The Pulpit Commentary — Hosea — Section 116

keep away from those places and those persons that would tend to le:i.d them into temptation. Hypocritical profession with irreligious practice was both detrimental and dangerous. After this friendly warning to Judah, Hosea resumes his complaint about Israel, II. PUNIBIIMI!:NT IS OFTEN A DARK REFLECTION OF MEN'S SINS, Israel had refosed God's yoke, comparatively easy as it was, and started backward or turned sideward instead of drawing forward. They declined God's service, and determined to have full liberty and licence, They got their desir~ but it was given them in judgrnent. The limits of the law and its straitness provokeu. their resistance; now they will be permitted t,, wander forth as captives through the wido wilderness of the East, or as exiles with all the world before them. They had been strong and stubborn as a headstrong, unmanageable heifer; now they are to become solitary as a lamb shut out from its flock or separated from its dam, and in a state as helpless as that same weak creature when exposed to savage beasts of prey, and left alone amid the wasteness of a wiluer- ness, Ephraim, turning away her affections from her Maker as her Husband, got attached to idols, and clave fast to them; and so they are given up to their own hearts' lusts. They don't wish to part with their beloved idols, or to be parted from them; nor shall they. They are incorrigible, and God gives them up as beyond reproof and without hope-absolutely desperate, They wished to be left to themselves and their own ways, and so they are; not even Judah is to interfere with them. They are to be let go on without check from conscience, or reproof from prophet, or warning from the Divine Word, or any interference by Providence. "It is a sad and sore jurlgment for any man to be let alone in sin: for God to say concerning a sinner,' He is joined to his idols, the world and the flesh; he is incurably proud, covetous, or profane, an incurable drunkard or adulterer,-let him alone; conscience, let him alone ; minister, let him alone ; providences, let him alone. Let nothing awaken him till the flames of hell do it.' The father corrects not the rebellious son any more when he determines to disinherit him. Those that are not disturbed in their sin will be destroyed for their sin.'' . III. PERSISTENCE IN EVIL PROVOCATIVE OF DIVINE DESERTION. 1. Persistence in evi1. Idolaters are so attached to their idol-gods that they will not give them up, however hideous .those idols or however vile those gods may be. (1) The people of Israel were bound to their idols; as another prophet says, "They hold fast deceit ; " they are even as loth to change as to give up their idols. "Rath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods?" The word in the original is the same as that used in Gen. xiv. of the kings who came together as confederates unto the valley of Siddim; and never was there a more unholy alliance than that of Israel and Israel's idols, or that of sinners and their beloved lusts in general. 'l'he word is also used of fascination, by binding magical knots; and never was magical knot tighter or fascination stronger than that of an easily besetting sin over its victim. Men have been found to sacrifice their best and dearest interests for the sake of some low lust, some evil'.propensity, or some sinfnl habit. (2) A great disproportion. •• But," says an old writer, "will idolaters thus adhere to their idols ? will their hearts be united to them? are they willing to be oue spirit with them? Oh, how much more should we be joined to the Lord our God, to Jesus Christ fthe Saviour, and to the Holy Spirit the Sanctifier-the glorious triune Jehovah], to be as one spirit with him! That exhortatiou of Barnabas (Acts xi. 23), that with full 'purpose of heart they should cleave unto the Lord,' is seasonable at all times." 2. Di-vim desertion. This was implied in the injunction to whomsoever it was addressed. (1) If addressed to Judah, as it seems, it enjoins them to withdraw from Israel, though their countrymen and brethren-to have nothing more to do with them, to leave them to themselves, to let them alone. Few things are worse to bear than spiritual isolation, When the saints withdraw from a man because of the stubbornness of his rebellion a~ainst God, and his incorrigible wilfulness in the pursuit of sin, it is a heavy judgment from God; it is equal in bitterness to the curse pronounced on thll man who loveth not the Lord Jesus Christ, and of whom it is said, "Let him be Anathema-Maranatha." AB if it were said," Let a curse rest on the devoted head of such a one; let him be left to himself, deserted by the saiuts and servants of God; in a word, lot him alone till the coming of the Lord, and the Lord will deal with him." (2) If the inju!lction is addrossed to the prophet, it ipeans that he is to take no furthor J108lV,, I 114 THE BOOK OF HOSEA.