TEXT [Commentary]
3. The folly of deceitful practices (12:7-11)
7 But no, the people are like crafty merchants
selling from dishonest scales—
they love to cheat.
8 Israel boasts, “I am rich!
I’ve made a fortune all by myself!
No one has caught me cheating!
My record is spotless!”
9 “But I am the LORD your God,
who rescued you from slavery in Egypt.
And I will make you live in tents again,
as you do each year at the Festival of Shelters.[*]
10 I sent my prophets to warn you
with many visions and parables.”
11 But the people of Gilead are worthless
because of their idol worship.
And in Gilgal, too, they sacrifice bulls;
their altars are lined up like the heaps of stone
along the edges of a plowed field.
NOTES
12:7 [8] crafty merchants. God accused the citizens of the northern kingdom of being no better than those whom he had dispelled from the land—the Canaanites. The noun translated “merchants” is kena‘an [TH3667B, ZH4047] (cf. “Canaan” [TH3667, ZH4046]; see the note on Zeph 1:11).
12:9 [10] tents . . . Festival of Shelters. The Festival of Shelters (or Tabernacles) commemorated the time of God’s protection of Israel after their deliverance from Egypt. God warned that he would bring his people back to the wilderness where he could again teach them to trust in him (see note on 2:14).
12:10 [11] parables. The word here (damah) implies similarity or likeness. Hosea often used similes in conveying God’s messages to the people.
12:11 [12] the people of Gilead are worthless. Despite the people’s boasting of great accomplishments done without wrongdoing, God had given them warning through the visions and words of his prophets, who often delivered their messages in parabolic speeches or proverbs that were largely ignored. Nevertheless, Hosea added yet another.
Gilgal. Like Bethel, Gilgal was condemned for its worship of Baal. By combining Gilead and Gilgal, Hosea achieved assonance and simultaneously used two places to represent all of the northern kingdom. Both socially (Gilead) and religiously (Gilgal), Israel was corrupt.
heaps of stone. Another literary play is intended here. The noun gallim [TH1530, ZH1643] (heaps) comes from the same root as the name Gilgal. The worthless pagan altars are as plentiful as stones cast away from carefully plowed fields. Their great number testifies to the widespread observance of idolatry in the northern kingdom.
COMMENTARY [Text]
God condemned Hosea’s contemporaries for their unholy ways. Whether in their commercial dealings, their social contacts, or their religious observances, the Israelites were guilty of all kinds of deceit and falsehood. In calling them worthless (’awen [TH205, ZH224]; 12:11), God employed a term that was used not only for all sorts of evil, but one that dredged up bad memories from the life of Jacob.
God had described his people in this way before (6:8; see note). The noun had often been used in a compound term for Bethel: Beth-aven (4:15; 5:8; 10:5, 8). Here God used it as a reminder of that equation (Beth-aven = Bethel) and as a way of reminding them of the significance of Bethel in the life of Jacob. The notice of the wickedness of Gilead also reached back to the story of Jacob. For there was a time when Jacob’s fleeing entourage deceived a pursuing Laban and his company there (Gen 31:19-55). Gilead was still filled with deception and evil. Like Bethel/Beth-aven, the northern kingdom was filled with the false worship of Baal. Like bloody Gilead (6:8), it perpetuated Jacob’s deceitful ways economically and socially.
All of this had come about because of Israel’s deceptive bent. Pretending to be true to God, they were committed to Baal. Despite God’s repeated pleadings and warnings of the past and those still being declared through his prophets, they continued in their own willful and stubborn way. So calloused had their consciences become that they pronounced themselves innocent of any wrongdoing, even in the face of their well-known dishonest practices.
Conditions in Hosea’s Israel provide a grim reminder of the folly of abandoning fellowship with God and ignoring his word. Where there is no divine revelation, society all too easily runs amok. Where people refuse to live by God’s clear revelation, matters fare no better: “When people do not accept divine guidance, they run wild” (Prov 29:18).
Believers must heed the same truth. Though the word of God will last forever (Ps 119:89; Isa 40:8), believers must allow it to work in their lives (Ps 119:16-17) if they are to keep themselves from sin (Ps 119:9, 11) and experience the fullness of God’s guidance (Ps 119:133, 169; cf. Col 3:16; 2 Tim 3:16-17).