building · noun, common feminine singular construct
work
פֹּ֣עֲלֵיPo.'a.lei
H6466
to do or make (systematically and habitually) · verb, qal active participle, masculine plural construct
iniquity
אָ֑וֶן'A.ven
H205
strictly nothingness · noun, common masculine singular absolute
polluted
עֲקֻבָּ֖ה'a.ku.Bah
H6121
(transitive) fraudulent or (intransitive) tracked · noun, common feminine singular absolute
blood
מִדָּֽםmi.Dam
H1818
blood (as that which when shed causes death) of man or… · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
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
Hosea 12:11 Is there iniquity in Gilead? surely they are vanity: they sacrifice bullocks in Gilgal; yea, their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the…
Hosea 4:2 By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood.
Micah 7:2 The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brot…
Joshua 21:38 And out of the tribe of Gad, Ramoth in Gilead with her suburbs, to be a city of refuge for the slayer; and Mahanaim with her suburbs,
2 Samuel 3:27 And when Abner was returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside in the gate to speak with him quietly, and smote him there under the fifth rib, t…
2 Samuel 20:8 When they were at the great stone which is in Gibeon, Amasa went before them. And Joab’s garment that he had put on was girded unto him, and…
1 Kings 2:5 Moreover thou knowest also what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me, and what he did to the two captains of the hosts of Israel, unto Abner th…
Psalms 10:8 He sitteth in the lurking places of the villages: in the secret places doth he murder the innocent: his eyes are privily set against the poo…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Hosea 6:4–end
Two things, two evil things, both Judah and Ephraim are here charged with, and justly accused of: -
I. That they were not firm to their own convictions, but were unsteady, unstable as water, Hos 6:4, Hos 6:5. O Ephraim! what shall I do unto thee? O Judah! what shall I do unto thee? This is a strange expression. Can Infinite Wisdom be at a loss what to do? Can it be nonplussed, or put upon taking new measures? By no means; but God speaks after the manner of men, to show how absurd and unreasonable they were, and how just his proceedings against them were. Let them not complain of him as harsh and severe in tearing them, and smiting them, as he has done; for what else should he do? What other…
Gilead . . . city--probably Ramoth-gilead, metropolis of the hilly region beyond Jordan, south of the Jabbok, known as "Gilead" (Kg1 4:13; compare Gen 31:21-25).
work iniquity-- (Hos 12:11).
polluted with blood--"marked with blood-traces" [MAURER]. Referring to Gilead's complicity in the regicidal conspiracy of Pekah against Pekahiah (Kg2 15:25). See on Hos 6:1. Many homicides were there, for there were beyond Jordan more cities of refuge, in proportion to the extent of territory, than on this side of Jordan (Num 35:14; Deu 4:41-43; Jos 20:8). Ramoth-gilead was one.
Adam Clarke on Hosea 6:8
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity - In this place Jacob and Laban made their covenant, and set up a heap of stones, which was called Galeed, the heap of testimony; and most probably idolatry was set up here. Perhaps the very heap became the object of superstitious adoration.
John Gill on Hosea 6:8
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity,.... The chief city in the land of Gilead, which lay beyond Jordan, inhabited by Gad and Reuben, and the half tribe of Manasseh; and so belonged to the ten tribes, whose sins are here particularly observed. It had its name from the country, or the country from that, or both from the mountain of the same name. It is thought to be Ramothgilead, a city of refuge, and put for all the cities of refuge in those parts, which were inhabited by priests and Levites; and who ought to have had knowledge of the laws, and instructed the people in them, and observed them themselves, and set a good example to others; but, instead of this, the whole course of their…
The Church Fathers
Galaad a city of idolaters, supplanted by blood, and like the throats of robbers (or "the city of a robber") for both readings are possible. The Septuagint: "There Galad despised me, a city that is devoted to vanity, and disturbs the water, and your strength, O violent men." We read in Ramoth Galaad that Jehu was anointed in king (IV Kings IX), who mixed blood with blood, and overthrew the house of Achab, and before sunrise ordered heaps of his sons' heads to be placed; in this city across the Jordan in the possession of the tribe of Gad, an idol was consecrated, which was inhabited by priests, for it was a city of fugitives. Therefore, the more celebrated and authoritative it was, because it had been delegated to a part of the priests, the more it was the beginning of idolatry and all evil for Israel living across Jordan, so that those who had sinned first were the first to be captured by the Assyrians. And since the province itself is full of thefts, compares them to thieves, just as priests have laid ambushes for the simplicity of the people, so have those [the thieves] done to travelers. Furthermore, according to the tropology, "Gilead" means "migration of testimony"; and he despises God, while he twists the testimonies of the Scriptures into perverse doctrines, and all his works are in vain, and he disturbs the waters of the Church, and from the purest fountains makes muddy and dirty streams that stain the baptized rather than cleanse them. And all the strength of this city, like that of pirate men, while imitating the devil, who, in the sea of this age, in which ships cross over, lies in wait for those who strive to reach port. Finally Symmachus has more clearly interpreted, saying: "And your throat like that of a lying pirate." We read about such pirates in Job: "There is no delay for the pirates" (Job XXV, 3, sec. LXX). Although they seem to boast of themselves in the present age, to stir up the waters, to act vainly, and to carry on piracy, yet there is no delay to the punishments that will quickly overtake them.
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
Gilead · 3. A city — 3. A city
Murder · Exemplified: People of Gilead — Exemplified: People of Gilead
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).
Hosea 6:8
8. Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood.
8. Galaad civitas operantium iniquitatem, astuta a sanguine (ad verbum ita est, vel,retenta a sanguine; alii vertunt, supplantata a sanguine; alii, inquinata a sanguine.)
I shall first speak of the subject, and then something shall be added in its place of the words. The Prophet here notices, no doubt, something special against Gilead, which through the imperfection of history is now to us obscure. But in the first place, we must remember, that Gilead was one of the cities of refuge; and the Levites possessed these cities, which were destined for fugitives. If any one killed a man by chance, that the rel…
The prophet cites a few examples in proof of this faithlessness in the two following verses. Hos 6:8. "Gilead is a city of evil-doers, trodden with blood. Hos 6:9. And like the lurking of the men of the gangs is the covenant of the priests; along the way they murder even to Sichem: yea, they have committed infamy." Gilead is not a city, for no such city is mentioned in the Old Testament, and its existence cannot be proved from Jdg 12:7 and Jdg 10:17, any more than from Gen 31:48-49,
(Note: The statement of the Onomast. (s.v. Γαλαάδ), that there is also a city called Galaad, situated in the mountain which Galaad the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh, took for the Amorite, and that of Jerome…
Hosea traces the way that human rebellion against God began with Adam and spread through the cities of Israel to the land of Judah.
Rashi on Hosea 6:8
who lurk to shed blood Heb. עֲקֻבָּה. Full of people who lurk to murder. Comp. (Jos. 8:13) “and their lyers in wait (עֲקֵבוֹ)”; (Gen. 27:36) “and he deceived me (וַיַּעְקְבֵנִי).”
