14 Bible Verses about Household Gods

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

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.

There was a man from the hill country of Ephraim; his name [was] Micah. And he said to his mother, "The eleven hundred [pieces] of silver that were taken from you, and about which you also pronounced a curse {in my hearing}, are with me; I took it." And his mother said, "Blessed be my son by Yahweh." He returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother thought, "I will certainly consecrate to Yahweh the pieces of silver from my hand for my son to make an idol of cast metal; now then, I will return them to you."read more.
When he returned the pieces of silver to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver, and she gave it to the smith, and he made it [into] an idol of cast metal; and it was in the house of Micah. 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. In those days there was no king in Israel, and each one did what was right in his own eyes.

When these went to Micah's house, they took the divine carved image, ephod, the teraphim, and the molten image, and the priest asked them, "What [are] you doing?"

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. And Saul sent messengers to arrest David, but she said, "He [is] ill." So Saul sent the messengers to see David, saying, "Bring him up to me in the bed, so that I can kill him."read more.
When the messengers came, {to their surprise} the idol [was] on the bed [with] the quilt of goat's hair at the head.

For the king of Babylon stands at the fork of the road at the head of the two roads to practice divination. {He shakes the arrows}, he inquires with the teraphim, he {examines} the liver.

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. And you must not bring a detestable thing into your house, or you will become a thing devoted to destruction like it; you must utterly detest it, and you must utterly abhor it, for it [is] [an] object devoted to destruction.

"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. You will not bow down to them, and you will not serve them, because I [am] Yahweh your God, a jealous God, punishing [the] guilt of [the] parents on the children on [the] third and on [the] fourth [generations] of those hating me, and showing loyal love to thousands [of generations] of those loving me and of those keeping my commandments.

'You shall not make for yourself a divine image of any [type] of form that [is] in the heaven above or that [is] on the earth beneath or that [is] in the water under the earth. 'You shall not bow down to them, and you shall not serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, [am] a jealous God, punishing the guilt of fathers upon [their] children and upon [the] third and upon [the] fourth generation of [those] hating me, but showing loyal love to thousands of [those who] love me and of [those who] keep my commandments.

Moreover, the mediums and the spiritists, the household gods and the idols, and all of the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, Josiah removed in order to establish the words of the law written on the scroll that Hilkiah the priest had found [in] the temple of Yahweh.

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. Then let us make ready and let us go up to Bethel, so that I can make an altar there to the God who answered me in the day of my trouble, and who has been with me on the way that I have gone." So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods that [were] in their hands, and the ornamental rings that [were] in their ears. And Jacob buried them under the oak which [was] near Shechem.

All those who form an idol [are] nothing, and their delightful things do not profit. And their witnesses do not see or know, so they will be ashamed. Who would form a god and cast an image of [which] he cannot profit? Look! all his companions shall be ashamed, and [the] artisans [are] human! Let all of them assemble; let them stand up. They shall tremble; they shall be ashamed together.

And if a man is righteous and does justice and righteousness, and on the mountains he [does] not eat and he [does] not lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, and the wife of his neighbor he [does] not defile and he [does] not approach a woman of menstruation,

Because the household gods speak deceit, and those who practice divination see a lie, and the dreamers of vanity speak in vain. Therefore [the people] wander like sheep; they are afflicted because there is no shepherd.