Hosea 10:5

King James Version (KJV)

The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.

Adam Clarke
Bible Commentary

The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear - According to Calmet, shall worship the calves of Beth-aven; those set up by Jeroboam, at Beth-el. Fear is often taken for religious reverence.

The people thereof shall mourn - On seeing the object of their worship carried into captivity, as well as themselves.

And the priests thereof - כמרים kemarim . The priests of Samaria, says Calmet, are here called kemarim, that is, black coats, or shouters, because they made loud cries in their sacrifices. Instead of יגילו yagilu, "they shall rejoice;" learned men propose ילילו yalilu, "shall howl," which is likely to be the true reading, but it is not supported by any of the MSS. yet discovered. But the exigentia loci, the necessity of the place, requires some such word.

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Albert Barnes
Notes on the Whole Bible

The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of - (i. e., for) the calves of Beth-aven He calls them in this place “cow-calves,” perhaps to denote their weakness and helplessness. So far from their idol being able to help “them, they” shall be anxious and troubled for their idols, lest these should be taken captive from them. The “Bethel (House of God)” of the patriarch Jacob, was now turned into “Bethaven, the house of vanity.” This, from its old sacred memories, was a more celebrated place of the calf-worship than Dan. Hosea then gives to the calf of Bethel its precedence, and ranks both idols under its one name, as “calves of the house of vanity.”

For the people thereof shall mourn over it - They had set up the idols, instead of God; so God calls them no longer His people, but “the people of the calf” whom they had chosen for their god; as Moab was called “the people of Chemosh” Numbers 21:29, its idol. They had joyed in it, not in God; now they, “its people” and its priests, should “mourn over” it, when unable to help itself, much less, them. Both their joy and their sorrow showed that they were without excuse, that they had “gone willingly after the” king‘s “commandment,” serving it of their own free-will out of love, not out of fear of the king, and, neither out of love or fear, serving God purely.

For the glory thereof, because it is departed from it - The true glory of Israel was God; the Glory of God is in Himself. “The glory of the calves,” for whom Ephraim had exchanged their God, was something quite outward to them, the gold of which they were made, and the rich offerings made to them. Both together became an occasion of their being carried captive. They mourned, not because they had offended God by their sin, but for the loss of that dumb idol, whose worship had beetn their sin, and which had brought these heavy woes upon them. Impenitent even under chastisement! The prophet does not mention any grief for “the despoiling of their country, the burning of their cities, the slaughter of their people, their shame”. One only thing he names as moving them. Even then their one chief anxiety was, not that God was departed from them, but that their calf in which they had set their “glory,” whereupon they so franticly relied, on which they had lavished their substance, their national distinction and disgrace, was gone. Without the grace of God people mourn, not their sins, but their idols.

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Matthew Henry
Concise Bible Commentary

A vine is only valuable for its fruit; but Israel now brought no fruit to perfection. Their hearts were divided. God is the Sovereign of the heart; he will have all, or none. Were the stream of the heart wholly after God, it would run strongly, and bear down all before it. Their pretences to covenant with God were false. Even the proceeding of justice was as poisonous hemlock. Alas, how empty a vine is the visible church even at this day! But all earthly prosperity is but a collection of bubbles, soon destroyed like foam upon the water. Sinners will in vain seek shelter from that Judge, whom they now despise as a Saviour.

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Ellen G. White
Prophets and Kings, 285

From generation to generation the Lord had borne with His wayward children, and even now, in the face of defiant rebellion, He still longed to reveal Himself to them as willing to save. “O Ephraim,” He cried, “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.” Hosea 6:4. PK 285.1

The evils that had overspread the land had become incurable; and upon Israel was pronounced the dread sentence: “Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone.” “The days of visitation are come, the days of recompense are come; Israel shall know it.” Hosea 4:17; 9:7. PK 285.2

The ten tribes of Israel were now to reap the fruitage of the apostasy that had taken form with the setting up of the strange altars at Bethel and at Dan. God's message to them was: “Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; Mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency? For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces.” “The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it.... It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to King Jareb” (Sennacherib). Hosea 8:5, 6; 10:5, 6. PK 285.3

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Cross References

the calves