Samaria shall become desolate,.... With this verse the fourteenth chapter begins in the Hebrew copies, and in the Targum, and in many versions; but seems better to conclude the present chapter; since it is in close connection with Hosea 13:15, and explains the figurative expressions there used. Samaria was the head of Ephraim, Isaiah 7:9; or the metropolis of the ten tribes of Israel; whose desolation is here prophesied of, and was accomplished by Shalmaneser king of Assyria, signified by the east wind; by whom it was not only besieged and taken, but very probably its houses were demolished, its walls broken down, and razed to the very foundation; see 2 Kings 17:5; and, as this was the head city, it may be put for all the rest, and even for the whole land, which was at the same time laid waste. The Targum is,

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(Heb. Bibl. Hosea 14:1). "Samaria will atone, because it has rebelled against its God: they will fall by the sword; their children will be dashed to pieces, and its women with child ripped up." אשׁם, to atone, to bear the guilt, i.e., the punishment. It is not equivalent to shâmēm in Ezekiel 6:6, although, as a matter of fact, the expiation consisted in the conquest and devastation of Samaria by Shalmanezer. The subject to yippelū (will fall) is the inhabitants of Samaria. The suffix to הריּותיו (its women, etc.) refers to the nation. The form הריּה is one derived from הרה, for הרה (Ewald, 189, c). The construction with the masculine verb יבקּעוּ, in the place of the feminine, is an anomaly, which may be explained from the fact that feminine formations from the plur. imperf. are generally very rare (see Ewald, 191, b). For the fact itself, compare Hosea 10:14; 2 Kings 8:12; 2 Kings 15:16; Amos 1:13.

Samaria shall become desolate - Or "shall bear her iniquity." Her iniquity should now find her out, and rest upon her. Of this, "desolation" was, in God's judgments, the consequence. Samaria, "the nursery of idolatry and rebellion against God," the chief in pride should be chief in punishment. "For she hath rebelled against her God." It aggravated her sin, that He "against" whom "she rebelled," was "her" own "God." He who had chosen her to be His, and made Himself her God; who had showed Himself "her" God in the abundance of His loving-kindness, from the deliverance out of Egypt to that day. This her desolation, it is again said, should be Complete. Hope remains, if the people of a generation are cut off; yet not only should these fall by the sword; those already born were to be dashed in pieces; those as yet unborn were to be sought out for destruction, even in their mother's womb. Such atrocities were common then. Elisha foretold to Hazael that he would perpetrate both cruelties 2 Kings 8:12, Shalmaneser clashed the young children in pieces 2 Kings 10:14, as did the conqueror of NoAmmon Nahum 3:10, and the Babylonians Psalm 137:9 afterward. The children of Ammon ripped up the women with child in Gilead Amos 1:13, and the usurper Menahem in Tiphsah and its coasts 2 Kings 15:16. Isaiah prophesies that Babylon should undergo, in its turn, the same as to its children Isaiah 13:16, and the Psalmist pronounces God's blessing on its destroyer who should so requite him Psalm 137:9.

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Samaria shall become desolate - This was the capital of the Israelitish kingdom. What follows is a simple prophetic declaration of the cruelties which should be exercised upon this hapless people by the Assyrians in the sackage of the city.

Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up.

16. This verse and Ho 13:15 foretell the calamities about to befall Israel before her restoration (Ho 13:14), owing to her impenitence.

her God-the greatest aggravation of her rebellion, that it was against her God (Ho 13:4).

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