33 Bible Verses about Baal Worship, History
Most Relevant Verses
So Israel joined themselves to Baal of Peor [in worship]. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. The Lord said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of the people [who have committed sin with the Moabites], and execute them in broad daylight before the Lord, so that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.” So Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Each one of you must kill his men who have joined themselves to Baal of Peor [in worship].”
Then it came about in the morning that Balak took Balaam and brought him up to the high places of Baal; from there he saw a portion of the Israelites.
Your eyes have seen what the Lord did at Baal-peor; for all the men who followed [and participated in the worship of] Baal of Peor, the Lord your God destroyed them from among you,
They joined themselves also to [the idol] Baal of Peor,
And ate sacrifices offered to the dead.
I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness [an unexpected and refreshing delight];
I saw your fathers (ancestors) as the first ripe fruit on the fig tree in its first season,
But they came to Baal-peor and consecrated themselves to shamefulness [the worship of Baal],
And [because of their spiritual and physical adultery] they became as detestable and loathsome as the thing they loved.
and they abandoned the Lord, the God of their fathers, who brought them out of the land of Egypt. They followed other gods from the gods of the peoples who were around them, and they bowed down to them, and offended and provoked the Lord to anger. So they abandoned the Lord and served Baal [the pagan god of the Canaanites] and the Ashtaroth.
And the Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord, and they forgot the Lord their God and served the Baals and the Asheroth.
But Joash said to all who stood against him, “Will you plead for Baal? Will you save him? Whoever pleads for Baal shall be put to death while it is still morning. If Baal is a god, let him defend himself, because someone has torn down his altar.” Therefore on that day he named Gideon Jerubbaal, meaning, “Let Baal plead,” because he had torn down his altar.
Then it came about, as soon as Gideon was dead, that the Israelites again played the prostitute with the Baals, and made Baal-berith their god.
Then the Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord; they served the Baals, the Ashtaroth (female deities), the gods of Aram (Syria), the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. They abandoned the Lord and did not serve Him.
So the Israelites removed the Baals and the Ashtaroth and served the Lord alone.
They cried out to the Lord, saying, ‘We have sinned because we have abandoned (rejected) the Lord and have served the Baals and the Ashtaroth; but now rescue us from the hands of our enemies, and we will serve You.’
Now Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, “As the Lord, the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.”
Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all [the kings] who were before him. It came about, as if it had been a trivial thing for Ahab to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went and served Baal and worshiped him. So he erected an altar for Baal in the house of Baal which he built in Samaria. read more.
Ahab also made the Asherah. Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel than all the kings of Israel who were before him.
Elijah said, “I have not brought disaster on Israel, but you and your father’s household have, by abandoning (rejecting) the commandments of the Lord and by following the Baals. Now then, send word and gather to me all Israel at Mount Carmel, together with the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of [the goddess] Asherah, who eat at [Queen] Jezebel’s table.”
He served Baal and worshiped him, and he provoked the Lord God of Israel to anger, in accordance with everything that his father [Ahab] had done.
Jehu assembled all the people and said [in pretense] to them, “Ahab served Baal a little; Jehu will serve him much [more]. Now, summon unto me all the prophets of Baal, all his worshipers and all his priests. Let no one be missing, for I have a great sacrifice for Baal; whoever is missing shall not live.” But Jehu did it with trickery, in order to destroy the worshipers of Baal. Jehu said, “Consecrate a festive assembly (celebration) for Baal.” And they proclaimed it. read more.
Then Jehu sent throughout Israel, and all the worshipers of Baal came; there was no one left who did not come. They went to the house (temple) of Baal, and the house of Baal was filled from one end to the other. He said to the man in charge of the wardrobe, “Bring out garments for all the worshipers of Baal.” And he brought the garments out to them. Then Jehu with Jehonadab the son of Rechab went into the house of Baal; and he said to the worshipers of Baal, “Search carefully and see that there are no servants of the Lord here with you, but only the worshipers of Baal.” Then they went in to offer sacrifices and burnt offerings.Now Jehu had stationed eighty men outside for himself and said, “If any of the men whom I have brought into your hands escape, the one who lets him go shall forfeit his own life for that man’s life.” Then it came about, as soon as he had finished offering the burnt offering, that Jehu said to the guards and to the royal officers, “Go in and kill them; let no one come out.” And they killed them with the edge of the sword; and the guard and the royal officers threw their bodies out, and went to the inner room of the house of Baal. They brought out the sacred pillars (obelisks) of the house of Baal and burned them. They also tore down the sacred pillar of Baal and tore down the house of Baal, and made it into a latrine [forever unclean] to this day. Thus Jehu eradicated Baal from Israel. However, Jehu did not turn from the [idolatrous] sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin, that is, [led them to worship] the golden calves which were at Bethel and Dan.
Then Jehoiada made a covenant between the Lord, the king, and the people, that they would be the Lord’s people—also between the king and the people [to be his subjects]. Then all the people of the land went to the house of Baal and tore it down. They utterly smashed his altar and his images to pieces, and they put Mattan the priest of Baal to death in front of the altars. And [Jehoiada] the priest appointed officers over the house of the Lord.
“Contend with your mother (nation); contend,
For she is not my wife and I am not her husband;
And have her remove her [marks of] prostitution from her face
And her adultery from between her breasts
Or I will strip her naked
And expose her as on the day she was born,
And make her like a wilderness
And make her like a parched land
And slay her with thirst.
“Also, I will have no mercy on her children,
Because they are the children of prostitution.
read more.
“For their mother has played the prostitute;
She who conceived them has acted shamefully,
For she said, ‘I will pursue my lovers
Who give me my food and my water,
My wool and my flax, my oil and my [refreshing] drinks.’
“Therefore, behold, I [the Lord God] will hedge up her way with thorns;
And I will build a wall against her [shutting off her way] so that she cannot find her paths.
“She will [passionately] pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;
And she will seek them, but will not find them.
Then she will say, ‘Let me go and return to my first husband,
For it was better for me then than now!’
“For she (Israel) has not noticed nor understood nor realized that it was I [the Lord God] who gave her the grain and the new wine and the oil,
And lavished on her silver and gold,
Which they used for Baal and made into his image.
“Therefore, I will return and take back My grain at harvest time
And My new wine in its season.
I will also take away My wool and My flax
Given to cover her nakedness.
“And now I will uncover her lewdness and shame
In the sight of her lovers,
And no one will rescue her from My hand.
“I will also put an end to all her rejoicing,
Her feasts, her New Moons, her Sabbaths,
And all her festivals.
“I will destroy her vines and her fig trees
Of which she has said, ‘These are my wages
Which my lovers have given me.’
And I will make them a forest,
And the animals of the open country will devour them.
“And I will punish her for the [feast] days of the Baals,
When she used to offer sacrifices and burn incense to them
And adorn herself with her earrings and nose rings and her jewelry,
And follow her lovers, so that she forgot Me,” says the Lord.
The more they [the prophets] called them [to repentance and obedience],
The more they went away from them;
They kept sacrificing to the Baals
And burning incense to the carved images.
When Ephraim spoke, there was trembling and terror.
He exalted himself [above the other tribes] in Israel;
But through [the worship of] Baal he became guilty and died [spiritually, and then came ruin, sealing Israel’s doom as a nation].
Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. He did not do right in the sight of the Lord, as his father (forefather) David had done. Instead he walked in the ways of the kings of Israel, and even made cast images for the Baals.
“[Even] the priests did not say, ‘Where is the Lord?’
And those who deal with the law [given to Moses] did not know Me.
The rulers and shepherds also transgressed against Me,
And the prophets prophesied by [the authority and in the name of] Baal
And walked after [idolatrous] things that did not benefit [them].
Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear [oaths] falsely, offer sacrifices or burn incense to Baal, and follow after other gods that you have not known,
And I said to her, “You shall stay with me for many days. You shall not play the prostitute nor shall you have a man; so I will also be toward you [until you have proved your faithfulness].”
Then the Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord and worshiped and served the Baals, and they abandoned the Lord, the God of their fathers, who brought them out of the land of Egypt. They followed other gods from the gods of the peoples who were around them, and they bowed down to them, and offended and provoked the Lord to anger. So they abandoned the Lord and served Baal [the pagan god of the Canaanites] and the Ashtaroth. read more.
So the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He gave them into the hands (power) of plunderers who robbed them; and He sold them into the hands of their surrounding enemies, so that they could no longer stand [in opposition] before their enemies.
Early the next morning when the men of the city got up, they discovered that the altar of Baal was torn down, and the Asherah which was beside it was cut down, and the second bull was offered on the altar which had been built. So they said to one another, “Who has done this thing?” When they searched about and inquired, they were told, “Gideon the son of Joash did it.” Then the men of the city said to Joash, “Bring out your son, so that he may be executed, because he has torn down the altar of Baal and cut down the Asherah which was beside it.” read more.
But Joash said to all who stood against him, “Will you plead for Baal? Will you save him? Whoever pleads for Baal shall be put to death while it is still morning. If Baal is a god, let him defend himself, because someone has torn down his altar.” Therefore on that day he named Gideon Jerubbaal, meaning, “Let Baal plead,” because he had torn down his altar.
“For she (Israel) has not noticed nor understood nor realized that it was I [the Lord God] who gave her the grain and the new wine and the oil,
And lavished on her silver and gold,
Which they used for Baal and made into his image.
You carried along your king Sikkuth and Kayyun [your man-made gods of Saturn], your images of your star-god which you made for yourselves [but you brought Me none of the appointed sacrifices].
For [as many as] the number of your cities are your gods, O Judah; and [as many as] the number of the streets of Jerusalem are the altars you have set up to the shameful thing, altars to burn incense to Baal.
Because the people [of Jerusalem] have abandoned (rejected) Me and have made this an alien and profaned place by burning sacrifices and incense in it to other gods, that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah ever knew, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I never commanded or spoke of, nor did it ever enter My mind (heart); therefore, listen very closely, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “when this place shall no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.
But what is God’s response to him? “I have kept for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.”
