How Are We to Understand God’s Commanding Hosea to Marry a Harlot? Would God literally command one of His servants to take an immoral woman for His wife? Or is this command to be interpreted only in a symbolic sense? Interpretations fall into five general categories:
1. Hosea was actually asked by God to marry a harlot. Those scholars who maintain this view think that such a marriage served as an object lesson to call Israel’s attention to their carnal state. Others have felt that such an act would be inconsistent with God, who “cannot look upon sin with the least degree of allowance” (Alma 45:16). While the Lord was not commanding Hosea to sin, some have felt God would not use sinful behavior even in an object lesson of this kind. Sidney B. Sperry said that this “would be imputing to God a command inconsistent with His holy character. Furthermore, for Hosea to marry a woman with a questionable past would make it impossible for him to preach to his people and expose their sexual immoralities. They could point the finger of scorn at him and say, ‘You are as guilty as we are; don’t preach to us.’” (Voice of Israel’s Prophets, p. 281.)
2. The whole experience came to Hosea in a dream or vision. There was neither harlot nor marriage, but Hosea was asked to accept the burden of being prophet (husband) to immoral Israel (Gomer). Although possible, most scholars reject this alternative because of the intensity of Hosea’s involvement with the imagery.
3. Hosea married a woman who at the time was good and faithful but later became a faithless wife, a harlot, when she left her husband to participate in the fertility rites of the neighboring Canaanites. In this case Hosea’s life was an “enacted parable,” and the phrase “wife of whoredoms” (Hosea 1:2) refers to what Gomer became. In other words, Hosea did marry Gomer, but she was not a harlot then. Those scholars who sustain this view explain that later in life, Hosea, looking back on his experiences and all that he had suffered and learned through them, recorded incidents that helped illustrate his teachings. The difficulty with this interpretation is that the Lord commanded Hosea to take a “wife of whoredoms” (v. 2). If Gomer were faithful and true at the time of the marriage, this phrase would seem like a peculiar way to describe her.
4. A variation of the interpretation in number three is that Gomer was not an actual harlot but was a worshiper of Baal; therefore, she was guilty of spiritual harlotry. But even so, it seems peculiar that God would ask a prophet to marry a nonbelieving wife.
5. Another approach that avoids some of these difficulties is that the words present an allegory designed to teach the spiritual consequences of Israel’s unfaithfulness. Sperry felt that Hosea never did actually contract such a marriage. He explains: “The Lord’s call to Hosea to take a harlotrous woman to wife represents the prophet’s call to the ministry—a ministry to an apostate and covenant-breaking people. The . . . children of this apparent union represent the coming of the judgments of the Lord upon Israel, warning of which was to be carried to the people by the prophet. The figure of the harlotrous wife and children would, I believe, be readily understood at the time by the Hebrew people without reflecting on Hosea’s own wife, or, if he was unmarried, on himself.” (Voice of Israel’s Prophets, p. 281.) Elder Henry B. Eyring of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles commented on his experience years before teaching Hosea to his early morning seminary classes: “The book of Hosea, like the writings of Isaiah, uses what seem to me almost poetic images. The symbols in Hosea are a husband, his bride, her betrayal, and a test of marriage covenants almost beyond comprehension. . . . Here are the fierce words of the husband, spoken after his wife has betrayed him in adultery: [Hosea 2:6–7]. “He goes on (through verse 13) to describe the punishment she deserves, and then comes a remarkable change in the verse that follows. . . . : [Hosea 2:14–15, 19–23]. “At that early point in the story, in just two chapters, even my youngest students knew that the husband was a metaphor for Jehovah, Jesus Christ. And they knew that the wife represented his covenant people, Israel, who had gone after strange gods. They understood that the Lord was teaching them, through this metaphor, an important principle. Even though those with whom he has covenanted may be horribly unfaithful to him, he would not divorce them if they would only turn back to him with full purpose of heart. “I knew that too, but even more than that, I felt something. I had a new feeling about what it means to make a covenant with the Lord. All my life I had heard explanations of covenants as being like a contract, an agreement where one person agrees to do something and the other agrees to do something else in return. “For more reasons than I can explain, during those days teaching Hosea, I felt something new, something more powerful. This was not a story about a business deal between partners, nor about business law. . . . This was a love story. This was a story of a marriage covenant bound by love, by steadfast love. What I felt then, and it has increased over the years, was that the Lord, with whom I am blessed to have made covenants, loves me, and you, . . . with a steadfastness about which I continually marvel and which I want with all my heart to emulate” (Covenants and Sacrifice [address to religious educators, 15 Aug. 1995], pp. 1–2).
] and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the LORD. [ In what way was ancient Israel comparable to Gomer, who is described as “a wife of whoredoms”? (See Hosea 1:2–3; 2:5, 13. Gomer had left her husband for her lovers; Israel had forgotten the Lord and become wicked.) See Judges 2:17 And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the Lord; but they did not so. ]
[ Who or what were Israel’s “lovers”—the things that caused her to commit these whoredoms, the things that caused the people to turn away from the Lord? (Other gods, material goods, and the practices of the world.) What things may divert us from our dedication to following the Savior? Elder Bruce R. McConkie explained: “In a spiritual sense, to emphasize how serious it is, the damning sin of idolatry is called adultery. When the Lord’s people forsake him and worship false gods, their infidelity to Jehovah is described as whoredoms and adultery. ]
3 so he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son.
[ Biblical names often were taken from the circumstances surrounding the child’s birth, so in this narrative the names are used to suggest or symbolize the destruction that awaits Israel because of her adulterous ways. ]
is spared and has their fortunes reversed. For the sands of the sea, cp. Gen. 22:17, for not being able to be counted, cp. Gen. 15:5. See also Gen. 32:12.] and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. [ Through the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant, Israel will some day return, and shall be numbered more than the sands of the sea. Then, they shall no longer be called "not My people", but rather "children of God" - Ever need a good example of the power of covenants.]