What Does Hosea 9:5 Mean?
What will you do on the day of the appointed times, and on the day of the LORD's feast?
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
What will ye do in the solemn day, and in the day of the feast of the LORD?THE KEY
The “solemn day” is an appointed meeting, so the verse asks what remains when its feast arrives and you cannot enter its celebration.
THE MEANING
The question speaks to you now: what do you do when a day set apart for meeting with God arrives, but taking part in its feast feels out of reach? The verse leaves the question open, letting the distance between the appointed day and your ability to join its celebration be felt.
THE ROOT
מוֹעֵד
mo'ed
GROWS FROM
יעד
y-ʿ-d
To appoint or designate; to set a time or place for meeting.
“day of the appointed times” in this verse is mo'ed. Mo’ed holds a date and a meeting together: this is time appointed for encounter, not merely a solemn square on a calendar. The question sharpens when the appointed meeting arrives but joining its celebration feels impossible.
ALSO GROWS
ya'ad: To appoint or designate.
יָעַד
The appointed day carries the sense of a meeting set in advance, so the question concerns whether you can enter the encounter when it arrives.
'edah: Assembly or congregation.
עֵדָה
This related branch links appointed meeting to a gathered people, bringing the feast’s communal dimension into view.
חַג
chag
GROWS FROM
חגג
ḥ-g-g
To celebrate a feast or make a pilgrimage for a festival.
“the LORD's feast” in this verse is chag. The feast is an enacted celebration, not only a date named on the calendar. Beside mo’ed, it gives the verse both an appointed meeting and the act of joining its celebration.
ALSO GROWS
chagag: To celebrate a feast or keep a festival.
חָגַג
The verb makes the feast something people actively enter and celebrate, giving weight to the question of what they can do when it comes.
chagigah: A festival offering or feast sacrifice.
חֲגִיגָה
This branch connects the celebration to shared worship, so the verse’s question reaches beyond the date to participation.
THE PATTERN
An appointed feast is a shared act of worship whose meaning is felt in whether people can take part.
Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, Concerning the appointed meetings of the LORD, which you shall call out as set-apart assemblies. These are my appointed meetings.Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of badness and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of clarity and truth.THE THREAD
When I remember these things, I pour out my living soul over me, for I crossed into the thick of the crowd and led them to the house of God, with the voice of ringing joy and extended hands of thanks, a roaring multitude circling in festival.The Hebrew behind “kept holyday” comes from the same feast-root, חגג, as Hosea’s “feast.” The psalm shows the shared celebration Hosea’s question makes you feel: a multitude going to God’s house, now remembered with longing.
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