Not every image of God is faithful to Jesus. (Listen here.)
‘When Israel was young, I loved him … It was I who taught Ephraim to walk … I bent down to feed them,’ says God through the prophet Hosea. These beautiful words resonate deep in my body. They recall the love I had for my own little children, the hours I spent holding their upstretched arms as they tottered down the hall and learned to walk. I remember the thousands of times I bent down to feed them, wipe their chin, see eye-to-eye with them and hug them. So it’s a crying shame that I find these words nearly drowned out by a long litany of violence.
For Hosea is a violent book. Take a step back from this reading, and you find that words of great tenderness and love are soon followed by accusations and threats. The tension mounts, the fear rises, then god explodes. There’s an image or three of graphic violence – women stripped and raped, their bellies torn open, their children dead in the streets. Men are attacked and mauled by god-as-predator: the angry bear, the lion. A country is shamed, the people humiliated, the land made barren; then the violence is explained away. ‘See what you made me do,’ says Hosea’s god. ‘I’ll teach you to be faithless! I’ll humiliate and hurt you, and it’s all for your own good.’ Then having justified his actions, this god speaks words of love and seduction and showers Israel with gifts.
This pattern of behaviour has a name: it’s called the cycle of abuse, or cycle of violence. It’s seen in many, many relationships, and it follows a predictable course. Very broadly, it begins with mounting tension. ‘I saw how you looked at him.’ ‘Call this house clean?’ ‘You don’t treat me right.’ As the accusations fly and the tension rises, the victim responds. Perhaps they try to comply, perhaps they try to placate. Perhaps they deliberately provoke the perpetrator, to get the explosion over and done with and to manage the presence or absence of kids. But whatever they do, however hard they try, eventually there’s an eruption.
At this point, the abuser chooses to engage in verbal, emotional, even physical abuse. There’s a scene, and with it a sense of catharsis. Then comes some form of reconciliation. The abuser might apologise. They might deny or diminish the abuse, or blame it on the victim. Either way, things are smoothed over for a while. For a period of time – a day, a week, a month – it’s all good. The abuse is ‘forgotten’ by the abuser at least; there might be love-bombing, tenderness, gifts. But below the surface the tension is rising again, and so the cycle repeats.
It doesn’t have to be like this. People make choices in how they respond to their feelings of rage, frustration or shame. In the same way, prophets and preachers make choices about which metaphors they use, which texts they elevate, and how they speak about God. Hosea might have been working at a time when violence against women seemed more acceptable, but most of the prophets said no. Most of the prophets used other ways to speak of God, and of God’s relationship with Israel.
Jesus, too, said no. ‘You have heard it said,’ he would begin, quoting the Jewish scriptures, ‘but I tell you …’ And the way he told it was love. The way he told it was to empty himself of power and to raise up others and to fill them with the free gift of his Spirit. The way he told it was that those who seek to dominate will be last in the kingdom, while those who are vulnerable come first. The way he told it was that women are important and children are central; and if our words or deeds trip up their faith, it would be better for us to wear concrete boots and be thrown into the sea. The way he told it, no woman was too slutty, too despised, too bloody, too forward or too foreign to be treated with anything other than respect and love. The way he told it, he came not to condemn; and men shut their mouths and put down their stones and quietly slipped away.
So what do we do with this reading from Hosea, and indeed with the entire book? Do we cherry-pick our readings, selecting only the nice bits and pretending the rest doesn’t exist? Do we throw it all away? Or is there something we can legitimately salvage?
As a person who tries to follow Jesus, I believe the answer lies in him. Jesus was not a biblical literalist. He did not accept that every word of scripture spoke truth about God, or about God’s relationship with humanity. Instead, Jesus quoted some bits of scripture, edited others, and left a whole heap out.
It began at the outset of his public ministry, when Jesus preached in his hometown, Nazareth. There he took the Isaiah scroll and read an excerpt aloud. ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,’ he proclaimed, ‘and it’s good news!’ Then he quoted some more of the scroll about who it’s good news for – the poor, the imprisoned, the blind, the oppressed – but he left out the bit about vengeance. Just in case his listeners missed what he skipped, he went on to talk about God’s love and activity among their enemies. It so enraged his audience that they tried to throw him off a cliff.
In all his teaching, the only part of Leviticus Jesus thought worth quoting was ‘Love your neighbour.’ Leviticus set out hundreds of rules for life: but only love was of interest to Jesus. And Jesus never once quoted from the horrifically violent book of Joshua. Joshua is one of the most important texts for Israel. It was used then and it continues to be used today to justify Israel’s genocidal occupation of the land. You’d think a good Jewish rabbi would quote it, especially as it was his namesake: for Jesus is how English speakers butcher the Greek version of Yeshua. Yet Jesus did not once directly acknowledge the book, and his silence is very telling.
Jesus constantly quoted and embodied Jewish scripture, but always in ways which emphasised God’s desire to draw all peoples into the kingdom, while again and again he overlooked or edited bits which describe God as vengeful or violent.
We are surrounded by voices promoting violent gods. Some of them are in the church, using scripture to justify patriarchal control and homophobic / transphobic violence. Some are in politics, using scripture to justify genocide. And some of them are stuck in our own heads, using scripture to tell us how unlovable and worthless we are. As Jesus’ followers, when we hear these voices, I suggest we adopt his approach.
By this I mean that, if something in the Bible argues against Jesus’ radical hospitality, or Jesus’ practice of enemy-love, or Jesus’ triumph over the forces of shame and death, then it tells us what many people think about God, but it is not God’s final word. And if someone promotes an image of God that is hate-filled, harmful and vengeful, then it tells us how many people imagine God, but it is not faithful to the way of Jesus.
More, as followers of Jesus, the law has no authority over us, except the authority which Jesus grants it. The prophets have no authority over us, except the authority Jesus which grants them. And Jesus’ authoritative word is that just two commandments are key: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and, from Leviticus, love your neighbour as yourself. There are no exceptions. Love God, love neighbour – whoever they are – and love yourself. According to Jesus, all the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.
So our ultimate interpretive lens must always be love. Every other lens, every Biblical interpretation, every sermon, every theological conclusion and every metaphor for God must be assessed through the lens of love. Of course, we can read the Bible with other lenses: and people read with judgemental, patriarchal and genocidal lenses all the time. But only one lens is faithful to Jesus.
Going back to Hosea, then, I suggest approaching the book with extreme caution. For the cycle of violence it describes is driven by the desire to dominate, control and punish. It is inconsistent with a god whose hallmarks are freedom, compassion and mercy. It is inconsistent with a god who raises up the vulnerable, and empties godself of power. It is inconsistent with a god who promises the first will be last, and the last, first, in the kingdom of love. It is inconsistent with good news. For the most part, the god portrayed by Hosea is into love-bombing, threats, humiliation and violence: and so I reject it.
On the other hand, I can elevate today’s portion because it’s a portrait of love. In this passage, we discover God portrayed as a mother who is tender and caring, who feeds her children, who crouches down beside them and showers them with love. There is mention of risk, yes, but in this passage God isn’t violent. Instead, here the only possible harm isn’t punishment from God, but the potential consequences of Israel’s actions. If put your hand on the hot stove, sweetie, you’ll get burned. If you run into the road, love, you’ll get squashed. And if you hang out with the big bully nations, kid, you’ll get thumped. Like a good parent, God sounds these warnings in order to protect their child.
More, while God still experiences feelings of frustration and anger, in this passage God chooses not to explode. ‘My heart is changed within me,’ says God, ‘all my compassion is aroused. I will not carry out my fierce anger …’ This is a God of self-control who chooses compassion over violence.
Many of us have had parents who were not gentle: but God is not like them. ‘I am God and not human, the Holy One among you,’ says God. ‘I will not come in wrath.’ In other words, unlike all too many humans God will manage their emotions. God will exercise self-control. God will be filled with compassion. God will not act out their anger. Instead, God will shower us in love and mercy like a tender parent, a gentle mother.
So let us reject any metaphor for God which is unfaithful to the way of Jesus: and do so clearly, unapologetically and with intelligence. Let us dwell instead in images of nonviolence, nurture and love. And if right now we can’t do this, may God to reveal to us the stories, the images and the voices we need to let go of and the ones we need to inhabit, that one day we might truly know just how deeply we are cherished.
Let us pray: God our most tender mother, you call us, feed us, and teach us to walk alone. Help us to receive your gifts and follow wherever you lead, that others might draw life and love from us in your name, Amen. Ω
Where & when: Wurundjeri country. We’re in the transition between Wombat and Orchid Seasons. It’s been a week of rainbows at twilight which have bathed the city in golden light. They shaped this reflection, for I looked and thought: That’s right, in the promise to Noah, God turns the bow away from the earth and will never destroy again.
Reflection on Hosea 11:1-11 shared with Coburg Uniting Church, 3 August 2025 (Proper 13 Year C) © Alison Sampson, 2025. Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash (edited).
Alison and the whale 