Hosea 10:6-8

6. The calf itself will be carried to Assyria for a present Not a present to secure help (Hosea 7:11; Hosea 12:1), though LXX. reads, “they shall carry it”; but after the conquest it is to be carried off as a part of the booty, which will be an additional proof of its helplessness.

King Jareb See on Hosea 5:13.

Shall receive shame,… shall be ashamed Not so much, they will have a sense of remorse and shame, but, they will be put to shame or confusion (Isaiah 1:29).

Of Or, through.

His own counsel Counsel is the ability to find ways and means and to adapt them to proper ends (compare Isaiah 11:2). The establishment of the calf worship was thought to be a master stroke (1 Kings 12:26 ff.); it is that very policy that will prove Israel’s undoing.

Hosea 10:7 should be translated, “Samaria is destroyed, her king is like foam upon the water.” The tenses are prophetic perfects, equivalent to shall be, for the destruction is still future (Hosea 10:6; Hosea 10:8). The judgment will reach its climax in the fall of Samaria. It did so when about fifteen years later the city was taken by Sargon of Assyria, in 722-721.

Her king The ruling monarch, not the idol god (Amos 5:26).

As the foam So Targum, Vulgate, and a few modern commentators. The meaning of the Hebrew word is uncertain: Probably, like a chip, which is tossed about and, irresistibly carried hither and thither by the stream, finally vanishes forever.

Hosea 10:8 in a sense continues Hosea 10:6; the calf is to be carried away and the very place where it has stood is to be smitten by Jehovah. To prevent the apparent interruption of the thought and to preserve the climax Harper places 8a immediately after Hosea 10:6.

High places See on Hosea 4:13.

Aven Beth-aven (Hosea 10:5).

Sin They were the embodiment of Israel’s sin (compare Hosea 4:12 ff.). The sanctuary, the altar, everything will vanish so completely that thorns and thistles will be allowed to grow undisturbed upon the ancient site (Hosea 9:6). When the king has been swept away, the capital destroyed, the idols carried away, the sanctuary leveled to the ground, when all this has come to pass the people that are left behind will in their despair cry out for swift death and destruction; they will call for the mountains to cover them that they may be compelled no longer to endure the terrible judgments of Jehovah (compare Luke 23:30; Revelation 6:16).