Ephraim compasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit: but Judah yet ruleth with God, and is faithful with the saints.
Ephraim compasseth me about with lies ... but Judah ... is faithful with the saints. Maurer joins this verse with Hosea 12:1-14. But as this verse praises Judah, whereas Hosea 12:2 censures him, it must belong rather to Hosea 11:1-12, and a new prophecy begins at Hosea 12:1-14. To avoid this, Maurer translates this verse as a censure, 'Judah wanders with God' - i:e., though having the true God, he wanders after false gods.
But Judah yet ruleth with God. To serve God is to reign. Ephraim wished to rule without God (cf. 1 Corinthians 4:8); nay, even, in order to rule, cast off God's worship (Rivetus). In Judah was the legitimate succession of kings and priests.
And is faithful with the saints - the holy priests and Levites (Rivetus). With the fathers and prophets who handed down the pure worship of God. Israel's apostasy is the more culpable as he had before him the good example of Judah, which he set at naught. The parallelism ("with GOD") favours margin, 'and is faithful with THE MOST HOLY ONE.' The same plural is used of God elsewhere (Joshua 24:19; Proverbs 30:3). х Qªdowshiym (H6918)] Its plural form, as indeed of the ordinary Hebrew name for God, 'Elohiym (H430), can only be accounted for by its being taken as implying the mystery of the Trinity.
Remarks:
(1) When Israel was weak, wayward, and ignorant as a child, then God loved him, and exhibited His love in choosing him out of all nations to be His special people and heritage. God publicly owned Israel, who was then but a bond-servant in Egypt, as His own son-yes, even His first-born; and as such God claimed him from his Egyptian oppressor. Egypt itself was caused by God to afford for a time shelter and sustenance to Israel, as it did subsequently to Israel's great antitype, Messiah. Heroin Israel is a type also of the Church and the true believer. God, by sending the Spirit of His Son into the hearts of His people (Galatians 4:6) as the spirit of adoption, calls them His while they are still in the Egypt of this world. Indeed, He separates them to Himself from the womb, and calls them by His grace, as He did Paul (Galatians 1:15).
(2) How sad a contrast to God's love is presented by Israel's perversity! Besides His first call to him in Egypt, God addressed many subsequent calls by Moses, Joshua, the judges, and the prophets (Hosea 11:2). But the more He called, the more the Israelites turned away from Him and His ministers. So also when the Son of God Himself subsequently addressed the heavenly call to them, they went away from even Him, one to his farm, another to his merchandise; while the rest, with the exception of but the few who believed, shed the blood of their Saviour who would have been their king, but that they declared, "We will not have this man to reign over us."
(3) Whereas Ephraim thus rebelled, God, on the other hand, had shown the tenderness of one who combined in Himself the character of Father and nurse to Ephraim, teaching him gently, in the weakness of national infancy, how to wall step by step; then, when Ephraim was wearied, God "took them by their arms," or as it may be translated, 'God took them up in His arms,' just as a loving father does his child when tired with its first efforts to walk (Numbers 11:12; Isaiah 63:9). He gave them the law, the ordinances of worship, and the priesthood, all to teach them the way that they should go. Then by day He guided them with the pillar of cloud, the symbol of His presence among them, and by night with the pillar of fire. But, oh, how sad to think that, such wondrous love should not be appreciated! "They knew not," saith God, in sorrowful expostulation, "that I healed them" (Hosea 11:3). The spiritual Israel of God are similarly supported and guided. The Saviour, as their great High Priest, bears their names on his breast, for their acceptance before God. By His Spirit in them, and by His providence for them, He teaches them the way that they should go. Let us never, then, forget for a moment Him who hath so graciously healed our soul-disease.
(4) God adds, "I drew him with cords of a man, with bands of love." God draws, not drives or drags. Jesus was "lifted on the cross" for the very purpose of "drawing all men unto Him" (John 12:32) His love is the magnet that draws His people to Him. At the same time, "no man can come unto Jesus except the Father draw him" by the Holy Spirit (John 6:44). Our part, therefore, is individually to pray, "Draw me, we will run after thee" (Song of Solomon 1:4). God draws with the cords of a man, not with the ropes needed for dragging a beast, The Son of God became man, in order to draw men, as such, by the cords of sympathy, as partaking of a common nature with us. His "bands of love" sit so lightly on those of us who wear them, that they are no hinderance to us in enjoying all that is really good for us, and which God has so richly "laid" before us (Hosea 11:4).
(5) Israel would not have God for his king, therefore, in just retribution, "the Assyrian should be his king" (Hosea 11:5). Israel's own politic counsels (as he thought them) proved the source of his ruin (Hosea 11:6). Hoshea the king, by conspiring with the Egyptian So, thought to secure his kingdom; but this proved to be the very occasion of its overthrow, by his thereby bringing down upon himself and his people the destroying hosts of Assyria. So short-sighted is human sagacity apart from piety toward God. Surely "He taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong" (Job 5:13).
(6) Yet such is the tender compassion of God toward the people of His covenant, that though they were "bent to backsliding," and 'clung to it' with desperate tenacity (Hosea 11:7), God still cries, "How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?" (Hosea 11:8.) It is true, Israel deserved to be treated as Admah and the other four guilty cities of the plain. But "God is not man," that He should change from the everlasting covenant made with Israel's forefathers, Abraham Isaac, and Jacob (Hosea 11:9).
Therefore, though His justice requires that the guilty ones in Israel should suffer, since He is "the Holy One in the midst" of the elect nation; yet His covenanted "mercy rejoices over judgment" as regards the nation. Accordingly, having once punished Ephraim, He will, when He shall have restored the people, "destroy" them no more. The time will come when His heart of infinite love shall turn to His long cast off people, and His "repentings" of the past evil inflicted on them shall be "kindled together" (Hosea 11:8). Then "shall they walk after the Lord" (Hosea 11:9), instead of backsliding from Him. His "children" shall flock to Him "as the doves to their windows," from the various regions of their dispersion, (Hosea 11:10); and they shall occupy permanent "houses" in their own lands (Hosea 11:11). So also the children of the spiritual Israel, "the remnant according to the election of grace," both of the circumcision and the uncircumcision. through the electing love of God, which triumphs over all their demerits and backslidings, shall at last "come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven." Christ Himself will place them in the "many mansions" of His "Father's house" (John 14:2). Just as when Israel walked "with deceit" (Hosea 11:12), yet Judah was "faithful with the saints," and with the Most Holy One; so God unto the end of the world shall never be without witnesses faithful to Him, and therefore "ruling with God" in spirit here, and about to reign with Christ in transfigured bodies hereafter. Let us see that our aim is not to reign without Christ now, but to rule already, through His Spirit in us, over the world, the flesh, and Satan; so hereafter shall we reign with Him in glory, when He who is our Life shall be manifested (Colossians 3:1-4).