Hosea 3:1-5

RESTORATION OF THE OUTCAST WIFE AND OF THE OUTCAST PEOPLE, Hosea 3:1-5.

In the introductory remarks to Hosea 2:2-23, it was stated that chapter iii is the natural continuation of Hosea 1:1-9; it is so, however, not in the sense that the events recorded in Hosea 3:1 ff., followed immediately upon the birth of Lo-ammi (Hosea 1:9), for in chapter 1 nothing is said about the departure of Gomer from the house of Hosea, which is presupposed in Hosea 3:1. The connecting link is easily supplied. Gomer is thought to have fled from her husband’s home, evidently to devote herself more freely to her shameful practices; Hosea 3:2 seems to imply that she had become the slave concubine of another. Impelled by love and a divine impulse the prophet proceeds to buy her back.