Blowing trumpets in cities announced the coming of an invader. Throughout Israel"s towns the sentries would blow alarms: in Gibeah and Ramah in northern Judah and in Beth-aven (Bethel) in southern Israel. Throughout the territory of Benjamin, which was home to all these towns at one time or another, news of war would come. Rather than leading Ephraim into battle, as the tribe of Benjamin did in Deborah"s day ( Judges 5:14), the invader would pursue Benjamin as it did Ephraim. Benjamin should have been particularly watchful because of its close geographical proximity to Israel. [source][source][source]
"This verse describes an invasion of the territory of Benjamin from the south, i.e, from Judah. The enemy is portrayed as advancing along the main mountain road from Jerusalem through Bethel and thereafter into the heart of Ephraim. Gibeah, only three miles north of Jerusalem, is the first to be attacked; then Ramah, five miles north of Jerusalem; and finally Bethel, eleven miles north of Jerusalem, on the northern border of Benjamin." [1][source]
Context Summary
Hosea 5:1-15 - God's Rebuke Of Apostasy
The prophet continues his grave indictment of his people. The court and the priesthood were chiefly responsible for the awful degeneracy that was eating out the national heart. The seductions of idolatry that abounded everywhere resembled the snares and nets set by hunters on the wooded heights of Gilead and Tabor.
Suddenly, within a month, Hosea 5:7, an alarm sounds from hill to hill. The foreign invader has entered the country and is slowly marching southward. Even Benjamin is threatened. Ephraim must suffer because of the institutions of Omri and Ahab, Hosea 5:11; and Judah, because her princes were grasping and fraudulent. Though message after message was sent to procure the help of Jareb-a symbolical name for Assyria, "the warlike," he would not be able to avert the approaching dissolution of the Jewish state. You cannot stop the dry-rot by grand alliances. Nothing can save a nation in whose heart the worst forms of corruption are being nourished, except a wholesale return of God and a seeking of His face. It is certain that if this lesson were profoundly learned and then practiced, the horrors of a world in arms would come to a speedy and a blessed end. [source]
Chapter Summary: Hosea 5
1The judgments of God are denounced against the priests, people, and princes, 9both of Israel and Judah, for their manifold sins 15An intimation is given of mercy on their repentance
Parse: Preposition-b, Article, Proper Noun, feminine singular
Root: רָמָה
Sense: a town in Benjamin on the border of Ephraim about 5 miles (8 km) from Jerusalem and near to Gibeah.