Hosea 6

Hosea 6:1

Come, and let us return unto the LORD.

And, in their seeking after me, they shall exhort and excite one another to repentance; Come, and let us return, etc.

Hosea 6:2

After two days will he retire us.

After a very short space of our afflictions, he will be gracious unto us; and so cheer and restore us, as if he had given us a new life.

Hosea 6:3

Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the LORD: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.

Then shall we attain to the perfect knowledge of the Lord, if we do carefully and constantly persist in using those good means that he hath appointed: he shall then so reveal himself to us, as the sun shews himself to the world, in his morning-rising, by degrees ascending to his full height; and he shall come to us, not at once, but as the rain, that falls down by drops, even as the rain of the autumn and spring, that descends sweetly in soft and gentle showers.

Hosea 6:4

O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee? O Judah, what shall I do unto thee? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away.

O Israel and Judah, what course should I take with you? I have neglected no means of your good; yet there is no hold to be taken of you: some profession you make, but it is altogether fickle and inconstant: your appearing goodness vanishes away, like as a morning cloud, or an early dew in summer.

Hosea 6:5

Therefore have I hewed them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth: and thy judgments are as the light that goeth forth.

Therefore, I have wrought upon them by my prophets, denouncing judgment against them: I have, as it were, smitten them dead by the terrible threats of my punishments; and I have given them such means of information, as have been no less clear than the light itself, that goeth forth upon the world.

Hosea 6:6

For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God, more than burnt offerings.

For it was true inward goodness and mercy, that I required of them, and not the outward formalities of sacrifice; and the

Hosea 6:7

But they like men have transgressed the covenant.

But they, like the right sons of Adam, have transgressed the covenant, that I made with them.

Hosea 6:8

Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood.

Even Gilead itself, a city of the priests, is a society of notoriously wicked men; and is full of murders.

Hosea 6:11

Also, O Judah, he hath set an harvest for thee, when I returned the captivity of my people.

Also, O Judah, corrupted Israel hath prepared a harvest of revenge for thee, in sowing the seeds of idolatry in thee; upon occasion of that captivity, whereinto thy brethren of Israel led thee, under Pekah, the son of Remaliah, from which I procured and wrought thy deliverance.