Hosea 1:4

And the Lord said unto him call his name Jezreel,.... Which some interpret the "seed of God", as Jerom; or "arm of God", as others; and Kimchi applies it to Jeroboam the son of Joash, who was strong,

And the LORD said unto 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 the Lord said unto him, Hosea the prophet, who as in taking to wife an adulteress, so in giving name’ to his son by her, was to presignify Israel’ s future calamities. Call his name, thy son now born, Jezreel: the word is, The seed of the Lord, or, The arm of the Lord, or, The Lord will scatter; so it may insinuate that God by his own arm will scatter among the people, i.e. the Assyrians, those who were his people or seed. But we have a surer guide to lead us through this, i.e. the history of what was by Jehu done in Jezreel; of which more presently. For; this is the reason why the prophet’ s son is so called. Yet a little while: it was four generations of Jehu God promised the throne to, and now the third that is now running, how near to an end we know not, but are sure it was within twenty-eight years; for Jeroboam began his reign in the fifteenth of Amaziah, and so thirteen years of his forty-one are spent ere Uzziah comes to the throne, ; this according to one account: but accounteth Jeroboam’ s twenty-seventh to be the first of Uzziah, and then there are not above fourteen years to come; so little a while was this here spoken of, for in six months after Jeroboam’ s death Shallum conspired against Zachariah, and slew him, and reigned a month; so Jehu’ s seed was cast out of the throne. Will avenge; inquire after and punish these crimes, which were committed in Jezreel. Heb. I will visit, i.e. as a just and impartial judge I will require an account, and execute punishments. The blood: murders committed are in Scripture expressed thus by blood: here are particularly meant the slaughters made by Jehu’ s hand or by his order, ,11 10:1-7, in Jezreel, where he did with a treacherous mind, and aiming at his own greatness, destroy Ahab’ s house, and slew Ahaziah king of Judah also. This was the just judgment of God upon that wicked house by Jehu executed, but he did it not with that mind God required. Of Jezreel; the town which Ahab chose above others to dwell in, where the dogs licked up Ahab’ s blood, when his chariot was washed and cleansed of the blood of that slain king, and where dogs did eat Jezebel, as the prophet threatened, . Upon the house of Jehu; which had now possessed the throne (Jehu usurped) through the reigns of Jehoahaz, Jehoash, and Jeroboam; but the usurper and his successors adhering to the idolatry of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and adding other sins to it, had now provoked God to declare a sudden extirpation of the family, which God will in his just revenge make as like to Jeroboam’ s family as Ahab’ s, and they had made themselves like them in sin; all which came to pass when Shallum, conspiring against Zachariah, slew him, .

Hosea 1:4 And the LORD said unto 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.Ver. 4. Call his name Jezreel] For the honourable name of Israel is too good for this people; call them therefore Jezreel, a people devoted to dispersion, and such as I will scatter into the four winds of heaven, as the seedsman scattereth his seed ( ζψς spargere to scatter). Thus Jeconiah is called Coniah (for a judgment upon him): Bethel, Bethaven; Har, Hammischa, the mount Olivet, or of unction, Har Hammaschith, the mount of corruption, 2 Kings 23:13. And this is not unusual among men; so when they would disgrace a man, to clip or play upon his name: as when they spitefully called Athanasius, Sathanasius; Cyprian, Coprian (as if all his excellent works were but dung); Calvin, Cain, &c. This people, saith God here, are more like Ahab than Jacob. Call them therefore Jezreel (Ahab’ s court), that is, a den of thieves and murderers, where innocent Naboth cannot be master of the vineyard that he was born to. Micah (who prophesied also much about these times) hath a saying much to the same purpose, Micah 2:7 : "O thou that art named the house of Jacob, is the spirit of the Lord straitened? are these his doings?" q.d. Ye that boast of Jacob to be your father, do you tread in his steps? are ye of his spirit, of his practice? was there such vile profaneness found in him as is openly found in you? David describeth the generation of such as "seek God, as seek his face," and then subjoineth, "this is Jacob," these are Israelites indeed, these are Jews inwardly, Psalms 24:6 : and all others are degenerate plants, and are the worse for their outward privileges: since "tribulation and anguish shall be upon every soul of man that doeth evil, but of the Jew first, and then also of the Gentile," Romans 2:9. For yet a little while] And yet this little was a long while, through God’ s gracious forbearance. As bad as this people were, they should not perish without warning; yea, though the Lord foreknew they would make no good use of it. Fιλειο Yεοςπροσημαινειν, saith the heathen historian Herodotus: God loves to forewarn, and premonish. But there is nothing more dangerous and dismal than these still revenges; as when God suddenly brake out in wrath upon Nadab and Abihu, upon Nebuchadnezzar, Herod, Pharaoh at the Red Sea, when he would not beware. It is a just both desert and presage of ruin, not to be warned. See this in Nineveh, spared at first, but after a little while revolting, soundly paid for the new and old faults, Nahum 3:19. Non consurget iterum afflictio, saith the same prophet.

(4) Jezreel means “God shall sow.” The prophet had already discovered the faithlessness of his spouse, and that his married life was symbolic of his nation’s history. Observe the resemblance in sound between Jezreel and Israel, and the historic associations of the former. It was the name of a very fertile plain in the tribe of Issachar, which was many times the scene of terrible struggles (Judges 4:13; Judges 6:33; Judges 7:1; 1 Samuel 29:1). It was also the name of a town associated with the guilt of Ahab and Jezebel in bringing about the murder of Naboth (1 Kings 21), and with the final extinction of Ahab’s house by Jehu (2 Kings 9:21; 2 Kings 10:11).

Verse 4. Call his name Jezreel] יזרעאל that is, God will disperse. This seems to intimate that a dispersion or sowing of Israel shall take place; which happened under Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, 2Kg 17:5-6. But the word refers also to the name of a city, where Jehu slew Jezebel and all the children of Ahab. 2Kg 9:10; 2Kg 9:36; 2Kg 10:6. This was one of those prophetic names which we so often meet with in the Scriptures; e.g. Japheth Abraham, Israel, Judah, Joshua, Zerubbabel, Solomon, Sheer-jashub, c. The blood of Jezreel] Not Jehu's vengeance on Ahab's family, but his acts of cruelty while he resided at Jezreel, a city in the tribe of Issachar, Joshua 19:18, where the kings of Israel had a palace, 1Kg 21:1. Will cause to cease the kingdom] Either relating to the cutting off of the kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians, see Hosea 1:6, or to the ceasing of the kingdom of Israel from the house of Jehu, 2Kg 10:30, and which was fulfilled, 2Kg 15:10. - Newcome.

4. Call his name Jezreel] The child of guilt; therefore not Israel but Jezreel (or, more exactly, Izreel). The name is referred to for its historical associations (comp. on Hosea 2:22). It points both backward and forward—backward to the massacre of Ahab’s family by Jehu (2 Kings 9:10.), and forward to the punishment for that wild and cruel act. Hosea (in whom natural peculiarities have been purified and not extinguished by the spirit of prophecy) regards the conduct of Jehu in a different light from the writer of 2 Kings 10:30. The latter praises Jehu for having ‘done unto the house of Ahab according to all that was in by mind’; he speaks on the assumption that Jehu had the interests of Jehovah’s worship at heart, and that he destroyed the house of Ahab as the only effectual means of advancing them. The former blames Jehu apparently on the high moral ground that Jehovah ‘desires mercy (love) and not sacrifice’ (Hosea 6:6). He speaks as the Israelites of his time doubtless felt. They no more recognized Jehu as a champion of Jehovah than did the priests of Baal whom he basely entrapped (2 Kings 10:18, &c.). But Hosea doubtless felt in addition that the idolatry to which the house of Jehu was addicted rendered a permanent religious reform hopeless. Image-worship could not be suppressed by such halfhearted worshippers of Jehovah, and hence, Jehovah’s moral government of His people must have made it certain to Hosea that even on this ground alone the dynasty of Jehu could not escape an overthrow. yet a little while, and I will avenge …] ‘Avenge’; lit. ‘visit’. Hosea represents (like a fellow-prophet, Amos 7:9) the destruction of the northern kingdom as synchronizing with the overthrow of Jehu’s dynasty. This was a remarkable proof of insight into God’s purposes. Both prophets saw the beginning of the end, though the final catastrophe (722) took place about nineteen years later than the death of Jeroboam II. (741).

Call his name Jezreel - that is, in its first sense here, “God will scatter.” The life of the prophet, and his union with one so unworthy of him, were a continued prophecy of God’s mercy.

4. Jezreel — That is, God sows. The name was to be given, as the next line shows, not on account of its meaning but on account of its historical connections. Jezreel is the well-known city of that name in the Plain of Jezreel.