se--viz., that Judah too should be carried into
captivity. It thus supplements chap. i. 7, by showing that the mercy
there promised to the inhabitants of Judah is to be understood
relatively only. Such suppositions, indeed, show very plainly how
distinctly the future lay before the eyes of the prophet.[5]--With
regard, now, to the historical reference,--it must, in the first place,
be remarked, that whatever is here determined concerning it, must be
applicable to all other [Pg 227] parallel passages also, in which a
future reunion of Israel and Judah, and their common return to the
promised land, are announced; _e.g._, Jer. iii. 18: "In those days the
house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, and they come
together out of the land of the north to the land that I have given to
their fathers;" l. 4: "In those days the children of Israel shall come,
they and the children of Judah together, weeping shall they come and
seek the Lord their God." Compare also Is. xi.; Ezek. xxxvii. 19,
20. In the passage under consideration, several interpreters, as
_Theodoret_, think of the return from Babylon, and refer the "one head"
to Zerubbabel. Now we certainly cannot deny that, in that event, there
is a small beginning of the fulfilment. But if that had been the entire
fulfilment, Hosea would more resemble a dreamer and an enthusiast than
a true prophet of the living God. The objection which immediately
presents itself--viz., that, after all, the greatest portion of the
ten tribes, and a very considerable part of Judah, remained in
captivity--is by no means the strongest. Although the whole both of
Judah and Israel had returned, the real and final fulfilment could not
be sought for in that event. It is not the renewed possession of the
country, as such, which the prophet promises, but rather a certain kind
of possession,--such a possession as that the land is completely the
land of God, partaking in all the fulness of His blessings, and thus a
worthy residence for the people of God, and for their children. One may
be in Canaan, and yet, at the same time, in Babylon or in Assyria. Had
not the threatened punishment of God been indeed as fully executed upon
those who, during the Assyrian and Babylonish captivities, wandered
about the country in sorrow and misery, as upon those who were carried
away? Can the circumstance that Jews are even now living in Jerusalem
in the deepest misery, be adduced as a proof that the loss of the
pr