Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi - that is, “My people, and to your sisters, Ruhamah,” i. e., “beloved or tenderly pitied.” The words form a climax of the love of God. First, the people scattered , unpitied , and disowned by God , is re-born of God; then it is declared to be in continued relation to God, “My people;” then to be the object of his yearning love. The words, “My people,” may be alike filled up, “ye are My people,” and “be ye My people.” They are words of hope in prophecy, “ye shall be again My people;” they become words of joy in each stage of fulfillment. They are words of mutual joy and gratulation, when obeyed; they are words of encouragement, until obeyed. God is reconciled to us, and willeth that we be reconciled to Him. Among those who already are God’s people, they are the voice of the joy of mutual love in the oneness of the Spirit of adoption; “we are His people;” to those without (whether the ten tribes, or the Jews of heretics,) they are the voice of those who know in whom they have believed, “Be ye also His people.” Despair of the salvation of none, but, with brotherly love, call them to repentance and salvation.”
This verse closes what went before, as God’s reversal of His own sentence, and anticipates what is to come (Hosea 5:14 ff). God commands the prophets and all those who love Him, to appeal to those who forget Him, holding out to them the mercy in store for them also, if they will return to Him. He bids them not to despise those yet alien from Him, “but to treat as brethren and sisters, those whom God willeth to introduce into His house, and to call to the riches of His inheritance.”