Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1853-1862, 1855-08-19
UNION AND AMERICAN
SUNDAY MORNING, AUGUST 10. 1855,
Era Of Written PrOpheey---HOSea.

tribes.
Jehovah shall smite Israel as reed is shaker
in the water and shall root them out of this gooC
land, and scatter them beyond the river" (Eu
pirates.
1t was the sad fate Of Elijah and Elisha to live
during the process of national descent towards this
| catastrophe. With resistless momentum of cor
ruption, things rushed towards that yEwning abyss
# public overthrow and disgrace. A prophet
fe in such circumstances is perhaps the most
painful possible to man. By the very nature Of
his mental and physical conditions. sensitive and
higt-strung, he is fighting lifelong losing game
tie is drinking cup of bitternss that is more and
more pungent to the very dregs
Elijah and Elisha were gone-and who should
lcceed them, as the hour of destiny drew nearer
and nearerH 1t would seem as if the impending
destruction of the house of Israel, aud the removal
in the following century of Judah to Babylon,
were preceded by mighty chorus of prophet
voices-as if the national lie exalted itself into
intensest prophetic development on the threshold
! of dissolution. Or as if the national torch threw
| up IN the midnight Of nations sudden bursts of
preternatural efulgence just before being quencbed
in gloom.
Earliest in that mighty company, and nearest sue
cessor Of Elijah and Elisha, was Hosea, the proph-
ct of Galiee
| His was to be career, like theirs, of deepest
tragic interest His path was to lie along through
nearly century of increasing public corruption,
degradation and crime, to the very crisis of Assy
rian invasion. 1t is this that gives particular in
terest to the writings of Hosea. We identify him
| more with the great northern dynasty Of the He
brew race And the mantle which Elisha received
from the departing Elijah, we may as it were, re-
gard as transmitted to the shoulders of Hosea
Jonah, Joel, Amos Nahum and Micah were cOtem-
pories but to neither of them was appointed so
protracted career, or so distinguished an utter
ance
Isiah indeed, was his superior both 10 the dura-
tiop of his career, and the granduer Of his voice,
but he was more identified with the house Of Ju-
dab.
Hoseas life must have been as deeply interesting
as that Of his great predecessors, Elijah and Eli
sha. Yet why is it that we think go little Of him
as real man? Why have we metamcrphosed him
into quoted book? The reason is because Eli
jah and Elisha left US written phrophecies, but
we have their biographies, sketches of their sayings
and doings, while of Hosea precisely the reverse is
true. We scarcely know anything of his personal
career; his writings alone are before Us. Thus the
man is absorbed in the work. And as great pro-
phetcal problems have been much mooted in con-
nection with his words, his name has in most
minds come to be mere title of an Anticipated and
somewhat rusty scroll of yatcinations. Yet, If
we could only reproduce his life, with even one
half of the detail of that of Elijah, how profoundly
interesting would it become
The truth Of this is the more evident from the
manner in which at the commencement of his mis-
siJn his own domestic relations were permanently
identified as symbols of national destinies.
He was directed to take wife whose previous
character might, by analogy represent the idos-
trOus and unfaithful conduct Of Israel.
He was commanded to give his children 2ames
significant of the approaching national fate thus
one was Jezreel, another Loruhamnh, and third
LO-amm
And as with each name significant prophecy
was connected, the prophets family itself from
year to year standing perpetual suggestion, both
to his own mind, and to the mind of the conmuni-
ty, Of the events indicated. The very name JEz-
REEL. every time be uttered it, brought up the
ida of all the tragedies of which that valley had
been the theatre.
The Odious reign of Ahab and Jezebe their
overflow by Jelu; Jehus failure to reform Israel
from the system OF Jereboam, and the predicted
destruction of his house, The last heir of which
was now on the throne. Hence every time
the name of that child was spoken at home or
abroad-it was like new utterauce OF the predc-
tion: "Yet little while, and will ayrnge the
plOod of Jezreel upon the house Of Jehu, and will
cause to cease the house of Israel and will break
the bow of Israel in the valley Of Jezreel."
So every time that daughters name, LO-ruhamah
was spoken at home or abroad, it was equivalent
to sounding in the ears Of prophet and people /
GoG's declaration, Il will no more have mercy
upon the house of Israel, but viii utterly take
them away"
So also every time that youngest son was name
ed, at nome and abroad it was equivalent to sound
ing in all ears the fearful sentence, "Ye are not
my people, and will not be your G d."
Thus was the prophets whole domestic life con-
structed into a complex prophetic symbOl-utter-
ing perpetualy, from year to year, darkest voices |
of warning of inevitable doom.
How strange the life of such man! How pro-
found the sensation Of a true patriot whose nation
is thus, as it were, brought in miniature under q!s
own roof, and he by kind Of shadowy sembance |
made as God, to judge and to condemn.
Yet, to prevent this being too fearfully gloomy,
there was appended to it kind Of refrain Of mer-
cy, and of triumph.
"Yet the number of the children of Israel shall |
be as the sand of the sea which cannot be number
ed nor measured and in the place where it was |
said unto them 'Ye are not my people, there j: /
shall be said unto them 'Ye are the cons Of the |
living God" !
How august this mystic Gtterance Of things even |
yet futurel A restoration even yet scarcely credi-
bic or imaginable,-wle "the children OF Israel |
and the children of Judah shall be gathered tOgeih-
er and appoint themselves one head, and they shall
come up out of the land and great shall be the day !
of Jezreel.
There is something in the very sound Of these |
words that is like trumpet call. What they |
mean, exactly, time alone can adequately unfold. |
But that they mean something sublime, and that |
they thrilled the soul of that sacred seer with a