Hosea 2:5-7

The Voice

Whenever God’s children abandon proper worship of Him in favor of any earthly thing—be it worship of another god, dependence on themselves, or trust in foreign leaders—they break their covenant with Him. Breaking that promise is like committing adultery, which is literally the destruction of a marriage covenant. Here, God is furious with Israel because they have chosen to serve the gods of other nations in addition to Him; they are committing adultery against Him.

Under the rule of King Jeroboam II in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, worship of a Canaanite deity named Baal is common. Many people believe he is the god of weather and therefore the one who makes the earth fertile and produces crops. Like God, he is worshiped through the donation of gifts and sacrificing of animals, but Baal is also honored by the activities of prostitutes at shrines dedicated to him. The men and women who are employed at those shrines are paid for their fertility rituals by customers (worshipers) not only with money but also with the produce of the land their sexual activities supposedly fertilized: bread and water, wool and flax, oil and wine.

⁵    Their mother was a prostitute;
        she brought shame on herself when she had these children.
        She chased her customers, saying, “I’m going to go looking for my lovers.
    They’re the ones who give me my bread and water,
        my wool and flax, my oil and wine.”
⁶    But I’ll block her way with a thorn hedge;
        I’ll put a wall up around her, blocking her usual paths,
⁷        and she will wander after her lovers like a dumb sheep.
    She’ll chase after them, but she won’t catch them.
        She’ll look for them, but she won’t find them.
    Then she’ll say, “I’m going to go back to my original husband
        because I was better off then than I am now!”