Again Hosea charged Israel with covenant unfaithfulness that called for destruction. Here he graphically portrayed the impending doom of the nation.
"In this passage Hosea brings to a close via climactic crescendo the predictions and warnings that comprise the bulk of the book."81
13:1 When members of the tribe of Ephraim spoke, the other Israelites trembled because they looked to Ephraim for leadership (cf. Judg. 8:1-3; 12:1-6). Jacob had prophesied that Ephraim would lead (Gen. 48:13-20), and the first king of the Northern Kingdom, Jeroboam I, had come from the tribe of Ephraim (1 Kings 11:26; 12:25). The Ephraimites exalted themselves in the North as well. Yet they were also the leaders in Baal worship. Therefore they were as good as dead since God would judge idolaters.
13:2 The Ephraimites, and the other Israelites, had continued to sin more and more by making molten images and carved idols of silver (cf. Exod. 20:4-5; 34:17; Deut. 5:8-9). They took great pains to make beautiful idols by employing skilled craftsmen for their construction. They also required that those who made sacrifices to them profess their devotion and homage by kissing the images.82How doubly ironical it was that they should worship things that they had created and that they should kiss images of animals!
13:3 Because they did this the Ephraimites would soon vanish from their land. They would disappear like fog or dew in the morning and like chaff from a threshing floor and smoke from a chimney that the wind blew away. Judgment would come swiftly and surely.
13:4 Yahweh had been Israel's God since the Israelites had lived in Egypt.83He had commanded the Israelites not to acknowledge any gods beside Himself because He was the only God who could save them (cf. Deut. 11:28; 32:17; Jer. 9:2; 31:34). For them to become idolaters would only be frustrating and futile. To abandon the only savior is to doom oneself to no salvation.
13:5 The Lord also was the one who cared for the Israelites in the wilderness and who kept them alive in that barren wasteland. His provisions of manna and water are only two examples.
13:6 When they entered the Promised Land and began to enjoy rich pastures, they soon became self-satisfied, proud, and forgot their God. Prosperity is often a greater temptation to depart from conscious dependence on God than adversity is, and Israel fell into this trap.
13:7-8 In view of Israel's behavior, the Lord promised to become as an enemy of His people, like a lion or leopard that laid in wait to attack a sheep grazing in rich pasture (v. 6). He would confront them as a mother bear crazed by the loss of her cubs (cf. 2 Sam. 17:8; Prov. 17:12). He would tear them open like a bear and consume them like a lioness. The lion, leopard, and bear were all wild animals native to Canaan that were notorious for their relentless manner of killing prey.
13:9 By turning against the Lord who only desired to help them (cf. v. 4), the Israelites had done something that would result in their own destruction. How ironic it was that Israel's helper would become her destroyer!
13:10 The people had formerly asked their leaders to give them a king like all the other nations. They hoped that their king and his princes would provide deliverance for them. God had given them kings, first Saul (1 Sam. 8:4-9; 12:12) and more recently the kings of Israel that were not of David's line but were kings of the people's own choosing (1 Kings 12:16-20). Yet all these kings had proved ineffective in saving the Israelites. Only Yahweh was their savior (v. 4).
13:11 God conceded to His people's request for a king, but it made Him angry because it expressed their reluctance to trust and obey Him. When Saul proved ineffective, since He did not trust in Yahweh, the Lord removed him, which also made Him angry. The Lord would also remove all the Ephraimite kings because they followed the pattern of Saul. The sins and bad times that all these kings' reigns brought on Israel were unnecessary and displeasing to the Lord who wanted His people to enjoy peace and prosperity.
13:12 God would not forget Israel's sins. Its iniquities were rolled up (Heb. sarar) in a bundle like a scroll and stored up (Heb. sapan) like a treasure. They stood as hard evidence that condemned the nation.
13:13 Israel was like a baby that refused to come out of its mother's womb in the sense that it refused to leave its comfortable sin. Despite the mother's (God's) strenuous efforts to bring the child into freedom, Israel refused to repent. This was evidence that Israel was a foolish child. She would die rather than leave her sins apparently feeling that the proper time for repenting was not yet.
13:14 The Lord asked rhetorically if He would buy the Israelites back out of death's hand. Would He pay a price for their redemption? No, compassion would be hidden from His sight; He would have no pity on them. He appealed for death (like a thorn bush) to torment the Israelites, as though thorns tore their flesh. He called on the grave (as a hornet) to sting them fatally.
Later in history God did provide a ransom for His people from the power of the grave, and He redeemed them from death. He did this when Jesus Christ died on the cross and rose again. God's future redemptive work for His people meant that death would not be the end for Israel even though judgment in the near future was inevitable.
The Apostle Paul quoted the famous couplet in this verse in 1 Corinthians 15:15:55 and applied it to the effect of Christ's redemption on all of God's people. Because God did provide a ransom and redeemed His people, death and the grave are not the final judgment and home of the believer. God has a glorious future beyond His punishment for sin for His own, both for national Israel and for Christians. Paul's use of this passage does not support the view that the church fulfills God's promises concerning Israel. Here in Hosea the promise is that Israel would indeed suffer death and the grave, not that she would escape it. Paul turned the passage around and showed that Jesus Christ's resurrection overcame the judgment and death that are inevitable for sinners.
13:15 With the removal of God's compassion (v. 14), Israel's prosperity would end. Hosea described that change like a hot eastern desert wind sweeping over Israel and drying up all its water sources. Israel had flourished among its neighbors, as a plant does when it grows in shallow water among reeds. Like a sirocco Assyria would sweep over Israel from the east and cause the nation of Israel to wither. The Assyrians would plunder everything valuable in the land.
13:16 Yahweh would hold Samaria, a metonymy for Israel, guilty for rebelling against Him, her covenant lord and God (cf. 7:13; 8:1). Israel's soldiers would die in battle (cf. Lev. 26:25), her children would suffer unmerciful executions (cf. Deut. 28:52-57; 32:25), and the Assyrians would even cut open her pregnant women with their swords (cf. 2 Kings 15:16; Amos 1:13).84These were curses that the Lord warned would follow rebellion against the terms of His covenant (cf. Lev. 26:25; Deut. 28:21; 32:24-25; Amos 4:10).85
