[6 Lesson Course] Hosea: Salvation Through Wilderness

Written by Dr. Noel Forlini Burt. The Book of Hosea sits squarely within the corpus of the Minor Prophets, what many scholars refer to as The Book of the Twelve. This collection spans many centuries of history in the lives of God’s people, Israel. This history covers the collapse of Israel, the northern half of the kingdom, to the nation of Assyria; the exile and displacement of Judah, the southern half of the kingdom, to the nation of Babylon; and the return of the exiled Judahites back to their land and the subsequent rebuilding of their lives following that return. Over the course of this six-lesson module, we will explore the wilderness tradition together through one of its primary intertexts—the prophet Hosea’s use of wilderness imagery in the 8th century BCE. In particular, Saint Jerome’s statement about the barrenness of the desert experience.