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9:1-13:16 ISRAEL'S PUNISHMENT

Punishments to fit the sins (9:1-17)

Baal worship and its accompanying immoral rituals were aimed at increasing the produce from farms and vineyards. As a punishment God will destroy the farms and vineyards and send the people into captivity. There they will be forced to eat food that to them is unclean (9:1-3). They will not be able to offer the usual food and wine offerings; in fact, they will barely have enough to keep themselves alive. Meanwhile the land in which they once lived will become wild again through neglect (4-6).

The people do not like Hosea's denunciations and warnings. He is God's messenger to them, the nation's watchman, but they call him a fool and a madman. They even plot to kill him (7-8). Their sin is as great as that of Gibeah in the time of the judges (9; see Judges 19:1-30; Judges 20:1-48).

When God brought the people of Israel out of Egypt and led them through the wilderness, his desire was that they enter a new era of fruitfulness. But even before they reached the promised land, they had turned to Baalism and its immorality (10; see Numbers 25:1-5). Such unfaithfulness has characterized the people ever since. They practise sexual rites, hoping that their families will increase. God's punishment, fittingly, will cause their families to decrease (11-14). Because of their Baal practices (as, for example, at Gilgal), they will be fruitless instead of fruitful. They will go into shameful captivity in a foreign land (15-17).