Hosea Chapter 5 verse 10 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 10. - The princes of Judah were like them that remove the bound. The individual who had the temerity to remove his neighbor's landmark was not only guilty of a great sin, but obnoxious to a grievous curse. Thus Deuteronomy 19:14, "Thou shall not remove thy neighbor's landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance;" and again Deuteronomy 27:17, "Cursed be he that removeth his neighbor's landmark. And all the people shall say, Amen." The removal of the landmark characterizes the conduct of men entirely regardless of the rights of others - utterly reckless. The Jewish nobles, the king's ministers and high officers of state, are compared to those who remove the landmark, disregarding alike what was due to their fellow-men and to their God. The Jewish commentators differ in their exposition between tact and figure - some of them taking the removal of the boundary as a matter of fact, the caph being for confirmation; thus D. Kimchi; while I. Kimchi explains it of the rejection of the appeal for justice against removers of landmarks; others understanding it figuratively, and the whole as expressing general lawlessness, thus Rashi: "Like a man who removes his neighbor's landmark, just so they hasten to hold fast the ways of Israel their neighbors... according to the literal sense, They grasped at the fields; but this, in my opinion, is harsh, for then the prophet must have written merely מסיגי, and not נמסיגי." Similarly Aben Ezra: "They exercise violence towards those who are in their power, whilst they are like those who secretly remove the landmark." The people of Judah had also sinned, and, like Israel in sin, they resemble them in suffering. There-tore I will pour out my wrath upon them like water. The word "wrath" here is from a root which signifies "to overflow;" it is thus the overflowing of Divine indignation; while the outpouring thereof denotes the full flood of wrath that will overwhelm those lawless leaders of a misguided and misgoverned people. The execution of the threatening was reserved for the Assyrians. who, under Tiglath-pileser and Sennacherib, invaded and laid waste the land. And yet those judgments, though so severe and plentiful, were not to end in total and lasting devastation as in the case of Israel. The following vers. 11-15 teach the inevitable nature of the judgments that were coming upon both Israel and Judah, and from which no earthly power could deliver them. The only relief possible depended on their seeking God in the day of their distress.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(10) The princes of Judah, such as Ahaz, whose pusillanimity brought untold evil on both Israel and Judah (2Kings 16:10-18).Like them that remove the bound (landmark).--A practice prohibited in Deuteronomy 19:14, and included in the curses of Mount Ebal (Deuteronomy 27:17), an indication that this very legislation existed before the time of the prophet. They break down the barrier between right and wrong, between truth and falsehood, between Jehovah and Baalim.