26 Bible Verses about False Worship

And he brought me to the inner courtyard of the house of Yahweh, and look, [at] the doorway of the temple of Yahweh, between the portico and the altar, [there were] about twenty-five men [with] their backs to the temple of Yahweh and their faces toward the east, and they [were] bowing down toward the east before the sun.

And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah will be unclean like the place of Topheth, all the houses where they made smoke offerings upon their roofs to all the host of heaven, and [where] they poured out libations to other gods." '"

He returned and rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had destroyed. He erected altars for Baal and made a pole of Asherah worship just as Ahab king of Israel had made, and he bowed down to all of the host of heaven and served them.

They abandoned all the commands of Yahweh their God and made for themselves two molten calf-shaped idols; they made a pole of Asherah worship and bowed down to the army of the heavens and served Baal.

And they shall spread them out before the sun, and before the moon, and before all the host of heaven, which they have loved, and which they have served, and which they have gone after, and which they have inquired about, and to which they have bowed in worship. They shall not be gathered, and they shall not be buried; they will be like dung on the surface of the ground.

You shall burn the images of their gods with fire; you shall not covet [the] silver or gold [that is] on them, and [so] you take [it] for yourself, so that you are not ensnared by it, for it [is] a detestable thing to Yahweh your God.

Then Jacob said to his household and to all who [were] with him, "Get rid of the foreign gods that [are] in your midst and purify yourselves and change your garments.

" 'You shall not make for yourselves idols and divine images, and you shall not raise up stone pillars for yourselves, and you shall not put a sculptured stone in your land in order to worship before it, because I [am] Yahweh your God.

Little children, guard yourselves from idols.

"You shall not make for yourself a divine image [with] any form that [is] in the heavens above or that [is] in the earth below or that [is] in the water below the earth.

They drank the wine and praised the gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood and stone.

You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the speechless idols, however you were led.

Has a nation exchanged gods? And they [are] not gods! But my people have exchanged their glory for that which does not profit.

For all the gods of the nations [are] idols, but Yahweh made the heavens.

Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods [to] whom they [are] making smoke offerings, but they will certainly not save them in the time of their trouble.

And the rest of humanity who were not killed by these plagues did not repent of the works of their hands, {in order not to worship} the demons and the gold and silver and bronze and stone and wooden idols, which are able neither to see nor to hear nor to walk,

And he appointed his own priests for the high places and for the goat idols and for the bull calves that he had made.

And {they may no longer sacrifice} their sacrifices to the goat-idols after which they were prostituting. This is {a lasting statute} for them {throughout} their generations." '

They sacrificed to the demons, not God, [to] gods whom they had not known, new [gods] [who] came from recent times; {their ancestors had not known them}.

They even sacrificed their sons and daughters to the demons,

A drought [will come] against her waters, and they will dry up, for it [is] a land of images, and because of the frightful [objects], they act like madmen.

And [now] you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven, and the vessels of his temple you have brought in before you, and you and your lords, your wives and your concubines, have been drinking wine from them, and you have praised the gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone that [do] not see and [do] not hear and [do] not know, but the God {who holds your life in his hand} and all of your ways {come from him}, you have not honored.

Therefore, [because we] are offspring of God, we ought not to think the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by human skill and thought.

They [are] vanity, a work of mockery, at the time of their punishment, they will perish.

What value [is] an idol when its carver has fashioned it, a molten idol, a teacher of lies? For [he who] fashioned his creation trusts in it, [though] making mute idols!

And the Lord gave Jehoiakim the king of Judah into his hand and {some of} of the utensils of the temple of God, and he brought them [to] the land of Shinar [to] the temple of his gods, and he brought the utensils to {the treasury} of his gods.

Then he built the houses on the high places, and he appointed priests {from all walks of life} who were not from the sons of Levi.

So not only is there a danger this line of business of ours [will] come into disrepute, but also the temple of the great goddess Artemis [will] be regarded as nothing--and [she] is about to be brought down even from her grandeur, [she] whom the whole [of] Asia and the [entire] world worship!"

Then [the] Philistines took the ark of God and brought it to the temple of Dagon and placed it beside Dagon.

As far as this matter, may Yahweh pardon your servant when my master goes [into] the house of Rimmon to worship there, and he [is] leaning himself on my arm, that I also bow down [in] the house of Rimmon: when I bow down [in] the house of Rimmon, may Yahweh please pardon your servant in this matter."

They abandoned all the commands of Yahweh their God and made for themselves two molten calf-shaped idols; they made a pole of Asherah worship and bowed down to the army of the heavens and served Baal.

The inhabitants of Samaria tremble for the calf of Beth-aven. Indeed, his people will mourn for it, and his idolatrous priests will wail over it-- over its glory because it has departed from it.

Only Jehu did not turn aside from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat [by] which he caused Israel to sin; [namely,] the calf-shaped idols of gold which [were in] Bethel and Dan.

So now you yourselves are considering [that you are] strong before the kingdom of Yahweh [which is] in the hand the sons of David, since you yourselves are a great multitude and you have bull calves of gold that Jeroboam has made for idols.

And he appointed his own priests for the high places and for the goat idols and for the bull calves that he had made.

And again, the {Israelites} did evil in the eyes of Yahweh. They served the Baals, the Ashtaroth, the gods of Aram, Sidon, Moab, and the gods of the {Ammonites} and Philistines; they abandoned Yahweh and did not serve him.

The high places which [were] east of Jerusalem, which [were] on the south of the Mountain of Destruction which Solomon king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab and for Molech the detestable thing of the {Ammonites}, the king defiled.

because he has forsaken me, and they bowed down to Ashtoreth, the god of [the] Sidonians, to Chemosh, the god of Moab, and to Molech, the god of the {Ammonites}. They did not walk in my ways to do right in my eyes, my ordinances, or my judgments, as [did] David his father.

They abandoned Yahweh, and they served Baal and the Ashtaroth.

And Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, "If with all your heart you [are] turning to Yahweh, remove the foreign gods and Ashtoreths from your midst. Commit your hearts to Yahweh and serve him alone. Then he will deliver you from the hand of [the] Philistines."

Then Michal took the household god and put it on the bed and put a quilt of goat's hair at its head and covered [it] with the clothes.

Now Rachel had taken the idols and put them in the saddle bag of the camel and sat on them. And Jacob searched the whole tent thoroughly but did not find them.

Now Laban had gone to shear his sheep, and Rachel stole the idols that belonged to her father.

The man Micah had for himself {a shrine}, and he made an ephod and teraphim, and {he appointed one of his sons} who became a priest for him.

And the five men that went out to spy out the land ([that is], Laish) responded and said to their relatives, "Do you know that there are in these houses an ephod, teraphim, and an idol of cast metal? So then, consider what you must do."

And he built an altar to Baal in the house of Baal which he had built in Samaria.

So they took the bull that he allowed to them, prepared it, and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, "O Baal, answer us!" But there was no voice and there was no answer, so they limped about the altar which they had made.

Therefore by this he will make atonement [for] the guilt of Jacob, and this [will be] all of [the] fruit [of] the removal of his sin: {when he makes} all [the] stones of [the] altar like crushed stones of chalk, no poles of Asherah worship or incense altars will stand.

the people {who provoke} me to anger continually to my face, slaughtering for sacrifices in the garden, and making smoke offerings on bricks,

When Ephraim multiplied altars to expiate sins, they became to him altars to sin [on].

So Israel was joined together to Baal Peor, and {Yahweh became angry} with Israel.

Your eyes have seen what Yahweh did with [the case of] Baal Peor, for {each} man that followed after Baal Peor Yahweh your God destroyed from your midst.

They also attached themselves to Baal of Peor, and they ate sacrifices offered to [the] dead.

Like the grapes in the wilderness, I found Israel. Like early ripened fruit on the fig tree in the first season, I saw your ancestors. They themselves came [to] Baal Peor, and they consecrated themselves to shame. And they became detestable things, like {the thing they love}.

[Is] not the sin of Peor {enough for us}, from which we have not cleansed ourselves today, and for which a plague came to the congregation of Yahweh,

And he took from their hand, and he shaped it with a tool, and he made it a cast-image bull calf, and they said, "These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt."

And I looked, and indeed you had sinned against Yahweh your God; you [had] made for yourselves an image of a calf [of] cast metal; you [had] turned quickly from the way that Yahweh had commanded [for] you.

Even when they made for themselves a molten idol of a calf and said, 'This is your God who brought you out from Egypt,' and committed great blasphemies.

They made a calf at Horeb and bowed down to a cast image.

And they manufactured a calf in those days, and offered up a sacrifice to the idol, and began rejoicing in the works of their hands.

" 'And you shall not give {any of} your offspring in order to sacrifice [them] to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I [am] Yahweh.

And they built the high places of Baal that [are] in the Valley of Ben Hinnom to present as offerings their sons and their daughters to Molech, which I had not commanded them, and it had not come to my {mind} to do this detestable thing in order to cause Judah to sin."

And you will take up Sikkuth, your king, and Kaiwan, your images, the star of your gods which you made for yourselves.

And you took along the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of the god Rephan, the images that you made, to worship them, and I will deport you beyond Babylon!'

He defiled the Topheth which [is] in the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, {to prevent} anyone causing his sons or his daughters to pass through the fire for Molech.

On that day humanity will throw away its idols of silver and its idols of gold, which they made for it to worship, to the rodents and to the bats--

{And then}, on that day,' {declares} Yahweh of hosts, 'I will cut off the names of the idols from the land, and they will no longer be remembered; and also the prophets and the spirit of uncleanness I will banish from the land.

it will not look to the altars, the work of its hands, and it will not see what its fingers made and the poles of Asherah worship and the incense altars.

{therefore} look, days [are] coming, and I will punish the images of Babylon, and all her land will be put to shame, and all her slain ones will fall in the midst of her.

And I will cut off your idols and your stone pillars from among you, and you will no longer bow down to the work of your hands.

The high places which [were] east of Jerusalem, which [were] on the south of the Mountain of Destruction which Solomon king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab and for Molech the detestable thing of the {Ammonites}, the king defiled.

For because of your trusting in your works and in your treasures, even you yourselves will be taken, and Chemosh will go out into the exile, his priests and his officials together.

Do you not possess what Chemosh your god gave you to possess? Whoever Yahweh our God has driven out before us, we will possess it.

Woe to you, Moab! You have perished, people of Chemosh. He has given his sons as fugitives, and his daughters into captivity, to the king of the Amorites, Sihon.

Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God with the likeness of an image of mortal human beings and birds and quadrupeds and reptiles.

You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the speechless idols, however you were led.

Therefore, concerning the eating of food sacrificed to idols, we know that "an idol [is] nothing in the world" and that "[there is] no God except one."

The rulers of [the] Philistines had gathered to sacrifice a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to rejoice. And they said, "Our god has given Samson our enemy into our hand."

Then [the] Philistines took the ark of God and brought it to the temple of Dagon and placed it beside Dagon.

And they put his weapons in the temple of their gods, and they fastened his skull to the temple of Dagon.

Assemble and come; draw near together, survivors of the nations! They do not know, those who carry {their wooden idols} and pray to a god who cannot save.

They [are] like scarecrows in a cucumber field, they cannot speak. Indeed, they must be carried, for they cannot march. You must not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil; furthermore, to do good [is] not in them."

And [although] they said these [things], [only] with difficulty did they dissuade the crowds from offering sacrifice to them.

For someone {named} Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver replicas of the temple of Artemis, was bringing no little business to the craftsmen.

And [when] the city secretary had quieted the crowd, he said, "Ephesian men, for who is there among men who does not know the Ephesian city is honorary temple keeper of the great Artemis and of [her] image fallen from heaven?

And [when they] heard [this] and became full of rage, they began to shout, saying, "Great [is] Artemis of the Ephesians!"

But the people began to call out loudly, "The voice of a god and not of a man!"

And [when] the crowds saw what Paul had done, they raised their voices in the Lycaonian language, saying, "The gods have become like men [and] have come down to us!"

But they were expecting [that] he was going to swell up or suddenly to fall down dead. So [after] they had waited for a long [time] and saw nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds [and] began saying [that] he was a god.

Their idols [are] silver and gold, [the] work of human hands.

And you will there serve gods {made by human hands}, [of] wood and stone, [gods] that cannot see and cannot hear and cannot eat and cannot smell.

The one who is [too] impoverished [for] a gift chooses wood [that] will not rot; he seeks a skillful artisan for himself to set up an image [that] will not be knocked over.

Therefore, [because we] are offspring of God, we ought not to think the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by human skill and thought.