Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Hosea · About this commentary
Out of Egypt I Called My Son
Hosea 11:1-4
1 “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. · WEB
The marriage image is dropped for a father teaching a toddler to walk, and every verb of care is answered by not being recognized.
The image changes and the change is the chapter's whole method. Ten chapters of a wife and her lovers give way to when Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.
A wife can be divorced. A child cannot be un-fathered, and the shift in metaphor is what makes the reversal at verse 8 possible.
The verse is quoted in the New Testament of the child Jesus brought back from Egypt Matthew 2:15 — a sentence about the nation's infancy read as being about one son's.
Verse 3 is the most domestic picture of God in the prophets: I taught Ephraim to walk. I took them by their arms. The verb describes a parent bent over a toddler, holding the arms while the legs learn. And the clause that follows is the wound: but they didn't know that I healed them. The book's knowledge word again, in the negative — the same failure as the wife who did not know who gave her the grain Hosea 2:8.
Verse 4 accumulates the tenderness: I drew them with cords of a man, with ties of love — restraint that is not rope — and then two images from animal husbandry that turn out to be affection. He was like those who lift up the yoke on their necks, easing the weight; and I bent down to him and I fed him.
That last clause is the height of it. The God who has been described as a lion, a moth, and rot Hosea 5:12 Hosea 5:14 is here on his knees, lowering himself to put food in a child's mouth. Nothing in these four verses is owed, and nothing in them is recognized.
settled What this mark means