Hosea 7:6
in Hosea 7For they prepare their heart like an oven while they lie in wait; all night their anger smolders; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
For they have made ready their heart like an oven, while they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire.
KJV
For they have made ready their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire.
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This verse in Hosea 7
Commentary
9 notes on this verse"who placed his heart in the oven as he dined with them. He slept throughout the entire night cooking them, and in the morning he burned like a flame of fire." LXX: "because their hearts were burning like an oven, when they were rushing down all night. Ephraim is filled with sleep: in the morning it happened: he is inflamed like the flame of fire."
This site's exposition
as an oven heated by the baker
on Hosea 7:4-7
The nation's appetite for evil is pictured as a baker's oven, banked low through the night so that it needs no fresh stoking before it blazes at dawn, wickedness so habitual it feeds itself. Verse five briefly leaves the figure for a court scene, the day of our king, princes made sick with wine and the king himself joining hands with scorners, before the oven returns in verse six to devour judges and topple king after king. The bench connects the rapid turnover of thrones here to Israel's last chaotic decades, several kings removed by conspiracy and the sword within a single generation, and the unit closes on its own refrain, there is none among them that calleth unto me.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers2 voices
But where shall I find an approach to the divine Scripture that teaches me what "an oven" is? I must call upon Jesus my Lord, that he may make me the seeker find and may open to the one knocking, that I may find in Scriptures "the oven" where I can rightly bake my sacrifice that God may accept it. Indeed, I think I have found it in Hosea the prophet, where he says, "All adulterers are as an oven ignited for burning." And again he says, "Their hearts glowed as an oven." The human heart therefore is "an oven." But this heart, if vices ignite it or the devil inflames it, will not bake, but it will burn up. But if that one who said, "I came to send fire into the earth" should ignite it, the loaves of the divine Scriptures and of the words of God which I receive in my heart, I do not burn up for destruction, but I bake for sacrifice.
Although you might marry and in the face of the authority of all the Scriptures never commit adultery, why do you not with God's grace accept what is lawful? Instead you dare to offend God and commit what is unlawful. I would like to know …
The Puritans and the Awakening3 voices
, 7 , and the charge of drunkenness comes in in the midst of this article; for wine is oil to the fire of lust, Prov. xxiii. Those that are inflamed with fleshly lusts, that are adulterers (
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens
As the baker, having kindled a fire in his oven, goes to bed and sleeps all night, and in the morning finds his oven well heated and ready for his purpose; so these when they have laid some wicked plot, tho' they may seem to sleep for a while, yet the fire is glowing within, and flames out as soon as ever there is opportunity for it.
For they have made ready their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait,....
2 more voices on this verse
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
As it conceals the lighted fire all night while the baker sleeps but in the morning burns as a flaming fire, so they brood mischief in their hearts while conscience is lulled asleep, and their wicked designs wait only for a fair occasion to break forth [HORSLEY]. Their heart is the oven, their baker the ringleader of the plot.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
For they have made ready their heart like an oven - He gives the reason old their bursting out into open mischief; it was ever stored up within.
The words behind it
14 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| כִּֽי־ | ki- | for | H3588 → | 4482 times |
| קֵרְב֧וּ | kerevu | they have brought near | H7126 → | |
| כַתַּנּ֛וּר | khatanur | like <the> oven | H8574 → | 15 times |
| לִבָּ֖ם | libam | heart their | H3820 → | 595 times |
| בְּאָרְבָּ֑ם | bearebam | in ambush their | H696 → | |
| כָּל־ | kol- | all | H3605 → | 5413 times |
| הַלַּ֙יְלָה֙ | halaylah | the night | H3915 → | |
| יָשֵׁ֣ן | yashen | [is] sleeping | H3463 → | |
| אֹֽפֵהֶ֔ם | ʾofehem | baker their | H644 → | |
| בֹּ֕קֶר | boker | morning | H1242 → | 214 times |
| ה֥וּא | hu' | it | H1931 → | 1879 times |
| בֹעֵ֖ר | voer | [is] burning | H1197 → | |
| כְּאֵ֥שׁ | keesh | like a fire of | H784 → | |
| לֶהָבָֽה׃ | lehavah | flame | H3852 → |
כִּֽי־for
ki-H3588 →4482 times
קֵרְב֧וּthey have brought near
kerevuH7126 →
כַתַּנּ֛וּרlike <the> oven
khatanurH8574 →15 times
לִבָּ֖םheart their
libamH3820 →595 times
בְּאָרְבָּ֑םin ambush their
bearebamH696 →
כָּל־all
kol-H3605 →5413 times
הַלַּ֙יְלָה֙the night
halaylahH3915 →
יָשֵׁ֣ן[is] sleeping
yashenH3463 →
אֹֽפֵהֶ֔םbaker their
ʾofehemH644 →
בֹּ֕קֶרmorning
bokerH1242 →214 times
ה֥וּאit
hu'H1931 →1879 times
בֹעֵ֖ר[is] burning
voerH1197 →
כְּאֵ֥שׁlike a fire of
keeshH784 →
לֶהָבָֽה׃flame
lehavahH3852 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Micah 2:1Woe to those who devise iniquity and plot evil on their beds! At morning’s light they accomplish it because the power is in their hands.
it leads to
- Psalms 36:4
Even on his bed he plots wickedness; he sets himself on a path that is not good; he fails to reject evil.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Isaiah 32:7
The weapons of the scoundrel are destructive; he hatches plots to destroy the poor with lies, even when the plea of the needy is just.
- Psalms 7:14–16
Behold, the wicked man travails with evil; he conceives trouble and births falsehood.
- Hosea 7:6–7
For they prepare their heart like an oven while they lie in wait; all night their anger smolders; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire.
- Proverbs 6:12–19
A worthless person, a wicked man, walks with a perverse mouth,
- Psalms 36:4
Through
Proverbs 4:16For they cannot sleep unless they do evil; they are deprived of slumber until they make someone fall.
it leads to
- Micah 2:1
Woe to those who devise iniquity and plot evil on their beds! At morning’s light they accomplish it because the power is in their hands.
- Isaiah 57:20
But the wicked are like the storm-tossed sea, for it cannot be still, and its waves churn up mire and muck.
- 2 Peter 2:14
Their eyes are full of adultery; their desire for sin is never satisfied; they seduce the unstable. They are accursed children with hearts trained in greed.
- Micah 2:1
About Hosea
This page draws on 10 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Caesarius of Arles, SERMON 43; Carl Friedrich Keil, The Twelve Minor Prophets; Edward Bouverie Pusey, The Minor Prophets: A Commentary; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Hosea 7:5-7; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Origen of Alexandria, HOMILIES ON LEVITICUS 5:2.