The following is derived from an extended written exchange between myself and one here called "Skeptic X" (because of his continued acts of disrespect and dishonesty) over the allegedly contradictory regard given to the Israelite king Jehu by Hosea the prophet on the one hand and the writer of 2 Kings on the other. To this day, even years after the last salvo by me, Skeptic X continues to claim victory in this exchange, though he has yet to answer my final remarks on the subject.

At any rate, here is the debate, reworked in format for the encyclopedia. No change has been made in terms of content, although Skeptic X and his fans are welcome to comb through it and ineffectually claim, as is their usual methodology, to have been misrepresented without offering tangible proof.

2 Kings 10:29-31 However, (Jehu) did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit--the worship of the golden calves at Bethel and Dan. The LORD said to Jehu, "Because you have done well in accomplishing what is right in my eyes and have done to the house of Ahab all I had in mind to do, your descendants will sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation." Yet Jehu was not careful to keep the law of the LORD, the God of Israel, with all his heart. He did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam, which he had caused Israel to commit.

Hosea 1:4 Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel.

The skeptical program for these verses is set by Skeptic X thusly:

In 2 Kings 9-10, for example, the story of Jehu’s massacre of the royal family of Israel at Jezreel is related with the obvious approval of whoever wrote the account. At the end of this account, the writer declared Yahweh’s approval of Jehu’s actions: “Yahweh said to Jehu, ’Because you have done well in carrying out what I consider right, and in accordance with all that was in my heart have dealt with the house of Ahab, your sons of the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel’” (10:30)...

Whoever wrote the record of Jehu’s and his descendants’ reigns obviously thought that Jehu had pleased Yahweh in the massacre of the royal family of Israel in order to usurp the throne. Several years later, however, the prophet Hosea expressed an entirely different opinion of Jehu’s actions. When his wife Gomer bore a son, Hosea claimed that Yahweh said to him, “Name him Jezreel; for in a little while I will punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel” (Hosea 1:4). So the writer of 2 Kings heaped praise on Jehu for the Jezreel massacre of the royal family, but years later the prophet Hosea apparently said that Yahweh would avenge the blood of Jezreel and end the reign of the house of Jehu. This was apparently a retrojected prophecy to explain the assassination of Zechariah, the last Israelite king from the house of Jehu, but, regardless, in making the “prediction,” Hosea put himself into obvious disagreement with the writer of 2 Kings, who thought that Jehu had done “all that was in [Yahweh’s] heart” in the matter of Jezreel.

An answer to this can be given in two ways: First, to show that in Kings Jehu exceeded his commanded mission and therefore, though he did earn his keep and kingdom for his descendants, also deserved the condemnation of Hosea; or, to show that Hosea is not condemning Jehu at all. I prefer the latter explanation and shall offer it first. The former explanation I will also present, as a secondary option.

Summary of view: The punishment is of a kind, not related in purpose. The likeliest answer here is that Hosea 1:4 is to be read to express the idea that the bloodshed of Jezreel will be visited upon the house of Jehu - which is to say, the verse should read, not “punished for the blood of Jezreel,” but “punished by” - the reference is to the mode of punishment, rather than the cause of it.

This view of course works with the assumption that Hosea here is specifically referring to the events of 2 Kings 10. But the fact is that there is nothing in the verse above that requires this connection at all. It has merely been assumed that since 2 Kings is the only other place in the OT that describes suitable events located at Jezreel, that this must be, necessarily, what Hosea is referring to. However, there is nothing in Hosea that connects this reference to the specific actions of Jehu in 2 Kings. Allegedly condemned here is the "house of Jehu" - but this "house" consisted of several kings and their respective housemates, all but one of which had sufficient time to commit some objectionable (but otherwise unrecorded) atrocity or series of atrocities in Jezreel, which was a rather large geographical area. In the end, there is no certainty that Hosea is indeed referring to the events recorded in 2 Kings 10, which may make the entire discussion pointless...though we will assume for the sake of argument hereafter that it does.

Significantly, Skeptic X merely dismisses this proposition as "a variation of the old same-name-different-person argument that inerrantists sometimes resort to in order to try to wiggle out of situations that are damaging to their inerrancy position," and then goes on to blather for several sentences about such arguments. That's all quite impressive, I'm sure, to Skeptic X's sycophants, but the bottom line is that the OT records only a tiny portion of the history of the kings of Israel and Judah (as indeed, what documents we have remaining from ALL ancient civilizations leave to us only the tiniest portion of their respective histories), and Skeptic X cannot simply assert on bare bones and polemic that Hosea can ONLY be referring to the 2 Kings incident. Skeptic X's response here is predictable, and polemical, but it fails miserably in terms of critical history, which leaves the matter open where direct evidence is not forthcoming.

But, to strengthen this point, Skeptic X tried to show that there was reason for Hosea to pick this event from Jehu's life as an example:

The fact that the prophet selected this particular event from Jehu's past as his example of what would happen to the house of Jehu would surely indicate that he considered it a despicable event. In other words, to find something appropriate to compare to the impending fate of the house of Jehu, Hosea looked back and selected Jehu's complete extermination of the royal family of Israel. Would he have done that if he had thought that Jehu's actions at Jezreel were praiseworthy?

However, no one is arguing that Hosea thought that Jehu's actions per se were praiseworthy; and Skeptic X is failing to distinguish here between condemnation and example. Which is to say: Assuming that Hosea did choose this event, there is no doubt that he chose it for its appropriateness; but that is not the same thing as condemning it! Thus, Skeptic X's analogy:

The death of those who fought at the Alamo is considered an example to be greatly admired, and so the men who died there are thought of as exceptional heroes. If the ignominious end of some despicable person should be compared to an event like the fall of the heroes at the Alamo, anyone could see the inappropriateness of it.

-- is incomplete and inappropriate. Aside from the problem of comparing the heroes of the Alamo to the (at the very least) wicked and (at best) unquantified subjects of Jehu's massacre, the point, under the "visit" interpretation, would not be the social and political principles behind the Alamo, but the absolute awfulness of the carnage of the Alamo - which, heroic actions or not, is an undeniable part of that event. Skeptic X is mixing apples and oranges here. Therefore, when he further puts the analogy:

Let's suppose, for example, that a prophet of today should pronounce impending doom upon Saddam Hussein by saying, "God will visit upon Saddam Hussein the death of those who died at the Alamo." Who would not be able to see the incongruity in the comparison? Anyone could see that a far better analogy would be to compare Hussein's fate to the atrocity that he administered on the Kurds within his own country when he used nerve gas to wipe them out.

-- this too misses the point. If the point of referring to the Alamo here is that the Texans were starving for independence, then yes, the analogy would be inappropriate - never mind the social, chronological and geographic anachronisms involved, which make this an even more inappropriate analogy for our case! But if this had been said with the particular violence of the Alamo in mind, then it would indeed be appropriate - albeit, because of the problem of anachronism, not as good as using the Kurds. So then: It is incorrect for Skeptic X to say that even if my interpretation is correct, "the text would still indicate that the prophet disapproved of the massacre at Jezreel." Actually, it would indicate that he thought it was a bloody event, not the kind of place where you'd sit down and eat popcorn and wave flags, but that in itself places no moral weight upon the motives and actions behind the event.

To fix that impaired analogy: The difference here would be between someone saying, "I will punish Santa Ana's descendants for the bloodshed at the Alamo" versus "I will visit upon Santa Ana's descendants the bloodshed of the Alamo." If we have the first sense, it is an obvious condemnation/punishment for the events of the Alamo. But if we have the second sense, then the source of the condemnation/punishment could be anything - perhaps the Alamo, but also perhaps if Santa Ana (or his descendants) beat someone up 20 years after the Alamo, or perhaps in relation to a poker debt! To decide one way or the other, we need to know the context of the statement - and that is where our arguments re the content of the rest of Hosea favoring a "visit" interpretation come into play.

The primary argument we will pursue under these assumptions involves two aspects:

1. concerning the word translated "punish/avenge"
2. the word translated "massacre."

The first argument a) is that Hosea's words indicate that the house of Jehu will be punished, not because of the blood of Jezreel, but in the same way as occurred at Jezreel - which is to say, as Jehu at Jezreel destroyed his enemies, so shall now the house of Jehu be destroyed.

6485. paqad, paw-kad'; a prim. root; to visit (with friendly or hostile intent); by anal. to oversee, muster, charge, care for, miss, deposit, etc.:--appoint, X at all, avenge, bestow, (appoint to have the, give a) charge, commit, count, deliver to keep, be empty, enjoin, go see, hurt, do judgment, lack, lay up look, make X by any means, miss, number, officer, (make) overseer have (the) oversight, punish, reckon, (call to) remember (-brance), set (over), sum, X surely, visit, want.

Note well the applicable meanings: We see avenge and punish; but also bestow, remember, set (over), visit. If this verse is read, "I will visit the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu..." or "apply the bloodshed of Jezreel" then we have something entirely different than what Skeptic X has argued, and which matches what we have stated previously: The matter is one of punishment by type and method, and has nothing to do with retribution for the actions of Jehu. It is saying no more than, "I will bring upon the house of Jehu the same type of judgment that they brought about at Jezreel" - i.e. extermination of the totality of the house.

The question, of course, is whether we are justified in deferring to the bestow/visit interpretation upon this word, in preference to the avenge/punish interpretation. In answer to one of my arguments about this verse Skeptic X made the observation that:

Whenever Biblicists are cornered on an issue, they love to start talking about the "Semitic mind" and nuances in the original language.

...and from there, Skeptic X proceeded to list some 20 English translations of the Bible, 2 of which offer the "visit" interpretation, but the rest of which use the punish/avenge interpretation. This is a classic example of the sort of superficial scholarship that is common in Skeptic X's presentations. Skeptic X's reaction to arguments related to Semitisms and the original language are a hint that he is aware that to take such a turn would put him out of his capabilities and place the argument beyond his reach. Given Skeptic X's apparent zeal for listing and copying translations in English (and even one in French), one is constrained to ask why he did not bother to consult a single source relative to the Hebrew, which is (we hope) certainly within his wherewithal.

Any OT schoolboy, however, knows that simply listing translations is insufficient scholarship. Further, let it be pointed out that we are not engaging any sort of special pleading here: It is no less legitimate to appeal to the "Semitic mindset" and the nuances of Hebrew when considering the OT than it is to appeal to the "medieval mind" and the nuances of Elizabethan English when considering the works of Shakespeare. Even the most basic anthropological work (such as Matthews and Benjamin's Social World of Ancient Israel) makes it quite clear that there is a world of difference between our way of thinking and that of members of Ancient Near Eastern Mediterranean society - and that these differences must be taken into account when considering the Old and New Testaments. Once again, Skeptic X fails on the same point as always, reading the text of the Bible through his jaundiced, 20th-century Western eyes and wondering why the text does not conform to his own chauvinistic expectations.

Now a few words from Skeptic X on the 2 translations which used the "visit" translation:

Even the two translations that offered the "visit" interpretation were clear in conveying that Hosea was saying that Yahweh would "visit" the blood of Jezreel on the house of Jehu in the same sense as when he said in many other passages that he would "visit" or "remember" the sins and iniquities of people. When used in that way, even the word "visit" carried the connotation of punishment or vengeance.

And we agree that it does: But is it a punishment FOR the blood of Jezreel, or BY (in the same way as) the blood of Jezreel? That is the issue at hand, and Skeptic X fails to address it. However, this is a good time to make a certain point - against an aspect of Skeptic X's "argument" which thinks that quoting English versions is the solution to his woes (and this all applies when other skeptics play this game as well).

In several places, Skeptic X sets against me the array of translators who came up with this verse in English in the way he supports it: viz. the "hundreds of translators who cooperated in producing the KJV, ASV, RSV, NRSV, NKJV, NAB, NIV, etc., etc., etc., etc. got it all wrong," and it is my "burden to prove that all of these translators were wrong" and I am right, etc. Skeptic X supposes here to build an army of argument by authority for his version of this verse (Never mind all that earlier rap about quoting scholars, eh! - apparently it is all right to do if you leave the scholars a faceless, anonymous mass!), but let's analyze this claim critically a moment. Hundreds? Let's say each of those 25 or so versions Skeptic X quotes from employed a team of 50 translators on average for their OT translation work. That adds up to hundreds, actually 1250. But it'd be a bit of a step to suggest that EACH of these 1250 worked on this verse - that's not how translations are put together! Translations of the Bible are done by teams, and each book is assigned a certain number of translators. A small-to-medium book like Hosea would not need many translators (as opposed to Isaiah, for example), but let's give Skeptic X the best face possible and say that 4 translators from each version worked on Hosea. That means we're only dealing with a hundred people...but we're not done yet!

The linguistic detail work on this verse has only been done in the last decade. Unless they had the gift of prophecy, the overwhelming number of these versions (I daresay at least the KJV!) were translated before this research was performed. Without examining the date of each of the versions, let's be generous and say that one-third were done by the time prescribed. We are down to 33 translators in Skeptic X's army. Now of these 33, we must presume that a) they were aware of the linguistic research in question; b) that they were able and willing to acquire and evaluate it; c) that they considered the data carefully and fairly, and finally d) critically evaluated the data and made a decision based on sound principles! So unless Skeptic X wants to go out and take a poll of those translators and find out WHY they chose the way they did, throwing the weight of their numbers at us is simply hot air - just the fallacy of argument by authority, and far, far more of a "sin" than he claims my quoting of scholars is!

Skeptic X also suggests that my commentators are "actually believers in biblical inspiration" who "are looking for a way to plug a big hole in the traditional claim that the Bible is a work of perfect harmony." Such charges are the province of those who have not the wherewithal to search for their own answers: While accusations of conspiracy are polemically viable (viz. the works of Robert Price), and manage to provide an answer without the drudgery of actual research, they deserve very little attention from those of us who think critically and observe the discipline of scholarship.

That said, let it be clarified (as if it were really needed by anyone other than Skeptic X) that my "commentators" run the spectrum from conservative to moderate to liberal. All three groups, when seeking resolutions to apparent problems, are really doing no more than any responsible historian (outside of the radical and presumptuous critical school) is doing, which is seeking first to resolve a given difficulty before assuming some error on the part of the source material. They also have different solutions: Some of the liberal bent suggest a type of progressive revelation, in which God has set higher standards of action in Hosea's time than were set in Jehu's time, in response to the human need for growth. [see AndFree.Hos, 178; Crai.12P, 12; for reply, see Irv.ThrJez, 499]. Others remain content with seeing contradiction (but seldom offer any detailed work on the subject - see Wolf.Hos, 17-18; May.Hos, 28; Jone.12K, 273). Irvine [Irv.ThrJez, 503] suggests that our 2 Kings passage (10:30-1) is a piece of imperial propaganda that was being refuted by Hosea, which would raise the question of interpolation in 2 Kings or its sources. Of course, if Skeptic X wishes to assert some harmonic conspiracy at work, that is his prerogative. It is certainly much easier for him than taking the time to absorb the requisite knowledge and make his own, qualified assessment of the matter, and slightly easier than engaging in the drudgework of seeking an answer in properly and better-informed sources.

To begin, now, with the answer for the visit/punish problem. Here we will give the floor to McComiskey's detailed exegesis [MCom.MP, 20n; see also MCom.PrIron and Garr.HosJoe, 57], which argues that the word paqad here "establishes a relationship expressing supreme irony." Places where Hebrew characters appear in the text are represented with material in ():

(Paqad) is difficult to define. It frequently describes an action that precedes the bestowal of blessing (Gen. 21:1, 50:24-5, Exod. 3:16) or the execution of judgment (Ex. 32:34, 1 Sam. 15:2, Is. 23:7) on the part of God. Since the word may precede an act of blessing, it cannot denote the sole idea of punishment. It is best to understand it as attending to or giving heed to a person, object or situation before responding. This concept of mental apprehension is apparent in the frequent association of the word with (remember, see, e.g., Jer. 14:10). There are many other nuances, but in contexts of judgment it describes an action in which God attends to the wrong he observes by intervening with appropriate action. When (paqad) is collocated with (upon) as well as a direct object and an indirect object (as it is here) in statements of judgment, the direct object is viewed as attending the indirect object. That is, the direct object is brought into the experience of the indirect object.

It is worth pausing here to look at Skeptic X's reaction to this paragraph. He writes:

It's sort of amusing that those who want to talk about "nuances" in Hebrew don't seem to understand even elementary points of grammar. All the way through his explication of "paqad," McComiskey confuses indirect objects with objects of prepositions and refers to indirect objects in sentences where the structure is really that of prepositions and their objects....

Skeptic X goes on to give us a lecture in English grammar - assuming that the English versions of our verse and assuming that the English grammar corresponds with the Hebrew grammar precisely. He does not analyze the Hebrew grammar or show how McComiskey has allegedly "confused" anything; he merely throws a few English rules into the mix and assumes that the job is done! Just the answer we would expect from a neophyte out of his range! To complain about someone not understanding "basic grammatical principles" without failing to comprehend that those principles often vary in nuances from one language to the next (indeed, often vary significantly!) is not just ignorance - it's chauvinism!

At any rate, from here Skeptic X employs his usual predictable conspiracy shebang, saying that our scholar McComiskey's work was merely "an effort to find some way out of the problem that the text in Hosea poses to biblical inerrancy" (again, quite a convenient substitute for actually dealing with the data, and a fair admission that the argument has indeed been lost - and how do we know and have no less proof that the liberals and skeptics aren't the ones who have been pushing a conspiracy...?); an attempt to find parallel in other verses, Exodus 34:6 and Deuteronomy 5:9 (Skeptic X is looking only at paqad 'al, "visit upon" - he needs to look for paqad 'dam 'al, "visit blood upon" - he won't find it) - and more, more charges of conspiracy. But let us now give an answer directly to the question asked of whether there is some "nuance" about Hebrew that Skeptic X is missing that I can inform him of. Yes there is - and it has to do with the way prepositions in Hebrew can work, in particular the one in Hosea 1:4. There is an explanation here, and it does not require a great deal of knowledge of Hebrew; in fact, what I am about to explain may be found in standard Hebrew grammars.

Skeptic X apparently means in his explanation about grammar above that Mccomiskey is calling the object of the preposition in the phrase, "upon the house of Jehu" -- "upon" being the preposition, and "house" being the object of the preposition -- an indirect object. No, sez: "house" is an object of a preposition. McComiskey is a fraud. Case closed. But is it?

What Skeptic X does not know about is this: the words in the phrase "upon the house of," in Hebrew, operate as a grammatical unity. Thus, "upon the house of" is treated as one word; thus, for Skeptic X to refer to an "object of the preposition" here is hopelessly anachronistic in context. There is no confusion of the "object of the preposition" with the "indirect object" because the preposition has been "absorbed" into the word following, and thereby becomes part of its grammatical identity - in this case, an indirect object. We now see why it is that Skeptic X thinks (wrongly) that McComiskey has confused an object of a preposition for an indirect object.

McComiskey, at any rate, cites as an example Jeremiah 15:3, where paqad is used:

"I will send (paqad) four kinds of destroyers against them," declares the LORD, "the sword to kill and the dogs to drag away and the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth to devour and destroy."

He then writes:

The collocation (visit upon) cannot denote punishment for in this context. The nation will not be punished for these destroyers, but by them. The direct object (the four destroyers) is to come into the experience of the indirect object (the nation as the object of the preposition upon). This sense of the idiom is exists in every context where (visited upon) has two objects. On the other hand, the translation "punish for" does not apply in every context. We must not assign that sense to the collocation uncritically.

A few citations will bring home the point that this word paqad is a difficult translation to determine - which explains why (in answer to Skeptic X) so many translations (as well as less in-depth commentaries) continue to use it. Speiser once remarked of paqad that, "there is probably no other Hebrew verb that has caused translators as much trouble" (and incidentally, Skeptic X doesn't think much of "Spiser" [sic] -- apparently not knowing he was one of the most highly respected liberal scholars in the business!) - and it will take only a few citations to see why:

Gen. 21:1 - Now the LORD was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did for Sarah what he had promised.

This verse has a blessing visited upon Sarah. Paqad is not literally translated and emerges through the word "did".

Gen. 40:4 - The captain of the guard assigned (paqad) them to Joseph, and he attended them. After they had been in custody for some time...

Ex. 3:16 - "Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers--the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob-- appeared to me and said: I have watched (paqad) over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt.' "

Ex. 32:34 - "Now go, lead the people to the place I spoke of, and my angel will go before you. However, when the time comes for me to punish, I will punish (paqad) them for their sin."

Num. 1:3-21 - In these verses, paqad is used several times in relation to the numbering of the Hebrews. The KJV and NIV offer no English word as a parallel.

1 Ki. 11:28 - Now Jeroboam was a man of standing, and when Solomon saw how well the young man did his work, he put him in charge of the whole labor force of the house of Joseph.

Paqad here is used to refer to Jeroboam being "put in charge" of the labor force.

1 Ki. 14:27 - So King Rehoboam made bronze shields to replace them and assigned (paqad) these to the commanders of the guard on duty at the entrance to the royal palace.

1 Ki. 20:26 - The next spring Ben-Hadad mustered (paqad) the Arameans and went up to Aphek to fight against Israel.

2 Ki. 3:6 - So at that time King Joram set out from Samaria and mobilized (paqad) all Israel.

2 Ki. 12:11 - When the amount had been determined, they gave the money to the men appointed (paqad) to supervise the work on the temple. With it they paid those who worked on the temple of the LORD--the carpenters and builders...

Skeptic X's response to this, not surprisingly, makes no attempt to answer the issue in terms of the Hebrew; that, we know well enough, is far beyond his comprehension. What he does say starts with this:

A written statement contains only the information that the writer puts into it. If there is no reason given for the sending of the "destroyers" in Jeremiah 15:3, it is because the writer didn't state the reason.

This, so far, has nothing to do with McComiskey's explanation. There is no issue at all relative to a "reason" for sending the destroyers within this verse; that much is true, but the point is that this is not a "reason" verse but rather a "method" verse - the same as we argue is in Hosea. Continuing:

In Hosea 1:4, the prophet stated the reason for the impending vengeance on the house of Jehu. Yahweh would extract this vengeance because of the "blood of Jezreel." The reason is specifically stated, and so this statement cannot be compared to another statement by another writer who used "paqad" but did not state the reason why Yahweh would "visit" or "remember" or "send" destruction or punishment.

Here we have simply a case of Skeptic X assuming what he needs to prove: That the use of paqad here does indeed imply vengeance. Whether Hosea did indeed give the "reason" within this single verse is the very point at issue! Skeptic X is not answering the matter, but merely restating his original position. From here, Skeptic X goes on to quote verses from Jeremiah showing that reasons were later given for the destroyers being sent, but the point is moot and irrelevant. We argue that Hosea, too, gave the reasons for the "visit" - it was no more than the same old sins, just as in the case of Jeremiah - but that the reason was not given in Hosea 1:4, and that it is a faulty reading of the verse to think that the reason is given there. Rather, McComiskey is arguing that the grammar in the Hebrew (NOT the English!) proves that this gives a method ("I will visit upon them the blood of Jezreel") versus a reason ("I will punish them for the blood of Jezreel") - and Skeptic X has provided not so much as a relevant answer to this issue.

Interestingly, then, Skeptic X says something that seems to show that he has grasped our point, and employs another impaired analogy:

...(T)here is no substantial difference in the way that (paqad) was used here and in Hosea 1:4 except that the verse in Jeremiah specified the kinds of punishment that Yahweh would use. For some reason (Holding) thinks that I see Hosea 1:4 as a warning that Yahweh would do to the house of Jehu exactly what Jehu had done at Jezreel, and so Hosea was saying that the house of Jehu would be brutally massacred, just as Jehu brutally massacred the royal family of Israel, but I have never thought that the verse was necessarily conveying the WAY that Yahweh would punish the house of Jehu but only the REASON why he would punish it. After all, vengeance doesn't necessarily entail payback in kind. If Smith should vandalize Doe's car, Doe could extract vengeance in many ways without doing exactly the same by vandalizing Smith's car. Doe could report to IRS a suspicion that Smith has been cheating on his income tax reports, or Doe could hire someone to beat Smith up. Any number of acts could constitute "vengeance" without resorting to the same act that Smith committed.

Yes, Skeptic X has indeed grasped the point of our argument, though he has failed to answer it. As for that analogy, here is what we are arguing in those terms: Smith has vandalized Doe's car, all right, but Doe hired him to vandalize it because he was entering an old-fashioned demolition race and wanted to look the part! But then, Smith also went on to Doe's house and set it on fire and painted Doe's dog purple. So, since Smith is an expert in vandalizing cars for such purposes as described, Doe chooses a condemnation that Smith will grasp perfectly: "For painting my dog and burning my house, I'm gonna mess your face up, and it's gonna look just like my car does now!" That, we argue, is what Hosea is doing, in a typical ANE communication fashion: Choosing a graphic example very familiar to the subject at hand (the house of Jehu) in order to let them know what's ahead for them.

So, the obvious difficulty with this word helps explain why translators have used, and sometimes continue to use, "punish" in Hosea 1:4. It is also explained by a couple of other factors:

• Most importantly - and a good reason why the majority of Skeptic X's translations don't carry this interpretation! - is that the detailed linguistic work on the matter has only been done in the last 5-7 years or so. The majority of Skeptic X's translations were performed and/or published earlier than this research was done.

  Significantly, Skeptic X responds to this point thusly:

  I certainly don't doubt that this "detailed linguistic work" on PQD has been done within the last 5-7 years, because the biblical inerrancy doctrine has faced some rather strong opposition during that period, much stronger than before then, so I can imagine biblical inerrantists in recent years desperately searching for something to use in explaining away the problem in Hosea 1:4.

  Well, perhaps Skeptic X has some charts and graphs to show that challenges to biblical inerrancy have been stronger in the last 5-7 years than before - what logical connection this has to scholarly research is far from demonstrated - but if this is an answer, then perhaps Skeptic X will accept as an answer from our side that the reason for the growth of the number of (seemingly) poignant arguments published on the Secular Web and in his Skeptical Review newsletter is that skepticism has faced so much strong opposition of late, what with the fall of Communism and all, and the skeptics are desperately dashing off piecework and trying to catch up with the times. Naturally, this serves to disprove the content of the SecWeb and TSR entirely. Further on this matter, Skeptic X also remarks:

  And so I guess we are supposed to believe that it has taken over 2,000 years to determine what the word "pqd" meant in Hosea 1:4 and that it took non-Jewish scholars to make that determination. How seriously does (Holding) expect us to take the claim that as much as the OT has been studied for centuries and centuries, the meaning and usage of a particular word, which was used repeatedly in the Bible text, just happened to be clarified within the past 5-7 years and was done by biblicists in a way that coincidentally solved a discrepancy in the Bible?

  Is Skeptic X truly this ignorant? Of course it may take over 2,000 years to get all of the nuances of an ancient language down pat: Especially when we have little or no other literature from the period! That Skeptic X does not know this simply reflects upon his ignorance of linguistic studies, and more than that, it's that same old conspiracy charge from Skeptic X's mouth, deserving not an ounce of credence. He is manipulatively using the spectre of "2000 years" (actually, serious Biblical scholarship has only been ongoing for the last 150-200 years; and most of the major discoveries in archaeology, linguistics, and paleography has been made in the last 50-100!) to suggest that there is no way that a "new" solution could have been missed before now -- when in fact, such propositions of interpretations are legion in the scholarly literature.

• The specific collocation here appears nowhere else in the OT. [Irv.ThrJez, 497] Unique words or word combinations are nearly always problematic.

  In response to this point, Skeptic X wrote:

  That being so, there would be no other passages to which to compare PQD as it was used in Hosea 1:4, so rather than this being a point in favor of (Holding)'s position, it would actually work against it. How could a credible argument be based on a "specific collocation" if that collocation occurred only once in a body of literature?

  To which I say: Precisely the point! We had no other comparison to make; hence this could favor - or work against - either argument. But in terms of what I am saying here, Skeptic X bypasses the point, which is that the lack of a comparable parallel does not make it improbable that this verse could have been mistranslated.

• An undoubtedly influential factor is that the Greek translation of the OT uses "punish/avenge" here. Of course, from the point of view of the later writers of the LXX, Jehu's house has already had their "visit" and it has turned out to be a "punishment." Their selection has rather the taste of hindsight!

  Skeptic X replies by saying that I "gave no evidence whatsoever to support this assertion" and goes on to (again!) appeal to that army of "hundreds" of translators. This, regrettably, only shows how little Skeptic X knows about the production of modern translations. The LXX is often given weight in deciding the meaning of a Hebrew word that is obscure or difficult to determine. (Certainly he remembers why it is that some translations use "virgin" in Isaiah 7:14!)

• Hosea uses paqad six additional times (2:13, 4:9, 4:14, 8:13, 9:9, 12:2) in his book. In most cases, it clearly indicates the "punish" mode, but obviously this should not mean that it is used that way throughout his book. (Note that the KJV translators rendered paqad as "visit" in some cases.)
• Andersen and Freedman acknowledge the viability of the "visit" translation and accept the same explanation of the issue as we have, as noted below. However, they stick with "punish" and reject a "visit" translation because "its vacuity misses the juridical connotations of the idiom." In other words, they use "punish" because of problems with the vacuity of our language - not because of the Hebrew!

  Skeptic X replies here:

  On what grounds can (Holding) argue that if a homograph in Hebrew conveyed in one of its senses the idea that is denoted by "visit" in English, a translator would be admitting "vacuity" in English unless he always used "visit" to translate that particular Hebrew homograph?

  It's not really clear what Skeptic X is trying to say here. The grounds are explained quite clearly by the quote from Andersen and Freedman (which we offer below): Our English word "visit" lacks juridical connotations. Hence, it does not clearly express the negative aspect of Hosea 1:4, according to our language as it is now used. And it is not an issue of "always" translating this way - it is an issue of translating this way in this verse. But Skeptic X does have the matter half correct: He is right when he says that "a particular word 'visit' lacked the substance to convey the sense of an idiom as effectively as 'punish' would." That's exactly what Andersen and Freedman are saying! "Visit" as we use the word today carries images of going over to your neighbor's house for a barbecue or bringing Grandma some flowers and candy - not the image we need for this verse! (Can you imagine the Terminator saying, "I'll be visiting this police station again"??) Nevertheless, Andersen and Freedman agree that what stands behind paqad in this verse is indeed a "visitation" - but not a pleasant one!

  Now here's another place where I'll insert something about Skeptic X using English translations as authorities. Andersen and Freedman, indeed, ascribe the same meaning to Hosea 1:4 that we do. Now here is a question: Since Andersen and Freedman nevertheless use "punish" to interpret paqad, how does Skeptic X know that all of these English translations he is appealing to are not using "punish" for the same reason, and in terms of the interpretation of this verse actually agree (as we do) with Andersen and Freedman? Because if a significant number of them DO agree here, Skeptic X is out of gas! Better start polling those translators!

• "Punish" is also selected in part because of the supposed connotation of the word for "massacre" (see below).

  And now to argument involving the word "massacre." The Hebrew here is dam, and the interpretation of it in our view yields a similar result to the matter of paqad above. Let's give the floor this time to commentator Douglas Stuart [Stu.HosJon, 23n; see also MCom.MP, 21-2]. Places where Hebrew symbols appear in the text are indicated with an ():

  It should be noted that the present oracle does not per se condemn Jehu's coup at Jezreel, called for by Elisha. (Dam yizre'el) could mean "bloodguilt of Jezreel" in the sense of a great, decisive slaughter. The former connotation, "bloodguilt," is found for (dam) in Lev. 20:9, Duet. 19:10, 2 Sam. 21:1, etc. But the connotation "killing" or "bloodshed" is also well-attested as in (dam) "bloodshed-of-battle" (1 Kgs. 2:5) or (dam) "unnecessary bloodshed" (1 Kgs. 2:31), etc. Recognition of the use of (dam) in the context, so often associated with requital of justice in the Old Testament, should not lead to the conclusion that Hosea is condemning Jehu for fulfilling God's command. Instead, Yahweh now announces that he will turn the tables on the house of Jehu because of the real issue, i.e., what has happened in the meantime. In the same way that Jehu in 842 had annihilated a dynasty feared for its long history of oppression and apostasy, so Yahweh himself will now put an end to the Jehu dynasty because it, in turn, has grown hopelessly corrupt.

  For this, Skeptic X first undertakes to examine the verses that Stuart refers to regarding "bloodguilt". So, on Lev. 20:9 --

  If anyone curses his father or mother, he must be put to death. He has cursed his father or his mother, and his blood will be on his own head.

  Of this, he writes:

  Under the Mosaic law, one could be put to death for cursing his father or mother: "And he that curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death" (Ex. 21:17). Thus, all that Leviticus 20:9 did was to repeat this law but to go on and say that those who curse their parents have no one to blame but themselves when they are put to death. "Their blood is upon them." In other words, the responsibility for the shedding of their own blood falls upon them, because they violated a law that called for the death penalty.

  Similar things are said of two other verses, Deut. 19:10 and 2 Samuel 21:1. Well, good enough, but there is one problem here. No, Skeptic X isn't overlooking a nuance in Hebrew. He's overlooking a "nuance" in Stuart. Stuart agrees with Skeptic X that the above verses should read "bloodguilt" - but he goes on to say that Hosea 1:4 should NOT read that way, but rather read "bloodshed" in line with interpreting paqad in a "visit" sense (or as Stuart puts it, "apply"). Skeptic X provides no answer at all to this, other than assuming the very thing he needs to prove.

  So, tying our two major arguments together with a little string:

  1. Had Hosea wished to indicate the avenge/punish interpretation, then he picked an unusual word for it. The present form "does not clearly inform the collocation with the sense of retributive justice." [MCom.PrIron, 94] A much stronger and precise word to use would be naqam, which means only "punish" as Strong's indicates:

     5358. naqam, naw-kam'; a prim. root; to grudge, i.e. avenge or punish:--avenge (-r, self), punish, revenge (self), X surely, take vengeance.

     This word is found in the following verses, where it clearly indicates punishment or vengeance:

     Gen. 4:15 - But the LORD said to him, "Not so ; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance (naqam) seven times over." Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.

     2 Ki. 9:7 - You are to destroy the house of Ahab your master, and I will avenge (naqam) the blood of my servants the prophets and the blood of all the Lord's servants shed by Jezebel.

     Is. 34:8 - 8 For the LORD has a day of vengeance (naqam), a year of retribution, to uphold Zion's cause.

     Another word that would have been better was yacar. It is used elsewhere by Hosea (7:12, 15; 10:10). It means:

     3256. yacar, yaw-sar'; a prim. root; to chastise, lit. (with blows) or fig. (with words); hence to instruct:--bind, chasten, chastise, correct, instruct, punish, reform, reprove, sore, teach.

     And is used in Gen. 15:14:

     But I will punish (yacar) the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions.

     Against this Skeptic X notes that paqad does serve in a strong and precise way to indicate punishment in many verses. That's fine, but we're dealing with this verse, and the specific and unique word set, not the others. There is a bit of a humorous point where Skeptic X looks at the definition of yacar and insists that it would not have been better than paqad to use because it is "the word used to instruct parents to 'chastise' or punish their children." And so it is, as he does show with the verses he cites (Prov. 19:18, for example), but it is also used (as I showed) in Gen. 15:14 regarding the punishment of a nation; but Skeptic X doesn't comment in that regard. (As it is, as yacar is used in the OT, it carries simply a sense of retributive punishment, without regard for the severity.)

     That Hosea chose another word for his "condemnation" besides one of the two above should be a signal to us. However, there is more:

  2. Let us consider the argument that Hosea is here displeased with what Jehu did to the house of Ahab. An unasked question is, "Why should he have been?" Hosea is no less condemning of the sins of the sort committed by the house of Ahab than the Kings writer is, and "nowhere else in the book (of Hosea) are the murders at Jezreel cited as the cause of Israel's demise." [MCom.MP, 20 ]. Instead, it is all the usual sins that are the problem. Andersen and Freedman [AndFree.Hos, 179; see also Acht.MP1, 16-7] bring this point home nicely:

     There is no reason to suppose that Hosea's view of Israel's history in relation to its God was significantly different from that of the biblical historians (the Kings writers - ed.) or the prophets who preceded or were contemporary with him. In the rest of his book we find numerous points of contact and agreement, although emphases and tendencies vary from the norms. In this case as well, we may suppose his full agreement with the thundering condemnation of Ahab and his house, and the necessity for the violent overthrow of that infamous regime. While, therefore he, along with other prophets and historians, could approve Jehu's action in overthrowing the house of Ahab, that in itself does not require automatic approval of Jehu and his dynasty in other matters. Thus the historian condemns Jehu and his house in the stereotyped fashion after granting the inexorable divine oracle and promise. The house of Jehu has turned out to be no different from the house of Omri; it will come to the same bloody end for the same reasons.

     In this aspect, Andersen and Freedman see in Hosea's words a similarity to the situation that Israel had when entering Canaan: They entered on a promise, but when they took up the evil ways of the Canaanites, the promise was turned back upon them. Thus, regarding Jehu's actions, they write that Hosea...

     ...viewed the behavior of Jehu in a dual light; in the very act of carrying out the divine judgment against the house of Ahab, he overstepped the bounds of his mandate and showed that arrogance and self-righteousness which was the undoing of the preceding dynasty. Already the seeds of destruction were sown in the terrible slaughter initiated by Jehu.

     This excess, Andersen and Freedman find (as we do) in the destruction of members of the house of Judah (see below; see also Hous.12K, 293). They therefore conclude:

     We should not suppose that in the thought of the prophet(s) it was Jehu's sin which doomed his great-great-grandson...

     Accordingly we reject the modern interpretation of Hos. 1:4 which maintains that the prophet here repudiates Jehu's extermination of Ahab's line and sees this as a crime for which his descendent must pay. On the contrary, the main target of Hosea's criticism of the royal house of his day is precisely the sin of the Omrides...Hosea is saying that what God did to Ahab and his brood by means of Jehu is exactly what he will now do to Jeroboam (II) and his family, and for similar reasons. (emphasis in original)

     The above exegesis travels a slightly different road, but arrives at the same conclusion that we have. Andersen and Freedman see the logical sense of the fact that, if Hosea condemns the same sins as those committed by the house of Ahab, how could he here be disapproving of Jehu's destruction of their house? We would also add, to complete the circle: Without any reasonable supposition as to why Hosea would take this tack against Jehu and his house in the matter of the house of Ahab, where is the logic or compulsion to read paqad in its avenge/punish sense?

     Regrettably, but not unexpectedly, Skeptic X first asserts in response to the above as a whole that he is "not going to play the game of my-scholars-against-your-scholars" (and no wonder, for as we noted re Dennis McKinsey, the skeppies ALWAYS lose that battle! - but yet, he also goes on to hypocritically call upon the "hundreds" of translators who worked on this verse for support!) and then goes on to cite verses where paqad means "visit" in a positive sense - saying that this "easily enables readers to determine that a 'visiting' or 'remembering' in a positive or favorable sense was intended." That's fine, of course, but all Skeptic X has done is shown that there are places where paqad can NOT be read in a "punish/avenge" sense because the action in reference is positive (something we already made quite clear in an extended quote from McComiskey!), which is NOT the same as proving the opposite assertion that we are making, that paqad can be read in an ominous, "visit" sense in places where negative action is intended (as in Jer. 15:3) without using the even more ominous "punish/avenge" translation.

     A little later, however, we come to the place where Skeptic X replies to our cite in our favor of the argument that the theme of Hosea as a whole does not support Skeptic X's interpretation, for there is no reason to suppose that he has a motive to support the destruction of the house of Jehu - being that they were guilty of the same sins as the house of Ahab, and the same sins that Hosea so roundly condemns in the rest of his book. I anticipated that Skeptic X's response to this section would be painfully amusing, for my chief source for these observations, the Anchor Bible commentary on Hosea, is written by two scholars (Andersen and Freedman - hereafter AF) who are not inerrantists and have absolutely no axe to grind, so that Skeptic X cannot honestly pull his usual arguments about ideological bias. He begins by isolating my comment:

     Let us consider the argument that Hosea is here displeased with what Jehu did to the house of Ahab. An unasked question is, "Why should he have been?"

     Now I have more to say than this, of course, but Skeptic X goes on to offer "three likely answers" to this question:

     First, it could well be that Hosea personally thought that no matter how grievous the sins of Ahab may have been, this was no justification for massacring descendants of Ahab who were not responsible for what Ahab had done or to kill those who were not descendants of Ahab.

     To which I say: could have been? That idea isn't in the text! If Skeptic X is going to roundly condemn people for speculating outside the text, at least he shouldn't be a hypocrite. But in fact, this is even funnier than we realize, for Skeptic X is actually indirectly SUPPORTING my upcoming arguments in regards to 2 Kings - especially when he alludes to people who were not descendants of Ahab! OK - so let's take this argument (or really, speculation) that Hosea is condemning the killing of members of the house of Ahab who were not responsible for what Ahab did, or people who were not descendants of Ahab. My questions are:

     1. Who are these people, and how does Skeptic X know that they were not involved in what Ahab did? We aren't given as much as names, ranks or serial numbers.
     2. How is this any different (aside from direct proof in 2 Kings!) from our upcoming assertion that, if this condemnation is for ANY reason related to Jehu, it is for killing people OUTSIDE the house of Ahab who had no direct responsibility? I will tell you how it is different - it does not support Skeptic X's desperate attempt to shore up his thesis! And that's the only reason we are served up this plate full of baloney and fudge!

     But even so, Hosea would have no concern regarding the death of any allegedly "not responsible" member of Ahab's house being killed, for of course punishment was thought of in terms of corporate responsibility in this age. Skeptic X is aware of this - he even alludes to it earlier, in a section we had no need to respond to - but what can he say in reply? He cites an article in his newsletter by jailbird Robert Dornbusch who alludes to "a tendency after the time of the captivity to reject the notion that children should bear the sins of their fathers". That's cool, but "corporate responsibility" is not quite the same concept as the "bear the sins of the fathers" issue, and it is not clear in what way this citation is applicable. The matter has no relevance to the book of Hosea at all. (For a reply to that issue, see here.)

     And by the way, let me throw a few things into the mix here:

     Skeptic X would be lost without the crutches of TSR references to quote. As we go through this 'argument,' I hope readers will ask themselves where Skeptic X would be if he could not say, 'Dornbusch put it like this,' or, 'Dornbusch thinks thus and so....'

     We see more and more in Skeptic X's "apologetic" works that his defense of error in the Bible depends on unlikely, strained interpretations of passages that are rather plain in their meaning, and in appeals to the authority of those like Dornbusch, who go out of their way to find some way to reconcile the Bible with their desire to believe that it is actually not divine in its origin.

     We're just supposed to take Dornbusch's word for this?

     Kinda gets ya right there, don't it, ? On to Skeptic X's second speculation - er, response:

     Second, Hosea could have thought that Jehu's actions at Jezreel had been excessive.

     What ho! Is Skeptic X converting to my point of view here? No -

     This is not to express agreement with (Holding)'s claim that Jehu had gone beyond what Yahweh had commanded him to do and that this was the reason why Hosea pronounced vengeance upon the house of Jehu, for even if Hosea did think that Jehu's actions had been excessive, this would not mean that the writer of 2 Kings also thought that Jehu had exceeded his orders. The problem is NOT whether Jehu was right or wrong in what he had done but that two biblical writers (Hosea and the author of 2 Kings) obviously disagreed on the acceptability of Jehu's conduct at Jezreel. If the writer of 2 Kings approved of Jehu's actions, as his statement in 10:30-31 clearly indicates, and if Hosea disapproved of the actions, this disagreement and not what Jehu did at Jezreel becomes the discrepancy.

     So then, aside from the fact that we'll dispose in Part 2 of that "approval" issue in 2 Kings, WHERE is it that our skeptic thinks that Hosea thought Jehu's actions were excessive, if not, as I say, in all the wrong people he killed? Is it forthcoming? Here's what's next:

     Later, I will state a third possible reason (which is the most probable one) why Hosea would have condemned Jehu's conduct at Jezreel.

     !!!! - We are not told WHAT specifically it was that was the "excess" in Jehu's conduct that Hosea was condemning but that the 2 Kings writer had no problem with! What was it? Did Jehu serve moldy bread at the Passover feast? Did he forget to knock before he went into the bathroom? Did he burp at the table? Did he write for a subscription to The Skeptical Review? All we have here is obfuscation - not reasons! And Skeptic X never fulfilled his promise here -- I would suggest that he was merely buying time to think of one that would suit his purposes!

     And now, to my brief comment:

     Hosea is no less condemning of the sins of the sort committed by the house of Ahab than the Kings writer is,

     Skeptic X stops me in mid-sentence and trills:

     The writer of Kings was very condemning of the "sort" of sins committed by the house of Ahab (1 Kings 21:1-26), but his inconsistency was in praising Jehu for committing atrocities that were fully as bloody as anything Ahab had done. Furthermore, the writer of Kings also condemned the idolatry of Ahab and Jezebel (1 Kings 16:31-32; 18:1-40) but gave Jehu only a slap on the wrist for allowing the worship of the golden calves to continue (2 Kings 10:29, 31). Hosea was more consistent in his condemnation of such sins than was the writer of Kings.

     Skeptic X's comment is misguided. The point is that Hosea roundly condemned the idolatry committed by the house of Jehu, which was the SAME KIND of idolatry committed by the house of Ahab - so that he has no reason at all to condemn the destruction of the house of Ahab by Jehu! He is "no less condemning" (Read: He is just as, if not indeed much MORE condemning) of such idolatry than the Kings writer! We will note in Part 2 that the Kings writer simply "slaps wrists" - which is to say, gives summary notices - for the golden calves (more precisely, those, along with the other Jeroboam sins) THROUGHOUT his work, and that he isn't praising Jehu for atrocities outside of God's command. As for the rest of those cites - 1 Kings 21:1-26 is the Naboth's vineyard story, which has no recorded parallel in Jehu's reign; in 16:31-2, Ahab serves and sets up altars for Baal, whereas Jehu kills off all of their priests - and the passages referenced in Chs. 16 and 21 are written in the Kings writer's usual disconnected, annalistic narrative style; 18:1-40 is the Elijah vs. the priests of Baal smash-up and has nothing to do with the condemnation of Ahab per se, but rather with the idolatry of the people at large! Bottom line: These are the same old arguments, and they still won't wash a washcloth.

     Continuing where Skeptic X cut me off:

     and "nowhere else in the book (of Hosea) are the murders at Jezreel cited as the cause of Israel's demise."

     Says Skeptic X:

     Is (Holding) saying that because Hosea did not condemn this atrocity several times, we can't conclude from his one denunciation of it that he opposed Jehu's actions? What kind of logic is that? How many times must one express disapproval of something before it can be known that he disapproved of it?

     Since whether Hosea did indeed condemn this atrocity once, if at all, is the issue at hand, Skeptic X is here simply assuming what needs to be proved, and again, one does not prove an argument by appealing to that argument! Other than that, it is revealing to read the book of Hosea in its entirety. Over and over and over, the cause for denunciation is the faithlessness of Israel. Not another word is said about this supposed condemnation for killing the Ahabites. Now it is POSSIBLE that Hosea mentions this just once and never goes back to it (and as we say, Skeptic X really begs the question here, anyway), but we had better have a darned good reason for saying that there is a sudden change in subject rather than a consistent message, once the writer has set a theme. In this case, the birth of the three children sets the theme for the rest of the oracle, which is TOTALLY about Israel's faithlessness. These children were born of a faithless marriage; likewise, each of the events that they are named for MUST (to maintain the parallelism) be a result of faithlessness to God. If it were actually about both that AND the bad acts of the house of Jehu in regards to the massacre, then it would be most sensible to expect Hosea to come back to the BOTH issues, not just keep harping on about one of them and ignore the other. Of course, as we have said, it is POSSIBLE that this is what has happened, but Skeptic X is going to need a heck of a lot better arguments than, "It fits what I want to believe better!"

     Put it this way: If Skeptic X wrote an essay on the evils of driving drunk, and we found a sentence that, as we first read it, seems to be on the subject of the evils of usurious lending, what ought we to think? Barring the possibility that either an interpolator had struck or that Skeptic X had gone off his rocker or was being cute, we would presume rather that we had misunderstood the context of his remark - and assume thematic consistency and an error in understanding on our part rather than inconsistency in theme on Skeptic X's part. But then again, I note that skeptics find it hard to be this generous with the Biblical text.

     After this Skeptic X takes his turn attacking the point of AF regarding the "usual sins" being the problem. He doesn't quote AF yet - he first quotes my intro to them, then rambles forth with a paragraph that simply has to be read to be believed:

     Hosea's use of the present tense throughout his book indicates that his focus was on "sins" that were contemporary to his times, but his reference in 1:4 to the past actions of Jehu clearly indicates his disapproval of what Jehu had done and expressed his prediction that Yahweh would punish the house of Jehu for the "blood of Jezreel."

     OK - so Skeptic X agrees with us that Hosea's preliminary focus was on sins of his time. But all he is doing after that is yet again assuming what he needs to prove: That 1:4 is indeed a reference to Jehu's specific doings. As yet, he has not succeeded in getting that established, and is still arguing in a circle.

     He goes on to give us some historical background on Hosea, noting that he was witness to the upcoming jeopardy of the Northern Kingdom. He then writes:

     (Holding) has introduced the Semitic and Neareastern "mind" into the discussion, so he needs to understand that the idea of kingdoms just rising and falling in the natural course of events was completely foreign to the Neareastern mind.

     When it happened, an explanation was needed.

     ... [It] is completely compatible with the thinking of the times to suppose that Hosea, seeing in contemporary political affairs the impending end of the kingdom of Israel, put the blame on a well known bloody massacre from Israel's past and attributed the end of Israel to the blood that Jehu shed at Israel.

     Now my question is, as with the first: WHERE is this found in the text of Hosea? It isn't, except by assuming what needs to be proved! We readily grant that Skeptic X's explanation makes some sense in the given social context; but even so, where is this found in the book of Hosea, other than by assuming what needs to be proven? Skeptic X still does not sufficiently overcome the facts that the condemnations in Hosea outside of our verse in issue are 100% composed of condemnations against idolatry and the sinful faithlessness of the people in the present time - and we need a lot more than speculation and circular reasoning to overturn the fact that this makes it all the more likely that Hosea 1:4 is in regards to these things and that time as well! But now, to the place where Skeptic X starts dealing with AF. Regarding their statement:

     There is no reason to suppose that Hosea's view of Israel's history in relation to its God was significantly different from that of the biblical historians (the Kings writers - ed.) or the prophets who preceded or were contemporary with him.

     He writes:

     There isn't? What about the fact that the "biblical historian" who wrote 2 Kings heaped praise on Jehu's actions at Jezreel, as we have repeatedly seen, but the prophet Hosea expressed disapproval of it by identifying it as the reason why Yahweh was going to bring the kingdom of Israel to an end? Would that be sufficient reason to "suppose that Hosea's view of Israel's history in relation to its God was significantly different from that of the biblical historian's"?

     Well, here's yet another argument in a circle! The reason that we can suppose that Hosea's view of history is different is - that it is different, here in the verse we are concerned with! Not only that, but Skeptic X treats his speculation here as Gospel truth! (We will see that the Kings writer was far from "heaping" praise, and the issue, by the way, is the respective writers' reactions to idolatry - not the Jezreel incident.)

     After an irrelevant comment (in which Skeptic X somehow manages AF's comments to ME!), Skeptic X next cites the following:

     In this case as well, we may suppose his full agreement with the thundering condemnation of Ahab and his house, and the necessity for the violent overthrow of that infamous regime. While, therefore he, along with other prophets and historians, could approve Jehu's action in overthrowing the house of Ahab, that in itself does not require automatic approval of Jehu and his dynasty in other matters.

     He writes (still attributing AF's words to me!):

     First of all, (Holding) should forget about Jehu's "dynasty in other matters," because the context of Hosea 1:4 makes no reference to anyone in Jehu's dynasty. It cited only the "blood of Jezreel" as the reason why the house of Jehu would be punished. For (Holding) to claim that the punishment was pronounced on the house of Jehu for what the dynasty had done "in other matters" is a crass assertion for which he can present no evidence. The text said that Yahweh would avenge THE BLOOD OF JEZREEL on the house of Jehu. Nothing was said about what anyone else in the house of Jehu had done after Jezreel.

     First of all, we cannot simply "forget" about Jehu's dynasty in other matters (though no doubt Skeptic X would LIKE to forget about it!) because it is the ENTIRE book of Hosea that is considered in this argument - not just 1:4, which is EXCLUDED from the argument by reason of it being the very thing at issue! And outside of 1:4, there is indeed condemnation for what the current administration of the house of Jehu was up to! Most of Hosea is directed towards the general population of Israel, but check out these couple of condemnations on the local royalty:

     Hos. 5:1 Hear this, you priests! Pay attention, you Israelites! Listen, O royal house! This judgment is against you: You have been a snare at Mizpah, a net spread out on Tabor.

     And what are Mizpah and Tabor? They are places where idolatry was practiced - and idolatry is an issue at hand in the oracle (5:1-7). There are also a few more condemnations of idolatry in the book that concern the royals. (Notably 8:6-7 - referring to the golden calf.) Next check this out, regarding the people of Israel:

     Hos. 7:3-7 They delight the king with their wickedness, the princes with their lies. They are all adulterers, burning like an oven whose fire the baker need not stir from the kneading of the dough till it rises. On the day of the festival of our king the princes become inflamed with wine, and he joins hands with the mockers. Their hearts are like an oven; they approach him with intrigue. Their passion smolders all night; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire. All of them are hot as an oven; they devour their rulers. All their kings fall, and none of them calls on me.

     It sounds like God is unhappy with the royalty for taking delight in the sins of the people! So where is Jezreel is all this? Where's Jehu? The issue never comes back, and it strains credulity to say that Hosea would set, at the very beginning of his collection of oracles, something thematically UNLIKE what he says in the rest of the book, and that he would have an interminable focus on present sins throughout his book, with the one exception that Skeptic X pleads for. It's possible, of course - but quite unlikely, and the burden of proof is on those who say otherwise.

     To AF's comment (and Skeptic X STILL thinks it's me):

     Thus the historian condemns Jehu and his house in the stereotyped fashion after granting the inexorable divine oracle and promise. The house of Jehu has turned out to be no different from the house of Omri; it will come to the same bloody end for the same reasons.

     Skeptic X writes:

     Now all that (Holding) needs to do is to find a biblical text that states this, but he can't do it. The biblical "historian" clearly stated that Jehu had "done well in exercising that which [was] right" in Yahweh's eyes and that he had done to the house of Ahab "according to ALL that was in [Yahweh's] heart" (2 Kings 10:30).

     Well, what about 2 Kings 10:31 - the quite stereotyped condemnation of the Kings writer on Jehu - and the condemnations in Hosea cited above, condemning the current royal house (Jehu's) for sins that match precisely in nature those of the house of Ahab? After this, Skeptic X finally does wake up and realize that I am quoting AF; but after a lot of irrelevant fussing, he says that "neither (Holding) nor any of his 'scholars' can cite a single scripture that suggests that Yahweh's approval of Jehu's actions at Jezreel were conditional on the good behavior of his descendants." Well, , if you're going to insult AF by putting "scholars" in quotes, you'd better darned well have a reason for doing so other than that you're a foaming-at-the-mouth bigot towards anyone who portends to have more knowledge of the Bible than you do and doesn't bow, kiss and scrape at the waving of the freethinker's flag. Second, no one is saying that "approval of Jehu's actions at Jezreel were conditional on the good behavior of his descendants." Jehu's actions at Jezreel aren't even on the ticket. What IS on the ticket is the blessing of the four generations on the throne - the last of which, Zechariah, might have lasted a bit longer or come to a more peaceful end had the house of Jehu kept up good behavior; but instead, since they behaved overall no differently than their predecessors - they got the same thing their predecessors did!

     Now to AF's comment that Hosea:

     ...viewed the behavior of Jehu in a dual light; in the very act of carrying out the divine judgment against the house of Ahab, he overstepped the bounds of his mandate and showed that arrogance and self-righteousness which was the undoing of the preceding dynasty.

     Skeptic X writes:

     Andersen and Freedman may regard Jehu's actions in this way, but one thing they cannot do is cite scriptural references that state that Jehu "overstepped the bounds of his mandate."

     First, it is more precisely that AF say that Hosea saw things that way, not that AF saw it that way; but even so, here, the "mandate" referred to is the one to kill the house of Ahab - and as we say, AF agree with us in seeing the acts of Jehu as overstepping those bounds, in particular where the 42 princes are concerned. And what can Skeptic X say to this? He pulls all of the usual bluster in preparation; argues in a circle some more...and rather amusingly, says that "We have seen a lot of speculation from Andersen, Freedman, and (Holding) (all for the sake of desperately trying to preserve biblical inerrancy), but we have seen NO textual evidence to support their denial of the obvious." Well, we have indeed seen plenty of textual support, in the rest of the Book of Hosea; we have seen a LOT of extra-textual speculation from Skeptic X, too, albeit not with quite the same level of social and literary data; and I think AF would be mightily peeved to be regarded as "desperately trying to preserve biblical inerrancy" - they don't believe in it.

     Finally, Skeptic X quotes my quote of AF:

     Accordingly we reject the modern interpretation of Hos. 1:4 which maintains that the prophet here repudiates Jehu's extermination of Ahab's line and sees this as a crime for which his descendent must pay.

     And, after again mistakenly attributing these quotes to me rather than AF ("[Holding] or Andersen or Freedman or whoever..." - Hey, if you can't even keep track of who's saying what, why should we trust you reading anything, like the Bible?), repeats all the usual binges....it's a conspiracy...all those modern translations (but remember, AF use "punish" yet agree with my interpretation - what if all of those English versions of Skeptic X's did the same thing?)...simple assertion....more ignorance of the rest of the content of Hosea (no, AF weren't saying that Hosea mentions the Omrides; they're saying that he mentions sins that exactly match those of the Omrides)...repeats of previous speculations...yet more appeal to those "hundreds of Hebrew experts"...in other words, Skeptic X has fulfilled my predictions to the letter. It is, indeed, the newness of the scholarship, along with his usual machinations, that came to the fore to do battle with these arguments, rather than solid data. Skeptic X has offered nothing to overturn our arguments regarding Hosea except heat and wind.

     Skeptic X has another point to make, and this one deserves a little attention:

     ...As far as biblical history is concerned, it recorded no massacre of Jehu's descendants. Jeroboam II, the fourth-generation descendant of Jehu, was assassinated by Shallum (2 Kings 15:8-12), and this ended the reign of the dynasty that Jehu began. The Bible, however, records no massacre of all of Jehu's descendants, and I can see no reason to interpret Hosea 1:4 to mean that the prophet was saying that all of the descendants of Jehu would die in a violent massacre like the one that he performed at Jezreel.

     We may readily recognize this as the good old argument from silence, but we can actually go a step further. True enough: The Kings writer records no such decimation of the house of Jehu (And incidentally, it was King Zechariah, not Jeroboam II, who was the one assassinated by Shallum to end the Jehu dynasty!), but a clear understanding of the social context of the assassination makes it a high historical probability that Shallum went on to get rid of anyone else that was in Zach's house - because anyone who was left would be the first in line to try a counter-coup. The social constraints of the ANE, indeed, made it foolish to NOT eliminate all the members of the house that you took the throne from; so that, while no explicit record is made of such a destruction, it is not a hazardous assumption to suppose that the rest of Zach's house was put to the sword not long after the assassination.

     And so, we, coupled with a mass of detailed scholarship, conclude that there is no grounds to read into Hosea any sort of condemnation of Jehu's actions. This by itself is sufficient to overturn Skeptic X's case for disharmony with 2 Kings, but because there is much yet to do, and because of the relative newness of this linguistic work (which we anticipate Skeptic X shall use [along with his usual machinations] as reason to discard it), we shall delve further into the matter and attack from the 2 Kings perspective. [Continue]

     ---

     Go Home!