Commentary on Hosea John Calvin
HOSEA
therefore the floor and the wine-press shall not feed them; I will deprive them of their support, that they may understand that they in vain worship false gods.'' Let us take a common similitude: We see some boys so disingenuous as not to be moved either by disgrace or even by stripes; but as they are subject to the cravings of appetite, when the father deprives them of bread, they nearly lose all hope. Stripes do no good, all warnings are slighted; but when the boy who loves excess sees that bread is denied him, he finds out that his father's displeasure ought to be feared. Thus God corrects men addicted to excessive indulgence; for they are so insensible, that no other remedy can do them any good.
We now, then, apprehend the meaning of the Prophet. He first reproaches the Israelites for loving a reward, for hastening after fictitious gods, that they might glut themselves with great abundance of things: but when the Lord saw that they had become stupefied in their fatness, he said, ``I will deprive them of all their provisions; neither wine nor wheat shall be given them; this want will at length drive them to repentance.'' We hence see how the Lord deals with men according to their disposition. And his manner of speaking ought to be noticed; he says, that neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them. He does not say, that the fields shall be barren; he does not say, that he would send hail or storm; but he says, that neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them; and further, that the new wine shall disappoint them; that is, when they shall think themselves to be blessed with all plenty, when the harvest shall appear abundant, and when they shall have already, by anticipation, swallowed up the large produce of their vineyards, all this shall come to nothing; for neither the floor nor the wine-press shall feed them; nay, the very wine which they thought to have been prepared shall disappoint them. It follows ---
Hosea 9:3
3. They shall not dwell in the Lord's land; but Ephraim shall return to Egypt, and they shall eat unclean things in Assyria.
3. Non habitabunt in terra Jehovae, et revertetur Ephraim in Aegyptum, et in Assyria immundum comedent.
The Prophet proclaims here a heavier punishment --- that the Lord would drive them into exile. It was indeed a dreadful repudiation, when they were deprived of the land of Canaan, which was the Lord's rest, as it is called in the Psalms, (Psalm
132:14.) While they dwelt in the land of Canaan, they lived as it were in the habitations of God, and could have a sure hope that he would be a father to them: but when they were thence expelled, the Lord testified that he regarded them as aliens; it was the same as when a father disinherits his son. The Prophet now threatens them not only with the want of food, but also with repudiation, which was far more grievous --- They shall not dwell, he says, in the Lord's land
There is an elegant play on words in the verbs here used; {,}ישבוishebu, and {,}ושבusheb; the one is from {,}ישבisheb, and the other from {,}שובshub. `They shall not dwell in the Lord's land; but Ephraim shall return into Egypt:' and the other circumstance is still more dreadful. In Assyria they shall eat what is unclean; for it was the same as if the Lord intended to blend that holy people with the profane
Gentiles, so that there should be afterwards no difference; for the uncleanness of