For Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; And Judah has multiplied fortified cities; But I will send a fire on his cities, And it will devour its fortresses."
But I will send a fire upon his cities - In the letter, the words relate to Judah; but in substance, the whole relates to both. Both had forgotten God; both had offended Him. In the doom of others, each sinner may read his own. Of the cities of Judah, Isaiah says, “your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire Isaiah 1:7 and in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah,” (some twelve years probably after the death of Hosea) “Sennacherib came up against all the cities of Judah and took them” 2 Kings 18:13; and of Jerusalem it is related, that Nebuchadnezzar “burnt the house of the Lord, and the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem, and every great man’s house he burnt with fire” 2 Kings 25:8-9. Man set them on fire; God brought it to pass; and, in order to teach us that He doeth all things, giving all good, overruling all evil, saith that He was the doer of it.