Hosea 13:11

I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(11) Gave . . . Took.—The past tenses should be present: “I give . . .” “take away.” The whole succession of Israelite kings, who generation after generation had been taken away, some by violent death, would close with Hoshea, who was to disappear as “a fragment on a stormy sea” (Hosea 10:7).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

13:9-16 Israel had destroyed himself by his rebellion; but he could not save himself, his help was from the Lord only. This may well be applied to the case of spiritual redemption, from that lost state into which all have fallen by wilful sins. God often gives in displeasure what we sinfully desire. It is the happiness of the saints, that, whether God gives or takes away, all is in love. But it is the misery of the wicked, that, whether God gives or takes away, it is all in wrath, nothing is comfortable. Except sinners repent and believe the gospel, anguish will soon come upon them. The prophecy of the ruin of Israel as a nation, also showed there would be a merciful and powerful interposition of God, to save a remnant of them. Yet this was but a shadow of the ransom of the true Israel, by the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. He will destroy death and the grave. The Lord would not repent of his purpose and promise. Yet, in the mean time, Israel would be desolated for her sins. Without fruitfulness in good works, springing from the Holy Spirit, all other fruitfulness will be found as empty as the uncertain riches of the world. The wrath of God will wither its branches, its sprigs shall be dried up, it shall come to nothing. Woes, more terrible than any from the most cruel warfare, shall fall on those who rebel against God. From such miseries, and from sin, the cause of them, may the Lord deliver us.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I gave thee a king in Mine anger - o: "God, when He is asked for ought amiss, sheweth displeasure, when He giveth, hath mercy, when He giveth not." "The devil was heard," (in asking to enter into the swine) "the Apostle was not heard," (when he prayed that the messenger of Satan might depart from him) , "God heard him whom He purposed to condemn; and He heard not him whom He willed to heal." : "God, when propitious, denieth what we love, when we love amiss; when wroth, He giveth to the lover, what he loveth amiss. The Apostle saith plainly, "God gave them over to their own hearts' desire." He gave them then what they loved, but, in giving, condemned them." God did appoint Jeroboam, although not in the way in which Israel took him. Jeroboam and Israel took, as from themselves, what God appointed; and, so taking it, marred God's gift.

Taking it to themselves from themselves, they maintained it for themselves by human policy and sin. As was the beginning, such was the whole course of their kings. The beginning was rebellion; murder, intestine commotion, anarchy, was the oft-repeated issue. God was against them and their kings; but he let them have their way. In His displeasure with them He allowed them their choice; in displeasure with their evil kings He took them away. Some He smote in their own persons, some in their posterity. So often as He gave them, so often He removed them, until, in Hoshea, He took them away forever. This too explains, how what God "gave in anger," could be "taken away" also "in anger." The civil authority was not a thing wrong in itself, the ceasing whereof must be a mercy. Israel was in a worse condition through its separate monarchy; but, apart from the calf-worship, it was not sin. The changing of one king for another did not mend it.

Individual kings were taken away in anger against themselves; their removal brought fresh misery and bloodshed. Nations and Churches and individuals may put themselves in an evil position, and God may have allowed it in His anger, and yet, it may be their wisdom and humility to remain in it, until God change it, lest He should "take" it away, not in forgiveness, but in "anger." : "David they neither asked for, nor did the Lord give him in His anger; but the Lord first chose him in mercy, gave him in grace, in His supreme good-pleasure He strengthened and preserved him." : "Let no one who suffereth from a wicked ruler, accuse "him" from whom he suffereth, for it was from his own ill deserts, that he became subject to such a ruler. Let him accuse then his own deeds, rather than the injustice of the ruler, for it is written, "I gave thee a king in Mine anger." Why then disdain to have as rulers, those whose rule we receive from the anger of God?" : "When a reprobate people is allowed to have a reprobate pastor, that pastor is given, neither for his own sake, nor for that of the people; inasmuch as he so governeth, and they so obey, that neither the teacher nor the taught are found meet to attain to eternal bliss. Of whom the Lord saith by Hosea, "I gave thee a king in Mine anger." For in the anger of God is a king given, when the bad have a worse appointed as their ruler. Such a pastor is then given, when he undertakes the rule of such a people, both being condemned alike to everlasting punishment."

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

11. I gave … king in … anger … took … away in … wrath—true both of Saul (1Sa 15:22, 23; 16:1) and of Jeroboam's line (2Ki 15:30). Pekah was taken away through Hoshea, as he himself took away Pekahiah; and as Hoshea was soon to be taken away by the Assyrian king.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I gave thee a king in mine anger; such as Shallum, Menahem, Pekah, &c.; but in displeasure against you.

I took him away; the Hebrew says not what; I think, their kings mentioned.

In my wrath: God was angry when he gave such kings to Israel, and he was no better pleased when he took them away; they were punishments when given, and it was punishment to Israel when they were taken away. If you read this verse in the future tense, as you may, I will give them a king in my anger, it may refer to God’s giving the king of Assyria the rule over them, making them his vassals; and I will take away, i.e. you, O Israelites, in my wrath, I will destroy some, and send others into captivity, take all away out of your land, and send you in wrath to the grave, or captives into Assyria.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

I gave thee a king in mine anger,.... Not the king of Assyria, sent to waste and destroy them, and carry them captive, as some, for of him the next clause cannot be said; nor Jeroboam, the first king of the ten tribes, as others, who was not given in anger to Israel, but to Solomon; rather Saul, as Kimchi and Aben Ezra, the first king of all Israel; and who was given at the request of the people, though in anger and resentment, they rejecting God their King; or it may design the kingly office and power in general, in a succession of kings from him the first of them:

and took him away in my wrath; not Jeroboam, who does not appear to be taken away by death in wrath; rather Saul, who died in battle with the Philistines, and fell on the mountains of Gilboa: but it may be rendered better, "I will take him away" (o); and refers not to Zedekiah the last king of Judith, as some in Kimchi; but to Hoshea, the last king of the ten tribes; for it is of there more especially the words, both in the text and context, are spoken; and so it respects the entire removal of kingly power from them, which ceased in Hoshea; see Hosea 3:4.

(o) "et auferam", Zanchius, Piscator, Cocceius, V. L. "recipiam", Drusius; "accipiam", Schmidt.

Geneva Study Bible

I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

11. I gave thee, &c.] Rather, I give thee kings [lit., a king] in mine anger, and take (them) away in my wrath. The reference is to the elevation of Jeroboam I., but also to the various dynasties which from time to time forced their way to the throne (comp. on Hosea 7:7). Indulged self-will brought with it its own punishment—hardening of the heart in apostasy. Thus our passage seems to mediate between the two different views of Jeroboam’s act presented to us in Hosea 1:11 (see note) and 1 Kings 11:29-39 respectively. In one sense Jehovah ‘gave’; in another, he ‘gave’ not.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 11. - I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath. The imperfects אחי and אקי here are correctly explained by Keil as denoting "an action that is repeated again and again, for which we should use the present; and refer to all the kings that the kingdom of the ten tribes had received and was receiving still, and to their removal." Hitzig calls it here the historical present. Jerome, Aben Ezra, and Kimchi refer the first clause to Saul as given in anger; and the second to Zedekiah as taken away in wrath. Hosea 13:11

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Hosea 13:9 commences a new strophe, in which the prophet once more discloses to the people the reason for their corruption (Hosea 13:9-13); and after pointing to the saving omnipotence of the Lord (Hosea 13:14), holds up before them utter destruction as the just punishment for their guilt (Hosea 13:15 and Hosea 14:1). Hosea 13:9. "O Israel, it hurls thee into destruction, that thou (art) against me, thy help. Hosea 13:10. Where is thy king? that he may help thee in all thy cities: and (where) they judges? of whom thou saidst, Give me king and princes! Hosea 13:11. I give thee kings in my anger, and take them away in my wrath." שׁחתך does not combine together the verbs in Hosea 13:8, as Hitzig supposes; nor does Hosea 13:9 give the reason for what precedes, but shichethkhâ is explained by Hosea 13:10, from which we may see that a new train of thought commences with Hosea 13:9. Shichēth does not mean to act corruptly here, as in Deuteronomy 32:5; Deuteronomy 9:12, and Exodus 32:7, but to bring into corruption, to ruin, as in Genesis 6:17; Genesis 9:15; Numbers 32:15, etc. The sentence כּי בי וגו cannot be explained in any other way than by supplying the pronoun אתּה, as a subject taken from the suffix to שׁחתך (Marck, and nearly all the modern commentators). "This throws thee into distress, that thou hast resisted me, who am thy help." בעזרך: as in Deuteronomy 33:26, except that ב is used in the sense of against, as in Genesis 16:12; 2 Samuel 24:17, etc. This opposition did not take place, however, when all Israel demanded a king of Samuel (1 Samuel 8:5). For although this desire is represented there (Hosea 13:7) as the rejection of Jehovah, Hosea is speaking here simply of the Israel of the ten tribes. The latter rebelled against Jehovah, when they fell away from the house of David, and made Jeroboam their king, and with contempt of Jehovah put their trust in the might of their kings of their own choosing (1 Kings 12:16.). But these kings could not afford them any true help. The question, "Where" ('ehı̄ only occurs here and twice in Hosea 13:14, for אי or איה, possibly simply from a dialectical variation - vid. Ewald, 104, c - and is strengthened by אפוא, as in Job 17:15), "Where is thy king, that he may help thee?" does not presuppose that Israel had no king at all at that time, and that the kingdom was in a state of anarchy, but simply that it had no king who could save it, when the foe, the Assyrian, attacked it in all its cities. Before shōpheteykhâ (thy judges) we must repeat 'ĕhı̄ (where). The shōphetı̄m, as the use of the word sârı̄m (princes) in its stead in the following clause clearly shows, are not simple judges, but royal counsellors and ministers, who managed the affairs of the kingdom along with the king, and superintended the administration of justice. The saying, "Give me a king and princes," reminds us very forcibly of the demand of the people in the time of Samuel; but they really refer simply to the desire of the ten tribes for a king of their own, which manifested itself in their dissatisfaction with the rule of the house of David, and their consequent secession, and to their persistence in this secession amidst all the subsequent changes of the government. We cannot therefore take the imperfects אתּן and אקּח in Hosea 13:11 as pure preterites, i.e., we cannot understand them as referring simply to the choice of Jeroboam as king, and to his death. The imperfects denote an action that is repeated again and again, for which we should use the present, and refer to all the kings that the kingdom of the ten tribes had received and was receiving still, and to their removal. God in His wrath gives the sinful nation kings and takes them away, in order to punish the nation through its kings. This applies not merely to the kings who followed one another so rapidly through conspiracy and murder, although through these the kingdom was gradually broken up and its dissolution accelerated, but to the rulers of the ten tribes as a whole. God gave the tribes who were discontented with the theocratical government of David and Solomon a king of their own, that He might punish them for their resistance to His government, which came to light in the rebellion against Rehoboam. He suspended the division of the kingdom not only over Solomon, as a punishment for his idolatry, but also over the rebellious ten tribes, who, when they separated themselves from the royal house to which the promise had been given of everlasting duration, were also separated from the divinely appointed worship and altar, and given up into the power of their kings, who hurled one another from the throne; and God took away this government from them to chastise them for their sins, by giving them into the power of the heathen, and by driving them away from His face. It is to this last thought, that what follows is attached. The removal of the king in wrath would occur, because the sin of Ephraim was reserved for punishment.