Hosea 5:15
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.
Study Note
Study Note
God's declaration 'I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early' presents divine withdrawal as disciplinary rather than abandonment. The theology of 'returning to my place' (the divine heaven) is unusual in the prophets and implies that God's active presence in Israel's midst was contingent on the covenantal relationship — its withdrawal is the consequence of chronic covenant violation. The conditional 'in their affliction they will seek me early' anticipates the pattern of the Judges cycle (suffering → crying out → divine rescue) as the mechanism by which divine discipline achieves its purpose. Luke 15:17-18 ('he came to himself... I will arise and go to my father') may echo Hosea 5:15-6:1's return-to-God pattern as the narrative structure of repentance.
Other Translations
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me earnestly.
I go--I turn back unto My place, Till that they are desolate, and have sought My face. In their distress they do seek Me speedily!'
I will go back to my place till they are made waste; in their trouble they will go after me early and will make search for me.
Cross References
And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony …
And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat, from between …
If they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, with their trespass which they trespassed against me, …
Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham …
But if from thence thou shalt seek the Lord thy God, thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with …
(For the Lord thy God is a merciful God;) he will not forsake thee, neither destroy thee, nor forget the …
And it shall come to pass, when all these things are come upon thee, the blessing and the curse, which …
That then the Lord thy God will turn thy captivity, and have compassion upon thee, and will return and gather …
And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord: for he had nine hundred chariots of iron; and twenty years …
And Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites; and the children of Israel cried unto the Lord.