Hosea 4:13
They sacrifice upon the tops of the mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit whoredom, and your spouses shall commit adultery. They sacrifice upon the tops of the mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit whoredom, and your spouses shall commit adultery.
Hosea 4:13 belongs to the prophecy of Hosea, whose name means salvation, the last of the great prophets of the northern kingdom, writing in the 700s B.C., with chapters 4-14 written about 734 B.C. His own painful and pathetic personal history was used to symbolize Jehovah's separation from His people. The verse warns the northern kingdom against idolatry and depravity, including shameful heathen rites introduced into the worship of God through sacrifice upon the tops of the mountains and burning incense upon the hills under oaks and poplars and elms.
It exposes the sad moral condition and degeneration and decay of the nation, with people, priests, and princes guilty of gross iniquity. The mention of whoredom by daughters and adultery by spouses is a figurative description of spiritual apostasy as worshiping idols and turning from the worship of Jehovah to false religious sects, and it does not describe church organization or the use of civil laws for temporal affairs. The chapter teaches that calamities come because people transgress God's law, summed up in the Ten Commandments.
The verse is part of a strong prediction of the coming captivity and desolation of the tribes, joined with a warning against alliance with Egypt. Beyond Israel's apostasy, the prophecy looks to the Lord's future restoration of His people, closing with remonstrance and tender exhortation and rich promises of blessing from God as the result of repentance.