The Pulpit Commentary — Hosea — Section 297

Vers. 9, 10.-Gibeah and BaaJ,..peor. From this point the mind of the prophet reverts largely to the past. He sees mirrored in it both God's love and the people's sins. Allusion is made here to God's early love for Israel, and to the sins of Gibeah and Baal-µeor. I. THE F.VIL OF SIN IS SEEN BY COMPABIBON WITH FORMER BINS, THE HEINOUSNESS OF WHICH ALL ADMlT. Two snch outstanding sins of the past were those of Gibeah, anii, at a still earlier period, of Baal-peor. The former (cf. Judg. xix., xx.) wa.s a. sin revealing depths of corruption in Israel such as had not previously been heard of (Judg. xix. 30). It shocked the national conscience. It led to fierce vengeance being taken on the transgressors, and on the Benje.mites who sided with them. The latter was a sin of wider scope, and scarcely less heinous in its character (Numb. xxv. 1-18). It combined idolatry with whoredom in a. peculiarly dating and offensive manner. It led to the destruction of twenty-four thousand in the camp of Israel by a. plague, and t.o the after extermination of the Midianites. '£hese were the " deep corruptions" which were now reproducing themselves in IsraeL The people might refuse to giv~ the right name to tLe iniquity e.s practised by themselves, but they could scarcely fail to repro- bate it when presented in these earlier instances. It was a peculiarity of these sins that th,,y had been judge,d, by Israel itself. It was the tribes that pronounced sentence on tl,e e"il-doers at Gibeah; and Phinehas had executed judgment on Zimri, as afterwards tLe men of war did on the Midia.nites. This, accordingly, was a case to which Paul's principle applied, that ability to judge of an offence in another renders one inexcusab_le if Le: does the same thing (lfom. ii. 1). ,ve a.re often, however, willing to condemn 1n otl,ers sins which we inconsistently tolerate in ourselves. lL THE EVIL OF SIN ONLY BEOOMEB FUL'I,Y APPARENT AGAINST THE BAOKGBOUND OF DIVINE LOVE. This is brought out in ver. 10 in the case of Baal-peor. The enormity of that sin was only fully seen when set against the manifestations of Div.ine love which had preceded. "I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness; I saw your fathers a.s the first ripe in the fig tree at her first time." There is indicated here : 1. God'• chaia of Isro,el. He "found " them " in the -wilderness;" he "saw '' them there, and chose tia,m. 2. God's delight in IB'fael. The nation was pleasant to him 11.11 grapes in the desert, or as the first-ripe fig. His choice and his affection were both manifested iD many wonderful ways. It was this love shown to Israel which made 11uch acts as Qlt, IL 1-17.] TUE BOOK OI!' HOSEA, 297