Hosea 6:7 is one text traditionally understood to teach a covenant with Adam: “But like Adam they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt faithlessly with me.” In addressing Israel’s sin, Hosea indicates that their manner of covenant violations was “like Adam.” Many Reformed theologians have seen this verse as a reference to a covenant involving the first man.²⁴

Not all have accepted this meaning of Hosea 6:7, suggesting alternative translations. An older view suggests that Israel broke the covenant “like men,” pointing to humanity’s general rebellious inclination.²⁵ Although linguistically possible, this translation does not dodge the issue that the only covenant involving every member of humanity was made with our first father Adam.²⁶ More recently, scholars have preferred translating this phrase as “at Adam,” suggesting there was some well-known violation of the Mosaic covenant in a city called Adam.²⁷ Problematically, this translation involves changing the preposition in the Hebrew text from “like” to “at,” which the manuscript tradition does not support.²⁸ Further, this change presumes widespread knowledge of an event not recorded in Old Testament or extrabiblical literature.²⁹ Even concerning the history of interpretation, this understanding was only recently proposed. It first arose in higher-critical circles, having significance because many higher-critical exegetes assume that the prophetic books were written prior to the Pentateuch, entailing that the prophet Hosea could not have referred to the man Adam from Genesis.³⁰ In their view, Genesis had not been written for Hosea to cite.³¹

Despite these alternatives, good reason remains to understand Hosea 6:7 as referring to the Adam of Genesis. First, some of the earliest Christian interpreters see the man Adam as Hosea’s referent. Jerome (d. 420) renders the phrase, “but they like Adam have transgressed the covenant” (ipsi autem sicut Adam transgressi sunt pactum). Jerome argues that Hosea meant “they were imitators of Adam, just as the one who acted in paradise by transgressing my covenant and law, so they acted in the land.”³² Likewise, Cyril of Alexandria (376–444) argues against the generic reference to humanity in favor of the proper name Adam: “The Hebrew edition, rather than ‘like man,’ has ‘like Adam transgressing the covenant,’ so that the Israelites’ transgression is understood to be of the same quality as Adam’s.”³³ Even very early Christian exegetes argue for the reference to Adam.

Second, contextual features support a reference to Adam. In contrast to higher-critical studies, more recent scholarship has recognized that the prophetic literature, including Hosea, makes sense only within the context of the earlier books of Moses.³⁴ In addition to this recent insight about the prophetic books generally, Hosea regularly alludes to Genesis, making a reference to Adam more probable.³⁵

Third, the other occurrence of the Hebrew phrase “like Adam” also mostly likely refers to the first man. Job 31:33 says: “If I have covered my transgressions like Adam by hiding my iniquity in my heart …”³⁶ If one rejects the higher-critical assumption that Genesis was written later in Israel’s history, no reason stands to doubt that Job would have known Adam’s story. In that case, the obvious allusion in the phrase “like Adam” is when Adam tried to cover his sin by sewing leaves together to hide his nakedness (Gen 3:7). Given that Job’s allusion in the phrase “like Adam” is to the first man, Hosea also very likely uses the same phrase to refer to the man Adam.³⁷

Hosea 6:7 does not prove the entire doctrine of the covenant of works, nor does the argument that God was in covenant with Adam rest entirely on this verse. Still, Hosea’s reference to Adam offers plausible reason that he was in covenant with God, which further biblical evidence confirms

Harrison Perkins, Reformed Covenant Theology: A Systematic Introduction (Lexham Academic, 2024), 24–26.

NOTES

24. Westminster Assembly, Annotations upon all the Books of the Old and New Testament (London, 1645), ad loc.; B. B. Warfield, Selected Shorter Writings of Benjamin B. Warfield, ed. John E. Meeter, 2 vol. (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1970), 1:116–29; C. F. Keil, The Twelve Minor Prophets, trans. James Martin, 2 vol. (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1878), 99–100; Thomas Edward McComiskey, “Hosea,” in The Minor Prophets: An Exegetical and Expository Commentary, ed. Thomas Edward McComiskey (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1998), 95; Richard P. Belcher Jr., “The Covenant of Works in the Old Testament,” in CT, 66–67; Jeremiah Burroughs, An Exposition with Practical Observations continued upon the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Chapters of the Prophesy of Hosea (London, 1649), 621–26; Brian C. Habig, “Hosea 6:7 Revisited,” Presbyterion 42/1–2 (Fall 2016): 13–20; TI, 8.3.8; CW, 6–7; Fesko, Last Things First, 88–91; KTC, 254–57; Wellum, “Progressive Covenantalism,” 89; Schreiner, Covenant, 20–21; Barcellos, Covenant of Works, 77–88.

25. William Rainey Harper, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Amos and Hosea (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1905), 288; John Murray, Collected Writings, 2:47–59; CC, 13:2.233–35.

26. Habig, “Hosea 6:7 Revisted,” 11–13.

27. E.g. Francis I. Andersen and David Noel Freedman, Hosea (New York: Doubleday, 1980), 435–39; A. A. Macintosh, Hosea: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997), 236–39.

28. The conjectural emendation is from כ to ב. Admittedly, the two letters look very similar, and it is not impossible that scribes may have confused the two. Still, any emendation lacking manuscript support is speculative, this one resting on erroneous assumptions about the Old Testament canon’s development; Byron G. Curtis, “Hosea 6:7 and Covenant-Breaking like/at Adam,” in LNF, 176–88.

29. Curtis, “Hosea 6:7,” 195–97.

30. Julius Wellhausen, Prolegomena to the History of Ancient Israel (New York: Meridian, 1957), 1–13, 295–308.

31. Habig, “Hosea 6:7 Revisited,” 7–11.

32. Eusebius Hieronymus, Commentaria in Osee, §2.6, in PL, 25:869–70.

33 Cyril of Alexandria, Commentarius in Oseam Prophetam, §66, in PG, 71:169–70.

34. Curtis, “Hosea 6:7,” 171–75.

35 Duane Garrett, Hosea, Joel (Nashville: B&H, 1997), 162–63; Curtis, “Hosea 6:7,” 188–93; Harper, Amos and Hosea, 288.

36. My translation. The occurrence of the same lexeme כְאָדָם in Job 31:33 and Hosea 6:7 provides some evidence against the conjectural emendation of כ to ב.

37. For a more extensive defense of Hosea 6:7 along the same lines, ACW, 239–62.

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Post authored by:

• David Hall

  

  Reverend David W. Hall is married to Ann, and they are parents of three grown children and grandparents of nine grandchildren. He retired as the Senior Pastor of Midway Presbyterian Church (PCA) in 2026 where he served since 2003. Previously, he served as Pastor of the Covenant Presbyterian Church in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (1984–2003) and as Associate Pastor at the First Presbyterian Church in Rome, Georgia (1980–1984). He was ordained to pastoral ministry in 1980, educated at Covenant Theological Seminary, and is the editor and author of several volumes, including Irony and the Presbyterian Church in America. You can find him on his Substack “Cheering Folly’s Demise.”

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• Harrison Perkins

  

  Harrison Perkins (PhD, Queen’s University Belfast; MDiv, Westminster Seminary California) is pastor of Oakland Hills Community Church (OPC), a member of the of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, a Senior Research Fellow at the Craig Center for the Study of the Westminster Standards,  online instructor in church history at Westminster Theological Seminary, a visiting lecturer in systematic theology at Edinburgh Theological Seminary, and author of Reformed Covenant Theology: A Systematic Introduction. You can read more from him at Pastor Perks.

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