3.  The prophecies of Hosea were addressed immediately to the kingdom of the ten tribes, yet so that he did not overlook Judah; for he considered the two kingdoms of Judah and Israel as constituting together the covenant people of God.  Of his personal history we know nothing except that he was the son of Beeri, for the transactions of the first three chapters may be best understood as symbolic acts seen only in vision.  See above, Chap. 22, No. 17.  For any thing that appears to the contrary, he was of Israelitish descent.  As it is generally agreed that Isaiah began to prophesy in the last year of Uzziah’s reign, or but a few years before his death, while Hosea prophesied in the reign of Jeroboam II., the great-grandson of Jehu (2 Kings 14:23), who died about twenty-six years before Uzziah, it follows that Hosea, though partly contemporary with Isaiah, was called to the prophetical work at an earlier period.  If we suppose him to have commenced prophesying two years before the death of Jeroboam, and then add the twenty-six remaining years of Uzziah’s reign, the sixteen of Jotham, the sixteen of Ahaz, and two of the first years of Hezekiah, we shall have a period of sixty-two years.  To Israel this was a calamitous period, embracing four usurpations and murders of the reigning sovereigns, and three invasions of the Assyrians.  See the history in 2 Kings 15:8-31, and 17:1-6.  In the last of these Hosea, king of Israel, became tributary to Shalmaneser, king of Assyria; but he proved unfaithful to his master, and sought the alliance of So, king of Egypt. 2 Kings 17:4.  For this the Assyrian king besieged him in Samaria, and after a siege of three years, took him with the city, and put an end to the kingdom of Israel in the fifth year of Hezekiah, king of Judah.  Hosea seems to have closed his writings when Hoshea was seeking the help of Egypt, while he had at the same time a covenant with Assyria (12:1), consequently somewhere early in Hezekiah’s reign.

4.  Hosea’s style is very concise and sententious, and his diction impresses even the casual reader as original and peculiar.  A remarkable feature of his book is the constancy with which he sets forth the relation of Israel to Jehovah under the figure of the marriage-covenant; thus making unfaithfulness to God, and especially idolatry and idolatrous alliances, to be spiritual adultery and whoredom.  This fact affords a key to the interpretation of the first three chapters, where the nature of the transactions requires that we understand them not as historic events, but as prophetic symbols occurring only in vision.  The remaining eleven chapters contain perhaps a summary of the prophet’s discourses to the people, written by himself near the close of his ministry.  The prophecies of Hosea are repeatedly referred to in the New Testament as a part of the oracles of God.  Matt. 2:15; 9:13; 12:7; Rom. 9:25, 26; and an allusion in 1 Cor. 15:55.  The prophet brings his book to a close with a delightful and refreshing view of the future prosperity and peace of the true Israel, chap. 14.