Hosea 3:1 – Flagons or Raisin Cakes
Then said the LORD unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an
adulteress, according to the love of the LORD toward the children of Israel, who
look to other gods, and love flagons of wine.
(Hosea 3:1)
The word
for flagons in the “ăshîyshâh” in the Hebrew actually means “something closely
pressed together.”
It comes from a root word “âshîysh” which means “pressing down
firmly.” If you are a baker, are
you going to press down on your cakes when they come out of the oven or will you
hope they rise and be fluffy?
When one looks at the actions of a winepress, we know that the winepress presses
the grapes till the juice comes out.
The word “raisin” is not associated with this word except by example
which is outside the word and not contained in the meaning of the word itself.
The theme of Hosea is the faithfulness of God while Israel was being unfaithful.
Hosea started prophesying about 800 B.C. and continued for seventy years.
Israel was playing the harlot with the false religions and were
idolatrous. Idolatrous feasts always had liquor and food.
Hosea 3:1 fits the
context of the rest of the book of Hosea when it uses the word flagons of wine.
Look at these other verses in Hosea describing the actions of the
unfaithful Israelites. They focus
is on wine not food or raisin cakes.
The reason for this is below in the explanation for Ephesians 5:18.
For she did not know
that I gave her corn, and wine,
and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold,
which they prepared for Baal.
(Hosea 2:8)
Whoredom and
wine and new wine take away
the heart. (Hosea 4:11)
In the day of our king
the princes have made him sick with
bottles of wine; he stretched out his hand with scorners.
(Hosea 7:5)
And they have not cried
unto me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds: they
assemble themselves for corn and
wine, and they rebel against me.
(Hosea 7:14)
The floor and the
winepress shall not feed
them, and the new wine shall fail in her.
(Hosea 9:2)
They shall not offer
wine offerings to the LORD,
neither shall they be pleasing unto him: their sacrifices shall be unto them as
the bread of mourners; all that eat thereof shall be polluted: for their bread
for their soul shall not come into the house of the LORD.
(Hosea 9:4)
Ephesians 5:18
And be not drunk with
wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit;
(Ephesians 5:18)
Now what does this verse
have to do with the subject?
An important aspect of this verse is the spiritual aspect.
In the pagan days of ancient countries, they believed getting drunk would
bring them closer to their god and that the false god would somehow connect with
them. When many of the people
became saved, they brought the same mindset into the church and that is why Paul
had to address the problem of drunkenness.
It was done out of debauchery but mainly to become one with their god.
Paul addressed this because many thought they could connect with God the
Father or the Lord Jesus Christ by getting drunk and Paul had to deter that type
of thinking. A similar situation
exists in the modern church with the Emergent Church Movement where they decry
Bible study and want their followers to focus on experience by emptying their
mind hoping that God will minister to them but unfortunately, just like getting
drunk, both the drunk and the empty mind are havens for demonic activity.
This is why Christians should avoid any contact with alcohol or the
experience based Emergent Church Movement.
Both of these are detrimental to the Christian.
Are there any of these
ancient pagan festivals today?
There sure is! We find one here in
the USA called Mardi Gras which is dedicated to Bacchus or otherwise known as
Dionysus who was the god
of the grape-harvest, winemaking and wine, of fertility, ritual madness, and
religious ecstasy. No wonder people
go mad at Mardi Gras because it is a satanic festival to the hilt.
1535 Coverdale
Then sayde ye LORDE to me: Go yet yi waye & wowe an aduouterous woma, who thy
neghboure loueth, as ye LORDE doth the childre of Israel: how be it they haue
respecte to straunge goddes, and loue
the wyne kannes.
1537 Matthews Bible
Then
sayde the Lorde to me: Go yet thy waye, & vowe an aduouterous woman, whom thy
neyghboure loueth, as the Lord doeth the children of Israell: how be it they
haue respecte to straunge Goddes, and
loue the wine kannes.
1539 Great Bible
Then
sayde the Lorde to me: Go yet thy waye & wowe an aduouterous woman, whom thy
neyghboure loueth, as the Lorde doth the chyldren of Israel: how be it they haue
respecte to straunge goddes, & loue
the wyne kannes.
1560 Geneva Bible
Then
said the Lord to me, Goe yet, and loue a woman (beloued of her husband, and was
an harlot) according to the loue of the Lord toward the children of Israel: yet
they looked to other gods, and loued
the wine bottels.
1568 Bishop’s Bible
Then sayd the Lorde to
me: Go yet and loue a woman beloued of her husbande, and yet an adultresse,
according to the loue of the Lorde towarde the chyldren of Israel: and yet they
haue respect to straunge gods, and
loue the wine pottes.
(Hosea 3:1)
1833 Webster Bible
Then
said the LORD to me, Go yet, love a woman beloved by her friend, yet an
adulteress, according to the love of the LORD towards the children of Israel,
who look to other gods, and love
flagons of wine.
Foreign Language Bibles
Und der HERR sprach zu
mir: Gehe noch einmal hin und buhle um ein buhlerisches und ehebrecherisches
Weib, wie denn der HERR um die Kinder Israel buhlt, und sie sich doch zu fremden
Göttern kehren und buhlen um eine
Kanne Wein. (Hosea 3:1)
Luther’s Bible states
“pots of wine.”
Y me dijo otra vez Jehová: Ve, ama una mujer amada de su
compañero (aunque adúltera), como el amor de Jehová para con los hijos de
Israel; los cuales miran a dioses ajenos,
y aman frascos de vino.
(Oseas 3:1)
Reina Valera
Gomez 2010 “and they love jars of wine.”
Ja \Herra\ sanoi minulle: Mene vielä ja rakasta
salavuoteista vaimoa ja porttoa, niinkuin \Herra\ rakastaa Israelin lapsia,
jotka kuitenkin kääntyivät muukalaisten jumalain tykö,
ja rakastavat viinaleiliä.
(Hosea 3:1)
Finnish Bible of
1776 “and love the liquor.”
The word for
Raisin in the Hebrew
“Tsammuwq” is the Hebrew word for raisins and is not
“ăshîyshâh.”
Then Abigail made haste, and took two hundred loaves,
and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and five measures of
parched corn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes
of figs, and laid them on asses. (1
Samuel 25:18)
And they gave him a piece of a cake of figs, and two
clusters of raisins: and when he had eaten, his spirit came again to him:
for he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any water, three days and three nights.
(1 Samuel 30:12)
And when David was a little past the top of the hill,
behold, Ziba the servant of Mephibosheth met him, with a couple of asses
saddled, and upon them two hundred loaves of bread, and an hundred bunches of
raisins, and an hundred of summer fruits, and a bottle of wine.
(2 Samuel 16:1)
Moreover they that were nigh them, even unto Issachar
and Zebulun and Naphtali, brought bread on asses, and on camels, and on mules,
and on oxen, and meat, meal, cakes of figs, and bunches of raisins, and
wine, and oil, and oxen, and sheep abundantly: for there was joy in Israel.
(1 Chronicles 12:40)
Winepress
The word winepress used in various verses.
The winepress was where they pressed firmly the grapes into wine and that
would correspond to both Hebrew words “ăshîyshâh”
and “âshîysh.”
And this your heave offering shall be reckoned unto you,
as though it were the corn of the threshingfloor, and as the fulness of the
winepress. Numbers 18:27
Therefore thou shalt say unto them, When ye have heaved
the best thereof from it, then it shall be counted unto the Levites as the
increase of the threshingfloor, and as the increase of the winepress.
Numbers 18:30
Thou shalt furnish him liberally out of thy flock, and
out of thy floor, and out of thy winepress: of that wherewith the LORD
thy God hath blessed thee thou shalt give unto him.
Deuteronomy 15:14
And there came an angel of the LORD, and sat under an
oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash the Abi-ezrite: and his son
Gideon threshed wheat by the winepress, to hide it from the Midianites.
Judges 6:11
And they took two princes of the Midianites, Oreb and
Zeeb; and they slew Oreb upon the rock Oreb, and Zeeb they slew at the
winepress of Zeeb, and pursued Midian, and brought the heads of Oreb and
Zeeb to Gideon on the other side Jordan.
Judges 7:25
And he said, If the LORD do not help thee, whence shall
I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress?
2 Kings 6:27
And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof,
and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and
also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth
grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
Isaiah 5:2
I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the
people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample
them in my fury; and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will
stain all my raiment. Isaiah 63:3
The Lord hath trodden under foot all my mighty men in
the midst of me: he hath called an assembly against me to crush my young men:
the Lord hath trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in a winepress.
Lamentations 1:15
The floor and the winepress shall not feed them,
and the new wine shall fail in her.
Hosea 9:2
Hear another parable: There was a certain householder,
which planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress
in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far
country: Matthew 21:33
Here winepress is used symbolically as an instrument of
judgment.
And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and
gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of
the wrath of God. Revelation 14:19
And the winepress was trodden without the city,
and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space
of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.
Revelation 14:20
And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. Revelation 19:15