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Other Gods
Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Exodus 20:3 (Deuteronomy 5:7, Judges 6:10, Hosea 13:4)
For thou shalt worship no other god: for
, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God: Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go a whoring after their gods, and do sacrifice unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice; And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go a whoring after their gods, and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods.
Exodus 34:14-16 (Deuteronomy 6:14,15)
Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them; Deuteronomy 11:16 (28:14, Joshua 23:7, Jeremiah 25:6)
And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth. Exodus 23:13 (Joshua 23:7)
He that sacrificeth unto any god, save unto
only, he shall be utterly destroyed. Exodus 22:20 (Leviticus 17:7, Jeremiah 48:35)
And it shall be, if thou do at all forget
thy God, and walk after other gods, and serve them, and worship them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely perish. Deuteronomy 8:19
Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee. Exodus 23:32-33 (Deuteronomy 7:16)
There shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god. Psalms 81:9
If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god; Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart. Psalms 44:20,21
Penalties
He that sacrificeth unto any god, save unto
only, he shall be utterly destroyed. Exodus 22:20 (Leviticus 17:7, Jeremiah 48:35)
If there be found among you, within any of thy gates which
thy God giveth thee, man or woman, that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of
thy God, in transgressing his covenant, And hath gone and served other gods, and worshipped them, either the sun, or moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded; And it be told thee, and thou hast heard of it, and enquired diligently, and, behold, it be true, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel: Then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman, which have committed that wicked thing, unto thy gates, even that man or that woman, and shalt stone them with stones, till they die. Deuteronomy 17:2-5
But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. Deuteronomy 18:20
If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for
your God proveth you, to know whether ye love
your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Ye shall walk after
your God, and fear him, and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve him, and cleave unto him. And that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from
your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to thrust thee out of the way which
thy God commanded thee to walk in. So shalt thou put the evil away from the midst of thee. Deuteronomy 13:1-5
If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from
thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is among you. Deuteronomy 13:6-11
If thou shalt hear say in one of thy cities, which
thy God hath given thee to dwell there, saying, Certain men, the children of Belial, are gone out from among you, and have withdrawn the inhabitants of their city, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which ye have not known; Then shalt thou enquire, and make search, and ask diligently; and, behold, if it be truth, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought among you; Thou shalt surely smite the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying it utterly, and all that is therein, and the cattle thereof, with the edge of the sword. And thou shalt gather all the spoil of it into the midst of the street thereof, and shalt burn with fire the city, and all the spoil thereof every whit, for
thy God: and it shall be an heap for ever; it shall not be built again. And there shall cleave nought of the cursed thing to thine hand: that
may turn from the fierceness of his anger, and shew thee mercy, and have compassion upon thee, and multiply thee, as he hath sworn unto thy fathers; When thou shalt hearken to the voice of
thy God, to keep all his commandments which I command thee this day, to do that which is right in the eyes of
thy God. Deuteronomy 13:12-18
And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Molech, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God: I am
. Again, thou shalt say to the children of Israel, Whosoever he be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that giveth any of his seed unto Molech; he shall surely be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones. And I will set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people; because he hath given of his seed unto Molech , to defile my sanctuary, and to profane my holy name. And if the people of the land do any ways hide their eyes from the man, when he giveth of his seed unto Molech, and kill him not: Then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that go a whoring after him, to commit whoredom with Molech, from among their people. Leviticus 18:21, 20:2-5
Places of Worship
Ye shall utterly destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye shall possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every green tree: And ye shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their groves with fire; and ye shall hew down the graven images of their gods, and destroy the names of them out of that place. Take heed to thyself that thou be not snared by following them, after that they be destroyed from before thee; and that thou enquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise. Thou shalt not do so unto
thy God: for every abomination to
, which he hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to their gods. Deuteronomy 12:2,3,30,31 (7:2-5, 20:17,18)
What Are the Gods?
For all the gods of the people are idols: but
made the heavens. 1 Chronicles 16:26 (Psalms 95:3, 96:4,5, 97:9, 135:5)
What say I then? that the idol is any thing, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is any thing? But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils. 1 Corinthians 10:19-21 (Deuteronomy 32:17)
One God
Hear, O Israel:
our God is one
: Deuteronomy 6:4
will be terrible unto them: for he will famish all the gods of the earth; and men shall worship him, every one from his place, even all the isles of the heathen. Zephaniah 2:11 (Exodus 12:12, Numbers 33:4 Jeremiah 10:11, 43:12,13, 46:25)
See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand. Deuteronomy 32:39 (2 Kings 5:15, Isaiah 43:10, 44:6,8, 45:5,6,14,20-22, Hosea 13:4, 1 Corinthians 8:4-6)
And he said,
God of Israel, there is no God like thee, in heaven above, or on earth beneath, who keepest covenant and mercy with thy servants that walk before thee with all their heart: 1 Kings 8:23 (Exodus 15:11, 18:11, 2 Samuel 7:22, 1 Chronicles 16:25, 17:20, 2 Chronicles 2:5, 6:14)
Related verses (these are mostly stories of people who either kept the commandment, or broke it): Exodus 32:1-35, 34:14-17, Numbers 25:1-5, Deuteronomy 7:4, 11:28, 28:36,64, 29:18-28, 32:16, Joshua 24:1-31, Judges 2:2,3,11-3:7, 5:8, 6:25-32, 8:33, 10:6-16, 17:5, 18:24, Ruth 1:15, 1 Samuel 6:5, 7:3,4, 8:8, 12:10, 17:43, 26:19, 28:13, 31:10, 2 Samuel 7:23, 1 Kings 11:1-10, 16:31,32, 18:18-40, 19:2,18, 20:10, 22:53, 2 Kings 1:16, 3:2, 5:17, 10:18-28, 11:18, 17:7-41, 18:33-35, 19:12, 21:3, 23:4,5,10, 1 Chronicles 5:25, 10:10, 14:12, 2 Chronicles 11:15, 13:8,9, 14:3, 17:3, 23:17, 24:7, 25:14-20, 28:2,22-25, 32:13-19, 33:3,15, 34:4, Ezra 1:7, Psalms 106:34-42, 138:1, Isaiah 36:19,20, 37:12, 41:23, Jeremiah 1:16, 2:8,23,28, 5:7, 7:6,9,18, 9:14, 11:10,13,17, 12:16, 13:10, 16:20, 19:5, 23:13,27, 32:29,35, 35:15, 44:2-8,15-19, Daniel 3:12-18,28,29, 4:8-18, 5:11-14, 6:7-12, 11:8, Hosea 2:8,13,17, 3:1, 11:2, 13:1, Zephaniah 1:4, Acts 7:40,41, Romans 11:4, Galatians 4:8, 1 Timothy 4:1, James 2:19, Revelation 9:20, 16:14
Blessings of Keeping the First Commandment
Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images. And ye shall serve
your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee. There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfil. I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee. Exodus 23:24-31
As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings: So
alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him. He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields; and he made him to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flinty rock; Butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat; and thou didst drink the pure blood of the grape. Deuteronomy 32:11-14
I have declared, and have saved, and I have shewed, when there was no strange god among you: therefore ye are my witnesses, saith
, that I am God. Isaiah 43:12
Related verses: 2 Chronicles 32:9-23 (See also The First Great Commandment)
Curses of Breaking the First Commandment
Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from
our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood; And it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst:
will not spare him, but then the anger of
and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and
shall blot out his name from under heaven. And
shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law: So that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which
hath laid upon it; And that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein, like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim, which
overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath: Even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath
done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger? Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of
God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt: For they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them: And the anger of
was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book: And
rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day. Deuteronomy 29:18-29
But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them; I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it. Deuteronomy 30:17,18 (Joshua 23:16)
But if ye shall at all turn from following me, ye or your children, and will not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods, and worship them: Then will I cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I have hallowed for my name, will I cast out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all people: And at this house, which is high, every one that passeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss; and they shall say, Why hath
done thus unto this land, and to this house? And they shall answer, Because they forsook
their God, who brought forth their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and have taken hold upon other gods, and have worshipped them, and served them: therefore hath
brought upon them all this evil. 1 Kings 9:6-9 (2 Chronicles 7:19-22, Jeremiah 5:19, 22:7-9)
Thus saith
, Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah hath read: Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands; therefore my wrath shall be kindled against this place, and shall not be quenched. 2 Kings 22:16,17 (2 Chronicles 34:24,25)
Therefore thus saith
, Behold, I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them. Then shall the cities of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem go, and cry unto the gods unto whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all in the time of their trouble. For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal. Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up a cry or prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time that they cry unto me for their trouble. What hath my beloved to do in mine house, seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many, and the holy flesh is passed from thee? when thou doest evil, then thou rejoicest.
called thy name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit: with the noise of a great tumult he hath kindled fire upon it, and the branches of it are broken. For
of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal. Jeremiah 11:11-17
For thus saith
of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will cause to cease out of this place in your eyes, and in your days, the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride. And it shall come to pass, when thou shalt shew this people all these words, and they shall say unto thee, Wherefore hath
pronounced all this great evil against us? or what is our iniquity? or what is our sin that we have committed against
our God? Then shalt thou say unto them, Because your fathers have forsaken me, saith
, and have walked after other gods, and have served them, and have worshipped them, and have forsaken me, and have not kept my law; And ye have done worse than your fathers; for, behold, ye walk every one after the imagination of his evil heart, that they may not hearken unto me: Therefore will I cast you out of this land into a land that ye know not, neither ye nor your fathers; and there shall ye serve other gods day and night; where I will not shew you favour. Jeremiah 16:9-13
And say, Hear ye the word of
, O kings of Judah, and inhabitants of Jerusalem; Thus saith
of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, the which whosoever heareth, his ears shall tingle. Because they have forsaken me, and have estranged this place, and have burned incense in it unto other gods, whom neither they nor their fathers have known, nor the kings of Judah, and have filled this place with the blood of innocents; They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind: Therefore, behold, the days come, saith
, that this place shall no more be called Tophet, nor The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of slaughter. And I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hands of them that seek their lives: and their carcases will I give to be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth. And I will make this city desolate, and an hissing; every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished and hiss because of all the plagues thereof. And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they shall eat every one the flesh of his friend in the siege and straitness, wherewith their enemies, and they that seek their lives, shall straiten them. And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings unto other gods.
Jeremiah 19:3-9,13
Related verses: Deuteronomy 31:16-21, 32:15-43, Psalms 106:34-42
's Law