Hosea 1:4

And the LORD said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel. CALL HIS NAME JEZREEL - i:e., God will scatter (cf. , "I will sow them among the people"). The similarity in sound of Jezreel to Israel (which was originally pronounced Yisrael) marks the connection between the sin and its punishment. They who had been by God's grant "princes with God" (so Israel means) shall be now by God's sentence, "scattered by God" (Jezreel). It was the royal city of Ahab and his successors, in the tribe of Issachar. Here Jehu exercised his greatest cruelties on the house of Ahab and Ahaziah king of Judah (;...

It now follows, the wife _conceived_, — the imaginary one, the wife as represented and exhibited. She _conceived_, he says, _and bare a son: then said Jehovah to him, Call his name Jezreel_. Many render יזרעאל, _Izroal_, dispersion, and follow the Chaldean paraphraser. They also think that this ambiguous term contains some allusion; for as זרע, _zaro _is seed, they suppose that the Prophet indirectly glances at the vain boasting of the people; for they called themselves the chosen seed, because they had been planted by the Lord; hence the name Jezreel. But the Prophet here, according to these interpreters, exposes this folly to contempt; as though he said, “Ye are Israel; but in another respect, ye are dispersion: for as the seed is cast in various directions so the Lord will scatter you, and thus destroy and cast you away. You think yourselves to have been planted in this land, and to h...

1-7 Israel was prosperous, yet then Hosea boldly tells them of their sins, and foretells their destruction. Men are not to be flattered in sinful ways because they prosper in the world; nor will it last long if they go on still in their trespasses. The prophet must show Israel their sin; show it to be exceedingly hateful. Their idolatry is the sin they are here charged with. Giving that glory to any creature which is due to God alone, is an injury and affront to God; such as for a wife to take a stranger, is to her husband. The Lord, doubtless, had good reasons for giving such a command to the prophet; it would form an affecting picture of the Lord's unmerited goodness and unwearied patience, and of the perverseness and ingratitude of Israel. We should be broken and wearied with half that perverseness from others, with which we try the patience and grieve the Spirit of our God. Let us a...

Verse Hosea 1:4. _CALL HIS NAME JEZREEL_] יזרעאל that is, _God will_ _disperse_. This seems to intimate that a dispersion or sowing of Israel shall take place; which happened under Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, 2 Kings 17:5. But the word refers also to the name of _a city_, where Jehu slew Jezebel and all the children of Ahab. 2 Kings 9:10; 2 Kings 9:36; 2 Kings 10:6. This was one of those _prophetic_ names which we so often meet with in the Scriptures; e.g. Japheth Abraham, Israel, Judah, Joshua, Zerubbabel, Solomon, Sh

CALL HIS NAME JEZREEL - that is, in its first sense here, “God will scatter.” The life of the prophet, and his union with one so unworthy of him, were a continued prophecy of God’s mercy. The names of the children were a life-long admonition of His intervening judgments. Since Israel refused to hear God’s words, He made the prophet’s sons, through the mere fact of their presence among them, their going out and coming in, and the names which He gave them, to be preachers to the people. He depicted in them and in their names what was to be, in order that, whenever they saw or heard of them, His warnings might be forced upon them, and those who would take warning, might be saved. If, with their mother’s disgrace, these sons inherited and copied their mother’s sins, then their names became even more expressive, that, being such as they were, they would be scattered by God, would not be owned...

EXPOSITION HOSEA 1:1 THE WORD OF THE LORD THAT CAME UNTO HOSEA, THE SON OF BEERI. The prophets are divided into the former (_rishonim, _Zechariah 1:4) prophets and the later prophets. The writings of the former prophets comprise most of the historical hooks, for the Hebrew conception of a prophet was that of an individual inspired by God to instruct men for the present or inform them of the future, whether orally or by writing; the _later _were the prophets properly so called, while these, again, are subdivided into the _greater, _consisting of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and the _lesser, _or minor, including the remaining twelve. The designation "minor" does not imply any inferiority in importance of subject or value of contents

AND THE LORD SAID UNTO HIM CALL HIS NAME JEZREEL,.... Which some interpret the "seed of God", as Jerom; or "arm of God", as others; and Kimchi applies it to Jeroboam the son of Joash, who was strong, and prospered in his kingdom; but it rather signifies "God will sow", or "scatter" n; denoting either their dissension among themselves; or their dispersion among the nations, which afterwards came to pass; and so the Targum, "call their name scattered"; and alluding also to the city of Jezreel, where some of the idolatrous kings of Israel lived, and where much blood had been shed, which should be avenged, as follows: FOR YET A LITTLE WHILE, AND I WILL AVENGE THE BLOOD OF JEZREEL UPON THE HOUSE OF JEHU; not the blood of Naboth the Jezreelite, that was shed by Ahab; but the blood of Joram the son of Ahab, and seventy other sons of his, and all his great men, kinsfolks and priests, shed by Je...

ANALYSIS AND ANNOTATIONS I. THE REJECTION OF ISRAEL AS THE ADULTEROUS WIFE AND HER FUTURE RECEPTION AND RESTORATION CHAPTER 1 Israel's Sin and Promise of Restoration _ 1. The introduction (Hosea 1:1) _ 2. The prophet's marriage and birth of Jezreel (Hosea 1:2) 3. The birth of Lo-Ruhamah (Hosea 1:6) 4. The birth of Lo-ammi (Hosea 1:8) 5. The future restoration (Hosea 1:10) Hosea 1:1. This superscription gives the period of Hosea's ministry.

HOSEA'S MARRIAGE: A PARABLE OF YAHWEH'S RELATIONS WITH ISRAEL. The prophet receives a Divine command to take (_i.e._ marry) a wife of whoredom and children of whoredom. The reason given for this startling procedure is that the land (_i.e._ the land of Israel) doth commit great whoredom departing from the LORD. Hosea obeys and takes as his wife _Gomer bath Diblaim_ (? daughter of fig-cakes), who bears three children to him. These are given symbolical names: the first, a son, is called Jezreel, a prophetic name pointing to the coming of vengeance on the house of Jehu [7] for the massacre at Jezreel of Ahab's house (2 Kings 10:11); the second a daughter and the third a son, bearing the names Lo-ruhamah (uncompassionated) and Lo-ammi (not my people), in token of Yahweh's rejection of Ephraim. [7] Jeroboam II. whose son Zechariah was the last of Jeh

JEZREEL. Note the Figure of speech _Paronomasia_ (App-6) between Israel (Hosea 1:1) and Jezreel (Hebrew. _Yisra'el_ and _Yizr! eel)._ The name is prophetic of coming judgment (see Hosea 1:5) and future mercy. Jezreel is. _Homonym,_ having two meanings: (1) may GOD scatter (Jeremiah 31:10); and (2) may GOD sow (Zechariah 10:9). These bind up the two prophetic announcements. Jezreel, the fruitful field, had been defiled with blood (2Ki 9:16, 2 Kings 9:25; 2 Kings 9:3