Hosea 1:4-5

‘And YHWH said to him, “Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the bloodshed of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause the kingdom (or kingship) of the house of Israel to cease. And it will come about at that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel”.'

Hosea was commanded by YHWH to name his firstborn son ‘Jezreel'. This was to be a sign that in a short while He would avenge the bloodbath of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu (that is would avenge the slaughter at Jezreel, not only of the kings of Israel and Judah, but also all of their retainers - see 2 Kings 10:11). This was something which would be accomplished in the Valley of Jezreel where Israel's bow would be broken and the kingdom of the house of Israel would cease.

The ‘breaking of the bow of Israel' (compare Psalms 46:9; Jeremiah 49:35) indicated that the power of her army would be broken, her strength would be gone, and that her armaments in which she prided herself (certainly in the time of Jeroboam II) would be captured by the enemy and disposed of. It was the indication of a heavy military defeat and the cessation of her ability to make war (Psalms 46:9). Because of its position (see below) Jezreel was always a prime target for invading armies intent on defeating Israel.

This was no light message. It was an indication of YHWH's coming judgment on the dynasty of the reigning king (thus placing this prophecy prior to 753 BC), as well as of the final destruction of the kingdom, and it would in consequence hardly have made Hosea popular in royal circles. ‘At that day' refers to the day of Israel's demise.

The reason for the need for vengeance would appear to be because, while Jehu had initially acted with prophetic approval in slaughtering the kings, and had delivered Israel from the royal house which was propagating the Phoenician Baal (Baal Melqart), even receiving the commendation of YHWH for doing so, he had gone too far by following out his own purposes, and had thus himself disobeyed YHWH. It was true that God had commended his partial obedience, declaring “Because you have done well in executing what is right in my eyes, because you have done to the house of Ahab according to all that was in my heart, sons of yours of the fourth generation will sit on the throne of Israel” (2 Kings 10:30). But the limit to ‘the fourth generation' indicated only qualified approval. He was being rewarded for what he had done, but his house would eventually be punished for his over excess, and for his failing to do what he should have done. For in his excess he had gone far beyond the house of Ahab in his bloodshed, and in his folly he and his dynasty, (including Jeroboam who had been especially ‘blessed' and therefore had little excuse), had not been so careful about the restoration of pure Yahwism.

The only thing that could remotely have justified the kind of bloodbath in which Jehu engaged (and even then it would not have justified his over excess in doing so), would have been the dedicated intention to return the whole of the nation to pure Yahwism. But instead of that, the house of Jehu had allowed the syncretistic worship at Bethel to carry on, with its golden calf, its compromises with Baalism (which are reflected in Hosea 2:16), and its uncontrolled Baal worship at high places on mountain summits. In other words its obedience had fallen far short of God's requirements.

Consequently Jehu's purges were seen to have been mainly self-serving, in that they had not resulted in a return to pure Yahwism. This indicated that Yahwism had simply been used as an excuse for his actions and in order to curry favour among the more religiously minded in Israel, rather than being an affair of the heart. As a consequence Jehu's dynasty were considered to have condemned themselves, because their actions were seen to have arisen, not out of a true concern for YHWH, but from political opportunism parading under the guise of religious zeal. To be the Lord's executioner was a serious matter, and to do it excessively, for the totally wrong reasons, could only inevitably lead to judgment on those who so involved themselves.

This is brought out by the fact that his reward, even initially, was limited to four generations, and by the fact that YHWH's commendation in 2 Kings 10:30 is itself placed between a reference to his continuing in the syncretistic and illegal worship instituted by Jeroboam I, and a further reference to the same in terms of his failure to walk in the law of YHWH the God of Israel with all his heart (2 Kings 10:29). Like Nebuchadnezzar (who was also YHWH's instrument, but went too far - Isaiah 10:5), he was YHWH's instrument, but he was seen to be an unsatisfactory instrument.

So the combined significance of the name Jezreel was that it indicated the coming of the end of the royal dynasty of Jehu because of its blood-guiltiness, and the total defeat of Israel at the hands of its enemies.

However, the significance of the name ‘Jezreel' does not stop there, for Jezreel not only plays an important part in this verse (where it is mentioned three times), but also in Hosea 1:11 and Hosea 2:22. In Hosea 1:11 there is to be a reversal of the situation described here, for in the future, when the peoples of Judah and Israel finally do unite under one head, ‘they will come up out of the land' (to Jezreel), and ‘great will be the day of Jezreel'. It will then be a place of celebration and rejoicing. Instead of symbolising judgment it will symbolise the triumph of the Davidic king, who will be seen to be reigning in the palace of the kings of Israel as well as in Jerusalem. The kingships of Judah and Israel will once more have been united under one head, and all will look to the one king. What Jehu had done rightly in the slaughtering of the two kings would have its final fruit in the true king reigning over the combined nation. In Hosea 2:22 the name ‘Jezreel' (God sows) symbolises Heaven and earth and all that grows in it, acting because ‘God has sown' (Jezreel means ‘God sows'), with the result that Israel will be fully restored as God's people.

So the naming of Hosea's son as ‘Jezreel' not only points to judgment on Jehu's (and Jeroboam's) dynasty, and the ceasing of the kingdom of Israel, but also to the later triumph of the Davidic king (Hosea 1:11) and the future God-wrought restoration of His people (Hosea 2:22).

Jezreel was an important site for it overlooked the pass that led from the north into the Coastal Plain (the route regularly taken by conquering kings). It was also the summer palace of the kings of Israel, and was a stout fortress. It was the scene of Ahab's treachery with regard to Naboth's vineyard (1 Kings 21). The fortress at the time of Ahab has been excavated, and it was discovered to have had a moat thirty six metres (117 feet) wide. Parts of Israelite buildings have also been found. To Hosea it symbolised kingship in Israel, while at the same time indicating the rejection of idolatrous Samaria. It also signified the protection of the realm. When Jezreel prospered Israel was strong.