Hosea 1:6 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Hosea 1:6
And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And God said unto him, Call her name Loruhamah: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away.
to be (or become) pregnant · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person feminine singular
bare
וַתֵּ֣לֶדva.Te.led
H3205
to bear young · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person feminine singular
daughter
בַּ֔תBat
H1323
a daughter (used in the same wide sense as other terms… · noun, common feminine singular absolute
said
וַיֹּ֣אמֶרvai.Yo.mer
H559
to say (used with great latitude) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Call
קְרָ֥אke.Ra'
H7121
to call out to (i.e. properly · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person masculine singular
name
שְׁמָ֖הּshe.Mah
H8034
an appellation · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person feminine singular
Lo-ruhamah
לֹ֣אlo'
H3819
Lo-Ruchamah · proper noun, a woman's name
more
אוֹסִ֜יף'o.Sif
H3254
to add or augment (often adverbial · verb, hiphil imperfect, 1st person common singular
mercy
אֲרַחֵם֙'a.ra.Chem
H7355
to fondle · verb, piel imperfect, 1st person common singular
house
בֵּ֣יתbeit
H1004
a house (in the greatest variation of applications · noun, common masculine singular construct
Israel
יִשְׂרָאֵ֔לYis.ra.'El
H3478
Jisrael · proper noun, a place name
utterly
נָשֹׂ֥אna.So'
H5375
to lift · verb, qal infinitive absolute
away
אֶשָּׂ֖א'e.Sa'
H5375
to lift · verb, qal imperfect, 1st person common singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
1 Peter 2:10 Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
Hosea 2:23 And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not m…
2 Kings 17:6 In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by…
Isaiah 27:11 When the boughs thereof are withered, they shall be broken off: the women come, and set them on fire: for it is a people of no understanding…
Hosea 2:4 And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms.
2 Kings 17:23-41 Until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had said by all his servants the prophets. So was Israel carried away out of their own…
Hosea 9:15-17 All their wickedness is in Gilgal: for there I hated them: for the wickedness of their doings I will drive them out of mine house, I will lo…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Hosea 1:2-7
These words, The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea, may refer either, 1. To that glorious set of prophets which was raised up about this time. About this time there lived and prophesied Joel, Amos, Micah, Jonah, Obadiah, and Isaiah; but Hosea was the first of them that foretold the destruction of Israel; the beginning of this word of the Lord was by him. We read in the history of this Jeroboam here named (Kg2 14:27) that the Lord had not yet said he would blot out the name of Israel, but soon after he said he would, and Hosea was the man that began to say it, which made it so much the harder task to him, to be the first that should carry an unpleasing message and some time before an…
Lo-ruhamah--that is, "not an object of mercy or gracious favor."
take . . . away--Israel, as a kingdom, was never restored from Assyria, as Judah was from Babylon after seventy years. MAURER translates according to the primary meaning, "No more will I have mercy on the house of Israel, so as to pardon them."
John Gill on Hosea 1:6
And she conceived again, and bare a daughter,.... One of the weaker sex; denoting the weaker state of the kingdom of Israel after Jeroboam, as Kimchi thinks; Zachariah his son reigning but six months, and Shallum the son of Jabesh, his successor, reigned but one month, 2 Kings 15:8,
and God said unto him, call her name Loruhamah; which signifies, "she hath not obtained mercy": and what follows explains it to the same sense. The Targum is,
"and they added and did evil works; and he said unto him call their name, who obtained not mercy by their works:''
for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; as he had heretofore, sparing them time after time, though they continued to sin ag…
Hosea 1:6
6. And she conceived again -- and bare a daughter. And God said unto him -- Call her name Loruhamah: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away.
6. Et concepit adhuc (concepit rursum) et peperit filiam: et dixit ei-- Voca nomen ejus Loruchama-- (hoc est-- non adepta misericordiam-- vel-- non dilecta: sic enim Graeci verterunt-- et Paulus sequutus est illam receptam versionem capite-- ad Rom.) quia non adjiciam amplius ut misericordia persequar (vel-- ut diligam) domum Israel-- quia tollendo tollam eos.
The Prophet shows in this verse that things were become worse and worse in the kingdom of Israel, that they sinned, keeping within n…
The Church Fathers
"And she conceived again, and bore a daughter. And he said to her: Call her name without mercy, for I will not add any more to show mercy to the house of Israel, but I will utterly forget them. And I will have mercy on the house of Juda, and I will save them in the Lord their God: and I will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battles, nor by horses, nor by horsemen." LXX: "And she conceived again, and bore a daughter. And he said to her: Call her name, Without mercy: for I will now no more have mercy upon the house of Israel, but I will utterly forget them. But I will have mercy on the house of Juda, and will save them by the Lord their God: and I will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, nor by horses, nor by horsemen." After the bow of Israel was broken and shattered in the valley of Jezreel, and the kingdom of the ten tribes was abandoned, so that they were led into captivity, no longer was Jezreel, that is, the seed of God, nor a son of the male sex born: but a daughter, that is, a fragile sex, subject to the contempt of the victors, and called Without mercy. Therefore she was taken captive, because she had no mercy of God. And the indignation of the Lord must be considered. So that it will never be said to the house of Israel to have mercy on them anymore, but to erase them from his eternal memory; since they serve until today the kings of Persia, and their captivity has never been released. But the house of Judah promises mercy, saying that they will be saved in the Lord their God or in Himself speaking; or the Father will save in the Son according to what is written: "The Lord rained from the Lord" (Gen. XIX, 24) For He saved them ("alt." also) when Israel was handed over to Assyrians, from the hand of Sennacherib, not with bow and sword and war and a multitude of horses, but with His strength, when He sent the Angel and struck one hundred and eighty-five thousand from the Assyrian army in one night (IV Reg. XIX). According to the pattern, we say that those who are called the Seed of God, because of His blood, are without mercy, and have dared to say: "His blood be on us and on our children" (Matt. 27:25), have been serving the Romans until now. But the house of Judah, namely those from the Jews who have confessed the Lord, have been saved not in the strength of an army, but in the preaching of the Gospel. We interpret this in…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Lo-ruhamah — Not pitied, the name of the prophet Hosea’s first daughter, a type of Jehovah’s temporary rejection of his people (Hos. 1:6; 2:23).
Loruhamah — (the uncompassionated), the name of the daughter of Hosea the prophet, given to denote the utterly ruined condition of the kingdom of Israel. (Hosea 1:6)
Children · Were named: Often by God — Were named: Often by God
Israel, Prophecies Concerning · .Of — .Of
Lo-Ruhamah · Hosea’s daughter — Hosea’s daughter
Name · SYMBOLI — SYMBOLI
Prophets · Frequently in their actions, &c were made signs to the people — Frequently in their actions, &c were made signs to the people
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
"And it cometh to pass in that day, that I break in pieces the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel." The indication of time, "in that day," refers not to the overthrow of the house of Jehu, but to the breaking up of the kingdom of Israel, by which it was followed. The bow of Israel, i.e., its might (for the bow, as the principal weapon employed in war, is a synecdochical epithet, used to denote the whole of the military force upon which the continued existence of the kingdom depended (Jer 49:35), and is also a symbol of strength generally; vid., Gen 49:24; Sa1 2:4), is to be broken to pieces in the valley of Jezreel. The paronomasia between Israel and Jezreel is here unmistakeable. And he…
Lo-ruhamah: The names of Hosea’s children were part of his prophetic message (cp. Isa 7:10–8:8).
Rashi on Hosea 1:6
I will not continue to grant clemency Heb. אֲרַחֵם, like לְרַחֵם, to grant clemency.
but I will mete out their portion to them I will mete out to them the portion of their cup and their deed. This expression is like (Gen. 43:34), “And he gave out portions (וַיִּשָּׂא מַשְׂאֹת).”
