Why did God tell Hosea to marry a prostitute (Hosea 1:2)?

The first chapter mainly consists of symbolic action, which represents the course of God's purposes. "The beginning of the word of Jehovah by Hosea. And Jehovah said to Hosea, Go, take to thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land has committed great whoredom, departing from Jehovah." Nothing can be more evident than this declared object. The prophet is commanded to do that which was necessarily most painful in itself, and suggestive of what he as a man of God must have felt to be humbling as well as repulsive. But such was the attitude of Israel to their God, and Jehovah would make the prophet and those who heeded the prophecy to understand in measure what He must feel as to His people. "So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son. And Jehovah said to him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel. And it shall come to pass at that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel." This was the first great blow. Israel was to be smitten in the house of Jehu, the avenger of the blood-guiltiness that had been brought in by the idolatrous Jezebel. Jehu was a rough man, vain and ambitious, suited notwithstanding to deal in his rude fashion with that which had dishonoured Jehovah — a man far enough outside the current of the feelings of the Spirit of God, but none the less employed in an external way to deal with the evident and open evil of Ahab's house and Israel.

Under certain circumstances mild measures avail nothing; only those of an extreme and drastic kind are of use. The state of Israel had become such, in the days of the kings mentioned in the opening verse of the prophecy before us, that mere words were futile. They would have fallen upon ears that were utterly deaf.

So "the beginning of Jehovah's word by Hosea" was an act that must have been extremely repugnant to himself, but which should call attention in a vivid way to the backsliding state of the nation, and to the judgment that must inevitably ensue.

"We must not imagine things to be unworthy of God, because they do not commend themselves to us. God does not dispense with the moral law, because the moral law has its source in the mind of God Himself. To dispense with it would mean to contradict Himself. But God, who is absolute Lord of all things which He made, may, at His sovereign will, dispose of the lives or things which He created. Thus, as sovereign judge, He commanded the lives of the Canaanites to be taken by Israel, as, in His ordinary providence, He has ordained that the magistrate should not bear the sword in vain, but has made him His minister, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. So, again, He, whose are all things, willed to repay to the Israelites their hard and unjust servitude by commanding them to spoil the Egyptians. He, who created marriage, commanded to Hosea whom he should marry. The prophet was not defiled by taking as his lawful wife, at God's bidding, one defiled, however hard a thing this was."

This is the strongest defense of the literal interpretation of this incident. But there is another interpretation possible, which we believe is the correct one. As the context shows the symbolical meaning of Hosea's marriage is to illustrate Israel 's unfaithfulness. But Israel was not always unfaithful; she played not always the harlot. Of necessity this had to be symbolized in the case of the prophet's marriage. The question then arises, was Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim an impure woman when Hosea married her, or did she become unchaste after her marriage to the prophet? We believe the latter was the case. The Hebrew does not require the meaning that she was impure at the time of the marriage; in fact, as already indicated, the supposition that Gomer lived the life of a harlot before her marriage to the godly prophet, destroys the parallelism, which the prophet's message embodies, with the relation of God to Israel. The expression "a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms" simply intimated to Hosea what the woman he married was going to be. If not taken in this sense it would mean that Gomer had already children when Hosea married her.

Gomer was called "a wife of whoredoms" by the omniscient Lord, in anticipation of her future conduct. She fell and became immoral after her union with Hosea, and not before. In this way she became a symbol of Israel, married unto the Lord, but afterwards became the unfaithful wife. With this view, the entire prophetic message of Hosea in the beginning of this book harmonizes. The name of the woman is likewise suggestive. Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, means "Completion--a double cake of figs." Israel 's wickedness is symbolized as complete and the double cake of figs is symbolical of sensual pleasures. And the prophet in spite of her unfaithfulness still loved her and did not abandon her. This illustrates Jehovah's love for Israel.

Then she bore him a son. Expositors have stated, "The children were not the prophet's own, but born of adultery and presented to him as his." But that can not be the meaning in view of the plain statement "she conceived and bare him a son."

The first three chapters compose the first part, or the revelations of God's purposes with respect to Israel. From the outset Israel is treated as being in a state of rebellion against God The prophet was to unite himself to a corrupt woman (a prophetic type, I doubt not), whose conduct was the expression of that of the people. The son to whom she gives birth is a sign, by means of the name which the prophet is to give him, of the judgment of God on the house of Jehu, and on the kingdom of Israel, which should cease to exist. In fact, after the extinction of Jehu's family, although there were several kings, all was confusion in the kingdom of Israel — the kingdom was lost. It is evident, that, although the zeal of Jehu was energetic in extirpating idolatry, so that in His outward government God could sanction and reward it (and, as testimony, must needs do so), yet the motives that governed him were far from pure. God, therefore, while in His public government blessing Jehu, shews here, where He reveals His thoughts and His real estimate of the work, that He judges righteously and holily; and that that which man brings in of ambition, of cruelty, and even of that false zeal which is but hypocrisy, concealing the gratification of its own will under the name of zeal for Jehovah — all, in a word, which is of self, is not hidden from His eyes, and meets with its just reward, and so much the more from its being masked under the great name of Jehovah.

Hosea was to act a parable, by taking a 'wife of whoredoms,' which may mean that the woman that he was to take would be unfaithful to him; but grace abounds over sin. Hosea's wife was symbolical of Israel who had been unfaithful to Jehovah. He took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, who bore him a son, who, by the Lord's direction, was called Jezreel (a place that had witnessed the judgements of God, 2 Kings 9: 30-37).

In the beginning of his ministry, when Hosea was a young man, the Lord commanded him to take unto him a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms, and that for the reason, because the land hath committed great whoredoms, departing from the Lord. This command was at once executed by the prophet; he took to wife Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim.

At Jehovah’s bidding Hosea married Gomer the daughter of Diblaim a prostitute. Gomer conceived two sons by the name of Jezreel and Lo-ammi and a daughter by the name of Lo - ruhamah (see section on peculiarities). We are not told anything else on Hosea’s life and death.

Hosea is presented to us as under orders to take a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms, and he does so. He takes Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, and by her he has a son, whom he is commanded to call Jezreel; then a daughter, whom, as in like manner commanded, he calls Lo-ruhamah, and then another son, whom he names, still at the bidding of the Lord, Lo-ammi. The first of these children's names signifies the dispersion of Israel; the second, mercy denied to Israel; the third, the Lord's rejection of Israel as His people.

In this action Hosea might say in the words of another Prophet, "Behold I and the children whom the Lord hath given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel;" for in all this the apostasy and judgment of Israel are clearly set forth. The marriage of the Prophet with the wife of whoredoms is Jehovah's covenant with faithless Israel, yielding therefore, as its fruit, judgment, till the children of Israel were found, as they now are, reprobate silver, a "Lo-ammi," a people disclaimed of their God.

But this marriage of the Prophet, typical as it was of the sin and judgment of Israel, is grounded on a fact in their history to which he consequently alludes. Hosea prophesied, as we read, in the days of Jeroboam who was of the house of Jehu; and the circumstance that brought that family into the honour of the kingdom, that is, "the blood of Jezreel," is the sin which called forth the typical marriage of the Prophet, and is taken up by him as the pattern of Israel's transgression, and thus the ground of God's dealings with them. We will open the scene to which he thus makes allusion, and we shall find that, like Ruth, it illustrates the duty of the Goel.

Most expositors of the past and of modern times have difficulties with the thought that a holy God should have given the order to one of his servants to marry a woman living in sin. Many Jews therefore consider this report not as an actual fact but as a symbolical representation. Many a modern researcher has subscribed to this opinion, too. Others want to see a revelation of Jehovah to Hosea in which Israel’s attitude towards his God is expressed in a parable only.

But it is not necessary to interpret the text in such a manner. Another possibility would be that the word “prostitute” or “wife of whoredom” (chap. 1:2) indicates anticipating what Gomer would do after her marriage. On the other hand the phraseology may also be understood to mean that Gomer had led an immoral life before getting married and this would be quite understandable considering the decline of the people. There is another example in the Old Testament of an Israelite’s relationship with a prostitute: Salmon begat Boaz of Rahab the prostitute (Matt. 1:5).

The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land has committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord …