What does the Heavenly Father mean with this statement?
Provided by the teachings of Brent Wiscombe
Exodus 20:3-9 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
Other Gods Mentioned in the Old Testament
by Claude Mariottini—Baal—The Canaanite Fertility God
“You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3).
The second commandment declares that in Israel, no other god should be worshiped in addition to the Heavenly Father (Yahweh). The commandment's words don't deny other gods, even if it implies monotheism. The truth of monotheism, that there was no other God besides Yahweh, came into existence late in the faith of Israel.
Henotheism is a word used to describe the worship of one god without denying the existence of other gods. The people of Israel believed in and worshiped Yahweh as their God, but they also acknowledged the existence of other gods.
Many people in the Ancient Near East were polytheists. Polytheism is a system of belief in which people worship many gods. In general, most polytheistic religions are associated with the various aspects of nature worship. Since primitive civilizations did not have a scientific understanding of the world in which they lived, most people in these societies associated natural phenomena with the realm of the gods.
The Old Testament mentions several gods. People who lived in the various nations that composed the world of the Bible associated these gods with themselves. The people of Israel worshipped some of these gods. The biblical writers attribute the exile to Israel's apostasy.
Some of the gods mentioned in the Old Testament:
1. Adrammelech (2 Kings 17:31)
Adrammelech was the name of one of the gods worshipped by the people of Sepharvaim. The Sepharvaim were a group of people whom the Assyrians settled in Samaria after the Northern Kingdom fell.
2. Anammelech (2 Kings 17:31)
The people of Sepharvaim also worshipped another god. The people of Sepharvaim worshiped their gods by burning their children as sacrifices.
3. Ashima (2 Kings 17:30)
A god worshiped by the people of Hamath who settled in Samaria after the fall of the Northern Kingdom.
4. Ashtoreth (1 Kings 11:5)
Ashereth was the goddess of the Sidonians. Ashtoreth is the name used in the Old Testament to refer to the Canaanite goddess Astarte. She was the consort of Baal, the Canaanite storm god.
5. Baal (Numbers 25:3)
Baal was the Canaanite storm god. Baal was also associated with the fertility of the land. The word “Baal” means “lord” or “husband.” Many people in Israel worshiped Baal in various forms and representations. The earliest mention of Baal in the Old Testament occurs in Numbers 25:3, where the people of Israel yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor.
6. Bel (Jeremiah 51:44)
The name by which Marduk, the god of the Babylonians, is called in the Old Testament. Bel appears in the Apocrypha, in addition to the book of Daniel.
7. Chemosh (1 Kings 11:7)
He is the national god of the Moabites, to whom Solomon built a temple in the mountains east of Jerusalem. The writer of Kings calls this god “the abomination of Moab.” The Moabites were called “The people of Chemosh” (Numbers 21:29).
8. Dagon (Judges 16:23)
Dagon appears in the Old Testament as the god of the Philistines. The nature of Dagon and its characteristics are not very clear. Some scholars have identified Dagon as a “grain” god, while others have identified him as a “fish” god. It seems that the Philistines adopted the cult of Dagon after they settled in the land of Canaan.
9. Kaiwan (NRSV) or Kiyyun (ESV; Amos 5:26)
Amos calls Kaiwan “your star-god.” Kaiwan was an astral god worshiped by some people of the Northern Kingdom after they became vassals of the Assyrians. The god is associated with the planet Saturn.
10. Milcom (1 Kings 11:5)
Milcom is known as “the abomination of the Ammonites.” He is also known as Molech. Jeremiah says that the Israelites offered their sons and daughters as sacrifices to Molech by burning them. The meaning of the name is unclear. Probably, the meaning of the name is derived from the word “melek,” the Hebrew word for king.
11. Molech (Jeremiah 32:35)
Molech is the same god as Milcom above. The name Molech comes from the consonants of the word “melek,” “king,” and the vowels of the Hebrew word “bosheth,” a word that means “shame.”
12. Nebo (Isaiah 46:1)
Nebo is the name of a Babylonian god that is exclusively mentioned in the book of Isaiah. The name of this god appears in the name of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.
13. Nehushtan (2 Kings 18:4)
This deity was the bronze serpent worshiped by some people in Judah in the days of Hezekiah. This deity was associated with the serpent Moses made in the wilderness (Numbers 21:8-9).
14. Nibhaz (2 Kings 17:31)
The name of a god worshiped by the Avvites, a people brought to Samaria by the Assyrians.
15. Nisroch (2 Kings 19:37)
The Assyrian god was worshiped by Sennacherib, king of Assyria. According to the biblical text, Sennacherib was worshiping his god when he was killed by his sons.
16. Rimmon (2 Kings 5:18)
A Syrian god. After Naaman was cured from his leprosy and proclaimed his faith in the God of Israel, he recognized that he would still have to bow down to Rimmon because he served the king of Syria.
17. Sakkuth (NRSV) or Sikkuth (ESV; Amos 5:26)
A Babylonian deity associated with astral worship. In the book of Amos, Sakkuth appears together with Kaiwan.
18. Succoth-benoth (2 Kings 17:30)
The name of a god worshiped by the people of Babylon who lived in Samaria after the Assyrians conquered the city of Samaria in 722 B.C.
19. Tammuz (Ezekiel 8:14).
A Mesopotamian god whose cult has been associated with the cycle of the harvest. The weeping for Tammuz is a reference to the death of the god, which in turn was associated with the agricultural calendar
20. Tartak (2 Kings 17:31)
The god worshiped by the Avvites, a group of people brought to Samaria by the Assyrians after they conquered the Northern Kingdom.
21. The Queen of Heaven (Jeremiah 7:18).
The name of an unidentified goddess worshiped by the people of Judah in the days of the prophet Jeremiah (7th and 6th centuries B.C.). The Queen of Heaven appears only in the book of Jeremiah (7:18; 44:17, 18, 19, 25). This goddess has been identified with the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar and with the Canaanite goddess Ashtoreth, also known as Astarte.
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