Ephraim, he mixeth himself with the peoples; Ephraim is a cake not turned.
Hosea speaks to the northern kingdom of Israel, which he calls Ephraim after its leading tribe. He charges it with blending into the nations around it, and God's picture of the result comes from the kitchen: bread left lying on one side of the fire.
The first half of the verse describes something Ephraim did to himself. One writer draws out how deliberate that was, and what it undid:
"He mixes himself with the peoples." That means he lets himself be mixed up with foreigners — people outside Israel, strangers to God's promises, who do not know the true God. It is his own choice of company, for reasons he thinks are sound and good enough. But it is a grave dishonour to the God of Israel, who had set this people apart to Himself by blood and power so that they might be holy to the Lord. By deliberately mixing himself among the nations, Ephraim is in effect cancelling God's plan as far as he can. God meant them to bring blessing to all nations — a living lesson in the rich goodness and truth of the merciful, gracious, patient Lord God.
Why did Ephraim mix at all? One writer traces it to weak resolve, and then explains the baking picture:
Weakness of purpose marked the ten tribes that had revolted. They were weak-willed, and the heathen worship around them drew them away. So the Lord said of them, "Ephraim mixes himself with the peoples; Ephraim is a cake not turned." The figure is expressive. In baking, people in the East turn their cakes over and over so the heat reaches every part. An unturned cake is burnt, not baked. It is useless unless both sides bake through.
Being half done is not a mild fault. It puts Ephraim in the same class as a group named much later in the Bible:
Ephraim (that is, Israel) is compared to "a cake not turned," Hosea 7:8, as unpalatable, like the lukewarm, "neither hot nor cold," of Revelation 3:16.
This was a point of no return that Ephraim need not have reached:
Ephraim had mixed himself up among the nations, to the dishonour of the Lord. There might have been some hope if he had judged this self-willed contempt and confusion, and had repented. But he has become "a cake not turned." So now it is only a question of getting so burnt that he is good for nothing.
The same figure has been applied to believers who take up some parts of God's word and quietly leave others aside:
If we neglect any part of the truth we become undeveloped as to that part, and like "a cake not turned," as Hosea puts it.
Others hear this verse as God's comment on Christians who lower the line between themselves and the world in order to attract it:
You must mix with the world, and let it mix with you; how else will you do it good?… And as they sink more and more to the world's level, they persuade themselves the world is rising up to theirs. Meanwhile God is saying, as He said of His people long ago, "Ephraim mixes himself with the peoples; Ephraim is a cake not turned. Strangers devour his strength, and he knows it not; gray hairs are sprinkled upon him, and he knows it not."
The danger sits in that last line: the grey hairs go unnoticed. Hosea says twice over that Ephraim does not know it, and one writer explains why that matters:
It is as if to say: without his knowing it, the spiritual dry-rot has set in. His conduct, character and conversation are becoming infected — and infectious.
- Mixture — Ephraim's ruin began with his own choice of company, made for reasons that seemed sound to him. That choice cancelled the very purpose God had set him apart for.
- Half-baked — Bakers turned their cakes so the heat reached both sides. Left unturned, bread is burnt on one face and raw on the other, and neither side alone will feed anyone.
- Unpalatable — A half-turned cake is not fit to eat. It is the same picture as the lukewarm, "neither hot nor cold," of Revelation 3:16.
- Wasted — Repentance was still open while Ephraim could judge his own confusion. Once the cake is not turned, one question is left: how burnt it gets.
- Unnoticed — Strangers eat his strength and grey hairs show, but he does not notice. The picture fits anyone who leaves part of God's truth alone, or drifts to the world's level and feels fine.
Strangers have devoured his strength, and he knoweth [it] not; yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, and he knoweth [it] not.
Hosea speaks to the ten tribes of Israel, called Ephraim here. Their decline is plain to God and invisible to themselves. Strangers drain their strength away, age creeps in, and the same line closes both halves of the verse — he knows it not.
One writer traces the line from Ephraim's mixing with the nations to the ruin it brought:
The prophecy shows Ephraim mixed up among the nations, to the dishonour of Jehovah. There might have been some hope if he had judged this self-willed contempt and confusion and had repented; but he has become "a cake not turned" (verse 8). So it is only a question of getting so burnt as to be good for nothing. It was plain enough that their heathen idols were proving their ruin... The grey hairs showing here and there promised no crown of honour for his head — far from it. They were only a sign of death at work in him, of growing feebleness, and of distance from God.
Another writer names the strangers and says what the grey hairs meant for the nation:
The Lord called Israel to be a separated nation, but Ephraim mingled with the heathen. They adopted heathen ways, heathen manners and heathen vices... The strangers with whom they mingled devoured their strength, and they did not notice the signs of their speedy national decay. This is the meaning of the statement, "gray hairs are sprinkled upon him, and he knows it not."
Decay runs through everything. What makes this verse solemn is the blindness that goes with it:
The tendency of all things here, whether physical, moral or spiritual, is to decline, to decay, and to die. The histories of man, of Israel, of the church, and of ourselves, together and one by one, all testify to this universal fact. But verse 9 holds something more solemn than the signs of decline and decay that Jehovah found in His people. They had no sense of them at all. The natural result of this decline and departure from God is that the soul stops noticing its own state.
Hosea says "he knows it not" twice in one verse. One writer names the condition behind the repeated line:
Signs of spiritual weakness and decay mark Ephraim's outward man. He drifts farther and farther from his Maker... To this Hosea adds, in this striking verse, the twice repeated "he knows it not." It is as though he said: without the man knowing it, the spiritual dry-rot has set in. His conduct, character and conversation are infected, and they infect others.
Another writer sees the same blindness in one man, Samson:
When Delilah had seduced him into revealing his secret, he thought that the resources he had used before were still available to him. But he was tragically mistaken, and the Philistines bound him and put out his eyes as if to mock his ignorance... In a similar way God says this of the ten tribes, represented by Ephraim.
The words also fit one person. A writer finds them in the old prophet of 1 Kings 13, who stayed in Bethel while others moved away from Jeroboam's idol worship:
It is deplorable when this has to be said of a believer in the Lord Jesus, but it seems to have been really true of the old prophet. Like Lot before him, he lived in bad surroundings, and "bad company ruins good morals"... He was not the kind of man God could use to publicly denounce the evils of Jeroboam and his followers.
Another writer turns it on us — the danger of defilement we do not notice, and the remedy:
The danger with us is that we are so open to these defilements and may not be conscious of it... How preserving it is to be aware of defilement, for then we shall take steps to have it removed.
Ephraim could not see his own grey hairs. The One who saw them also watches for the first sign of return:
Who first saw the grey hairs and the turning away of heart? Jehovah. Who saw the first symptoms of returning? Jehovah. Who was the first to notice the departure of the prodigal son and to miss him from the family table? Who was watching for his return? — "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran."
- Mixing — God called Israel to stay separate, but Ephraim mingled with the heathen and took up their ways. He became "a cake not turned," burnt until he was good for nothing.
- Draining — the strangers he mingled with devoured his strength, and his idols were plainly ruining him.
- Ageing — the scattered grey hairs are signs of fast national decay: death at work in him, and distance from God.
- Blindness — worse than the decay is the twice-repeated "he knows it not." Spiritual dry-rot works unnoticed, as Samson found when he reached for strength that was already gone.
- Grace — the God who saw the grey hairs first is the God who sees the first step home, while the wanderer is still a long way off.