Israel’s Hope: Divine Compassion (Hosea 11:1-11)
Since the beginning of Hosea 4, the prophet’s oracles have alerted and warned the northern kingdom of Israel of their approaching devastation and exile. The Assyrian empire is predatorial and expansionistic. They will occupy and annex the territory of Israel, and God will permit this due to Israel’s sin.
While Hosea 4-10 has identified the sins of Israel and God’s intent that the nation will suffer the consequences of those sins, Hosea 11 strikes a different note. We hear the sound of hope and promise despite their exile into “Egypt.”
In fact, the movement of the oracle recalls the journey out of Egypt, their return to Egypt, and the hope of return from Egypt. Israel was liberated from Egypt, but now they are returning due to their rebellion. But God’s compassion and deep love for Israel means that ultimately God will bring them home and once again liberate them from Egypt. While the first use of Egypt is historical (referring to the Exodus), the other uses of “Egypt” are metaphorical—symbolic of Israel’s return to oppression under the Assyrian empire and their eventual deliverance from “Egyptian” oppression once again.
Jim Limburg, in his Interpretation commentary on Hosea, nicely outlines this section of chapter eleven: past (1-4), immediate future (5-7), present (8-9), and distant future (10-11). While some of Israel is already overrun by Assyria (v. 6) and some are experiencing deportation (v. 11), Samaria—the capital city—is not yet destroyed, and the people are awaiting the final Assyrian push to take over the whole nation (v. 6). As Limburg suggests, this fits the context of the reign of King Hoshea of Israel (732-722 BCE) who made a futile alliance with Egypt as a desperate last effort to save his nation (2 Kings 17:4).
The Past: Out of Egypt (Hosea 11:1-4)
The Exodus is described as an act of God’s kindness. Israel is birthed out of love as Yahweh’s own son. Israel is the “firstborn” among the nations (Exodus 4:22), and they were birthed as a nation when they were liberated from Egyptian oppression. They were baptized in the sea and the cloud, journeyed to Sinai, and entered into covenant with God.
Yahweh treated Israel as God’s own child and lovingly cared for him. God loved, nurtured, and protected Israel. Notice the “I” statements in this section; they are emphatic! God is the subject of these verbs.
- Taught Ephraim to walk
- Took Ephraim in his arms
- Led them with kindness and love
- Lifted them up as infants to God’s cheeks
- Bent down to them
- Fed them
Love appears prominently here. “I loved” Israel, Yahweh says, and Yahweh led them out of Egypt and through the wilderness with “bands of love.” This birthing in love is also a calling—Israel has a role to play in world history and the coming of the Messiah.
God took the initiative to bring Israel out of Egypt due to God’s own love. This is the language of Deuteronomy 7 and 9: God chose Israel because God loved Israel and not because Israel was so faithful, righteous, numerous, or great.
This is not only a parental metaphor—in addition to the spousal metaphor of Hosea 1-3—but a kenotic one: Yahweh bends over backwards to accommodate and care for Israel. The Creator of the universe condescends to live and walk with Israel like a parent with a child. Yahweh is the transcendent Holy One who gets dirty hands by trekking through the wilderness with Israel.
Israel’s response, however, was rebellion. Hosea 11:2 recognizes the centrifugal force of God’s call and Israel’s rebellion. “The more I called them, the more they went from me,” Yahweh says. They turned to other gods, the Baals, and offered sacrifices to them. They “did not know” that Yahweh had healed them—led them out of Egypt, led them through the wilderness, and gave them a land in which to dwell.
The Immediate Future: Back to Egypt (Hosea 11:5-7)
Because of their rebellion and their refusal to return to God through submission to the prophetic word, Israel will return to Egypt. Since Assyria will be their king, the reference to “Egypt” is symbolic of a return to oppression in Assyrian exile. Instead of returning to God, they will return to Egypt from which God had called them in the beginning.
This is not only their immediate future; it is already happening. Violence through the sword has already arrived in their cities, presumably in the northern regions of the country like Galilee. Israel’s “empty-talkers” or “oracle-priests” (NRSV) have no impact; their oracles are consumed by the fires of the Assyrian empire. Their schemes will not save Israel but contribute to its destruction. The leaders of Israel did not listen to Hosea but listened to their false prophets and priests. Consequently, they will experience the ravages of war.
At some point in the process, it becomes too late to reverse it. Even if they call at this late moment, the consequences of their sins must play out because Israel has habitually and consistently turned away from God at every point. They may call to God in the midst of their trauma, but their hearts are actually far from God as their past demonstrates.
The Present: The Loving Parent (Hosea 11:8-9)
Nevertheless, God’s heart burns with compassion for them. God is not heartless. Neither does God take pleasure in the horror that is about to fall on the whole nation of Israel.
God addresses Israel with heart in hand; it is a soliloquy—a dramatic monologue—that expresses Yahweh’s depth of emotion. Yahweh is an anguished parent over the plight of Israel. Like many anguished parents, Yahweh asks, “What can I do?” or “How will I respond?”
The one thing Yahweh knows, it seems, is that God’s steadfast love will not give up on Israel. Though Israel rejected Yahweh over and over again, Yahweh will not finally and ultimately reject Israel.
Yahweh will not treat them like Admah and Zeboiim. These two cities were associated with Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 10:19; 14:2, 8), and they were destroyed with Sodom and Gomorrah (Deuteronomy 29:23). They were annihilated; they no longer existed.
But Yahweh will not do that to Israel. God will not fully vent his anger against Israel or destroy Ephraim altogether. Yes, they will suffer violence and war; they will go into exile, and they will lose their national existence. But God’s compassionate and tender heart mitigates, even controls, his “fierce anger.” God, unlike human beings, is not controlled by anger. Rather, God is the “Holy One”—the transcendent one, whose anger neither dictates nor compels God’s response. Ultimately, God will not act in wrath.
At one and the same time, God is both “Other” (transcendent) and also draws near (“bends down”). God is, at one and the same time, both transcendent and immanent; both the Holy One and the one who self-empties to be near beloved children.
The Distant Future: Home from Egypt (Hosea 11:10-11)
Rather, God will come, and Israel will respond. The dispersed Israelites—whether in Assyria, Egypt, or other nations—will return once God roars like a lion again. God’s children will come in fear and trembling back home. Israel will experience a new exodus, a deliverance from oppression and exile.
Though they roar like lions, they shall return as doves—birds that return to their home nest. The children of Israel will return “to their homes.” This is the promise of a restoration; a return to their houses. Their exile will come to an end. This is Israel’s hope, and it is grounded in the love and compassion of Yahweh who calls Israel “my son.”
The end of the exile and their resettlement in their homes is not explained. There is no timeline, nor is there any full description of what that means or entails. There is, however, no return of the northern kingdom in the descriptions of Chronicles, Ezra, or Nehemiah. Judah returns to the land, but Ephraim does not. Ultimately, according to Romans 9-11, Israel returns through the Messiah of Israel, Jesus of Nazareth.
Matthew’s Use of Hosea 11:1: A Christological Reading
After the birth of Jesus, Herod the Great sought to kill the newborn king, but Joseph was told to flee to Egypt. The family remained there until Herod’s death. This happened, according to Matthew, “to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, ‘Out of Egypt I have called my son’” (Matthew 2:15).
As we read Hosea, it seems clear that Hosea 11:1 is not a prediction. On the contrary, it describes a past event; it describes the Exodus. There is no hint that it refers to anything in the future.
The Gospel writer in Matthew employs a theological (typological) hermeneutic that sees the analogy, parallel, and even the type-antiype of the story of Israel and the story of Jesus. Just as Israel was called out of Egypt, so Jesus was called out of Egypt. The fulfillment is not one of prediction-fulfillment but of type-fulfillment.
Jesus acts as the new Israel. Just like Israel, he comes to the promised land from Egypt. He travels by the grace and compassion of God. He settles in Galilee, the area of the northern kingdom of Israel first annexed by Assyria. He relives the story of Israel.
Except this time, Jesus is the faithful son rather than a rebellious one like Ephraim had been. He is the true Israellite, the true son of God—he represents the whole nation, both Israel and Judah. Israel gets a “do-over” in the life of Jesus.
When Matthew quotes Hosea 11:1, he intends for us to read the whole story of Hosea 11:1-11 in the light of God’s work in Jesus by the Spirit. Jesus has stepped into the story of Israel and reoriented it to faithfulness, and Jesus repeats the story of Israel but in faithfulness. And Jesus, who came to save his people from their sins, will liberate Israel by a new Exodus.
Thanks be to God!