Hosea 4:2

‘There is nought but mouthing curses and breaking faith, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery.'

This lack of truth and compassion comes out plainly in their behaviour. They continually pronounce curses ('lh) on others, they break faith and deceive and bear false witness, they kill, they steal, and they commit adultery, thus breaching the manward side of the commandments in Exodus 20 (coveting was not a chargeable offence as not being provable).

‘They break out, and blood collides with blood.'

Most heinously they are guilty of much bloodshed. ‘They break out'. That is they at times remove all restraint. We might say, ‘they break all bounds.' The suggestion appears to be that every now and again groups of men are roused to violence by some slight, imagined or real, and engage in shedding the blood of their fellow-Israelites. Thus the whole land is constantly on the edge of violence. As we know they were turbulent times, with each king arising as a consequence of assassinating another (something always exacerbating dissension); with the threat of Assyria constantly on the horizon and every now and then appearing; with fierce disagreement between different political parties as to how to meet the problem posed; and with a Judah which was unwilling to enter into an alliance with them and Aram (Syria), and thus having to be put in its place. All this encouraged violence and thoughts of violence, and violence begets violence.