Exodus 34:14

: for it is a terrible thing that I will do with thee. 11 Observe thou that which I command thee this day: behold, I drive out before thee the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite. 12 Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee: 13 But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves: 14 For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God: 15 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; 16 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. 17 Thou shalt make thee no molten gods. Reconciliation being made, a covenant of friendship is here settled between God and Israel. The traitors are not only pardoned, but preferred and made favourites again. Well may the assurances of this be ushered in with a behold, a word commanding attention and admiration: Behold, I make a covenant. When the covenant was broken, it was Israel that broke it; now that it comes to be renewed, it is God that makes it. If there be quarrels, we must bear all the blame; if there be peace, God must have all the glory. Here is, I.

34:10-17 The Israelites are commanded to destroy every monument of idolatry, however curious or costly; to refuse all alliance, friendship, or marriage with idolaters, and all idolatrous feasts; and they were reminded not with idolaters, and all idolatrous feats; and they were reminded not to repeat the crime of making molten images. Jealously is called the rage of a man, Pr 6:34; but in God it is holy and just displeasure. Those cannot worship God aright, who do not worship him only.

For thou shall worship no other god,.... Than the Lord their God, the one only living and true God, which was the first command given to the people of Israel, and binding upon all men: for the Lord whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God; his name and nature answer to one another; he admits of no rival or competitor in worship; he will not give his glory to another god, or one so called, nor his praise to graven images; and in this he is distinguished from all nominal and fictitious gods, who have many joined with them, and are rivals of them, which gives them no concern, because insensible; but it is otherwise with the Lord, who knows the dishonour done him, and resents it, and is as jealous of any worship being given to another, as the husband is of the honour of his marriage bed; for idolatry is spiritual adultery, as is suggested in the following verse.

(14) For thou shalt worship no other god. —The images, altars, and groves would, if retained, lead on to the worship of the gods to whom they were dedicated—indeed, they could be retained for no other purpose. Thus their destruction followed, as a corollary, from the second commandment. Whose name is Jealous.—Comp. Exodus 20:5, and see Note 2 on that passage. Many attempts have been made to show that jealousy is unworthy of the Divine Nature; but that the one Only God, if there be but one Only God, should claim and exact under severe penalties an undivided allegiance is natural, reasonable, and in harmony with the most exalted conceptions of the Divine essence. If God looked with indifference upon idolatry, it would imply that He cared little for His human creatures: that, like the Deity of Epicurus, having once created man and the world, He thenceforth paid no attention to them.

Whose name is Jealous ; who hath made himself known by, and glories in that name, The jealous God, who cannot endure any competitor or corrival; whereas the false and puny gods of the heathens were contented with multitudes of partners. So this is properly said to be the name of God, whereby he is known and distinguished from all other gods.

Cut down their groves - This is the first reference to what is commonly known as grove-worship. The original word for "grove" in this connection אשׁרה 'ăshêrāh is different from that so rendered in Genesis 21:33 . Our translators supposed that what the law commands is the destruction of groves dedicated to the worship of false deities Judges 6:25 ; 2 Kings 18:4 ; but inasmuch as the worship of asherah is found associated with that of Astarte, or Ashtoreth Judges 2:13 ; Judges 10:6 ; 1 Samuel 7:4 , it seems probable that while Astarte was the personal name of the goddess, the asherah was a symbol of her, probably in some one of her characters, made in wood in some conventional form.

Verse 14. - For thou shalt worship no other God. This is a reference to the Second Commandment ( Exodus 20:5 ). The meaning is - "Thou shalt not spare the idolatrous emblems of the Canaanite nations, for thou couldst only do so to worship them, and thou art already forbidden to worship any other god beside me." The existence of the Decalogue and its binding nature, is assumed throughout this chapter Exodus 34:14

9, 10. he said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us—On this proclamation, he, in the overflowing benevolence of s heart, founded an earnest petition for the Divine Presence being continued with the people; and God was pleased to give His favorable answer to Moses' intercession by a renewal of His promise under the form of a covenant, repeating the leading points that formed the conditions of the former national compact.

To recall the duties of the covenant once more to the minds of the people, the Lord repeats from among the rights of Israel, upon the basis of which the covenant had been established (ch. 21-23), two of the leading points which determined the attitude of the nation towards Him, and which constituted, as it were, the main pillars that were to support the covenant about to be renewed. These were, first, the warning against every kind of league with the Canaanites, who were to be driven out before the Israelites ( Exodus 34:11-16 ); and, secondly, the instructions concerning the true worship of Jehovah ( Exodus 34:17-26 ). The warning against friendship with the idolatrous Canaanites ( Exodus 34:11-16 ) is more fully developed and more strongly enforced than in Exodus 23:23 . The Israelites, when received into the covenant with Jehovah, were not only to beware of forming any covenant with the inhabitants of Canaan (cf. Exodus 23:32-33 ), but were to destroy all the signs of their idolatrous worship, such as altars, monuments (see Exodus 23:24 ), and asherim, the idols of Astarte, the Canaanitish goddess of nature, which consisted for the most part of wooden pillars (see my Comm. on 1 Kings 14:23 ), and to worship no other god, because Jehovah was called jealous, i.e., had revealed Himself as jealous (see at Exodus 20:5 ), and was a jealous God.

This was commanded, that the Israelites might not suffer themselves to be led astray by such an alliance; to go a whoring after their gods, and sacrifice to them, to take part in their sacrificial festivals, or to marry their sons to the daughters of the Canaanites, by whom they would be persuaded to join in the worship of idols. The use of the expression "go a whoring" in a spiritual sense, in relation to idolatry, is to be accounted for on the ground, that the religious fellowship of Israel with Jehovah was a covenant resembling the marriage tie; and we meet with it for the first time, here, immediately after the formation of this covenant between Israel and Jehovah. The phrase is all the more expressive on account of the literal prostitution that was frequently associated with the worship of Baal and Astarte (cf. Leviticus 17:7 ; Leviticus 20:5-6 ; Numbers 14:33 , etc.). We may see from Numbers 25:1 . how Israel was led astray by this temptation in the wilderness.