Hosea 1

Hosea was another prophet during the reigns of Jeroboam II, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. Thus, he was a contemporary to Isaiah, Micah, Amos, and possibly even Jonah.

One day, God told Hosea to marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her. This was because Israel was promiscuous to God.

This is certainly an odd directive by God. For starters, we don't see God instructing people whom they should marry very often in the Bible. To make it more odd, a lot of the other passages of the Bible say to avoid promiscuous women. The Book of Proverbs is full of warnings against marrying such women.

Despite its oddity, it has ring of redemption as well, particularly for Hosea's wife. A promiscuous woman would have a hard time getting married in those days and probably even so today in many cultures. Would Christian men in America today be willing to marry a former porn star who has cleaned her life up now goes to church? I think that might be a good modern analogy to what God was telling Hosea to do. But God's directive to Hosea did not specify whether she was formerly or presently promiscuous.

Hosea had several children with her and each time, God told the parents to give a specific name for the child which represented God's judgment and punishment on Israel.

It also has a parallel to what was happening with Isaiah. Isaiah received several prophecies involving unborn children. The name of Isaiah's own child predicted the destruction of the Arameans and the northern kingdom and Isaiah also had prophecies about the Emmanuel child.