Year of the Bible

Access your family's weekly resource for the Year of the Bible HERE

Commentary on the Book of Hosea, Chapter 6: 

After revealing the depth of disaster that can come when God’s people trust the false gods and politics of this world more than God (chapter 5), God explains that the people need to turn back to Him, acknowledge their hurt, and allow Him to heal them, something the foreign nations cannot do (5:13). Reflecting Jesus’ own death and resurrection hundreds of years in the future, the people are to recognize that on the third day God will raise them up. God knows the people’s love is fleeting like morning clouds or dew, so He calls them to true covenantal love in a quote Jesus will later use to challenge the religious leadership of His time (Matthew 9:11-13): God desires mercy and knowledge of more than the typical daily sacrifice of burnt offerings. This reveals God’s longing for His people to internally embrace what He offers in the Covenant (2:19-20) and to live it with others rather than try to look good through merely external ritual alone. The chapter concludes with more examples of the people’s sins.

The Book of Hosea, Chapter 6:

1 “Come, let us return to the
Lord;
for he has torn, that he may heal us;
he has stricken, and he will bind us up.
2 After two days he will revive us;
on the third day he will raise us up,
that we may live before him.
3 Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord;
his going forth is sure as the dawn;
he will come to us as the showers,
as the spring rains that water the earth.”
4 What shall I do with you, O Ephraim?
What shall I do with you, O Judah?
Your love is like a morning cloud,
like the dew that goes early away.
5 Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets,
I have slain them by the words of my mouth,
and my judgment goes forth as the light.
6 For I desire mercy and not
sacrifice,
the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings.
7 But at Adam they transgressed the covenant;
there they dealt faithlessly with me.
8 Gilead is a city of evildoers, tracked with blood.
9 As robbers lie in wait w for a man,
so the priests are banded together;
they murder on the way to Shechem,
yes, they commit villainy.
10 In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing;
Ephraim’s harlotry is there,
Israel is defiled.
11 For you also, O Judah, a harvest is appointed. When I would restore the fortunes of my people,

*Daily Lectio Divina Question:

Insert yourself into this chapter and imagine yourself saying: "Come, let us return to The Lord; for He has torn that He may heal us." (v.1) Then hear The Lord say to you: "What shall I do with you...your love is like a morning cloud..." (v.4) Meditate on this. What stirs in you as you ponder this exchange?

Biblical Commentary provided by the Catholic Biblical School of Michigan. Join a Catholic Biblical School of Michigan class this September at Holy Family in Grand Blanc, or online.

Revised Standard Version; Second Catholic Edition. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2006).
Permission to use the RSV-2CE given for Bishop's Year of the Bible by Ignatius Press. Many thanks to Ignatius for this.
If you're looking for a good Catholic edition of the Bible, look no further.