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Question: I'm looking for information about marriage in the Old Testament. The story line is about a prostitute married to a good man. I believe God spoke to the man saying for him to stay with her. Please help me with this information.

Answer: No doubt you are referring to the prophet Hosea.

Often in the Old Testament prophets would "act out" their prophecies to give them greater impact on the people. Hosea lived in a very difficult time for the northern kingdom Israel. After the northern kingdom had seceded from the southern kingdom, Judah, the northern nation of Israel began to drift into idolatry. By the time Hosea wrote Israel had degenerated spiritually to the point that she was about to receive judgment from God.

Israel's sin of leaving the true God, and beginning to worship idols of wood and stone was declared to be spiritual adultery; so God used the marriage relationship to illustrate what Israel had done. That is, Israel was represented in the analogy of an unfaithful wife, who had sought other lovers (the idols) than her husband. So Hosea was told to take Gomer, a prostitute, to be his wife.

The children resulting from this marriage were named for judgments that would come upon Israel in the future because of their sins. The first child, a son, was named Jezreel, to illustrate that the slaughter at Jezreel would be avenged. (2 Kings 10:11). The next child, a daughter, was named Loruhamah, meaning "not pitied." This was to illustrate the prophecy that Israel had gone too far, and that God would not have pity on them when they would be invaded by the Assyrians. The third child would be a son, named Loammi, meaning "not my people," showing that God would disown them. Then these gloomy prophecies were followed by the grand prophecies that God would some day restore the Jewish people, and reunite Israel and Judah into one nation, and they would again be God's people (Hosea 1:10-11).

We cannot use this Scripture passage to prove that God approves of adultery, but quite the contrary, God hates adultery or any violation of marriage vows (Malachi 2:16). Two other prophets also dramatized their prophecies. Isaiah walked naked and barefoot for three years as a sign to illustrate the coming judgment against Egypt and Cush, when the Assyrians would lead them captive in this manner (Isaiah 20:1-3). Then also Ezekiel was commanded to act out a soon to be fulfilled prophecy against Judah (Ezekiel chapter 4, and also 5:1-4).

In all these cases I just mentioned, God asked the prophets to do something that was unpleasant to the prophets personally, but it was to emphasize by illustration that judgment was going to fall because of their sin. It did not mean that God was teaching people to sin, but the exact opposite, that judgment was coming on them because of sin.

I hope that this clarifies the matter for you.


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