When God would have healed Israel (v1), He discovered that their repentance was a fraud. Hosea then uses 5 pictures of Israel's unfaithfulness: the picture of an oven's fire, an oven's heat, a cake unturned, a silly dove, and a faulty weapon.
The oven's fire is started at midnight while the dough rises. In the morning it's coals are stirred and break into flame again. So Israel's passions and lusts, dying down at times but always flaring up when excited and never quenched. The hot oven represents the leaders wrath and anger that destroyed judges and killed 4 of their last 6 kings. A cake unturned is burnt on one side, doughy on the other. Not fit for eating, fruit of a work half done. The silly dove is insensitive to danger, easily trapped by the net, and flies from place to place (Assyria and Egypt) when threatened but never to God. A bad bow and arrow never hits the target, often misfires, and always disappoints its owner. Here are five pictures of what a believer never wants to be.
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