Tampering with the Text: Hosea 6:2

The Anti-missionary’s charge:

Hosea 6:2 - Luke's tells Jesus rose on the Third Day: “Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”  (24:46-47) as prophesied Hosea 6:2.  Paul wrote in I Corinthians, “and Jesus was buried and that he rose again the third day ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURES”

(I Corinthians 15:4).  “After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up and we shall live in his sight”.

However, the Jewish Scriptures say something different: Hosea 6:1-2 “They will say, Come let us return to God for He has mangled us and He will heal us; He has smitten and He will bandage us.  (2) He will heal us after two days; on the third day He will raise us up and we will live before Him. We, of course refers to the nation of Israel.

The last verse in Chapter 5 sets the scene and explains the situation very clearly: “I (God) will go, I will return to My place until they will acknowledge their guilt and seek My face; in their distress they will seek Me (Hosea 5:15).  Hosea explains in verse 5 that God sent a clear-cut message to you (Israel) through My prophets; you heard and refused to repent, so My offer resulted in your death sentence.  How could I vindicate you after such defiance? Then Hosea explains: "Come let us return to God"!

You are absolutely correct.  I do not believe for a moment that Paul (or Luke) was referring to Hosea 6:2 when he wrote that , “and Jesus was buried and that he rose again the third day ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURES”  The Hosea passage is not related to Yeshua’s resurrection the third day.  However, Hosea 6:2 is related to the Second Coming, but that’s a different story.

Rather, I feel that Paul was referring to the book of Jonah, chapter 2 (Hebrew).  There Jonah drowned, is in the belly of the great fish three days and three nights, resurrected, and regurgitated.  He went through an experience similar to the experience that Yeshua went through.  This is an example of Literal Prophecy plus Typical Fulfillment (Remez).  Jonah is a type.  The word “type” is generally used to denote a resemblance between something present and something future, which is called the “antitype.”

I would say that chapter 2 of Jonah is where we should look to find the reference made by Paul and Luke, “written … according to the Scriptures.”  Jonah 2:1 (Heb.) (Jonah 1:17, Eng.)

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.

Paul and Luke handle Jonah in this manner because this is exactly how Yeshua used the verse in Matthew 12:40:

for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

In addition, note Luke 11:30:

For just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so shall the Son of Man be to this generation.

The sign that Yeshua is referring to is the sign of resurrection.  The resurrected Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites and the resurrected Jesus was a sign to Israel. 

In summary, I would say that Paul was right on track when he made his comment “according to the Scriptures.”  Your objection misses the mark because you have gone to the wrong Scripture verse.  We should take our direction from what the Brit Chadashah (NT) has to say about the “third day.”  The Brit Chadashah would direct us to Jonah and not to Hosea.