Resurrection in the OT, Part 7

Hosea 6:1–3 and 13:14

(avg. read time: 5–10 mins.)

With Part 7 we make our transition to the Latter Prophets. Two texts from Hosea are of interest here: the more notable 6:1–3 and the less direct 13:14. As with the previous installment, I will begin with the less direct text, which lacks verbs associated with resurrection.

The Hebrew of Hos 13:14 is ambiguous and can be taken as either a set of rhetorical questions followed by invitations to death and Sheol to inflict punishment upon the covenantal people (as per most translations)—in which case this would be a denial of resurrection imagery—or a set of future-oriented declarations leading to taunts of victory aimed at death and Sheol on behalf of the covenantal people. Paul understood it in the latter fashion in 1 Cor 15:54–55. John Day has also argued that Isa 26:19, a resurrection text I will address in Part 10, uses this text in the context of a broader usage of Hos 13–14 in Isa 26–27.¹ His cited parallels are not all equally compelling, but I am inclined to agree with Jon Levenson’s evaluation that this particular connection is valid:

Whatever the weakness of some of Day’s parallels taken individually, the sheer density of them in a delimited corpus is highly curious and suggests that Hosea 13–14 has indeed had an influence to one degree or another on Isaiah 26–27. In particular, the case of allusions to unproductive birth pangs followed directly by references to deliverance from the underworld or resurrection of the dead (Hos 13:13–14; Isa 26:17–19) seems unlikely to be coincidental. In fact, that progression from agony and diminished vitality to new life and vigor is characteristic of the underlying movement of each text. It is also critical to the context in which an expectation of resurrection develops.²

Thus, it seems two of the earliest interpreters—to say nothing of the versions, which I address below—use this text in such a way as to imply that it uses resurrection imagery. The determination ultimately depends on how one translates the last line: “נחם will be hidden from my eyes.” As I have already addressed this matter in the Sheol analysis, I will repeat that analysis here.

Since so much depends on it, we will start with the last line first. The Hebrew noun is often translated as “compassion” or “repentance,” and so it is taken as a statement of judgment against Israel. However, the root can be translated in a completely different sense, as Walter Harrelson concludes in agreement with the JPS translation, “I am convinced that the hapax legomenon nōḥam in the verse is best rendered ‘settling of accounts’ or ‘restoring the balance,’ and that therefore ‘vengeance’ is the best way to render the term.”³ This statement thus reflects God’s reconciliation with Israel by denying the punishments Sheol and death can inflict on his people. The people have certainly been unfaithful to God, as has been the frequent point of this entire book, and so they have been deserving of being consigned to Sheol. But now God declares that this will not be their fate, meaning that we should understand the first two sentences as God’s declaration of what he will do in ransoming from Sheol and redeeming from death. This statement fits as part of a pattern in Hosea, where God declares his love, reminds Israel of its sin, follows with a threat of destruction, but then resolves to be gracious and presents Israel with promises.⁴ As Harrelson explains, “God does have to bring enemies against a faithless people, as Hosea clearly affirmed throughout chapters 4-13. But God, out of love and compassion, can and does turn against the bringers of death and destruction, calling a halt to the death-dealers, saying ‘Enough!’ to endless vengeance, displaying that quality that is synonymous with Israel’s God: mercy (see Exod 34:6-8).”⁵ God’s word of salvation is the last word and death is denied its victory in the case.

To that end, we must also look at the taunts of the middle two sentences. Death is asked where are its דברים. The same vowel pointing (albeit with the second-person suffix that I have not presented here) and the same consonants could indicate the use of either of two words. One, as it is frequently understood, is “plagues.” However, this would be the only case of the plural for this word in the OT. Two, it can be understood as the more common word, often translated as “words.” This is of course a term with a broad semantic range that can have all manner of different senses depending on the context. The LXX/OG and Θ render it as δίκη, meaning something like “sentence,” “verdict,” or “case.” The Peshitta agrees with this sense, rendering it as “victory” in Syriac, more specifically having the sense of victory in court, meaning that the term is akin to “innocence,” “justice,” or “justification.”⁶ The “word” here thus attains a narrower sense of a “word” given at the end of a trial, specifically a word signaling victory in court. In this victory, the Judge himself taunts death and Sheol, questioning where death’s case or its preferred verdict is, and where Sheol’s “sting”—which is to say its preferred punishment (its characteristic act of swallowing the disfavored)—is. In the end, God’s promises are what are upheld in this court, not the claims of death and Sheol on God’s people.

That leaves us to address Hos 6:1–3. This text, with its reference to resurrection on the third day, is often examined (if not always supported) as a basis for the belief presented in 1 Cor 15:4 that Jesus’s resurrection on the third day was in accordance with the Scriptures. Since plural Scriptures are referenced, I am not inclined to think that this text was the sole justification for this belief. But I also see no reason to doubt that it contributed something to this basis. Where it certainly had more purchase in arguments about resurrection according to the Scriptures was among the rabbis (y. Sanh. 11.8; y. Ber. 5.2, 9a; b. Sanh. 97a; Gen. Rab. 56.1; Deut. Rab. 7.6; Pirq. R. El. 51; S. Eli. Rab. 6; Yalq. Hos 6:2; Midr. Tannaim Deut 32:39) and patristic authors (Tertullian, Marc. 4.43; Adv. Jud. 13.23; Cyprian, Test. 2.25; Lactantius, Epit. 47; Ambrosiaster, Comm. 1 Cor. 15:4). The translations of the LXX (and its versions), the Targum, and the Vulgate also signify that it was understood as a resurrection text.

As with Deut 32:39, we see in Hos 6:1–2 that death is on a continuum with wounding (drawing on the imagery from 5:13–14) and life is on a continuum with healing. The deliberate poetic amplification here and how it draws on the initial wounding followed by tearing to pieces in 5:13–14, as well as the reference to the people being slain in 6:5, imply that we should see imagery of resurrection here and not only of healing. In fact, v. 2 uses two verbs associated with resurrection that we have encountered multiple times to this point: חיה in its piel form and קום in its hiphil form. The קום is also complemented by another use of חיה to indicate the result of this raising action as living in the presence of God. The temporal references (“after two days”/“on the third day”) seem simply to signify a short time span, perhaps to indicate that the revival will happen before decay sets in. There is otherwise no precedent in the OT for associating resurrection with the third day, but, among other things, the third day is associated with significant events of divine provision (Gen 22:4–18) and establishment of the covenant (Exod 19:10–11, 15–16).

This last point of resonance leads to a link made by J. Wijngaards. Wijngaards cites several ancient examples from covenantal contexts that linked death to deposing and resurrection imagery to enthronement or restoration of a vassal king by a suzerain.⁷ Likewise, as with v. 3, the favor of a suzerain or the favorability of a vassal was in this context associated with images of fertility in the land, such as rain or dew (images also associated with renewal in Hos 14:5–6 and the later resurrection text of Isa 26:19).⁸ He thus summarizes:

The peculiar features of the prayer also suggest that its contents have a covenantal bearing. K. BALTZER has illustrated that confessions of sins spoken by the whole people find a natural setting in the renewal of the Covenant after a breach. The characteristics of such covenantal prayers for renewal: confession of guilt, acknowledgement of the suzerain's justice, recalling his former benefits, requesting forgiveness and help in the present emergency, seem all, at least implicitly, contained in the text. Or, perhaps with more precision one could state that our passage constitutes the exhortation that preceded the actual confession of guilt, closely resembling the exhortation preceding public prayer in Joel ii 13-17.⁹

This analogy is not quite on-point, since it is the people as a whole, and not their king, that is in focus here. Nor does it quite fit with the more cultically and ethically driven covenant of Israel in contrast to the surrounding nations. Still, there is certainly a covenantal context to this statement. In the immediate context, this is demonstrated by part of YHWH’s response in vv. 5–7, where the covenantal relationship is explicitly invoked. Of course, the broader context also clearly establishes the covenantal relationship, such as with the symbolic link of God’s relationship with Israel with Hosea’s relationship with Gomer. Thus, we can see again the link of resurrection language with covenantal themes already observed in Deut 32 and Ps 16, and which we will observe again as this series continues.

Another interesting component of this text is that the people’s responsive call to seek reconciliation with YHWH is rebuffed in the subsequent text. The implication appears to be that the Israelites are seeking to use the language of repentance and the glorification of YHWH as an empty attempt to bribe him into acting.¹⁰ In other words, this situation is much like the Judges’ cycle where the people would cry out to God for deliverance but would not follow up with long-term repentance.

Still, while YHWH has no intention of acting in this way for his people at this point, the promises of restoration elsewhere in Hosea (such as in chs. 2–3 and 11, as well as the end of the book) indicate that this is not a permanent denial. And indeed, Hos 13:14, as well as ch. 14, represent a final resolution to this situation anticipated at multiple points in Hosea. The resurrection imagery most directly applies to the restoration of the covenantal people and the renewal of the covenantal relationship, which has further consequences such as the renewal of the land. This use of resurrection imagery is drawn from the belief that God can raise the dead, as Leonard Greenspoon states, “Although the people who speak in Hos 6:1-3 misuse the Biblical concept of bodily resurrection, their very misuse is valuable evidence for the existence of this concept during the 8th century. They were probably dependent at least in part on traditions which associated Elijah and Elisha with the process of resurrection. References to natural phenomena in Hosea 6 may also point in the same direction.”¹¹ Even if the resurrection imagery applies to something other than literal resurrection, it would not have been effective as an image for the hope if there was no precedent for thinking that God could raise the dead, if there were no plausibility structures in place for resurrection belief, particularly in connection with his history with the covenantal people.

1. John Day, “A Case of Inner Scriptural Interpretation: The Dependence of Isaiah xxvi.13–xxvii.11 on Hosea xiii.4–xiv.10 (Eng. 9) and Its Relevance to Some Theories of Redaction of the ‘Isaiah Apocalypse’,” JTS ns 31 (1980): 309–19.

2. Levenson, Resurrection, 204.

3. Harrelson, “Death and Victory,” 158. Also see Harrelson, “Death and Victory,” 151, 157.

4. Harrelson, “Death and Victory,” 156.

5. Harrelson, “Death and Victory,” 158.

6. Popko, “Hosea 13:14,” 505.

7. J. Wijngaards, “Death and Resurrection in Covenantal Context (Hos. VI 2),” VT 17 (1967): 230–34.

8. Wijngaards, “Death and Resurrection,” 234–36.

9. Wijngaards, “Death and Resurrection,” 236–37 (italics original).

10. Wright, Resurrection, 118.

11. Greenspoon, “Origins,” 309.