If Maury was around for Hosea.....

[Wynteriii]

I've the idea that not all three children listed are Hosea's, but product of Gomer's infidelity. Maury wasn't around for DNA results but maybe you can help figure whether Hosea is or isn't the father of the last 2 children.

 

[Cymro]

Hosea did not have 3 children, neither did he marry a harlot. To do so would contravene Lev 21:7.
The description is typical in nature. Hosea carries on from the Song of Solomon which speaks of the
the true Israel, the Church, the bride of Christ . Solomon being a type of the Prince of Peace, the Lord
Jesus.
Hosea in Ch1 becomes the bridegroom and is married to the apostate Jerusalem who had played the
harlot. The children are the children of Israel after the flesh. Their names and persons are simply prophetic.
eg, Not pitied, and not my people. Gomer is Israel. The chapter in context is speaking of a people who had
whored from the living God, and in 2 :2 God divorces Israel, and 2 :2-5 declares her judgments.

 

[The Conductor]

But isn't Leviticus 21:7 for priests?

 

[scottmaciver]

A quick note from Jeff O'Neil to say his computer is playing up & unfortunately he can't respond to the thread.

 

[DeniseM]

According to Calvin:

Go, he says, take to thee a wife of wantonness, and the children of wantonness; and the
reason is added, for by fornicating, or wantoning, has the land grown wanton. He doubtless
speaks here of the vices which the Lord had long endured with inexpressible forbearance.
By wantoning then has the land grown wanton, that it should not follow Jehovah.
Here interpreters labour much, because it seems very strange that the Prophet should
take a harlot for a wife. Some say that this was an extraordinary case.

3 Certainly such a license could not have been borne in a teacher. We see what Paul requires in a bishop, and no doubt
the same was required formerly in the Prophets, that their families should be chaste and
free from every stain and reproach. It would have then exposed the Prophet to the scorn of
all, if he had entered a brothel and taken to himself a harlot; for he speaks not here of an
unchaste woman only, but of a woman of wantonness, which means a common harlot, for
a woman of wantonness is she called, who has long habituated herself to wantonness, who
has exposed herself to all, to gratify the wish of all, who has prostituted herself, not once
nor twice, nor to few men, but to all. That this was done by the Prophet seems very improbable.

But some reply as I have said, that this ought not to be regarded as a common rule, for
it was an extraordinary command of God. And yet it seems not consistent with reason, that
the Lord should thus gratuitously render his Prophet contemptible; for how could he expect
to be received on coming abroad before the public, after having brought on himself such a
disgrace? If he had married a wife such as is here described, he ought to have concealed
himself for life rather than to undertake the Prophetic office. Their opinion, therefore, is
not probable, who think that the Prophet had taken such a wife as is here described.
Then another reason, utterly unresolvable, militates against them; for the Prophet is
not only bidden to take a wife of wantonness, but also children of wantonness, begotten by
whoredom. It is, therefore, the same as if he himself had committed whoredom.

4 For if we say that he married a wife who had previously conducted herself with some indecency and
want of chastity, (as Jerome at length argues in order to excuse the Prophet,) the excuse is
frivolous, for he speaks not only of the wife, but also of the children, inasmuch as God would
have the whole offspring to be adulterous, and this could not be the case in a lawful marriage.
Hence almost all the Hebrews agree in this opinion, that the Prophet did not actually marry
a wife, but that he was bidden to do this in a vision. And we shall see in the third chapter
(Hosea 3:1) almost the same thing described; and yet what is narrated there could not have
been actually done, for the Prophet is bidden to marry a wife who had violated her conjugal
fidelity, and after having bought her, to retain her at home for a time. This, we know, was
not done. It then follows that this was a representation exhibited to the people.

Some object and say, that the whole passage, as given by the Prophet, cannot be understood
as relating a vision. Why not? For the vision, they say, was given to him alone, and
God had a regard to the whole people rather than to the Prophet. But it may be, and it is
probable, that no vision was presented to the Prophet, but that God only ordered him to
proclaim what had been given him in charge. When, therefore, the Prophet began to teach,
he commenced somewhat in this way: “The Lord places me here as on a stage, to make
known to you that I have married a wife, a wife habituated to adulteries and whoredoms,
and that I have begotten children by her.” The whole people knew that he had done no such
thing; but the Prophet spake thus in order to set before their eyes a vivid representation.
Such then, was the vision, a figurative exhibition, not that the Prophet knew this by a vision,
but the Lord had bidden him to relate this parable, (so to speak,) or this similitude, that the
people might see, as in a living portraiture, their turpitude and perfidiousness. It is, in short,
an exhibition, in which the thing itself is not only set forth in words, but is also placed, as
it were, before their eyes in a visible form. The reason is added, for by wantoning has the
land grown wanton