[612] xi. 7.
[613] This is especially true of vv. 11 and 12.
[614] Even in the most detachable portion, vv. 8-10, where the און of ver. 9 seems to refer to the באונו of ver. 4.
[615] Viz. in vv. 3 and 15.
[616] Beer indeed, at the close of a very ingenious analysis of the chapter (Z.A.T.W., 1893, pp. 281 ff.), claims to have proved that it contains "eine wohlgegliederte Rede des Propheten" (p. 292). But he reaches this conclusion only by several forced and precarious arguments. Especially unsound do his pleas appear that in 8b לעשק is a play upon the root-meaning of כנען, "lowly"; that כנען, in analogy to the בבטן of ver. 4, is the crude original, the raw material, of the Ephraim of ver. 9; and that כימי מועד is "the determined time" of the coming judgment on Israel.
[617] Something is written about Judah (remember what was said above about Hosea's treble parallels), but the text is too obscure for translation. The theory that it has been altered by a later Judæan writer in favour of his own people is probably correct: the Authorised Version translates in favour of Judah; so too Guthe in Kautzsch's Bibel. But an adverse statement is required by the parallel clauses, and the Hebrew text allows this: Judah is still wayward with God, and with the Holy One who is faithful. So virtually Ewald, Hitzig, Wünsche, Nowack and Cheyne. But Cornill and Wellhausen read the second half of the clause as עם־קדשים נצמד, profanes himself with Qedeshim (Z.A.T.W., 1887, pp. 286 ff.).
[618] Why should not Hosea, the master of many forced phrases, have also uttered this one? This in answer to Wellhausen.
[619] So LXX., reading שוא for שד.
[620] Isa. xxx. 6.
[621] Heb. Judah, but surely Israel is required by the next verse, which is a play upon the two names Israel and Jacob.