Jareb

The name Jareb belongs to the Assyrian addressee in two Hosea oracles against Ephraim. UPDV does not transliterate the Hebrew as a proper name; at both occurrences it reads "the great king" — the figure to whom Ephraim turns for healing and to whom the calf-image of Beth-aven is finally carried as tribute.

Ephraim's Appeal for Healing

In Hosea's first oracle the great king appears as a misplaced physician. "When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah [saw] his wound, then Ephraim went to Assyria, and sent to the great king: but he is not able to heal you⁺, neither will he cure you⁺ of your⁺ wound" (Hos 5:13). Yahweh's next word makes the futility explicit: "For [my Speech will be] to Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, [by my Speech,] will tear and go away; I will carry off, and there will be none to deliver" (Hos 5:14). The great king cannot bind a wound Yahweh himself has opened.

Tribute from Beth-aven

The second occurrence reverses the direction of the gift. The calf of Beth-aven, mourned by its priests when "its glory... has departed from it" (Hos 10:5), is itself sent north: "It also will be carried to Assyria for a present to the great king: Ephraim will receive shame, and Israel will be ashamed of his own counsel" (Hos 10:6). The transaction collapses in the next breath — "Samaria is cut off, her king as a twig on the water" (Hos 10:7). Israel's idol-glory ends as foreign-court tribute, and the king who hoped to be healed by Assyria has his own throne snapped off.