Me.'
The idolatrous priests of the calf worship will tremble when that image,
which had been shamefully their 'glory,' is carried off to Assyria, and
given as a present to 'king Jareb'--a name for the king of Assyria
meaning the fighting or quarrelsome king. The captivity of the god is
the shame of the worshippers. To be 'ashamed of their own counsel' is
the certain fate of all who depart from God; for, sooner or later,
experience will demonstrate to the blindest that their refuges of lies
can neither save themselves nor those who trust in them. But shame is
one thing and repentance another; and many a man will say, 'I have been
a great fool, and my clever policy has all crumbled to pieces,' who will
only therefore change his idols, and not return to God.

Verse 7 recurs to the political punishment of the civil rebellion. The
image for the disappearance of the king is striking, whether we render
'foam' or 'chip,' but the former has special beauty. In the one case we
see the unsubstantial bubble,

'A moment white, then melts for ever';

and in the other, the helpless twig swept down by the stream. Either
brings vividly before us the powerlessness of Israel against the roaring
torrent of Assyrian power; and the figure may be widened out to teach
what is sure to become of all man-made and self-chosen refuges when the
floods of God's judgments sweep over the world. The captivity of the
idol and the burst bubble of the monarchy bid us all make Jehovah our
God and King. The vacant shrine and empty throne are followed by utter
and long-continued desolation. Thorns and thistles have time to grow on
the altars, and no hand cuts them down. What of the men thus stripped of
all in which they had trusted? Desperate, they implore the mountains to
fall on them, as preferring to die, and the hills to cover them, as
willing to be crushed, if only they may be hidden. That awful cry is
heard again in our Lord's predictions of judgment, and in the
Apocalypse. Therefore this prophecy foreshadows, in the destruction of
Israel's confidences and in their shame and despair, a more dreadful
coming day, in which we shall be concerned.

Verses 9 to 11 again give the sin and its punishment. 'The days of
Gibeah' recall the hideous story of lust and crime which was the
low-water mark of the lawless days of old. That crime had been avenged
by merciless war. But its taint had lived on, and the Israel of Hosea's
day 'stood,' obstinately persiste