Keluaran 23:24
Konteks23:24 “You must not bow down to their gods; you must not serve them or do according to their practices. Instead you must completely overthrow them and smash their standing stones 1 to pieces. 2
Bilangan 33:52
Konteks33:52 you must drive out all the inhabitants of the land before you. Destroy all their carved images, all their molten images, 3 and demolish their high places.
Ulangan 7:5
Konteks7:5 Instead, this is what you must do to them: You must tear down their altars, shatter their sacred pillars, 4 cut down their sacred Asherah poles, 5 and burn up their idols.
[23:24] 1 tn The Hebrew is מַצֵּבֹתֵיהֶם (matsevotehem, “their standing stones”); these long stones were erected to represent the abode of the numen or deity. They were usually set up near the altar or the high place. To destroy these would be to destroy the centers of Canaanite worship in the land.
[23:24] 2 tn Both verbs are joined with their infinitive absolutes to provide the strongest sense to these instructions. The images of the false gods in Canaan were to be completely and utterly destroyed. This could not be said any more strongly.
[33:52] 3 tn The Hebrew text repeats the verb “you will destroy.”
[7:5] 4 sn Sacred pillars. The Hebrew word (מַצֵּבֹת, matsevot) denotes a standing pillar, usually made of stone. Its purpose was to mark the presence of a shrine or altar thought to have been visited by deity. Though sometimes associated with pure worship of the
[7:5] 5 sn Sacred Asherah poles. A leading deity of the Canaanite pantheon was Asherah, wife/sister of El and goddess of fertility. She was commonly worshiped at shrines in or near groves of evergreen trees, or, failing that, at places marked by wooden poles (Hebrew אֲשֵׁרִים [’asherim], as here). They were to be burned or cut down (Deut 12:3; 16:21; Judg 6:25, 28, 30; 2 Kgs 18:4).
