The Pulpit Commentary — Hosea — Section 8

EXPOSITION. record. It continued during the reigns of CHAPTER L the four kings of Judah above mentioned, Ver. 1.-The word of the Lord that came and during tha.t of Jeroboam II. Kiug of =to Hosea, the son of Jleeri. The prophets Israel, which wa.s in part coincident with nre divided into the former (rishonim, Zeeb. that of Uzziah. Uzzi.ah and Jeroboam i. 4) prophets and the later prophets. The reigned contemporaneously for twenty-six writings of the former prophets comprise years. Somewhere during or rather before most of the historical books, for the Hebrew the end of that period Hosea commenced his conception of a prophet was that of an ministry. Uzzia.h survived Jeroboam some individual inspired by God to instruct men twenty-six years, then Jotham and Ahaz for the present or inform them of the future, in succession reigned each sixteen years. whether orally or by writing; the later During all these fifty-eight yea.rs Hosea. were the prophets properly so called, while continued his ministerial labours. To these these, again, are subdivided into the greater, must be added a. few years for the beginning consisting of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, of his prophetic career during the reign oc' and the lesser, or minor, including the re- Jeroboam, and some two or three years maining twelve. The designation "minor" before its close in the reign of Hezekiah ; for does not imply any inferiority in importance the destruction of Sa.maria, which took of subject or value of contents, but has place in the fourth year of that king, the respect solely to the smallness of their size prophet looks forward to as still future. as compared with the larger discourses of '.rh us for three score years and more- the others. The twelve minor prophets probably nearer three score years and ten, were added to the ea.non before its comple- the ordinary period of human life-the tion as e. single book," lest," says Kimchi, in prophet persevtred in the discharge of his his commentary on this verse, " e. book of onerous duties. It may seem strange that, them should be lost because of its smallness, though Hosea. exercised his prophetic func- if ea.eh one of them should be kept separate tion in Israel, yet the time during which he by itself." They were accordingly reckoned did so is reckoned by the reigns of the kings as one book-oo\oe«a Iv µovo/3(/3>..'I', us Eusebius of Judah. The single exception of Jeroboam expresses it. The name Hoseo., like other II. is accounted for in a rabbinic tradition Hebrew names, is significant, and deno,tes on the ground that he did not credit or act "deliverance," or" ealvation;"or, the o.bstre.ct on the evil report which Ame.zia.h the priest being put for the concrete, "deliverer," or of Bethel preferred age.inst the Prophet "saviour." It is radically the ea.me name as Amos, as we read (Amos vii. 10), "Then Joshua, except that the prefix of the latter Ame.ziuh the priest of Bethel sent to J ero- implies the name of Jehovah as tho Author of boam King of Israel, saying, Amos bath such deliverance or salvation; while the conspired t1gainst thee in the midst of the Greek form of Joshua is Jesus, which in two house of Israel; the land is not able to be,,r passages of the Authorized Version stands all his words" (see also vers. 11-13 of the for it. The form of the mime in the original same cl,apter). The real reason for the is closely connected with Hosanna (hoshia reckoning by the kings of Judah, and for na), "save now,"which occurs in Ps. cxviii. 25. the exceptional case of Jeroboam, was not In the days of Uzziah, J'otham, Ahaz, and that assigned by the rnLbins; neither was Hezekie.h, kings of J'ude.h, and in the days of it an indication, on the part of the prophet, J'eroboam the son of J'oash, king of Israel. of the legitimacy of the kingdom of Judah The period of 1-Iosea's propbetio activity is on tho one hand, and evidence, on Lhe other one of the long,·st, if not the longest, on hnnd, of the performance of God's promi.,e IWSEA, B  THE IlOOR OF HOSEA. [on. 1. 1-11.