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Israel's holiest things became sin to them through their disregard of God's commandments.

I. THE ALTAR BECOME SIN. (Ver. 11.) The law required that there should be but one altar, and that in the place where God had put his Name (Deuteronomy 12.). Ephraim disregarding this command, multiplied altars, and so committed sin. The worship at local altars was at most but tolerated in the days of the judges, of Samuel, and the early kings, in consideration of the unsettled state of the nation (1 Kings 3:2). It became sin once a house had been built for God's worship. Had it been necessary, after the division of the nation, to appoint a district center for Israel, God would have directed the people in the choice of one. They, however, neither desired nor sought for guidance, but organized their worship in their own way, blending with it idolatrous rites, and, beside Jehovah's altars, reared altars to idols (Hosea 10:1). They thus sinned, both in the number of their altars and in the use they put them to. Accordingly, God declares that these very altars, the things whereby they professed to worship him, would be imputed to them for sin. We are taught:

1. That God claims to regulate his own worship.

2. That wanton departures from the rule he has given is imputed as transgression.

3. That will-worship is not acceptable to God (Colossians 2:23).

4. That we cannot condone for disobedience in the matter of worship by either the number or magnificence of our services.

II. THE LAW BECOME SIN. (Ver. 12.) God had given Israel a Law, the myriad precepts of which would have guided them aright in every situation of life; but this Law Israel had "counted as a strange thing." The Law, which was "holy, and just, and good," became sin to the people through their neglect of it. Consider:

1. The dignity of the Law. It is God's Law ("my Law"); one, yet many. Single in its principle - " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God," etc. (cf. Deuteronomy 6:5) - yet manifold in its applications, branching out into an infinite multiplicity of precepts, and extending to every detail of life.

2. The accessibility of the Law. God had, to secure its being kept it: remembrance, put it in written form. The turn sometimes given to these words, "I would have written to him," etc., is meaningless in the connection. The prophet is dealing with what Ephraim has done, not with what he might have done under certain conceivable circumstances in which he was never placed. The passage is a testimony to the existence of a written Law. We should remember our own privileges in the possession of a written revelation.

3. The neglect of the Law. Ephraim permitted this Law, great, wonderful, and holy as it was, fitted to instruct and guide him m the way of life, to be as "a strange thing" unto him. He forbore to study it. He neglected to practice it. The very Law thus redounded to his condemnation. How many act in a similar way with the Bible! They possess it, but leave it unopened, unstudied. The unread Book becomes sin to them. It will rise against then, in the judgment.

III. SACRIFICES BECOME SIN. (Ver. 13.) As seen before, sacrifices will not be accepted by God as a substitute for obedience (Hosea 6:6; 1 Samuel 15:22). Without the right spirit in the offerer, they become as mere "flesh," in which God takes no pleasure. The sacred thing becomes a thing common. Instead of atoning for iniquity, the sacrifices became themselves iniquity. They were imputed for sin. Neither the number nor magnitude of them could avert the wrath that was decreed. "They shall return to Egypt," i.e. to a new Egypt, to Assyria.

IV. TEMPLES BECOME SIN. (Ver. 14.) As sacrifices cannot be taken instead of obedience, so temples cannot be accepted as a substitute for godliness. Israel "built temples," but had "forgotten his Maker." The very temples thus became as sin. The building of temples and the lavishing of outward adornment upon them often proceeds the more rapidity that God himself has been forgotten. Worship becomes externalism. The outward is made the most of, as if to condone for the want of the inward. It is not, however, outward temples that God primarily desires, but the temples of humble and contrite spirits (Isaiah 57:15). The former without the latter are sin.

V. FENCED CITIES BECOME SIN. (Ver. 14.) It is added that Judah had multiplied fenced cities. As sacrifices were substituted for obedience, and temples were substituted for godliness, so fenced cities got to be put instead of God himself. The sin lay in looking away from the pledged Divine help to mere earthly defenses. Those who do this are left at last to prove the worthlessness of their defenses. God would send a fire upon the cities, and it would devour the palaces. Human strength is no protection in the absence of God's help; it is equally powerless to protect against God's judgments. - J.O.

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KJV: Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin.

WEB: Because Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, they became for him altars for sinning.