AUTHOR: Hosea, son of Beeri, was a prophet of the northern kingdom (Israel or Ephraim). Prophesied about the same time as [ Am 1:1 - "Words which Amos, the sheep farmer in Tekoa, received in visions, concerning Israel two years before the earthquake. Uzziah was king of Judah, and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel." ], [ Isa 1:1 - "The vision which Isaiah, son of Amoz, had concerning Judah and Jerusalem during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah". ] and [ Mq 1: 1 - "The word of the LORD that came to Micah of Moresheth during the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah; the vision which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem." ] in Judah.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME: It is often misinterpreted as “Jehovah saves” or “saved by God”, because of the name Joshua, which also has a Hebrew origin, but is composed of the elements " Jeh", which means "Jehovah" and "oshea", which means "saved".

THEME: The four reigns of Judah, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah add up to a period of 113 years: 52 of Uzziah, 16 of Jotham, 16 of Ahaz and 29 of Hezekiah [ 2Ch 29 :1 ]. It is evident that Hosea's ministry did not encompass all these years. The historical events referred to in the Book of Hosea cover a period of approximately 60 years. The theme of the book is God's love and restoration, it is a great exhortation to repentance addressed to the northern kingdom, over a long period of time. Hosea describes the disturbances of his time: the priests had joined with the people to attack and murder pilgrims on the way to Shechem. The nation plunged into dense darkness, being destitute of truth, goodness and knowledge of God [Hos 4:6] and full of perjury, lies, death, theft, adultery and bloodshed [...]. This spiritual, social and political decay intensified as time passed, culminating in the Assyrian captivity in 722 BC, by Shalmaneser V [ 2 Kings 17:3 ] and consummated by Sargon II [ Is 20:1 ]. >

COMPILATION: Hosea is the first of the books called Prophets, considered by the Hebrew Bible to be a single book. They called it "The Book of Twelve". The designations "major prophet" and "minor prophet" were coined by Augustine of Hippo, at the beginning of the fourth century AD, in his work The City of God. These books are called minor not because of their importance, but because of their size. The Minor Prophet Books range from Hosea to Malachi. Approximately 750/720 B.C. It consists of 14 chapters and 197 verses.