Chapter 10 in Hoshea follows the decree of exile mentioned in the previous chapters, and its purpose is to clarify its underlying cause: what actually brought such a decree upon Israel. The Malbim explains that the Holy One, blessed be He, brought about turmoil and rebellion among the people, in that the nation rebelled against its kings, and this was the cause of the exile. We have already seen in chapters 7 and 8 that they killed Shallum son of Yavesh, and later they rebelled against Hoshea son of Elah as well, informing on him to the king of Assyria that he had sent emissaries to So, king of Egypt, seeking alternative patrons.
And what was the root of the rebellion? The Malbim explains that the people were displeased that these kings did not cling to the sin of Jeroboam; that is, they adopted a new approach and stopped worshiping the golden calves. Note this carefully: Shallum son of Yavesh and Hoshea son of Elah were not righteous men, but they did abolish the worship of the calves. Many among the people disliked this change and rose up in rebellion against them. This rebellion brought about the invasion of the king of Assyria - first in the days of Menachem son of Gadi and ultimately in the days of Hoshea son of Elah - until he exiled them all. Alongside the Malbim's explanation, we will also see the approach of the Radak, who interprets the chapter in a straightforward manner, without referencing the rebellion against these two kings.
גֶּפֶן בּוֹקֵק יִשְׂרָאֵל פְּרִי יְשַׁוֶּה־לּוֹ כְּרֹב לְפִרְיוֹ הִרְבָּה לַמִּזְבְּחוֹת כְּטוֹב לְאַרְצוֹ הֵיטִיבוּ מַצֵּבוֹת׃ - Israel is an emptying vine, he puts forth fruit for himself; as his fruit increased, he multiplied altars; as his land was good, they adorned monuments.
The people of Israel are likened to a vine, just as we learned in Yeshayahu chapter 5: "My beloved had a vineyard on a fruitful hill." The Holy One, blessed be He, planted this vine and expected it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. There it is said, "He hoped for justice, but behold, violence; for righteousness, but behold, an outcry" - the Holy One, blessed be He, expected the vine to produce good fruit, and that good fruit is justice and righteousness. Instead, Israel became a "gofen bokek" (an emptying vine), a vine that sheds its fruit, casting it off and failing to yield fruit worthy of it.
"He puts forth fruit for himself" (peri yeshaveh-lo) - it was expected to yield fruit commensurate with its stature. The Malbim analyzes the difference between the root of placing (sima) and the root of equating (hashva'ah): when one places one object upon another, there is not necessarily any intrinsic connection between what is placed and that upon which it rests, which is why the verb "to place" (lasim) is used. However, the expression "teshaveh", as in "glory and majesty You lay upon him" (hod vehadar teshaveh alav), also carries the connotation of value (shovi) - that the item is commensurate in worth with the one upon whom it is placed. Here as well, the Holy One, blessed be He, expected from the vine fruit that would be commensurate with it, fruit according to its true capacity. Instead, "Israel is an emptying vine", an expression of dropping, falling, and emptiness.
And why? "As his fruit increased, he multiplied altars; as his land was good, they adorned monuments." All the goodness that Hashem bestowed upon them and all the blessing that He granted them were meant to serve for good, yet they - the more He increased their fruit and the better He made their land, the more they multiplied altars and adorned pillars for idolatry. The Malbim explains that the pillars were meant to glorify pagan temples or the state, and he calls them "pyramids, obelisks": pyramids or an obelisk. An obelisk is a monument, a kind of tall, narrow pillar topped with a pyramid-like point; in antiquity, it was carved from a single rock, one massive elongated stone rather than built from multiple stones, and erected in the land to glorify idolatry. In modern Hebrew this is called a "needle monument" (matzevat machat). All the strength of the vine, from which fruit was expected, was diverted toward idolatry.
חָלַק לִבָּם עַתָּה יֶאְשָׁמוּ הוּא יַעֲרֹף מִזְבְּחוֹתָם יְשֹׁדֵד מַצֵּבוֹתָם׃ - Their heart is divided, now they will bear their guilt; He will break down their altars, He will desolate their monuments.
Rashi explains "their heart is divided": their heart separated from Me, meaning they parted from Hashem, blessed be He, and went to worship idols. Therefore "now they will bear their guilt", and this will cause Him to "break down their altars" - smash their altars, related to the idiom of breaking the neck (arifah).
Rashi cites a well-known Midrash Aggadah here: Great is peace, for even if Israel worships idols yet there is peace among them, Satan does not prosecute them, as it says, "Ephraim is joined to idols; leave him alone" - as we saw above in chapter 4, that so long as Ephraim is united, even if they worship idols, "leave him alone", the Holy One, blessed be He, does not punish them. But once "their heart is divided - now they will bear their guilt." Notice that the Rabbinic exposition here differs from the peshat: according to the simple meaning, their heart turned away from Hashem, whereas according to the Derash, "their heart is divided" means that their hearts were divided from one another, that they were fractured and fraught with discord. So hated is controversy and division that the moment they became divided, an opening was created for Satan to come and accuse them.
The Malbim explains: because they made calves for themselves and sought to worship idols, Hashem divided their hearts - the Holy One, blessed be He, brought about discord among them. According to this, "their heart is divided" refers to the Holy One, blessed be He, for He divided their hearts, and consequently "now they will bear their guilt" and receive their punishment. And that punishment is that "He will break down their altars, He will desolate their monuments": this division of hearts caused the altars to be demolished and the monuments to be shattered - the king went ahead, uprooted the altars, and smashed the pillars, which was contrary to the will of the people. And as noted, Shallum son of Yavesh and Hoshea son of Elah did not consent to Jeroboam's calves, and so they broke down their altars and desolated their pillars, which caused a rift within the nation.
כִּי עַתָּה יֹאמְרוּ אֵין מֶלֶךְ לָנוּ כִּי לֹא יָרֵאנוּ אֶת־יְהֹוָה וְהַמֶּלֶךְ מַה־יַּעֲשֶׂה־לָּנוּ׃ - "For now they will say: We have no king, for we did not fear Hashem; and what could a king do for us?"
The Malbim explains: Out of that very division, they will rebel against the king and seek to depose him. The king did something that displeased them and abolished the worship of Yarov'am's calves, and therefore they say: "We have no king!" Why should he suddenly come and abolish the calf worship, setting up the service of Hashem in its place? "For we did not fear Hashem" - we do not fear Hashem, and this service does not suit us; "and what could a king do for us?" - why should the king force us to serve Hashem and fear Him?
This is what brought about "their heart is divided": the people rose up and rebelled against the king because he abolished the calves, and they informed on him to the king of Assyria. The king of Assyria then came, shattered the calves, and took everything away - so it turns out that they themselves brought about their own downfall. Here was a king who had already abolished the calves, yet you informed on him and rebelled against him, creating a situation where a foreign king would come from outside and exile everyone. They brought this catastrophe upon themselves.
The Malbim adds another explanation of "now they will be found guilty": Until now, the kings had forced the people to worship idols. Yarov'am fashioned calves and declared, "These are your gods, O Israel," forbidding them to go up to the Beis HaMikdash, and gradually they grew accustomed to worshipping the calves. Thus, the issue did not originate from their guilt but from the guilt of the kings, giving them a measure of justification. But now, when Shallum ben Yavesh and Hoshea ben Elah abolished the calf worship, and the people themselves insisted on continuing it - the demand coming from below - this brought immense guilt upon them. You have proven that you yourselves desire the calves, and you can no longer blame your corruption on the king, claiming, "He forced us, he commanded us." I raised up kings for you who opposed the calf worship, yet you demanded the calves! This is "now they will be found guilty": through the division of heart, by rebelling against the king, the guilt falls squarely upon them.
Radak explains the verse in a completely different way: "For now they will say" refers to the aftermath of the exile, expressing repentance and remorse. In exile they will say: "We have no king" - for he lacks the power to save us from the enemy's hand. We asked for a king to fight our battles and deliver us, yet here we are, exiled; where is our king? "For we did not fear Hashem" - we erred; we should have feared Hashem rather than asking for a king. Had we remained fearful of Hashem, no trouble would have befallen us, and He would have saved us from our enemies when doing His will. "And what could a king do for us?" - the king we requested, what can he do to help us now? It turns out that what we trusted in cannot save us. Thus, according to Radak, this entire verse is an expression of remorse and repentance by the nation in their exile.
דִּבְּרוּ דְבָרִים אָלוֹת שָׁוְא כָּרֹת בְּרִית וּפָרַח כָּרֹאשׁ מִשְׁפָּט עַל תַּלְמֵי שָׂדָי׃ - "They speak words, swearing falsely in making a covenant, and judgment blossoms like hemlock upon the furrows of the field."
According to Radak: "They speak words" - Yarov'am and his associates consulted on what to do to retain the monarchy, devising schemes to prevent the people from going up to Yerushalayim. "Swearing falsely, making a covenant" - over this they swore, entering a covenant and taking false oaths to abolish the Torah and the mitzvos and to worship idols. "And judgment blossoms like hemlock upon the furrows of the field" - therefore, understand why the judgment with which Hashem judges and punishes them blossoms like hemlock and wormwood, in the language of "a root bearing hemlock and wormwood." What blossoms in the furrows of their fields will be hemlock and bitterness: what you cultivated, that you shall eat. And what did you cultivate? You cultivated poison - crops of idolatry, of corruption, and of abandoning the service of Hashem. This is what grows upon the furrows of your fields, so do not wonder why judgment blossoms over you like hemlock and wormwood, and why you were exiled.
The Malbim, as is his way, interprets the verse as referring to the period before the exile, describing the rebellion against Shallum ben Yavesh and Hoshea ben Elah who abolished idolatry. "They speak words" - this was their constant talk among themselves. "False oaths" - in doing so, they violated the oath of allegiance they had sworn to the king; for when crowning a king, people swear allegiance and subservience to him, as otherwise in what way did they accept him as king? Thus their oath turned out to be a false oath, since the moment the king commanded that the calves be abolished, you were unwilling to accept it. "Making a covenant" - they forged a conspiracy among themselves to kill Shallum ben Yavesh, and to hand Hoshea ben Elah over to the king of Assyria to destroy him.
And it was this covenant made to do harm that caused "judgment [to blossom] like hemlock upon the furrows of the field" - the retribution came upon them immediately. "Blossoming" refers to something that sprouts and blooms in an instant: the seed of rebellion that you sowed in secret, in the depths of the field's furrows, immediately sprouted, blossomed, bore fruit, and produced bitter clusters, and you immediately received your judgment and punishment, as we will soon see.
לְעֶגְלוֹת בֵּית אָוֶן יָגוּרוּ שְׁכַן שֹׁמְרוֹן כִּי אָבַל עָלָיו עַמּוֹ וּכְמָרָיו עָלָיו יָגִילוּ עַל כְּבוֹדוֹ כִּי גָלָה מִמֶּנּוּ׃ - For the calves of Beit Aven the dwellers of Samaria shall dread, for its people mourn over it, and its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it.
The Malbim explains that here the prophet describes the cause of the rebellion and the immediate springing up of judgment. "For the calves of Beit Aven" - the entire crux was that their calves were taken from them and their idolatrous worship was abolished. Those calves in Beit El and Dan were what brought about the division and discord between the people and the king, and on their account "shall gather" (*yaguru*) - the inhabitants of Samaria assembled to rebel against the king for putting an end to their worship. "For its people mourn over it" - the people mourn over the abolishment of the worship of the calves. "And its priests trembled over it" - the idolatrous priests who had served the idol until now are broken and depressed "for its glory, because it has departed from it," over the fact that the glory of the calves was exiled.
Let us also explain this according to the approach of the Radak and Rashi. First, what is "Beit Aven"? The calves that Jeroboam made were male, yet Scripture refers to them as "heifers" (*eglot*, in the feminine) as a term of disgrace; similarly, "Beit Aven" (House of Iniquity) is Beit El, but Scripture refers to it with a derogatory name. This is like the principle cited in the Gemara that one should refer to idolatry with disparaging nicknames: *Beit Galya* becomes *Beit Karyah*, and similar examples brought in the Gemara, showing that idolatry should be called by a term expressing negativity, because we do not wish to mention it except in a way that conveys our revulsion toward it. And because the deed of Beit El was an act of *aven*, an act of falsehood and wickedness, Scripture calls them "the calves of Beit Aven."
Radak explains *yaguru* as an expression of fear and dread (*magor*), unlike the Malbim who interpreted it as an expression of gathering: the dwellers of Samaria are afraid. And why is Samaria mentioned, when there were no calves in it? Because Samaria was the capital of the kingdom, and the foremost worshippers of the calves were the people of Samaria; therefore, he mentions the calves in connection with Samaria. The meaning of the matter is: when Beit El was destroyed and the calves did not save it, the dwellers of Samaria began to fear for themselves - if the calf upon which I relied to protect and save cannot even save itself, who will protect me? For all the rest of the Land of Israel was captured before Samaria, which the king of Assyria besieged for three years. This is "for its people mourn over it" - they were mourning and grieving over the calf in Beit El and over its glory that had departed from it, and from this they realized that calamity was already waiting at their door.
גַּם אוֹתוֹ לְאַשּׁוּר יוּבָל מִנְחָה לְמֶלֶךְ יָרֵב בׇּשְׁנָה אֶפְרַיִם יִקָּח וְיֵבוֹשׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵעֲצָתוֹ׃ - It too shall be carried to Assyria as a tribute to King Yarev; Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of its own counsel.
"It too shall be carried to Assyria" - this refers to the calves. Rashi explains that this occurred in the twelfth year of Ahaz, as stated in Divrei HaYamim, that Hashem stirred up the spirit of Pul, the king of Assyria, and he exiled the Reubenites and the Gadites, and then he took the golden calves in Beit El and went on his way, fulfilling what was said: "It too shall be carried to Assyria." Who is "it"? Those "calves of Beit Aven" that were mentioned - your idol, they took it too, carried it off, and departed.
"As a tribute to King Yarev" - this refers to Sennacherib. Some say that "King Yarev" was his actual name, while others say he was called this because he would contend (*rav*) and quarrel with the nations, and was therefore called King Yarev (the King of Strife). The Malbim explains that pagan idolaters had a deity of strife and war, and "King Yarev" was the one appointed on behalf of that deity over strife and warfare. One can also suggest that the end of the name "Sennacherib" is *riv*, and *riv* shares the letters of *yarev*, so according to this, *yarev* describes the king who would contend with them. And the calves were brought to him as a tribute.
The Malbim explains that this clarifies "and judgment sprouts like hemlock" - how their punishment was immediate. When the king of Assyria captured Hoshea, Scripture states that he shut him up in prison, because informants reported that he had forged ties with So, the king of Egypt, bypassing the king of Assyria, since any contact with other kings was intended to save him from the hand of Assyria. The people, who were displeased that their calves had been taken from them, informed on Hoshea the son of Elah to the king of Assyria. And see what came of this: the king of Assyria arrived, furious over the overture to the king of Egypt, deposed Hoshea and locked him in prison - and took the calves as well! What had they hoped to gain? That Hoshea would be punished and the calves would remain with them. Yet behold, "it too shall be carried to Assyria": not only was Hoshea taken from you, but the calf was also taken as a tribute to King Yarev.
"Ephraim shall receive shame" - Assyria took Ephraim's shame. For the calf is called by derogatory terms, and here it is called "shame" (*boshnah*): Assyria came and carried away Ephraim's shame, its calves, to his land. "And Israel shall be ashamed of its own counsel" - now the penny drops for Israel: How foolish I was! I devised a scheme to overthrow Hoshea the son of Elah by informing on him to the king of Assyria, and the king of Assyria came and took my calves as well! Not only did he take him, but the calves too. And Israel realizes how it shot itself in the foot, how its own counsel boomeranged and inflicted harm upon itself.
נִדְמֶה שֹׁמְרוֹן מַלְכָּהּ כְּקֶצֶף עַל פְּנֵי מָיִם׃ - Cut off is Samaria with her king, like foam upon the face of the water.
The expression "nidmeh" (נדמה) receives several interpretations here. Targum Yonatan translates "behatat Shomron bemalkah" - an expression of shame: Shomron was put to shame by its king. We thought the king would save us, yet he is like foam on the face of the water - an expression for something nonexistent, that vanishes entirely. His power equals foam upon the water, which in a single moment is nullified and erased.
Rashi explains "nidmeh" as related to silence, as in "do not be silent (al domi lach)": the king of Shomron was silenced, and he is like foam upon the face of the water. Radak explains it as an expression of cutting off, as in "My people are cut off (nidmeh ami)". According to this, the king of Shomron was cut off; he was under siege for a time, and ultimately could not be saved and went into exile.
And what is "ketzef"? Targum Yonatan translates it as boiling bubbles, foam, and Rashi similarly explains it using the Old French word for foam. Rashi also explains this in the Talmud, where the Gemara mentions foam and says one should be careful not to drink the foam on top of a beverage, and Rashi explains that this refers to the foam on the surface of the water. Radak, however, offers an intriguing explanation: that ketzef means tree bark, as in "and His fig tree to splintered bark (liktzafah)", which refers to the bark of the fig tree. According to this, "like foam upon the face of the water" means like tree bark tossed upon the water's surface.
The Malbim explains that this clarifies the phrase "and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel": that very counsel with which they thought to bring down Hoshea - by summoning the king of Ashur and informing him that Hoshea had rebelled against him - is what brought about their downfall. In his approach, "nidmeh" is related to comparison and allegory: Shomron and its king are likened to foam on the face of the water. Boiling produces froth, but when the water shifts and moves, the foam dissolves and vanishes, and the water becomes smooth once more; the movement of the water is what calms the foam and makes it disappear.
So it was in reality: on account of the king, the nation seethed and frothed with rage, and out of that froth they rebelled against the king - conspiring with Hoshea ben Elah against Pekach ben Remalyahu, putting him to death and enthroning Hoshea in his place. Through this, this foam went into exile, driven by the slander brought against Hoshea to the king of Ashur. Just as the motion of the water dissolves the foam, so this movement carried them off to Ashur; their schemes to fortify the worship of the calf did not succeed, for in the end, they were all exiled to Ashur. Thus, "nidmeh" is interpreted either as an expression of shame, of silencing, of being cut off, or of comparison and metaphor.
The chapter comes to explain the root cause of the exile. Israel was a vine planted by the Holy One, blessed be He, Who anticipated fruit worthy of it - justice and righteousness - yet it emptied out its fruit, redirecting all the bounty it received toward altars and monuments. Because of this, Hashem divided their hearts, and when kings arose who abolished the calf worship, the people rebelled against them, swearing false oaths and making covenants to kill and slander, and the seed sown in secret instantly sprouted as poison weed and wormwood. The outcome was the exact opposite of everything they planned: the king of Ashur took not only the king but the calves themselves, and the shame of Ephraim was carried as a tribute to King Yarev - "and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel." And the kingdom of Shomron, which they believed would save them, was likened to foam upon the water, which any slight movement erases. We also learn from here how abhorrent division and strife are: as long as they were united - "Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone" - but the moment "their heart is divided," "now they shall be found guilty."