Suppose there is found in your midst—within one of your gates that Adonai your God is giving you—a man or woman who does what is evil in the eyes of Adonai your God by transgressing His covenant.
For they had not listened to the voice of Adonai their God, but transgressed His covenant—all that Moses the servant of Adonai had commanded—they neither listened nor did it.
For he rebuilt the shrines that his father Hezekiah had destroyed and he erected altars for Baal and made an Asherah pole, as King Ahab of Israel had done, and bowed down to all the host of heaven and worshipped them.
“But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days” —it is a declaration of Adonai— “I will put My Torah within them. Yes, I will write it on their heart. I will be their God and they will be My people.
I will give the men who have transgressed My covenant, who have not performed the words of the covenant which they made before Me, when they cut the calf in two and passed between its parts
“Moreover, you are to tell Bnei-Yisrael: Anyone from Bnei-Yisrael or from the outsiders dwelling in Israel, who gives any of his children to Molech, should surely be put to death. The people of the land are to stone him with rocks.
I will bring a sword upon you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant, and you will be gathered together inside your cities. I will send the pestilence among you and you will be given into the hand of the enemy.
“Now when someone hears the words of this oath and in his heart considers himself blessed, thinking, ‘Shalom will be mine, even though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart’—thus sweeping away the moist with the dry—
“For when I bring them to the land flowing with milk and honey that I swore to their fathers, and they eat and are satisfied and grow fat—then they will turn to other gods and serve them, and they will spurn Me and break My covenant.
Watch yourselves, so that you do not forget the covenant of Adonai your God, which He cut with you, and make for yourselves a graven image in the form of anything that Adonai your God has forbidden you.
When you transgress the covenant of Adonai your God, which He commanded you, and go and worship other gods and bow down to them, then will the anger of Adonai burn against you, and you will perish quickly off this good land which He has given you.”
Israel has sinned. Yes, they have also transgressed My covenant, which I commanded them. Now they have even taken of the things under the ban of destruction. So they have also stolen and even deceived, and even put them among their own possessions.
Then whoever is taken with whatever is under the ban must be burned with fire, he and all belonging to him, because he has transgressed the covenant of Adonai, and because he has committed a disgrace in Israel.’”
So the anger of Adonai burned against Israel, and He declared, “Since this nation has transgressed My covenant that I commanded their fathers and has not listened to My voice,
But Joash said to all who stood against him, “So you’re going to defend Baal? You’re going to rescue him? Whoever defends him will be put to death in the morning! If he is a god, let him defend himself—since someone has broken down his altar.”