected them from being his people. God left Israel to
be carried into slavery and they suffered all kinds of
indignities in the hands of their masters.
 Reconciliation
• Like Hosea desires to be reunited so does God with the Israelites
• God will punish them until they repent and come back to God
• Punishment in the form of penance for their sins
• God will not wipe out the Israelites even though they deserve it
• Hosea is the first book to feature the relationship between God and Israel as
a marriage and uses the language and images of marriage
• To God, infidelity in Israel’s behavior means betrayal of justice, compassion,
integrity, and true worship
• Out of God's steadfast love (hesed) for his
people Hosea is asked to change the names
of his second and third sons to "Pitied" and
"My People."
• This shows Yahweh’s gracious love to have
pity on Israel and call her His people again.
• However, since the name of the first son was
not changed it meant the sins of Jehu were
not forgiven, but he was to be punished.
•As Hosea appealed to Gomer through
his children, so did God appeal to the
Israelites through his numerous
prophets.
•All that God required of them was
steadfast love and knowledge of God
more than any other living.
HOSEA'S MARRIAGE WITH
GOMER (REF: HOSEA 1:2-11)
(i) Hosea's marriage to Gomer formed
the key for the interpretation of his
message of God's love for the
Israelites.
(ii) God instructed Hosea to take for a
wife a woman of harlotry.
(iii) Following God's instructions
Hosea married Gomer and bore three
children.
(iv) Hosea gave his children symbolic
names.
(v) The name implied that God would
punish the house of Jehu for the blood of
Jezreel and would put an end to the
kingdom of Israel.
(vi) The second daughter was named Lo-ruhamah meaning 'Not
pitied'. This symbolized that God would no longer have pity on
the house of Israel.

(vii) The third child, a son was named Lo-ammi meaning ‘Not
my people' symbolizing that God had dissolved the covenant and
rejected the Israelites - they were not longer His people.

(viii) Initially, there was love between Hosea and Gomer.

(ix) But Gomer proved unfaithful by
going after other men who gave her
pleasure.
(x) Gomer's unfaithfulness meant
that she had rejected the relationship
with Hosea.
(xi) Hosea, out of love implored her
to return, and even asked his
children to plead with their mother
to come back, but to no avail.
(xii) Thus,Hosea divorced her, and her harlotry made her
end up in slavery.
(xiii) Hosea interpreted the covenant God made with Israel as
similar to marriage.
(xiv) As in the case of Hosea's marriage, initially there was a
relationship of love when Israel came out of Egypt 'in the
days of her youth'.
(xv) Like Gomer the Israelites played the harlot by forsaking
Yahweh for Baal, their licentious worship at the sanctuaries
was denounced as nothing less than harlotry and whoredom.
(xvi) Just as Hosea divorced Gomer, the covenant
between God and Israel has broken because of Israel's
unfaithfulness or infidelity.
(xvii) Gomer's harlotry made her end in slavery. In the
same way Israel would be punished by Assyria and
Egypt, she would be taken into exile where she would be
denied priest, king, ephod or sacrifice.
(xviii) Hosea continued to love Gomer and took her after
disciplining her. Similarly, Yahweh had steadfast love for
his people.
(xix) Just as Hosea's disciplinary measures
against Gomer were redemptive, so Yahweh’,
discipline was redemptive and not
destructive, it was governed by steadfast love.
(xx) Hosea, out of love, implored Corner to
come back but she refused.
(xxi) He sent his children to plead with her to
return, but to no avail.
(xxii) Gomer was influenced by the worldly
things she was getting from her lovers.
(xxiii) Despite Gomer's unfaithfulness and
Hosea's disappointments, Hosea still loved her.
(xxiv) Hosea's marital experience and love for
his wife was a demonstration of God's love for
Israel.