א כְּרָפְאִי לְיִשְֹרָאֵל וְנִגְלָה עֲוֹן אֶפְרַיִם וְרָעוֹת שֹׁמְרוֹן כִּי פָעֲלוּ שָׁקֶר וְגַנָּב יָבוֹא פָּשַׁט גְּדוּד בַּחוּץ: ב וּבַל-יֹאמְרוּ לִלְבָבָם כָּל-רָעָתָם זָכָרְתִּי עַתָּה סְבָבוּם מַעַלְלֵיהֶם נֶגֶד פָּנַי הָיוּ: ג בְּרָעָתָם יְשַֹמְּחוּ-מֶלֶךְ וּבְכַחֲשֵׁיהֶם שָֹרִים: ד כֻּלָּם מְנַאֲפִים כְּמוֹ תַנּוּר בֹּעֵרָה מֵאֹפֶה יִשְׁבּוֹת מֵעִיר מִלּוּשׁ בָּצֵק עַד-חֻמְצָתוֹ: ה יוֹם מַלְכֵּנוּ הֶחֱלוּ שָֹרִים חֲמַת מִיָּיִן מָשַׁךְ יָדוֹ אֶת-לֹצְצִים: ו כִּי-קֵרְבוּ כַתַּנּוּר לִבָּם בְּאָרְבָּם כָּל-הַלַּיְלָה יָשֵׁן אֹפֵהֶם בֹּקֶר הוּא בֹעֵר כְּאֵשׁ לֶהָבָה: ז כֻּלָּם יֵחַמּוּ כַּתַּנּוּר וְאָכְלוּ אֶת-שֹׁפְטֵיהֶם כָּל-מַלְכֵיהֶם נָפָלוּ אֵין-קֹרֵא בָהֶם אֵלָי:

Hosea 7 (NRSV translation)

1 when I would heal Israel,the corruption of Ephraim is revealed,and the wicked deeds of Samaria;for they deal falsely,the thief breaks in,and the bandits raid outside. 2 But they do not considerthat I remember all their wickedness.Now their deeds surround them,they are before my face. 3 By their wickedness they make the king glad,and the officials by their treachery. 4 They are all adulterers;they are like a heated oven,whose baker does not need to stir the fire,from the kneading of the dough until it is leavened. 5 On the day of our king the officialsbecame sick with the heat of wine;he stretched out his hand with mockers. 6 For they are kindled like an oven, their heart burns within them;all night their anger smoulders;in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire. 7 All of them are hot as an oven,and they devour their rulers.All their kings have fallen;none of them calls upon me.
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The preceding verses are somewhat cryptic. It is important to note that Hosea prophesied in the Kingdom of Israel before the destruction of Samaria by the Assyrian king Sargon in 722 BCE. This sets him apart from most other prophets such as Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekial who were active during the sixth century in the Kingdom of Judah. Now while it is admittedly probable that he did not write down his own prophesies and the book we have now was put to writing many years later, yet even so we can assume that the historical Hosea prophesied somewhere along the lines of the version of the book we have now. Furthermore, the book of Hosea was probably written before most other prophetic books and this explains why the abovementioned verses are so cryptic.

Verse 4

ד כֻּלָּם מְנַאֲפִים כְּמוֹ תַנּוּר בֹּעֵרָה מֵאֹפֶה יִשְׁבּוֹת מֵעִיר מִלּוּשׁ בָּצֵק עַד-חֻמְצָתוֹ:

They are all adulterers; they are like a heated oven, whose baker does not need to stir the fire,from the kneading of the dough until it is leavened. (NRSV)

The NRSV does not explain the Hebrew letter "mem" prefix attached to the word baker ("opheh" in Hebrew).

Another problem: The Hebrew word "me`ir" could be translated "stirrer", that is, the person who stirs the fire, or it could be translated "from stirring". The NRSV seems to go with the latter translation but I don’t find any such expression elsewhere in the bible. me`ir as stirrer is found in Isaiah 13:17, Jeremiah 50:9 and Jeremiah 51:1 - in all those instances it denotes the person who stirs (a fire and by secondary meaning strring people up to war and conquest).

Verse 5 requires further investigation. What is meant by "the day od our king". The intent of this verse is that the king and his officials are also involved in corruption. It continues from verse 3 where it states that the king and his officials are happy about the wickedness and treachery of the people, that is, they do not protest those acts and are possibly benefiting directly from such corruption in the form of bribery. I have a strong feeling that the Hebrew word "yom" (translated as day) is an error and it should instead be some verb that is a parallel to thee verb "hechelu" associated with his officials, which presumably has a root meaning sickness.

The overall point of this passage, however, is not very hard to figure out. Hosea is condeming the social iniquities practiced by the powerful. He is comparing them to a fire in the oven that burns quietly all night when it is not being used but in the morning it is stirred up so that it can be used for baking and warming. Likewise, the evildoers of Samaria are acting clandestinely. They pretend to be innocent and benevolent but when the opportunity arises they will burst out of their shell (just like the fire in the oven flares up in the morning) and attack the innocent stealing their property etc... Furthermore, in the rage of their evils they even attack their judges so that no justice can be served upon them. This is the intent of verse 7. The "kings" that are mentioned there do not refer to the corrupt kings talked about earlier who are perticipants in the corruption. Rather, they are the parallel of the "judges", namely those officials who are responsible for enforcing the law and meting out justice.

Now that we understand the overall meaning of these passages and how the wicked are compared to a simmering oven, we can examine verse 4 and 6 more closely.

MT (Masoretic text) reading:
ד כֻּלָּם מְנַאֲפִים כְּמוֹ תַנּוּר בֹּעֵרָה מֵאֹפֶה יִשְׁבּוֹת מֵעִיר מִלּוּשׁ בָּצֵק עַד-חֻמְצָתוֹ:

Revised reading (my educated guess):
ד כֻּלָּם מְנַאֲפִים כְּמוֹ תַנּוּר בְּעֵרָה מֵאַפָּהּ יִשְׁבּוֹת מֵעִיר מִלּוּשׁ בָּצֵק עַד-חֻמְצָתוֹ:

And the translation is:

They are all adulterers; a fire comes forth from her nostrils just like the fire that comes forth from an oven, after the stirrer has rested, from the kneading of the dough until it is leavened. (italics are added for clarification and not in Hebrew).

In other words, just like the oven remains smoldering quietly while the dough is rising and then when the dough is ready to be baken, the stirrer suddenly flares up the fire, so the evildoers from Samaria pretend to be innocent and quiet and then when ready to attack, they do suddenly and unexpectedly.

The Hebrew word "be’erah" is found in the covenant code with precisely this meaning (Exodus 22:5) "the one who kindled the fire shall make restitution". It is also interesting to note the verse in Numbers 11:1:

א וַיְהִי הָעָם כְּמִתְאֹנֲנִים רַע בְּאָזְנֵי יְהוָֹה וַיִּשְׁמַע יְהוָֹה וַיִּחַר אַפּוֹ וַתִּבְעַר-בָּם אֵשׁ יְהֹוָה וַתֹּאכַל בִּקְצֵה הַמַּחֲנֶה:

When the people complained in the ears of the Lord about their misfortunes, Yahweh heard it His nostrils were steaming and the fire from Yahweh burned among them, and consumed some outlying parts of the camp. (NRSV trsnlation with my revision)

Thus we see that a fire (be`erah) comes forth from a steaming nostril (‘aph). As you will see, we find another example of this association in verse 6.

Verse 6
ו כִּי-קֵרְבוּ כַתַּנּוּר לִבָּם בְּאָרְבָּם כָּל-הַלַּיְלָה יָשֵׁן אֹפֵהֶם בֹּקֶר הוּא בֹעֵר כְּאֵשׁ לֶהָבָה:

For they are kindled like an oven, their heart burns within them; all night their anger smoulders; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire. (NRSV)

Obviously, the NRSV reads the Hebrew word "be`arbam" (in their lurking/ambush) as "beqirbam" (in their midst/within them). However, it is not clear to me how it reads the first word in the verse "qarebu" which literally means "they came close". The two Hebrew words that could be translated as "they are kindled" are "yaqedu" and "ba`aru", neither of which is close in spelling to the original "qarebu".

I have therefore given it some thought and considered the possibility that be`arbam and qarebu got mixed up. be`arbam should be beqirbam and qarebu should be `arebu:

Revised reading (my educated guess)
ו כִּי-אָרְבוּ כַתַּנּוּר לִבָּם בְּקִרְבָּם כָּל-הַלַּיְלָה יָשֵׁן אַפֵּהֶם בֹּקֶר הוּא בֹעֵר כְּאֵשׁ לֶהָבָה:

For their heart lurks inside them like an oven; their nostril is asleep all night; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire. (NRSV translation with my revision)

In the context of the passage, as explained earlier, this verse makes a lot of sense. Hosea compares the evildoer’s heart to a "lurking oven". Just like the oven lurks in ambush all night and flares up in the morning, so is their mind in ambush, that is, they think of ways to hide their aggressive and corrupt deeds so that their victims are vulnerable and unprepared.

Thus, verse 6 is a slight variation of verse 4. In verse 4, the oven simmers while the dough is rising; here the oven simmers all night. In verse 4, fire bursts forth from their nostrils when they are ready to attack just like the oven does when it is ready to accept the dough; here it is the morning that signals the burning of their nostrils just like the oven is flared up in the morning.

The clear association of `aph (nostril) and bo’er (burns) in verse 6 is strong evidence that in verse 4 it talks about `aph, a nostril and not opheh, a baker.