'Foreign' in the Bible

So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods which are among you, and purify yourselves and change your garments;

So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods which they had and the rings which were in their ears, and Jacob hid them under the oak which was near Shechem.

Then she gave birth to a son, and he named him Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.”

and her two sons, of whom one was named Gershom, for Moses said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.”

If she is displeasing in the eyes of her master who designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He does not have authority to sell her to a foreign people because of his unfairness to her.

All of you shall have the sabbath products of the land for food; yourself, and your male and female slaves, and your hired man and your foreign resident, those who live as aliens with you.

“The Lord alone guided him,And there was no foreign god with him.

If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you after He has done good to you.”

“Now therefore, put away the foreign gods which are in your midst, and incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.”

So they put away the foreign gods from among them and served the Lord; and He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.

Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, “If you return to the Lord with all your heart, remove the foreign gods and the Ashtaroth from among you and direct your hearts to the Lord and serve Him alone; and He will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines.”

Now King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women,

Thus also he did for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods.

“I dug wells and drank foreign waters,And with the sole of my feet I dried upAll the rivers of Egypt.”

for he removed the foreign altars and high places, tore down the sacred pillars, cut down the Asherim,

He also removed the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the Lord, as well as all the altars which he had built on the mountain of the house of the Lord and in Jerusalem, and he threw them outside the city.

Shecaniah the son of Jehiel, one of the sons of Elam, said to Ezra, “We have been unfaithful to our God and have married foreign women from the peoples of the land; yet now there is hope for Israel in spite of this.

Then Ezra the priest stood up and said to them, “You have been unfaithful and have married foreign wives adding to the guilt of Israel.

Now therefore, make confession to the Lord God of your fathers and do His will; and separate yourselves from the peoples of the land and from the foreign wives.”

Let our leaders represent the whole assembly and let all those in our cities who have married foreign wives come at appointed times, together with the elders and judges of each city, until the fierce anger of our God on account of this matter is turned away from us.”

They finished investigating all the men who had married foreign wives by the first day of the first month.

Among the sons of the priests who had married foreign wives were found of the sons of Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and his brothers: Maaseiah, Eliezer, Jarib and Gedaliah.

All these had married foreign wives, and some of them had wives by whom they had children.

Did not Solomon king of Israel sin regarding these things? Yet among the many nations there was no king like him, and he was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel; nevertheless the foreign women caused even him to sin.

Do we then hear about you that you have committed all this great evil by acting unfaithfully against our God by marrying foreign women?”

Thus I purified them from everything foreign and appointed duties for the priests and the Levites, each in his task,

“Let there be no strange god among you;Nor shall you worship any foreign god.

How can we sing the Lord’s songIn a foreign land?

Indeed, He will speak to this peopleThrough stammering lips and a foreign tongue,

“Yet I planted you a choice vine,A completely faithful seed.How then have you turned yourself before MeInto the degenerate shoots of a foreign vine?

It shall come about when they say, ‘Why has the Lord our God done all these things to us?’ then you shall say to them, ‘As you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your land, so you will serve strangers in a land that is not yours.’

Behold, listen! The cry of the daughter of my people from a distant land:“Is the Lord not in Zion? Is her King not within her?”“Why have they provoked Me with their graven images, with foreign idols?”

‘Does the snow of Lebanon forsake the rock of the open country?Or is the cold flowing water from a foreign land ever snatched away?

and all the foreign people, all the kings of the land of Uz, all the kings of the land of the Philistines (even Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron and the remnant of Ashdod);

and all the kings of Arabia and all the kings of the foreign people who dwell in the desert;

He will take action against the strongest of fortresses with the help of a foreign god; he will give great honor to those who acknowledge him and will cause them to rule over the many, and will parcel out land for a price.

“Then it will come about on the day of the Lord’s sacrificeThat I will punish the princes, the king’s sonsAnd all who clothe themselves with foreign garments.

Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the sanctuary of the Lord which He loves and has married the daughter of a foreign god.

But God spoke to this effect, that his descendants would be aliens in a foreign land, and that they would be enslaved and mistreated for four hundred years.

And as I punished them often in all the synagogues, I tried to force them to blaspheme; and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities.

By faith he lived as an alien in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, fellow heirs of the same promise;

quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.