WHAT is with all the prostitutes? Is it me or does book have more prostitutes than any other character? When kids read this, what are they told harlots are? How is that explained? In this book the prophet is actually told to go and marry a harlot, named and I kid u not, Gomer. So in my mind I'm totally picturing a female Gomer Pyle.
They have kids and name them very uplifting things like "not pitied"
Basically this family is the symbolic voice of Gods anger toward Israel. Each child represents an action God is taking toward the Israelites. They have another kid who get the, roll off the tounge name Not my people.
Hosea's brethren Ammi and sister "you-have-been-pitied-and-have-obtained-mercy" on the other hand have great names. These guys, I think represent the house of Judah.
It goes on to use the symbol of the harlot to explain the sins of Israel in choosing to not follow Gods laws.
Gomer cheats on her husband, just as Israel has cheated on God. God tells Hosea to go and buy her back because apparently she's become a slave.From what I can gather though, he is to treat her somewhat like a slave himself until she has proven her worth. Which is what God plans to do to Israel. See how its all related! Then there's a bit about raisin cakes and all I can think of are those gross Little Debbie raisin cream pies. Blahhhch. And then a bunch more about woman sleeping around. Daughters sleeping around, daughters in law sleeping around...this was written by men right? Hard to tell sometimes. We must remember though that most of this is symbolic harlotry. Cheating on God with Baal.
At the end of chapter 7 God gets really, really angry. He has a pretty moving monologue in which he says in a nutshell...REALLY!?
2 comments:
God is irritated that they are not giving him the glory. Isn't that how people are though? When things are going great they forget about God, but as soon as some tragedy happens they get their religion back. Again, that's the problem with practicing religion and not living Christianity.
In 5:10 it talks about removing landmarks and in [] it says the barrier between right and wrong. I wonder if this is what was meant in earlier readings. Isn't that what we've done nowadays? We've removed the barrier between right and wrong. That is, we've tried to move toward moral relativism. People claim that what was right and wrong in the "old" days doesn't count anymore....like homosexuality, etc. But I think it does, and so did our founding fathers..hence the use of the word "inalienable". Things/rights that never change. That are steadfast in their moral apptitudes. We, as fallible beings, have no right to move the barrier between right and wrong.
Did the Israelites (and us in our interpretation) fail to see that it is doing what's good and right that God loves not sacrifices? Whether back then, or now, God didn't want sacrifices or asking for forgiveness to be a flippant thing. That is, the point was to SINCERELY ask forgiveness and atonment....to do good and obey him. It was about the actual sacrifice in and of itself. That was just to "reset" us. But for the Israelites it became more about the traditions in the law than the morality. And even today with Catholics,etc. it seems to be more about going through the motions, confession, etc. I know a lot of Catholics when I was younger that would party like rock stars on sat. night then go to mass on sun. morn. all hung over. And did this week in and week out. And they actually thought they were going to heaven. Really? It's not about the going through the motions...God doesn't care about confessing to a priest just so you can go out and purposefully sin again, He doesn't care about hail mary's or our father's. He cares about people who sincerely try to follow His precepts.
You know, in America today we have this problem with people trying to interpret things whether it's the Const. or the Bible in a way that fits the lifestyle they want to live for their own self-centered reasons. We tend, like this reading says, to start thinking we are great simply because or own "greatness". Like in the U.S. today, we've forgotten where we've come from. We have people who try to errantly interpret the sep. of church and state to mean something that is clearly and totally different than what our found. fathers meant it to be. We think our might and wealth comes from ourselves (by ourselves) and so attempt to remove God (and ref. to Him) from all public life. Of course, God being a God of free will, will absolutely leave us alone if we ask. And when He does, and something bad happens whether it's a hurrican in the Gulf, a earthquake in CA., or a terrror attack on the east coast, the first thing skeptics ask is, Where was God. And I would remind them that He took a hike like you asked Him to. If He forced himself upon you, then people would claim we're just puppets. You can't have it both ways. You can't say that you want free will (to tell God to get lost and have Him listen) only to wonder why he did as you asked leaving you more vulnerable to tragedy. But that's what we do.
Post a Comment