Three days ago I got into an argument with my Atheist friend, who said that God orders that infants be dashed to pieces and that every women with child shall be ripped open, does God order this to happen as punishment or is this a prophecy?
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
No, No, No!!!
Hos 13:16 is a simple statement of future fact (ie, a prophecy) - Samaria was unfaithful to God (by rebellion) and thus would be invaded by barbarous people who would do unspeakable things to the inhabitants of Samaria.
That is, because the Samarians had rejected God (rebelled against God) and His protection, God, in obedience to their wish, would withdraw protection and the prophet simply states the natural consequences of that series of choices - disastrous results indeed!!
Samaria will bear her guilt [ie, its consequences]
because she has rebelled against her God [ie, rejected God]
They will fall by the sword [of the invading army]
their little ones will be dashed to pieces [[by the invading army]
and their pregnant women ripped open [by the invading army]
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. (Hosea 13:16, KJV)
Notice in the text itself that the people have rebelled. Does God say that He Himself will rip up their pregnant women? No. The text does not say anything near this. It simply foretells what will occur.
When people rebel against God, God is no longer able to protect them. It is then that the Enemy is able to harm them. Unprotected because of their own rebellion, these bad things will happen. God knows the future and sees what will happen. He warns the people of what will happen because He does not want to see them go down that path. Yet when they rebel against Him, ignoring the warning, it cannot be blamed on God that these evil things come as a result.
In Hosea 13:16 both of the two Hebrew verbs translated as "shall be dashed in pieces" (H7376) and "shall be ripped up" (H1234) are in the pual form, which means they are Hebrew passive voice. (See image below.) Because it is impossible for commands in Hebrew to be in the passive voice, these words cannot possibly be interpreted as commands of God. They are simply predictions, and God cannot be said to have caused these things.
Two related questions were asked and answered HERE and HERE.
HOSEA 13:16 The people of Samaria must bear their guilt, because they have rebelled against their God They will fall by the sword; their little ones will be dashed to the ground, their pregnant women ripped open.”
You asked … “does God order this to happen as punishment or is this a prophecy?”…..
You (and your friend) are adding something to this section that simply isn’t there. God did not ‘order’ this - at all. Where or how are you assuming this?
This verse is expressing a consequence that will come upon the people of Samaria because they rebelled against their god (lower case ‘g’ intentional). Their ‘god’ was not God. And God did not ‘order’ this. And what’s more, He couldn’t intervene. They had rejected the God of Israel.
It is not evil to fulfill a promise of wrath to a rebellious people. Many of us like to take powers and righteousness away from God by saying things like God can’t do that. Which automatically is false because he is GOD ALMIGHTY. He will have mercy on who he has mercy. He is a perfect holy good Judge. In that statement tells that when he warns a nation of consequences to sin is condemnation. Always has been always will be. He shown grace to Adam and Eve when they rebelled and he told them they would die. Every breath is grace. We should have been eradicated along time ago due to rebellion. So we don’t have any right to breath at all if we are sinners at conception as David so states clearly. The attributes of God are highly neglected in debates such as these.
The other answers give good arguments to show that God did not directly cause the events in the prophecy. The OP’s question, however, leads me to also consider whether or not God played an indirect role in those events.
Looking at the text of Hosea as a whole, the book is replete with dire threats and warnings against Israel. However, the only violent action that is directly attributable to God is confined to the words of the message/prophecy itself.
Therefore I have cut them in pieces by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of My mouth; And the judgments on you are like the light that shines. –Hosea 6:5
The shocking language of Hosea was therefore intentional, meant to lay bare the sins and wickedness of Israel, and to alert it to the danger that lay ahead. And though God was unquestionably angry, he did not gloat over their impending doom.
How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart is turned over within Me, All My compassions are kindled. –Hosea 11:8
Quite the contrary, the thought of what was going to happen stirred God’s compassion and moved him to act, that is, to send warning by means of the prophecy. Like the prophecies before it, it was a gesture of God’s goodness and mercy.
But I have been the Lord your God since the land of Egypt; I will make you live in tents again, As in the days of the appointed festival. I have also spoken to the prophets, And I provided many visions, And through the prophets I spoke in parables. –Hosea 12:9-10
Furthermore, woven into the prediction of doom and destruction was a call to repentance and a message of hope that there was still time to turn to God and be saved.
“Come, let’s return to the Lord. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us. –Hosea 6:1
So as for you, return to your God, Maintain kindness and justice, And wait for your God continually. –Hosea 12:6
If Israel heeded God’s words, he would relent of his anger. But it did not. What role then did God play in the fulfillment of the prophecy? In my understanding of the text, the prophecy was not fulfilled by any direct or indirect action of God. If God can be said to be responsible at all, it is only by the withdrawal of his presence and help.
Whereas before he had been there to aid them.
But they did not know that I healed them. I pulled them along with cords of a man, with ropes of love, And I became to them as one who lifts the yoke from their jaws; And I bent down and fed them. –Hosea 11:3-4
For there is no savior besides Me. I cared for you in the wilderness, In the land of drought. –Hosea 13:5
Now he would go away and withdraw his help.
I will go away and return to My place Until they acknowledge their guilt and seek My face; –Hosea 5:15
They will go with their flocks and herds To seek the Lord, but they will not find Him; He has withdrawn from them. –Hosea 13:5
But Israel chose to face its enemies alone. In the final analysis Israel and no one else was responsible for its own destruction.
It is to your own destruction, Israel, That you are against Me, against your help. –Hosea 13:9
For God is “the Holy One who is faithful” (Hos 11:12). Unlike men, God does not return evil for evil.
I will not carry out My fierce anger; I will not destroy Ephraim again. For I am God and not a man, the Holy One in your midst, And I will not come in wrath. –Hosea 11:9
If we think God capable of evil, then we would be guilty, just as the Israelites were, of having no understanding of God (Hos 4:11, Hos 5:4).
For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. –Hosea 6:6 KJV
No, it does not state he orders that action. Simply that, because the people of Samaria rebelled, he'll allow it to happen to them, where he presumedly otherwise wouldn't have. Still pretty dark.
Your friend's argument would be better served through the story of Jezebel (evil woman, but the slaughter of Baal prophets by Elijah isn't exactly "Christ-like"), or Sodom and Gomorrah (Lot's wife, assumedly righteous as her husband was, was turned to salt for turning around against an angels instruction, not to mention the entire destruction of two cities).
If you want to try to counter him on every point in the Old Testament though, good luck. Always been a fan of the New Testament God myself... less anger/wrath. Jesus also made it clear the intent and purpose of an individual was true morality, not following the letter of the law laid out in the Old Testament (see Matthew 5:21-44, Mark 2:23-28, Luke 13:10-17, etc)
Yeah, because he is angry. I mean really if you read the whole chapter it's like a monologue in a theater performance, you gotta admit it would be pretty awesome to watch if a good actor could portray all that rage and betrayal as well as it reads. Seriously, when I read this whole chapter it read like an ancient, long breakup text. Several times he mentions his negative emotions to this act by the Israelites, so we can conclude that God gets enraged and maybe even feels regret. I like this particular depiction of God because he's behaving... Like a god. Exactly like the other gods that people worshipped at that time. This is exactly like something a Greek God would say. It also seems like God could be upset because he actually has rivals to contend with and losing his worshippers to one of them made him jealous. His feelings are clearly hurt. But I could be wrong.
There are many passages that imply God has or will punish, directly or indirectly. This is far from an exhaustive list.
Hosea 10:10, 14 10 When I please, I will punish them; nations will be gathered against them to put them in bonds for their double sin. 14 ......when mothers were dashed to the ground with their children.
Isaiah 35:4 Say to those with fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you.”
Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.(Numbers 31:17-18)"
1 Samuel 15:2-4 2 Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up from Egypt. 3 Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
Assyria to be used to punish Judea – Gods instrument to punish.
Isaiah 10:5 Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger-the staff in their hands is My wrath.
Amos 3:13-15 - 13 “Hear this and testify against the descendants of Jacob,” declares the Lord, the LORD God Almighty. 14 “On the day I punish Israel for her sins, I will destroy the altars of Bethel; the horns of the altar will be cut off and fall to the ground. 15 I will tear down the winter house along with the summer house; the houses adorned with ivory will be destroyed and the mansions will be demolished,” declares the LORD.
Amos 4:2 2 The Sovereign LORD has sworn by his holiness: “The time will surely come when you will be taken away with hooks, the last of you with fishhooks.
Micah 1:6 “Therefore I will make Samaria a heap of rubble,
Micah 15:5 I will execute vengeance in anger and fury on the heathen, such as they have not heard. Ezekiel 23:45-48 (King James Version) 45: And the righteous men, they shall judge them after the manner of adulteresses, and after the manner of women that shed blood; because they are adulteresses, and blood is in their hands.
46: For thus saith the Lord GOD; I will bring up a company upon them, and will give them to be removed and spoiled.
47: And the company shall stone them with stones, and dispatch them with their swords; they shall slay their sons and their daughters, and burn up their houses with fire.
48: Thus will I cause lewdness to cease out of the land, that all women may be taught not to do after your lewdness.
If in spite of this you still do not listen to me but continue to be hostile toward me, 28 then in my anger I will be hostile toward you, and I myself will punish you for your sins seven times over. 29 You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters."(Leviticus 26:27-30)
"Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones." (Psalm 137:9)
"For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous, Or a man that is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded, Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken. No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the Lord made by fire: he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God." (Leviticus 21:18-21)
NOT ONLY in the OT
Matt 10:34 34 Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law – 36 a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.” (Matthew 10: 34-36)
“But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and kill them in front of me.” (Luke 19:27)
“the Son of man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn” (Matthew 24:30)
1 Corinthians 15:24 [Jesus] will turn the Kingdom over to God the Father, having destroyed every ruler and authority and power.
15:25 For Christ must reign until he humbles all his enemies beneath his feet.
Luke 12:49 - “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!
All who would not seek the LORD, the God of Israel, were to be put to death, whether small or great, man or woman. (2 Chronicles 15:13)
Revelations 2:23 And I will kill her children with death; and all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts: and I will give unto every one of you according to your works.
Revelation 19:11-21 describes the ultimate war with Christ, the conquering commander who judges and makes war “with justice” (v. 11). It’s going to be bloody (v. 13) and gory. The birds will eat the flesh of all those who oppose Him (v. 17-18). He has no compassion upon His enemies, whom He will conquer completely and consign to a “fiery lake of burning sulfur” (v. 20).
“every tribe on earth will mourn because of him” (Rev. 1:7)
Rev 12:5 5 She gave birth to a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne,
“judge and wage war” (Rev. 19:11)
his robe will be “dipped in blood” (19:13)
(Revelations 2:23) And I will kill her children with death; and all the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts: and I will give unto every one of you according to your works.
Conclusion
God will punish those who go against his Law / commandments as they have caused corruption in the society. The only issue that appears at odds is the unwarranted killing of children and babies as they are innocent and God would not punish the innocent.
We just need to read Hosea 13:15 where God said that the "wind of the Lord" is the one bringing the destruction. This is of his own making.
I don't know why people resist so hard admitting this. Didn't God bring the rain that drowned the entire population of the planet saving only Noah and his family? Didn't God drown babies and pregnant women? Why does it sound so weird that he would cause the death of babies and pregnant women in Hosea 13:16?
