The people of Israel did things that were not right against the Lord their God. They built for themselves high places at all their towns, from watchtower to fortified city;
The carved image of Asherah that he had made he set in the house of which the Lord said to David and to his son Solomon, “In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever;
Listen! The cry of the daughter of my people from far and wide in the land: “Is the Lord not in Zion? Is her King not in her?” (“Why have they provoked me to anger with their images, with their foreign idols?”)
And now they keep on sinning and make a cast image for themselves, idols of silver made according to their understanding, all of them the work of artisans. “Sacrifice to these,” they say. People are kissing calves!
you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, destroy all their figured stones, destroy all their cast images, and demolish all their high places.
“You must demolish completely all the places where the nations whom you are about to dispossess served their gods, on the mountain heights, on the hills, and under every leafy tree.
“ ‘Cursed be anyone who makes an idol or casts an image, anything abhorrent to the Lord, the work of an artisan, and sets it up in secret.’ All the people shall respond, saying, ‘Amen!’
They made me jealous with what is no god, provoked me with their idols. So I will make them jealous with what is no people, provoke them with a foolish nation.
The Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, serving the Baals and the Astartes, the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. Thus they abandoned the Lord and did not worship him.
Yet they did not listen even to their judges, for they lusted after other gods and bowed down to them. They soon turned aside from the way in which their ancestors had walked, who had obeyed the commandments of the Lord; they did not follow their example.
So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he said, “Because this nation has transgressed my covenant that I commanded their ancestors and have not obeyed my voice,
But he himself turned back at the sculptured stones near Gilgal and said, “I have a secret message for you, O king.” So the king said, “Silence!” and all his attendants went out from his presence.