Hosea 3:3

And I said unto her,.... Having bought or hired her; this was the covenant or agreement he made with her, thou shall abide for me many days; dwell alone in some solitary and separate place, and have

And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man: so will I also be for thee.

This verse is the form of contract, or the articles of agreement, between the prophet and this woman. Abide for me; dwell with me, and expect and wait in an unmarried condition, until I see it fit to espouse thee. Many days; it is not said how long, but a slave, as she is represented here, may not think this severe; the preferment will compensate her waiting. Thou shalt not play the harlot: this is the third condition, she is to live chaste and modest, not to do as she had done. This was to settle her in a virtuous life, and to prove whether she would betake herself to a life praiseworthy. Thou shalt not be for another man; she is bound to marry, none other, nor to commit adultery with any other. So will I also be for thee; in due time I will accomplish the contract, and, as I wait, so I will be for thee. So the deed is mutually sealed and signed.

Hosea 3:3 And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for [another] man: so [will] I also [be] for thee.Ver. 3. Thou shalt abide for me many days] Even till the last days, Hosea 3:5, or last year, as Ezekiel hath it, Ezekiel 38:8. Thus they have abode, or sat (as a desolate widow, so the Hebrew hath it), 700 years before Christ, and above 1600 years since, in a most forlorn condition; crying out in their, daily prayers to God, Veniat regnum tuum, bimherah, beiamenu, Let thy kingdom come speedily, even in our days. And again, Aedifica templum tuum, aedifica, aedifica, cito, cito, cito; Lord, build, build, build thy Temple quickly, quickly, quickly. But God’ s time is not yet come; for they are not yet throughly humbled. Were they but ripe, he is ready; when help is seasonable, his fingers itch (saith one) to be doing, as the mother’ s breast aches when it is time the child had suck, Exodus 12:40-41. At midnight were the firstborn slain and Israel sent away, because then exactly the 400 or 430 years of their captivity in Egypt were expired. So Daniel 5:30, "In that night was Belshazzar slain"; because then exactly the seventy years were ended. God promiseth to take this Church again to wife, but having found her formerly so fickle and faithless, he would for a long time try her, and keep her unmarried as a probationer: he would lay her (as we do filthy garments) a soaking and a frosting for many hundred years, to try them, "and to purge, and to make white, even to the time of the end, because it is yet for a time appointed," Daniel 11:35. And to presume to prescribe to him in this case is to set the sun by our dial. As he never fails his in his own time, so he seldom comes at ours. Here, then, our strength is to sit still, Isaiah 30:7, and not to start up, and say, as that impatient prince did, "What should I wait for the Lord any longer?" 2 Kings 6:33. Shall Christ lose his right in his wife, because he takes her not by the day set down in our calendar? possibly the calendar of heaven hath a postdate to ours. Sure it is, that we are apt to antedate the promises in regard of the accomplishment, as those, Jeremiah 8:20, that looked for help that summer at farthest, but were deceived. See the disease and the remedy put together, Habakkuk 2:2-3, and learn to wait. God will surely bring us to it if we belong to him: and thereby inure us both to patience and continence as here.

(3) Shalt abide for me—i.e., shalt abide in seclusion at my discretion. The “many days” are an indefinite period of amendment, while watchful care was being exercised over her. During this time she is to withdraw herself from her paramour and also from her husband. Will I also be for thee.—Better, to thee: i.e., I will have no intercourse with thee. So Aben Ezra, Kimchi, and others. That this was only to be a temporary discipline is evident from Hosea 3:4 and Hosea 6.

Verse 3. Thou shalt abide for me many days] He did not take her home, but made a contract with her that, if she would abstain from her evil ways, he would take her to himself after a sufficient trial. In the meantime he gave her the money and the barley to subsist upon, that she might not be under the temptation of becoming again unfaithful. So will I also be for thee.] That is, if thou, Israel, wilt keep thyself separate from thy idolatry, and give me proof, by thy total abstinence from idols, that thou wilt be my faithful worshipper, I will receive thee again, and in the meantime support thee with the necessaries of life while thou art in the land of thy captivity. This is farther illustrated in the following verses.

3. Thou shalt abide for me many days] Rather, shalt sit still (as Isaiah 30:7, Jeremiah 8:14 in A. V.). Gomer is to lead a quiet secluded life; her licentious course is cut short, and her conjugal intercourse may not yet be resumed. This is to last for ‘many days,’ i.e. as long as is necessary to assure Hosea of Gomer’s moral amendment. so (will) I also (be) for thee] i. e. Hosea plights his troth that he will form no connexion with any other woman but Gomer. ‘Ego vicissim tibi fidem meam obligo’, Calvin. Others, with Aben Ezra and Kimchi, understand, instead of ‘will be’, ‘will not go in’, taking the clause as a contrast to that which precedes (‘but I will not go in unto thee’). Ewald renders, ‘and yet I am kind unto thee’. It is possible that some short word (such as ‘so’ or ‘not’) has dropped out of the text.

Thou shalt abide for me many days - Literally, “thou shalt sit,” solitary and as a widow Deuteronomy 21:13, quiet and sequestered; not going after others, as heretofore, but waiting for him; Exodus

3. Gomer cannot be immediately restored to her full privileges as wife. Abide — Remain inactive; in what sense the latter part of the verse states. For me — As my possession.