Hosea 1:6

"And she conceived again and bare a daughter. And Jehovah said unto him, Call her name Lo-ruhamah; for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel, that I should in any wise pardon them."

"Conceived and bare a daughter ..." Note that it is not stated here that Gomer bare Hosea a daughter. Some have considered this an unimportant variation, pointing to the economy of words in the narrative and the obvious purpose of focusing attention upon the symbolical names of the children; but the very names given by the Lord to the last two children certainly raise the question of their true father, especially in connection with the fact that "children of whoredom" were prophesied from the very first.

"Call her ... Lo-ruhamah ..." This name means "unpitied," or "no pity," leading to the deduction that Gomer herself refused to bestow a mother's love upon her infant daughter. Myers rejected these commonly understood meanings of the name saying, "They are a weak rendering of the Hebrew which means unloved, or disliked."[22]

Again from Myers, "The name of this child signifies the breach of the Covenant love which existed between God and Israel."[23] This is indeed true and points up the extensive shadow of the entire prior history of Israel which falls over this tragic story. The unfaithful wife presupposes a covenant marriage between God and Israel, and the whole impact of Hosea has meaning only in the light of that prior relationship. Not only did the divine covenant with Israel exist at this time, it had existed for centuries and was at the point of being abrogated by God Himself. All of the profound teachings of the Torah lie behind this narrative, the inference being absolutely undeniable that the Torah (or Pentateuch) not only existed, but that it was known thoroughly by Israel, as witnessed by their breaking of its specific terms. Brueggmann is correct in pointing out that:

"The new direction of scholarship, which is not the movement of any special school or tradition of scholars, makes it clear beyond doubt that we cannot understand the prophets except in relation to the old and legal traditions preserved in the Torah."[24]

Hosea's domestic experience is meaningless in its application to the affairs of the nation of Israel, except in the context of the violated covenant between God and Israel.