Jehovah was going to show her that her material possessions were not from Baal, and so he sent Hosea to warn Israel what failure to repent would mean. After Jeroboam II died, Israel faced her most terrible period. A reign of terror, with a number of rulers being assassinated, continued down until the Assyrian captivity in 740 B.C.E.

10. What is to result from the nation’s rejection of knowledge?

¹⁰ Prophetic judgments against Ephraim (and Judah) (4:1–14:9). The first verse of chapter 4 gives the setting for the prophetic warnings that follow: “Jehovah has a legal case with the inhabitants of the land, for there is no truth nor loving-kindness nor knowledge of God in the land.” What will result from this condition? “Because the knowledge is what you yourself have rejected, I shall also reject you from serving as a priest to me; and because you keep forgetting the law of your God, I shall forget your sons, even I,” says Jehovah. (4:1, 6) The very spirit of fornication has caused Israel to wander away. There will be an accounting for harlotlike Israel and Judah, but they will seek Jehovah when they find themselves “in sore straits.”​—5:15.

It is woe to them. Why? They are loafing about, scheming bad things, overstepping Jehovah’s covenant, and transgressing his law. “For it is wind that they keep sowing, and a storm wind is what they will reap.” (8:7) Jehovah will remember their error and give attention to their sins. “They will become fugitives among the nations.” (9:17)

14. What accurate fulfillments of Hosea’s prophecy are to be noted?

¹⁴ The book of Hosea strengthens faith in Jehovah’s inspired prophecies. Everything that Hosea prophesied concerning Israel and Judah came true. Israel was deserted by her lovers among the idolatrous neighbor nations and reaped the whirlwind of destruction from Assyria in 740 B.C.E. (Hos. 8:7-10; 2 Ki. 15:20; 17:3-6, 18)