to grave · verb, qal imperfect, 1st person common singular
things
רֻבֵּ֖יri.bov
H7230
abundance (in any respect) · noun, common masculine plural construct
law
תּֽוֹרָתִ֑יto.ra.Ti
H8451
a precept or statute · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix
counted
נֶחְשָֽׁבוּnech.Sha.vu
H2803
properly · verb, niphal perfect, 3rd person common plural
thing
זָ֖רzar
H2114
to turn aside (especially for lodging) · adjective, 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
Deuteronomy 4:6-8 Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes,…
Romans 7:12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.
2 Kings 17:15-16 And they rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified against them; and t…
Nehemiah 9:13-14 Thou camest down also upon mount Sinai, and spakest with them from heaven, and gavest them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes and…
Nehemiah 9:26 Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against thee, and cast thy law behind their backs, and slew thy prophets which testified ag…
Psalms 50:17 Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest my words behind thee.
Psalms 119:18 Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.
Psalms 147:19-20 He sheweth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Hosea 8:8–end
It was the honour and happiness of Israel that they had but one God to trust to and he all-sufficient in every strait, and but one God to serve, and he well worthy of all their devotions. But it was their sin, and folly, and shame, that they knew not when they were well off, that they forsook their own mercies for lying vanities; for,
I. They multiplied their alliances (Hos 8:9): They have hired lovers, or (as the margin reads it) they have hired loves. They were at great expense to purchase the friendship of the nations about them, that otherwise had no value nor affection at all for them, nor cared for having any thing to do with them but only upon the Shechemites' principles - Shall not t…
great things of . . . law-- (Deu 4:6, Deu 4:8; Psa 19:8; Psa 119:18, Psa 119:72; Psa 147:19-20). MAURER not so well translates, "the many things of My law."
my law--as opposed to their inventions. This reference of Hosea to the Pentateuch alone is against the theory that some earlier written prophecies have not come down to us.
strange thing--as if a thing with which they had nothing to do.
Adam Clarke on Hosea 8:12
I have written to him the great things of my law - I have as it were inscribed my laws to them, and they have treated them as matters in which they had no interest.
John Gill on Hosea 8:12
I have written to him the great things of my law,.... Which was given by Moses to Israel at the appointment of God, in which were many commands, holy, just, and true; a multiplicity of them, as the Targum, relating to the honour of God, and the good of men; many excellent and useful ones of a moral nature, and others of a ceremonial kind; and particularly concerning sacrifices, showing what they should be, the nature and use of them, and where and on what altar they should be offered; and which pointed at the great sacrifice of the Messiah, who is both altar, sacrifice, and priest: and these things were frequently inculcated by the prophets, who from time to time were sent unto them; so that…
The Church Fathers
I will write to him many of my laws, which are regarded as alien: they will offer sacrifices, they will slaughter meats and eat, and the Lord will not receive them." LXX: "I will write to them a multitude: their rightful altars have been regarded as foreign. Because if they sacrifice and eat meat, the Lord will not accept them:" which I had previously given through Moses. But what profit is there in writing further, since he has despised those which he previously received? Is it not contempt of God when, at my command that there be one altar in Jerusalem, idols were made on all the mountains and hills to provoke the Lord? They also made altars for the same reason, not to please me, but so they could eat the meat of the many sacrifices offered, according to what the Lord says in the gospel, "Amen, amen I say unto you, you seek me, not because you saw miracles, but because you did eat of the loaves, and were filled." (John VI, 26). For every pursuit of sacrifices, they have it, to devour the offerings, not to please God through them; and the Lord will not receive those which they have immolated not to Him, but to their own stomachs and throats. But the apostle teaches that there is one altar in the Church, and one faith, and one baptism (Ephesians 4), which heretics, deserting them, have fabricated many altars for themselves, not to placate God, but to multiply transgressions. Therefore they do not deserve to receive God's laws, since they have previously despised the ones they received. And if they say anything about the Scriptures, it must be understood, not as divine words, but as expressing the ideas of the heathen. These men offer many sacrifices and eat the meat of these animals, abandoning the one sacrifice of Christ; and they do not partake of his flesh, the flesh which is the food of believers. Whatever they do, pretending to follow the order and rites of sacrifices, whether they give alms, make promises of chastity, or feign humility, and deceive the simple with false flattery, God will accept nothing of such sacrifices.
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
Decalogue · Written by Go — Written by Go
Table · 4:13;5:4-22;9:10; — 4:13;5:4-22;9:10;
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 8:12
12. I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.
12. Scripsi ei pretiosa legis meae, sicut alienum reputata sunt (quasi aliquid extraneum reputatum fuit.)
The Prophet shows here briefly, how we ought to judge of divine worship, and thus intends to cut off the handle from all devices, by which men usually deceive themselves, and form disguises, when at any time they are reproved. For he sets the law of God, and the rule it prescribes, in opposition to all the inventions of men. Men think God unjust, except he receives as good and legitimate whatever they imagine to be so; but God, as it is said in another place, prefers obedience to…
This threat is accounted for in Hos 8:11., by an allusion to the sins of Israel. Hos 8:11. "For Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, the altars have become to him for sinning. Hos 8:12. I wrote to him the fulnesses of my law; they were counted as a strange thing." Israel was to have only one altar, and that in the place where the Lord would reveal His name (Deu 12:5.). But instead of that, Ephraim had built a number of altars in different places, to multiply the sin of idolatry, and thereby heap more and more guilt upon itself. לחטא is used, in the first clause, for the act of sin; and in the second, for the consequences of that act. And this was not done from ignorance of the divine w…
Israel has built many altars: As Israel’s idolatry increased, her religious activities increased in an attempt to take away sin; instead, these rites only increased her sin.
Rashi on Hosea 8:12
I write for them I constantly reprimand them through My prophets, and write for them the great things of My Law, but they are considered a strange thing.
