Chapter 7

Israel compared to a heated oven that the baker has abandoned.  I am confused about the imagery in this chapter. 

2024 - Again, Barnes to the rescue:

They are all adulterers - The prophet continues to picture the corruption of all kinds and degrees of people. "All of them," king, princes, people; all were given to adultery, both spiritual, in departing from God, and actual, (for both sorts of sins went together,) in defiling themselves and others. "All of them" were, (so the word means,) habitual "adulterers." One only pause there was in their sin, the preparation to complete it. He likens their hearts, inflamed with lawless lusts, to the heat of "an oven" which "the baker" had already "heated." The unusual construction "burning from the baker" instead of "heated "by" the baker" may have been chosen, in order to express, how the fire continued to burn of itself, as it were, (although at first kindled by the baker,) and was ever-ready to burn whatever was brought to it, and even now was all red-hot, burning on continually; and Satan, who had stirred it, gave it just this respite, "from the time when he had kneaded the dough" , until the leaven, which he had put into it, had fully worked, and the whole was ready for the operation of the fire.

The  world is full of such people now, ever on fire, and pausing only from  sin, until the flatteries, whereby they seduce the unstable, have worked  and penetrated the whole mind, and victim after victim is gradually  leavened and prepared for sin.

When I read the bolded line above it made me stop and wonder at just how much the Bible can say to different people.  It made me wonder why I study and struggle to interpret the Bible when true scholars like Barnes have already studied it out in so much deeper detail than I have the time or the learning to do.  Why do I try to "do it myself" when such resources are so readily available?  Of course it is because God speaks to us all and individually through his word.  He communicates with each of us at our point of need, at our level of understanding.  It's great to read commentaries, but not "instead of" reading the Bible and listening for the Spirit to reveal.  We ought to read the comments of the great Bible scholars, but we ought to read the word ourselves even more, that we may know what God has for us in our own lives.

Many references to Ephraim.  It was NW of Jerusalem originally.  Perhaps just a reference to Samaria.  It says that Ephraim appeals to both Assyria and to Egypt.  God continues to proclaim that His vengeance on them is imminent, that they are about to fall.  The language gets pretty intense.  The theme seems to be that God would really like to help them, to forgive them.  Yet they continue to accuse God, to tell lies about him, to rebel against him.  Even in their want and their distress they do not turn to God.  They devise evil against God.  God says they will fall by the sword, and Egypt will deride them for their insolence.

So far, this book has been a constant stream of unmitigated, non-PC, hard core indictment of Israel.  It reeks of God's impending wrath.  Like judgment is past, like leniency in sentencing is past, hope for renewal is past.  You can just tell that God is beyond angry.  This book is harsher in its language than other prophetic books I've read so far this time through.  It leaves no doubt. 

2025 - As I finish up this chapter I note that these are prophecies that have been fulfilled for the most part.  These chapters are indictments against both Israel and Ephraim.  Here is a map, from the resources page.  It's source is linked there:

Note that this half of Manasseh includes both Samaria and Megiddo, which are mentioned in this book.  Always Ephraim though, and not Manasseh as the wrath is announced upon Israel.  Remember that Ephraim was the "chosen" of Joseph's sons though he was the younger.  He was to rule, and yet so far as I know, he never really did.