Historical Background

1. Historical Background “Hosea is symbolic. It comes from the same Hebrew root as Joshua, which is the Hebrew name for Jesus. Hosea’s name is appropriate because his message can help us learn about and feel more deeply the power of the atonement.”

2. Important Points to Look For: • Violating sacred covenants brings forth God’s Judgment • The Lord loves His children and will accept and forgive those who repent and come unto Him • God’s justice and mercy are evidences of His love for His children.

3. Why is marriage important?

4. What qualities would you consider important in a spouse?

5. What has the Lord revealed about the importance of marriage?D&C 131:1-4

6. D&C 133:1-4 “In the celestial glory there are three heavens or degrees; And in order to obtain the highest, a man must enter into this order of the priesthood [meaning the new and everlasting covenant of marriage]; And if he does not, he cannot obtain it. He may enter into the other, but that is the end of his kingdom; he cannot have an increase.”

7. What promises has He made to those who marry in the temple and remain worthy?D&C 132:19-20

8. D&C 132:19-20 • Come forth in the first resurrection • Inherit thrones, kingdoms, principalities, and powers, dominions, all heights and depths • Be gods because they have no end • Be above all because all things are subject unto them. • They have all power and the angels are subject unto them.

9. Hosea Gomer

10. Hosea 1:1-2 “The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the lord.”

11. “Whether [Hosea’s marriage was literal or symbolic], the religious significance of chapters 1-3 is quite clear. Hosea’s wives represent Israel, the disloyal and harlotrous consort of Jehovah, who stipulates that unless Israel puts aside her harlotries and reforms she will meet with stern action. For her gross sins she will be checked and punished and thus learn in the crucible of bitter experience that her husband means more to her than she at first supposed.” Sidney B. Sperry, The Voice of Israel’s Prophets [1952], 282

12. In a spiritual sense, to emphasize how serious it is, the damning sin of idolatry is called adultery. When the Lord's people forsake him and worship false gods, their infidelity to Jehovah is described as whoredoms and adultery. (Jer. 3:8–9; Hos. 1:2; 3:1.) By forsaking the Lord, his people are unfaithful to their covenant vows, vows made to him who symbolically is their Husband. Bruce R. McConkie (Mormon Doctrine, p. 25)

13. Hosea’s and Gomer’s Children • Jezreel – “God shall sow” or scatter abroad, since anciently sowing was done by casting handfuls of seed. It undoubtedly alludes to the overthrow and scattering of Israel. • Lo-ruhamah – “not having obtained mercy” no amount of mercy from God would set aside divine justice and save northern Israel; • Lo-ammi –”Not my people” shows that by their harlotry Israel could not be thought of as God’s people.

14. Hosea The Lord Gomer Israel How do these labels apply to Hosea and Gomer?

15. Hosea 2:1-5 “Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhanah. Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts; Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst. And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms. For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.

16. Hosea 2 What are the Meanings of the Metaphors?

17. From those verses, how did the Lord feel when Israel was unfaithful?

18. Do you think the Lord feels as sad if we are unfaithful?

19. The image of a loving, forgiving God comes through clearly to those who read and understand the scriptures. Since he is our Father, he naturally desires to raise us up, not to push us down, to help us live, not to bring about our spiritual death. Spencer W. Kimball (The Miracle of Forgiveness [1969], 344)  

20. The growing permissiveness in modern society gravely concerns us. Certainly our Heavenly Father is distressed with the increasing inroads among his children of such insidious sins as adultery and fornication, homosexuality, lesbianism, abortions, pornography, population control, alcoholism, cruelty expressed in wife-beating and child-abuse, dishonesty, vandalism, violence, and crime generally, including the sin of living together without marriage. We call upon our Church members everywhere to renew their efforts to strengthen the home and to honor their parents, and to build better communications between parent and child. Important as it is, building stronger homes is not enough in the fight against rising permissiveness. We therefore urge Church members as citizens to lift their voices, to join others in unceasingly combating, in their communities and beyond, the inroads of pornography and the general flaunting of permissiveness. Let us vigorously oppose the shocking developments which encourage the old sins of Sodom and Gomorrah, and which defile the human body as the temple of God. … God will not be mocked. His laws are immutable. True repentance is rewarded by forgiveness, but sin brings the sting of death. … As we think back upon the experiences of Nineveh, Babylon, Sodom and Gomorrah, we wonder—will history repeat itself? What of our world today? Are we forgetting in our great nations the high and lofty principles which can preserve the nations? … … there are among us those same vices which we have seen wreck empires, and we see them becoming flagrant in all nations. Shall we, like Belshazzar, sow the wind and reap the whirlwind? Shall we permit the home to deteriorate and marriage to become a mockery? Shall we continue to curse God, hate our enemies, and defile our bodies in adulterous and sensuous practices? And when the patience of the Lord with us is exhausted, shall we stand trembling while destruction comes upon us? Or shall we wisely see the handwriting on the wall and profit by the sad experience of the past and return unto the Lord and serve him? (Ensign, Nov. 1977, pp. 5–6)

21. “If I could go back again to that group of students of mine, I would see every classroom day throughout the year as the opportunity for them to know a little better Jesus Christ as he is. He is the God speaking through these verses in Hosea. The exactness, the demand for perfect fidelity, combined with the willingness to reach out with mercy, apparently almost endlessly, are not in conflict. They do not create a paradox. Jesus Christ, the God of the Old Testament, shares his Father’s desire that all of us might have eternal life, to live the life that God lives. To do that we must become like him—perfectly faithful, clean without blemish. He knows that standard is not reachable for us, unless we do all that we can do and then rely on his mercy in faith.” Henry B Eyring,(CES Symposium on the Old Testament • 15 August 1995 • Brigham Young University)