Hosea 11:1–11 (Summary)

This passage expresses:

• God’s fatherly love for Israel.
• Israel’s rejection and unfaithfulness despite God’s care.
• God’s compassion overcoming wrath.
• A promise of future restoration.

We seek to understand this through the revelation of the mystery of Christ and the mystery of the Spirit.
Luke 24:27
Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

https://bible.com/bible/2016/luk.24.27.NRSV

Overview ( Emmaus reading with the help of ChatGPT)

Hosea 11:1
“When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called My son.”

This is quoted in Matthew 2:15 as a prophecy fulfilled when Jesus was brought out of Egypt after fleeing from Herod.

Some see this as a type: Israel’s history prefigures Christ. Jesus completes Israel’s journey but in perfect obedience.

Christ is the crucified one, Son of God, who is from the beginning One God with the Father. For Christians, the event of the incarnation can be seen as from the beginning, a mystery revealed.

M Emlyn Humphries

Hosea 11:2–4 –
“The more I called them,
the more they went away…
I led them with cords of kindness…
I bent down to them and fed them.”

The “cords of kindness” can be seen as God’s Incarnation, the “descent” of the Word to draw us up.

Hosea 11:5–7
“They shall return to Egypt…
the sword shall rage…
My people are bent on turning away from Me…”

Sin leads to spiritual exile. Sin is a turning from God, leading to captivity (internally and externally). Egypt can be seen as a symbol of worldliness and bondage to passions.

Hosea 11:8–9
“How can I give you up, O Ephraim?
…My heart recoils within Me…
I will not execute My fierce anger…
For I am God and not a man…”

God is unchanging but acts with compassion. The “recoiling heart” imagery shows how God’s mercy transcends human justice.

Hosea 11:10–11
“They shall go after the Lord…
He will roar like a lion…
they shall come trembling from the west…
I will return them to their homes, declares the Lord.”

These verses foretell repentance and return. The “roar of the lion” is seen by some as the voice of Christ, calling all nations. The gathering of people “from the west” hints at the inclusion of the Gentiles in the call.

The return home may speak of salvation as in Jesus’s parable of the two sons .
Luke 15:20
So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.
https://bible.com/bible/2016/luk.15.20.NRSV

M Emlyn Humphries

Theological Viewpoint

God’s Love

• Not transactional, but covenantal and fatherly.

Israel’s Failure

• A pattern of humanity’s fall, needing the New Adam (Christ).

Christological Fulfillment

• Jesus as the true Son, faithful where Israel failed.

Mercy over Wrath

• God’s mercy is greater than justice; love is ultimate.

Restoration

• exile to homecoming, death to life.

O Lord of mercy,
whose heart is moved by compassion, not wrath,
you feed us with unseen kindness.
Bending low, you lift our heads;
your mercy holds us fast.
Though we may turn from your ways

and bow to pride and comfort,
you call us home.

Forgive us our sins.

Therefore, we cry:
Glory to you, who stoops low in gentleness:
Glory to you, who gathers the scattered:
Glory to you who heals with love, not force.

M Emlyn Humphries with the help of ChatGPT