A Note:
I will preface by saying I did a lot of homework for this response. More than I plan to do for subsequent posts, but I think we will all find it helpful. I really wanted to try and wrap my mind around this text - as much as one can do without being a Hebrew scholar or experiencing the ancient culture. So without further adieux, here are some thoughts to set the stage (I hope) for some fascinating discussion.
1. Spiritual Formation
While like Anna I am in awe of this story and the work of God's hand, I am hesitant to pray, "Dear God, bless me like Hosea...challenge my marriage with infidelity so that your truth may be known." I also understand that when we ask God to show us God's ways, we are inviting the unpredictable, and sometimes scary stuff! On another note, is it fair to say that this book reflects the theology of a pre-Christian understanding of God? I mean, Hosea is ordered to take a whore for a wife. And God is obligated to love an unfaithful people. This seems conflicting with what I came to appreciate in the Reformed understanding (a la Karl Barth) that God is "the one who loves in freedom."
2. Context
This story also tries to make sense of the fragmentation of the time. Political and personal realms in Hosea's time are a mess. The kingdom is uncertain and unstable - the chronology of Kings' turnover and the variance between ruling styles is enough to exhaust the reader. In the domestic realm, marriages and faith are challenged by the emergence of Canaanite cultic sex rituals. While the religion of Israel was predominantly monotheistic centered around Yahweh, with the expansion of the Empire came the infusion of other deities and beliefs - so that a pluralistic "hybrid" religion emerged.
The Canaanites worshipped Baal whose name means "master" or "husband." Baal was the storm god responsible for bringing rain, which was the answer to drought in crops, flocks, and families. The cultic prostitution that came out of Baal worship involved reinacting intercourse that reflected behavior of Baal and a sister deity, Anat. Men of all ranks in Israel engaged in these acts to bring about fertility. The initial intent was very serious. But this religious practice soon devolved into an excuse to have orgies at church; a threat to family cohesion and the Israelite understanding of Yahweh.
3. Redemption
The story of Hosea seems a redemptive rollercoaster of brokenness and wholeness - of the identity of humanity fluctuating between "not my people" and "children of the living God." And I see this story also as a window into the culture of Ancient Israel in the context of Empire. I know Christians love to glean allusions to Christ from the Old Testament, and I, too, am guilty of this. I see a transparency here where it is revealed that Israel is in need of redemption from its own oppressive and broken culture. For one, it is clear that the context of Ancient Israel was sexist. (i.e. of course God is portrayed as faithful, patriarchal husband and humanity is portrayed as sinful adulterous wife.) Relationships between men and women are top-down with women as subjects. I see Gospel stories like that of Jesus' encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well or his healing of the arthritic woman on the Sabbath setting this story free. The law of Empire seems to absorb the customs of war and violence, pluralistic cultic religion, and domination of women into its ideology. The grace of Christ says, "I am the way, the truth and the life." And I believe we get a glimpse into this redeemed reality in the hope of Hosea 1:10-11
"...and in the place where it was said to them, "you are not my people," it shall be said to them, "children of the living God." The people of Judah and the people of Israel shall be gathered together and they shall appoint for themselves one head; and they shall take possession of the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel."
(Sources used: Women's Bible Commentary, Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe, editors. An Introduction to the Old Testament, Raymond B. Dillard and Tremper Longman III.)
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1 comment:
Good post, Kendra!!!
I like what you said about this book reflecting a pre-Christian understanding of God...could you expound on that idea some more?
As you explained the context of what is going on in the culture, sexual immorality, idol worship and a "hybrid" religion (good term), and especially the political termoil, Hosea is called by God to marry an adulterous wife.
In my perspective, it seems very insignificant to the political climate. If I were Hosea, I'd want to be called to do something "great", something visible and large-scale to communicate God's purpose. Instead God tells him to marry a prostitute to illustrate God's relationship to his adulterous people. And he obeys!
The redemption portion of this passage is hard not to get excited about. i:10 is also quoted in Romans, and I think the context there is worth reading...it's a bit long, but read it with an open heart:
Romans 9:14-26
14What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."
16It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. 17For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to hae mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
19One of you will say to me: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" 20But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?" 21Does not the potter have the right to make out of he same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?
22What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath--prepared for destruction? 23What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory -- 24even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 25As he says in Hosea:
"I will call them 'my people' who are not my people; and I will call her 'my loved one' who is not my loved one," 26and,
"It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' they will be called ' sons of the living God."
This is exciting to me because we can apply this promise to ourselves! We were not his people, and now he calls us his people. What an amazing sense of belonging we have. More than I am an American, more than I am a social work student, a Utahn (or Utard), a Hudson, a Springer. or even "Steve's" - I am God's. Just as being completely loved and accepted by and finding complete security in my husband has given me more freedom to be and become myself, how much more freedom is there in knowing that I am LOVED by God? I am an object of his mercy, to whom he has shown the riches of his glory!
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