The Expositor's Bible: The Book of the Twelve Prophets, Vol. 1: Commonly Called the MinorSmith, George Adam
Religion
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of the Twelve Prophets, Vol. 1: Commonly Called the Minor
Smith, George Adam
Bible. Minor Prophets -- Commentaries
shall I do to thee, Ephraim? what shall I do to thee, Judah?_--there
are no apparent objections; and they are generally admitted by
critics. As Kuenen says, it would have been surprising if Hosea had
made no reference to the sister kingdom. His judgment of her is amply
justified by that of her own citizens, Isaiah and Micah.
Other short passages of doubtful authenticity will be treated as we
come to them; but again it may be emphasised that, in a book of such
a style as this, certainty on the subject is impossible.
Finally, there may be given here the only notable addition which the
Septuagint makes to the Book of Hosea. It occurs in xiii. 4, after
_I am Jehovah thy God_: "That made fast the heavens and founded the
earth, whose hands founded all the host of the heaven, and I did not
show them to thee that thou shouldest follow after them, and I led
thee up"--_from the land of Egypt_.
At first this recalls those apostrophes to Jehovah's power which
break forth in the Book of Amos; and the resemblance has been taken
to prove that they also are late intrusions. But this both obtrudes
itself as they do not, and is manifestly of much lower poetical
value. See page 203.
* * * * *
We have now our material clearly before us, and may proceed to the more
welcome task of tracing our prophet's life, and expounding his teaching.
FOOTNOTES:
[394] See below, pp. 213 f.
[395] _Geschichte_, pp. 93 ff., 214 ff., 439 f.
[396] A list of the more obvious is given by Kuenen, p. 324.
[397] The first chapter in the Hebrew closes with ver. 9.
[398] Cf. this with Amos; above, pp. 192 ff.
[399] König's arguments (_Einleitung_, 309) in favour of the
possibility of the genuineness of the verse do not seem to me to be
conclusive. He thinks the verse admissible because Judah had sinned
less than Israel; the threat in vv. 4-6 is limited to Israel; the
phrase _Jehovah their God_ is so peculiar that it is difficult to
assign it to a mere expander of the text; and if it was a later hand
that put in the verse, why did he not alter the judgments against
Judæa, which occur further on in the book?
[400] So Cheyne and others, Kuenen adhering. König agrees that they
have been removed from their proper place and the text corrupted.
[401] Rom. ix. 25, 26, which first give the end of Hosea ii. 23 (Heb.
25), and then the end of i. 10 (Heb. ii. 2). See below, p. 249, _n._ 2.
[402] 721 B.C.
[403] Stade, _Gesch._, I. 577; Cornill, _Einleitung_, who also would
exclude _no king and no prince_ in iii. 4.
[404] This objection, however, does not hold against the removal of
merely _and David_, leaving _their king_.
[405] ii. 7, 11, 14, 17 (Heb.). In i. 4 B-text reads Ἰούδα for יהוא
while Q^{mq} have Ἰηου.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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