Striking New Images
(Chapter Seven)

Introduction

In this Chapter, we find the Prophet Hoshea using powerful new images, some drawn, surprisingly, from the kitchen – a “baker, a burning oven, leavened dough, giving us in the early aftermath of Pesach, additional insight into the spiritual significance of “chametz,” a cake not turned over” (Hoshea 7:4-7), from everyday life - a “man who has lost track of his days, and suddenly finds himself aged” (Hoshea 7:9), from the field – a “dove with no instinct of self-preservation, easily trapped by man, nor effective defenses against its natural enemies, readily brought down by air-borne predators, such as hawks and eagles” (Hoshea 7:10-11), but having little to fear from a hunter who uses a bow that “cannot shoot straight” (Hoshea 7:16).

Selected Commentary

Hoshea 7:1

"When I would heal Israel, (I am prevented from doing so) because the iniquity of Ephraim and the sins of Shomron are not concealed, for they produce falsehood; thieves rob indoors, and bands of highwaymen conduct raids on the roads."

RASHI
HaShem (in the role of Spiritual Physician) says, ”When I wish to heal them of their sins, they fail My spiritual examination, as individuals and as a society – as individuals, they produce innumerable thieves and as a society, bands of raiding bandits, committing the sin of  “chamas,” violence, the same crime committed by the “Dor HaMabul,” the Generation of the Great Flood, that caused HaShem to destroy all living things in the time of Noach (Bereshit, Chapters 6-8).  Interestingly, “chamas” is the same name as one of the “leading” terrorist groups now violently harassing the State of Israel.

MAHARI Kara
”When I was engaged in forgiving them for the sin of the first Golden Calf, suddenly they make two new ones!”

Ib’n Ezra
Since HaShem said (Hoshea 6:1), “He tore us and He healed us,” we were confident that He would in fact heal us, but when He tried to, He found that He could not, for the People of Israel were continuing to act in their same sinful ways, acting as thieves, and harassing travelers on the roads.

Metzudat David 
They exhibit a progression of evil, moving from crimes of individuals (thieves) to crimes of large groups (raiding parties).

Hoshea 7:2

"They do not say in their heart that I remember all their evil; Now their deeds have surrounded them – they are before My Face!"

RASHI
They deny My Omniscience, that I know all their deeds, and are oblivious to the fact that before Me, there is no forgetfulness.

MAHARI Kara
The sheer volume of their sins has surrounded them with their evil; and made it impossible for Me to overlook it.

RADAK 
Their denial is that described by RASHI, but the RADAK adds that when they receive their punishment, they will then realize that nothing can be hidden from Me.


Hoshea 7:3

"With their evil, they make the king glad, and with their lies, princes."

RASHI
Their king is pleased with the evil that they commit.

MAHARI Kara
With their robberies of households and travelers, they make their king and his officers happy, because they share the stolen property with them.

RADAK 
When the People of the Kingdom of Israel agreed to worship the New Golden Calves, they delighted the king and his officers, and when they uttered the falsehood, “These are our gods, O Israel,” thus appearing to accept the “new religion” not only in action but also in belief, they also delighted the king and his “Ministers of Religion.”

Hoshea 7:4
"They are all adulterers, like an oven heated by the baker; the arouser rests from kneading the dough until it leavens."

In the above verse, the Prophet refers to the natural process of “chimutz,” leavening.  This is a process in which, due to biochemical reactions, there is a natural release of carbon dioxide gas, that puffs up the dough.  The Prophet is using it as a “mashal,” a metaphor for a person’s being inflated with desire, because he has allowed his ego to be “puffed up” beyond reason. 

The task of the Jew, one of which he learns from the avoidance of “chametz” on Pesach, is to maintain his perspective, that he is the servant and HaShem is the Master, and the Only One entitled to a large ego, even though He Himself flees from that characteristic.  As Rabbi Yochanan says, “Every place where you find the Greatness of the Holy One, Blessed Be He, there do you also find His humility.

RASHI
Their desire burns within them as does a burning oven; once the plan of evil is formulated, their desire allows them to sleep overnight, with the desire increasing, before bringing the plan into action, as a baker allows his oven to get hot before he actually uses it to bake.

Targum Yonatan
They all lust for their neighbors’ wives, and burn like an oven that the baker has heated, and will therefore be exiled from their cities, because they failed to remember the great miracles performed for them at the time of Pesach, the time of Matzah, that they ate before the dough had risen.
 

RADAK
The usual time for heating the oven was when the baker would pause from awakening the women who would bake their bread in his oven, and that was from the time of the kneading of the dough until it would leaven.  When it had leavened, he would awaken them that they should come with their dough to bake it.  During that interval, the oven would heat.  The Prophet exaggerates, but not by much, when he says that the people became as heated with desire, as their ovens, with heat for baking.

Hoshea 7:5
"The day of our king, the princes became ill from the heat of the wine; he (the king) placed his hand with the scorners."

RASHI
”The day of our king” means the day that we crowned our king.  On that happy occasion, the citizens of the Kingdom of Israel celebrated not in a dignified, sober manner, but rather in the manner of drunken revelry.  This deviant behavior was carried to the point that the king would withdraw his favor from the conscientious, capable advisors to the drunken, mindless revelers.

MAHARI Kara 
On the day that the People appointed Yeravam ben Nevat, that evil king’s paranoia immediately set in.  Yeravam thought that his grip on the kingship was very tenuous, because when the People would go up to Yerushalayim on the three Pilgrim Festivals (Pesach, Shavuot and Sukkot), as the Torah commands, they would abandon him and return to Rechavam.  They would see in the Kingdom of Yehudah a real spiritual center, the “Beit HaMikdash,” the Holy Temple.  They would also perceive that only Rechavam, King of “Malchut Yehudah,” from which they had seceded, and not Yeravam, would be able to sit in the Temple Courtyard, the “Azarah,” because of the law that no one but a member of the Family of David was allowed to sit there.

He decided to act in such a manner that he would preclude his People from attending the Temple worship in Jerusalem.  He announced that he would be building two new shrines for public worship, which would, in effect replace Yerushalayim and the “Beit HaMikdash.”  He told his People some of the practical advantages, including the fact that his two-site shrine would be much more roomy, although the Mishnah in Pirkei Avot (5:7) teaches that this was by a miracle less of a problem than ordinary capacity considerations would indicate, and of course that the trip would be shorter.  When many People attempted to go to Yerushalayim anyway, he intercepted them and had them killed.

He seated two scoffers next to each righteous person in his kingdom, and he instructed them to engage the righteous in a debate; this is what the verse refers to when it speaks of “And the King allied himself with the scoffers.”

Hoshea 7:6

"For they have made ready their heart like an oven with their ambush; all night their baker sleeps, in the morning he burns like a flaming fire."

RASHI
The People prepared themselves for their ambush, as an oven is prepared and made ready for baking.

RADAK
The heart, it was believed, is the organ of thought and, more likely, the power behind it, and that is the “baker” of this allegory.   

Hoshea 7:7

"They are all heated like an oven and they devour their judges; all their kings have fallen, none of them calls to me."

RASHI
In the Talmud Yerushalmi (Avodah Zarah 1:1), we find, “On the day that the princes crowned Yeravam, they came to him and said, ‘Get up and make idols for us.’  But he refused, thinking, “Maybe the People will change their mind, and are only asking for this now that they are drunk.”  He said to them, “Come back in the morning.”  When they came back, they asked for the same thing.  Again, he refused, saying, “I am afraid of your Sanhedrin (Supreme Court) who will kill me if I do this crime against the Torah.”  But the People said that they would kill the Sanhedrin.  And this is what the verse refers to when it says, “…and they devour their judges…”

Hoshea 7:8

"Ephraim mingles with the peoples; Ephraim was as a cake that was not turned over."

RASHI
…quotes the Targum Yonatan who explains that the Kingdom of Israel will mingle in Exile with the other nations.

RADAK 
A cake that was not turned over becomes burnt on the bottom and unbaked on top; that is the “mashal,” the metaphor, representing the “half-baked” idea of the Kingdom of Israel to erect idols in Beit El and Dan, repeating one of the worst sins of the People of Israel in the desert.

Hoshea 7:9

"Strangers have consumed his strength, but he did not know; also old age was cast into him, but he did not know."

RASHI
In the time of Yehoachaz, the power of the Kingdom of Israel was vastly decreased by confrontations with the Kings of Aram, as the strength of an old man is vastly decreased from what it was in the days of his youth.  But Yeravam ben Yoash, grandson of Yoash, did not know that the reason for the weakening was the continuing sin. 

RADAK
In general, an old man, especially if he feels that his days on earth are numbered and that his record is far from blemish-free, will do “Teshuvah,” Repentance.  However, even the last King of Israel, Hoshea ben Elah, maintained his stubbornness, and refused to do “Teshuvah.”

Hoshea 7:10

"And the pride of Israel was humbled before him, and they did not return to the L-rd their G-d, and did not seek Him despite this."

RASHI
…quotes Targum Yonatan, “And the Pride of Israel was humbled, and they realized that the reason was their abandonment of HaShem, but nevertheless, their arrogance and stubbornness prevented them from changing their ways.”

Hoshea 7:11
"And Ephraim was like a mindless dove, without a heart; they called upon Egypt, they went to Assyria.”

RASHI
Ephraim, like the “Yonah,” has no “heart,” in the sense of “intelligence,” to distinguish what is good for it from what is bad for it.  For example, it called for help to Egypt (!), whose entire history of relationship with the People of Israel, was as persecutors.

RADAK
Just as the Yonah, or any other bird, doesn’t understand that taking the bait from a trap will not be to its advantage, Israel doesn’t understand that going to Egypt or Ashur for assistance, rather than to HaShem, in whom all power resides, is a big mistake.

Hoshea chose the Yonah because it is even less “intelligent” than other birds, because it lacks a “gall bladder,” which must have been thought of in ancient times, and maybe correctly, that in the bird kingdom, intelligence is focused more in the gall bladder and the heart, than in the brain.

Author’s Remark:  It is interesting to note that the Yonah was the bird that revealed to Noach that the “Mabul,” or Great Flood, was over, by not returning to the Ark.  It is also interesting to note that the dove, along with the pigeon, was used as a sacrifice on the altar (for example, VaYikra 1:14-17), to help restore peace between the human being and his Creator.  And, in “Shir HaShirim,” the Song of Songs, it is portrayed in a very beautiful light, and is a “mashal,” or metaphor, for the People of Israel, in terms of its beauty and loyalty.

Hoshea 7:12
"When they go, I will spread My net over them; like the fowl of the heaven I will bring them down.  I will chastise them as I let their congregation hear."

RASHI
”My Net”- HaShem says that He will let the events of history, not guided by His protection, but by the logic of cause and effect, bring disaster upon the wayward Jewish People.

“I will bring them down” – Just as there are natural predators, so are there predatory nations, such as Babylonia, Ashur, Rome and Germany who, unchecked, will use their power to inflict catastrophe upon the world and especially upon the Jewish People.

“I will chastise them” – As we find that the People came to Yirmiyahu the Prophet and asked him to prophecy whether it would be good or bad for them to flee to Egypt.  His response was, “If you run to Egypt to escape the sword, the sword will find you there in the personage of Nevuchadnezzar.”

RASHI cites the opinions of two prominent Grammarians and Commentators: Menachem Ib’n Seruk interprets “Aysirem” as “I will tie them in a knot.” Dunash Ib’n Librat, however, interprets that word as meaning, “I will make them suffer.”

Hoshea 7:13

"Woe is to them for they have wandered away from Me; plunder to them for they have rebelled against Me.  I would redeem them, but they speak lies about me."

RASHI
”I wanted to redeem them from the trouble in which they found themselves, but their continuous lies made that impossible.”  This refers specifically to when they said to Yirmiyahu that he had lied to them and did not represent the true opinion of HaShem, concerning whether they should flee to Mitzrayim.

RADAK 
The Kingdom of Israel wandered away from Me when they chose to worship the calves constructed by Yeravam.

Hoshea 7:14

"And they did not cry out to Me with their heart, therefore they will wail on their beds; because of the corn and the wine that they store up, they turn away from Me."

RASHI
They have piles and piles of grain and (in typical Jewish fashion when life becomes “too easy”), they rebelled against Me.

RADAK
They didn’t cry out to Me because of their mistaken notion that I wasn’t listening to their cries and was unaware of their situation, whether it was good or bad (that I had abandoned them).

Hoshea 7:15 

"But I chastised them?  I strengthened their arms, yet to Me they attribute evil."

RASHI
I attempted to strengthen their belief in Me by sending many Prophets to give them reproof, but that too was to no avail.

Hoshea 7:16

“They will return but to no avail; they were like a deceitful bow; their princes shall fall by the sword, from the fury of their tongue. This is their derision in the land of Egypt .”

RASHI
The expression “lo al” means “not to their advantage.”

A “deceitful bow” is a bow that doesn’t shoot straight; if you aim north, it shoots south, and vice versa.

The expression “fury of their tongue” refers to the hostile response that they gave to Yirmiyahu.

”Derision in the land of Egypt” refers to the Egyptian response to their arrival, “Why have you returned to us?  Is it to inflict more punishments upon us?  Was it not prophesied to you that ‘You will never see them in power again!?’ ”