Hosea 13:9

Hosea DESTRUCTION AND HELPHosea 13:9 . These words are obscure by reason of their brevity. Literally they might be rendered, ‘Thy destruction for, in, or against Me; in, or against thy Help.’ Obviously, some words must be supplied to bring out any sense. Our Authorised Version has chosen the supplement ‘is,’ which fails to observe the second occurrence with ‘thy Help’ of the preposition, and is somewhat lax in rendering the ‘for’ of the second clause by the neutral ‘but.’ It is probably better to read, as the Revised Version, with most modern interpreters, ‘Thou art against Me, against thy Help,’ and to find in the second clause the explanation, or analysis, of the destruction announced in the first. So we have here the wail of the parental love of God over the ruin which Israel has brought on itself, and that parental love is setting forth Israel’s true condition, in the hope that they may discern it. Thus, even the rebuke holds enclosed a promise and a hope. Since God is their help, to depart from Him has been ruin, and the return to Him will be life. Hosea, or rather the Spirit that spake through Hosea, blended wonderful tenderness with unflinching decision in rebuke, and unwavering certainty in foretelling evil with unfaltering hope in the promise of possible blessing.

His words are set in the same key as the still more wonderfully tender ones that Jesus uttered as He looked across the valley from Olivet to the gleaming city on the other side, and wailed, ‘O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Therefore your house is left unto you desolate.’ We may note here I. The loving discovery of ruin. It is strange that men should need to be told, and that with all emphasis, the evil case in which they are; and stranger still that they should resent the discovery and reject it. This pathetic pleading is the voice of a divine Father trying to convince His son of misery and danger; and the obscurity of the text is as if that voice was choked with sobs, and could only speak in broken syllables the tragical word in which all the evil of Israel’s sin is gathered up-’his destruction,’ or ‘corruption.’ It gathers up in one terrible picture the essential nature of sin and the death of the soul, which is its wages-inward misery and unrest, outward sorrows, the decay of mental and moral powers, the spreading taint which eats its way through the whole personality of a man who has sinned, and pauses not till it has reduced his corpse to putrefaction.

(9) In me . . . Help. —The close of this verse is rhetorically abrupt, which is altogether missed in the English version. Render, but against Me thy help. We must supply “Thou hast rebelled,” the construction being the same as in Hosea 13:16 . “Thy captivity, O Israel, is from thee; thy redemption is from Me; thy perishing is from thee: thy salvation is from Me” (Pusey).

Hosea 13:9 . O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself — Thy sins have brought down destruction upon thee, and it is from me only thou canst expect any help, which I will in due time afford thee. The Hebrew of this verse is capable of different versions. That of the Vulgate, Destruction is thy own, O Israel: only in me is thy help, seems one of the most literal; unless, taking שׁחתךְ for a verb, we prefer rendering the first clause, It has destroyed thee, O Israel; that is, all that sin and folly of thine, with which thou hast been before charged. As thy own wickedness has many a time corrected thee, so it has now at length destroyed thee. Observe, reader, wilful sinners are self-destroyers; obstinate impenitence is the grossest self- murder. Those that are destroyed of the destroyer, have their blood upon their own heads: they have destroyed themselves. Observe, also, that the case of such is not yet desperate: God will be their help if they will make application to him. This is a plank thrown out after shipwreck; and greatly magnifies not only the power of God, that he can help when things are at the worst, can help those that cannot help themselves; but the riches of his grace, that he will help those who have destroyed themselves, and therefore might justly be left to perish, and even those that had long refused his help. Dr. Pocock reads this verse, O Israel, this has destroyed thee, that in me is thy help. And R. Tanchum interprets it to the same effect.

They understand the sentiment to be, “that the cause of the destruction of Israel was, his presuming upon God’s readiness to help him. They hardened themselves in their corrupt practices, in the confidence that God would never give them up; that, notwithstanding the severity of his threatenings, he would interpose, as upon so many occasions he before had done, to rescue them from their enemies when things came to an extremity. The passage, thus understood is a cool reflection upon the fatal effects of God’s kindness upon the perverse minds of the Israelites.” — Horsley.