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Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up.

After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.

Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the LORD: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.

4

O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee? O Judah, what shall I do unto thee? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away.

5

Therefore have I hewed them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth: and thy judgments are as the light that goeth forth.

6

For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

7

But they like men have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me.

8

Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood.

9

And as troops of robbers wait for a man, so the company of priests murder in the way by consent: for they commit lewdness.

10

I have seen an horrible thing in the house of Israel: there is the whoredom of Ephraim, Israel is defiled.

11

Also, O Judah, he hath set an harvest for thee, when I returned the captivity of my people.

Hosea 6:1

6:1 return unto the LORD. Following God’s pronouncement in the preceding verse that He is awaiting Israel’s confession and repentance, the prophet puts himself in the place of returning Israel in the last days, prophetically anticipating her confession and resultant restoration.

Hosea 6:2

6:2 the third day. Two prophetic mysteries are suggested here. Jesus Christ, representing the true Israel in His death, was raised the third day. The earthly nation of Israel, seemingly “dead” for about two thousand years, will be raised for her thousand-year millennial reign, when she returns to Messiah, and He to her at the end of this present age (Ezekiel 37:12-14). On the divine equation that “one day is with the Lord as a thousand years,” see the note on II Peter 3:8.

Hosea 6:6

6:6 mercy, and not sacrifice. The Lord Jesus quoted this verse in Matthew 9:13, affirming the eternal principle that religious rituals were meaningless without the obedience in heart and life that they were supposed to express.

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