Hosea 4:6 - Meaning and Application

God is here taking up his case against both the priests and the people. The people had argued with the priests in Hosea 4:4 when the priests were still doing their duty. But most of the priests had neglected their calling, so God has a word for them and for the people who liked it that way, as in Jeremiah 5:31. It is striking to see how the punishment matches the sin, and how God sets one against the other to show that his judgment is right.

First, the people fought against the priests who should have taught them to know God. So they were justly destroyed for lack of knowledge, as Hosea 4:6 says. Those who rebel against the light can expect nothing but to perish in the dark. The words may also be a charge against the priests, who should have kept teaching the people knowledge (Ecclesiastes 12:9), but did not, or did it so poorly that it was as if they had never done it at all. Then there was no knowledge of God in the land, and because there was no clear vision, or none that did any good, the people were ruined (Proverbs 29:18). Ignorance is not the mother of devotion, it is the mother of destruction. Lack of knowledge ruins both people and nations.

These were still God’s people, and that makes their ruin worse. They were destroying themselves by failing to learn the God under whose command they lived and with whom they were in covenant. It also made the priests’ guilt greater, since God had set his children in their care, and they did not give them proper instruction.

Second, both priests and people rejected knowledge, and so God would reject them. The reason the people did not learn, and the priests did not teach, was not that light was lacking. It was that they hated the light. They had no heart for knowing God or making him known. So God says, “I will also reject you; I will refuse to acknowledge you and own you. You do not want to know me, and you tell me to go away, so I will say, ‘Depart from me, I do not know you.’”

This meant the priests would no longer be admitted to the honors or work of the priesthood. They would not be received back again, as we later see in Ezekiel 44:13. Ministers who reject knowledge, who are deeply ignorant and shameful in life, should not be recognized as true ministers. What they seem to have should be taken away from them (Luke 8:18). The people too would no longer be what they once were, a kingdom of priests, a royal priesthood (Exodus 19:6). By rejecting knowledge, God’s people lost their honor and brought shame on themselves.

Third, they forgot the law of God. They did not want it in mind, did not try to keep it, and did not pass it on to their children. So God would forget them and their children. The people failed to teach their children the knowledge of God and duty to him, so God would no longer acknowledge them as his covenant people. If parents do not teach their children, while they are young, to remember their Creator, they should not expect their Creator to remember them. This may also refer to the priests’ children. They would not follow their fathers in the priestly office, but would be brought low and reduced to poverty, as was threatened against Eli’s house in 1 Samuel 2:20.

Fourth, they dishonored God with the very things that had been their honor. So God would strip them of that honor, as Hosea 4:7 says. Their glory had been their increase in number, wealth, power, and dignity. The nation had started small, but over time it had grown large and strong. The priestly family also increased greatly. But as they increased, they also sinned more against God. The more the nation grew, the more sin and open wickedness spread. Their wealth, honor, and power only made them bolder in sin. So God says he will change their glory into shame.

If their numbers were their glory, God would reduce them. If their wealth was their glory, he would bring them low. In the end, they would be ashamed of what they had once boasted in. Their priests would be made despised and low, as in Malachi 2:9. What is our honor, if we use it to dishonor God, will sooner or later turn into our shame. Those who despise God will be lightly esteemed (1 Samuel 2:30).

Fifth, the priests fed on the sins of God’s people, and so they would eat but never be satisfied. They abused the support given to them by God’s law, or, in the case of the calf-priests, by their own false arrangement, as Hosea 4:8 says. They “eat up the sin of my people,” meaning the sin offerings. If this refers to the priests of the calves, it means they seized what they had no right to take. They claimed the income of priests even though they were not priests. If it refers to the lawful priests, it means they were greedy for the benefits of their office but gave no care to its duties. They enjoyed the food that came from the offerings to the Lord, but forgot the work they were paid to do.

They set their hearts on the people’s wickedness. They welcomed sin, because sin meant more offerings, and more offerings meant more for them. The more sins there were, the more sacrifices there were, and they did not care how much the people sinned. Instead of warning the people against sin, the sacrifices should have taught them how serious sin was before God, because such an offering was needed to make atonement. But the priests turned that into a reason to encourage sin, since atonement could be made at so small a cost. So they grew rich on the sins of the people and helped keep alive what they should have destroyed. It is a very wicked thing to be pleased with other people’s sins because they may somehow benefit us.

Therefore God would deny them his blessing on what they received, as Hosea 4:10 says. They would eat and not be satisfied. Even if they had plenty from all the offerings coming in, they would find no real satisfaction in it. Either their food would do them no good, or their greedy appetite would still not be filled. What is gained wrongly cannot be enjoyed well. The same is true of what people greedily chase after in the wrong way. It is just that those with endless desires should remain unsatisfied, and that those who never know when they have enough should never have enough. See Micah 6:14 and Haggai 1:6.

The more they increased, the more they sinned (Hos 4:7). So, even though they committed sexual sin and used the most wicked ways to multiply their numbers, they would not truly increase. Even if they had many wives and concubines, as Solomon did, they would not build up large families by them, any more than he did. People who hope to grow by sinful means will be disappointed.

God would also spoil all their plans because they had stopped paying attention to the Lord. There was a time when they had some respect for God, for his authority over them, and for his care toward them. But they had left that behind. They gave no attention to his word or to his providence, his wise rule over events. They did not look to him in either. They had turned away so far that they had no concern for God at all, and were truly without God in the world. When people stop paying attention to the Lord, they give up all that is good, and they can expect good to leave them.

The people and the priests hardened one another in sin, and so they would justly share the punishment too (Hos 4:9). It would be, like people, like priest. They were alike in character, both ignorant and ungodly, careless about God and duty, and devoted to idol worship. So they would be alike in condition. God would bring judgments on them that would destroy both priest and people. The famine that took away food from the people would also take away the priests’ food offerings (Joe 1:9). A full picture of complete ruin is this, that it is as with the people, so with the priest (Isa 24:2). When God sends his judgments with full authority, they make no distinction. Those who share in sin must expect to share in ruin. God would punish them both for their ways and repay them for what they had done. He would make their deeds come back on them. When a sin is committed, the sinner thinks it is gone and will never be heard of again. But it will return, either to humble him or to condemn him.

They had given themselves over to the pleasures of the body to keep up their spirits, but they would find that these pleasures took their hearts away (Hos 4:11). Sexual sin, wine, and new wine take away the heart. Some connect this with the words just before it: they had left the Lord to follow sexual sin, wine, and new wine, or because these things had taken away their hearts. Their pleasures had pulled them away from prayer and worship and had drowned out all that was good in them.

Or we may take it as a separate statement, giving a truth we see confirmed every day, that drunkenness and sexual sin dull people’s minds and make them foolish. They weaken and wear people down. They take away both understanding and courage.