17 Bible Verses about Temples, Heathen

Samson prayed: Sovereign Lord Jehovah please remember me. Please, God, give me my strength just this one time. With this one blow I can get even with the Philistines for putting out my two eyes. Then Samson took hold of the two middle columns holding up the building. He put one hand on each column. He pushed against them. Samson shouted: Let me die with the Philistines! He pushed with all his might, and the building fell down on the five kings and everyone else. Samson killed more people at his death than he had killed during his life.

They brought it into the temple of Dagon and placed it beside Dagon. Early the next day the people of Ashdod saw that Dagon had fallen forward on the ground in front of Jehovah's Ark. So they took Dagon and put him back in his place. But the next morning they saw that Dagon had again fallen forward on the ground in front of Jehovah's Ark. Dagon's head and his two hands were cut off and were lying on the temple's threshold. The rest of Dagon's body was intact.

The next day the Philistines came to strip the dead. They found Saul and his three sons lying on Mount Gilboa. They cut off his head and stripped off his armor. Then they sent men throughout Philistine territory to tell the people this good news in their idols' temples. They put his armor in the temple of their goddesses the Asherahs and fastened his corpse to the wall of Beth Shan.

I hope Jehovah will forgive me when I accompany my king to the temple of Rimmon, the god of Syria, and worship him. Surely Jehovah will forgive me!

Jehovah has given command concerning you [Nineveh]. Your name will no longer be perpetuated. I will throw your gods, graven and molten images out of your house. I despise you! You are contemptible! I will prepare your grave.

He thought to himself: The way things are my people will go to Jerusalem and offer sacrifices to Jehovah at the Temple there. They will transfer their allegiance to King Rehoboam of Judah and will kill me. After asking for advice, the king made two golden calves. He said: You have been worshiping in Jerusalem long enough. Israel, here are your gods who brought you out of Egypt.read more.
He placed one in Bethel and the other in Dan. This became Israel's sin, worshiping the golden calves. The people went as far as Dan to worship the one calf.

He built an altar for Baal in the house of Baal that he built in Samaria.

Jehu sent through all Israel; and all the servants of Baal came, not one kept away. They entered the house of Baal. It was full from one end to the other end.

Then they all went to the temple of Baal and tore it down. They smashed the altars and idols. Then they killed Mattan, the priest of Baal, in front of the altars.

Destroy all the places where the nations you dispossess serve their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree. Tear down their altars and smash their sacred pillars. Burn their Asherah poles with fire. Cut down the carved images of their gods and obliterate their name from that place.

Then King Ahaz went to Damascus for a meeting with Tiglathpileser king of Assyria. There he saw the altar at Damascus. King Ahaz sent a drawing of the altar, giving the design of it and all the details of its structure to Urijah the priest. Urijah made an altar from the drawing King Ahaz sent from Damascus. He had it ready by the time King Ahaz came back from Damascus. When the king came from Damascus, he saw the altar. He went up on it and made an offering.read more.
He made his burned offering and his meal offering and his drink offering there, draining out the blood of his peace offerings on the altar.

He sacrificed to the gods of Damascus. These were the gods who had defeated him. He thought: The gods of the kings of Aram are helping them. I will sacrifice to them so that they will help me. But they ruined him and all Israel.

He built heathen altars in the Temple of Jehovah. The same Temple that Jehovah spoke of when he said: In Jerusalem will I put my name. And he built altars for all the stars of heaven in the two outer courts of the Temple of Jehovah.

He built altars for the entire army of heaven in the two courtyards of Jehovah's Temple.

The sons of that wicked woman Athaliah had broken into God's Temple and used all the holy things of Jehovah's Temple to worship other gods, the Baals.

Then he said: Son of man, do you see what the elders of the house of Israel are committing in the dark, each man in the room of his carved images? For they say: 'Jehovah does not see us! Jehovah has forsaken the land!' He said: Yet you will see still greater abominations that they are committing. Then he brought me to the entrance of the gate of Jehovah's house toward the north; and I saw women sitting there weeping for Tammuz (the god).read more.
He said to me: Do you see this, son of man? Yet you will see still greater abominations than these. So he took me to the inner courtyard of the Temple. There near the entrance of the sanctuary, between the altar and the porch, were about twenty-five men. They turned their backs to the sanctuary and were bowing low toward the east, worshiping the rising sun.

However when he became powerful, his pride destroyed him. He was unfaithful to Jehovah his God. He went into Jehovah's Temple to burn incense on the incense altar. Azariah the priest went in after him with eighty of Jehovah's courageous priests. They opposed King Uzziah. They said to him: Uzziah, you have no right to burn incense as an offering to Jehovah. That right belongs to the priests, Aaron's descendants, who have been given the holy task of burning incense. Get out of the holy place because you have been unfaithful. Jehovah God will not honor you for this.read more.
Uzziah held an incense burner in his hand. He became angry. As his anger with the priests grew, a skin disease broke out on his forehead. This happened in front of the priests in Jehovah's Temple as Uzziah was at the incense altar. When the chief priest Azariah and all the priests turned toward him, a skin disease was on his forehead. They rushed him away. Uzziah was in a hurry to get out because Jehovah had inflicted him with the disease.