abraham destroyed idols bible verse

58 Dost thou not know, or hast thou not heard, that this evil which thou doest, our ancestors sinned therein in days of old, and the eternal God brought the waters of the flood upon them and destroyed them all, and also destroyed the whole earth on their account? Anyone who accepts the seven mitzvot (of the Noahides) and is careful not to violate them should be considered one of the righteous gentiles and has a share in the World to Come. Psalms 135:15 - 127:17 - The idols of the . Abraham's father, Terah, joined the adamant opposition to his son in Harran, which indicates that he had continued to cling to his profession of making and selling idols. 48 Now therefore my father refrain from this, and bring not evil upon thy soul and the souls of thy household. idols of any kind. It is precisely the struggle of thinkers like Rambam and Rav Kook that can be most helpful in answering such questions. [13]Even if its conclusions will, in the end, be rejectednot always and not necessarilyby practical halacha. Nevertheless, see his comment further on in the piece, The words ofaggada, which can have such good and blessed effects are literally the words of the living God. This statement seems to be very much in accord with what I called the highest level of faith, the belief in the ahistoricity of the narrative. SeeIggrot Raayahvol. And Nimrod and all his princes and servants were that day sitting before him, and Terah sat also before them. Conjunctive waw | Verb - Piel - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular, A Phoenician goddess, also an image of the same, Verb - Piel - Perfect - third person masculine singular, Conjunctive waw, Article | Noun - masculine plural, Preposition-l | Verb - Hifil - Infinitive construct, Conjunctive waw | Noun - masculine singular construct, Preposition-b | Noun - masculine singular construct, Israel -- 'God strives', another name of Jacob and his desc, Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular, Preposition-l | Noun - proper - feminine singular, Jerusalem -- probably 'foundation of peace', capital city of all Israel, He takes order for the repair of the temple, Josiah sends to Huldah to enquire of the Lord, Huldah prophesies the destruction of Jerusalem, but respite thereof in Josiah's time, Josiah, causing it to be read in a solemn assembly, renews the covenant with God, Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, OT History: 2 Chronicles 34:7 He broke down the altars and beat (2 Chron. One approach (the older and more nave one) claims that the job of a historian is to make a copy of the past and place it, as-is, before present day students of history. Dr. [26]It would be wrong to simplify the dichotomy by trying to distinguish between the simple person, who would wish to hide from contradictions since answering them would be beyond this persons ability, and the learned person, who, ostensibly, can deal with such tensions. Delivered at Provo, Sunday Afternoon, August 28th, 1881, Reported by Geo. Thus, we can say that there is no reason not to ascribe great literary prowess to God. So he got a club, or some other weapon, and knocked off the heads of some, the arms and legs of others, and made a general wreck among the idols, but left the biggest untouched. The Bible says we should put living in a righteous manner above all other pursuits of the flesh and mind. 5. Later, a woman walked into the store and wanted to make an offering to the idols. 2 And Sarai said to Abram, "Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. [19] The various literary layers identified by biblical scholars in the text do not contradict its status as divine. Conjunctive waw | Verb - Piel - Conjunctive perfect - second person masculine plural, Noun - masculine plural construct | third person masculine plural, Noun - feminine plural construct | third person masculine plural, Verb - Qal - Imperfect - second person masculine plural | Paragogic nun, Conjunctive waw | Noun - feminine plural construct | third person masculine plural, A Phoenician goddess, also an image of the same, Verb - Piel - Imperfect - second person masculine plural | Paragogic nun, Conjunctive waw | Noun - masculine plural construct, gods -- the supreme God, magistrates, a superlative, Noun - masculine singular construct | third person masculine plural, Holy things must be eaten in the holy place, and holy things must be eaten in the holy place, Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, OT Law: Deuteronomy 12:3 And you shall break down their altars (Deut. Nevertheless, this possibility brings to mind the old joke about the elephant and the ant. Does the story become less powerful, less complete, less true? They meant the world to me and taught me crucial lessons. It would always have been possible to claim that one author, Moses for instance, wrote it on his own. From whence sprang the suggestion to interpret the Torah against the way it has been read? Join today!. Furthermore, this objection often remains inchoate and not fully articulated. The Torah tells the story in a certain way, and other traditions tell it in different ways. The believer who adopts this narrative wishes to engage it directly. Finally, Abraham is not punished . If the stories about the ancestors of the nation had not been included in the Torah at Sinai, it seems likely that they would be without any religious implications. 14 The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, "Lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward, 15 for all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever. 1, p. 164: Tamar Ross makes great use of this principle, primarily in dealing with the feminist critique of Torah. In a world where there are many doubts about the historicity of core events in the Torahs narrative,[24] establishing the palace of Torah upon a higher foundation would seem to be a constructive goal. Deuteronomy 9:21 And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount. It is thou that didst place the hatchet in the hand of the big god, and thou sayest he smote them all. Abraham answered his father, and said: How, then, canst thou serve these idols in whom there is no power to do anything? 51 And he said, I beseech thee my lord, to hear meNow fifty years back a child was born to me, and thus has he done to my gods and thus has he spoken; and now therefore, my lord and king, send for him that he may come before thee, and judge him according to the law, that we may be delivered from his evil. The simple reader of Maimonidesand even the not so simple readerwas likely to feel that the loss of Gods body was almost equal to the loss of God. These events are seennot without causeas being singular and special. Intuitive attachment to our inherited traditions is common to all people, regardless of education. Rav Kook, in his analysis of this approach, found that Rambam made use of it as he wrestled with Aristotles notion of an eternal universe. Muhammad describes Abraham's anguished attempts to reason with His father and persuade him to accept a new divine Message this way: "O my Father! Because of the signs in the heavens that were associated with his birth Nimrod tried to kill him at that time. 29 And Abram took the savory meat from his mother, and brought it before his fathers gods into the chamber; and he came nigh unto them that they might eat, and he placed it before them, and Abram sat before them all day, thinking perhaps they might eat. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. Why did God choose to limit the divine creative impulse to the (apparently) inadequate framework of narrative? Now, believing it is safe, Abram leaves Noah's home and returns to his father Terah. See: Tamar Ross,Expanding the Palace of Torah: Orthodoxy and Feminism(Waltham: Brandeis, 2004). As such, writing is secondary to the event itself. [27]See Rambam,Mishneh Torah, Laws of Repentence, 3:7. Nimrod the mighty hunter was one of the sons of Kush. 16When the men(A) got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way. A young Abraham destroys his father Terah's idols, by Jacob Ernst Marcus, 1819. Please support us. See:The Complete Works of Achad Ha-Am(Tel Aviv, 1947), p. 342 [Hebrew]. script>. 10Azariah, the chief priest (K)of the house of Zadok, said to [f]him, (L)Since the contributions started coming into the house of the Lord, we have had enough to eat with plenty left over, for the Lord has blessed His people, and this great quantity is left over.. Our analysis of the truth problem leads us to this summary statement: Whenever we as readers encounter a description of an event in the Torah, the main concern for us as students of Torah is not the reality of the event as it happened but the event as described in the biblical narrative. Although the book focuses on a period of time later than that discussed herethe period of David and Solomonnevertheless, the rhetorical force of the essays that express reservations similar to that expressed aboveessays that come from very different scholarsdemonstrates the tangible reality of the emotional power that stands behind the truth problem. I must admit that I could not personally identify with any of the (admittedly thoughtful) analyses in that collection, and this is probably due to my own alternative way of thinking about this problem, as described in this essay. Thus, such a God can be greater than any image of a god based upon said Gods great size and dimensions as envisioned by those who assume that God is physical. To me, it seems likely that the par between those who criticize the ahistorical paradigm and those who embrace it can be traced to the par between the correspondence theory of truth and the coherence theory of truth, but a full analysis along these lines would take us too far afield. [27] Putting this view forward before those who believed that God had a body probably caused those believers a crisis of faith. In their understanding, the written text is not there to convey an event; it is the event itself. Abraham had three wives: Sarah, Hagar, and Keturah (by date when [13] The sacred written Torah is the teaching of God and it is forbidden to learn it indifferently. Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five people?, If I find forty-five there, he said, I will not destroy it., 29Once again he spoke to him, What if only forty are found there?, He said, For the sake of forty, I will not do it., 30Then he said, May the Lord not be angry,(Z) but let me speak. In an ahistorical reading, we exchange Abraham the man, his biographic detailsonly some of which have any connection to Godwith Gods Abraham. 60 And if thy wicked heart will not hearken to my words to cause thee to forsake thy evil ways, and to serve the eternal God, then wilt thou die in shame in the latter days, thou, thy people and all who are connected with thee, hearing thy words or walking in thy evil ways. Conversely, if the Torah is only telling stories, it would appear, at first glance, more difficult to account for the similarities between its stories and those of the surrounding cultures. The fervent attempt to capture some meaning in each and every word of the Torah, without making recourse to any external factors as a control, is a clear expression of this perspective. 31 And in the evening of that day in that house Abram was clothed with the spirit of God. Abraham did destroy his father's idols though. Terah was the father of Abram (his name was later changed to [6]In my book, I deal with this in chapter 4. Terah exclaimed that such a thing was impossible, since idols could not quarrel or fight. His Test Abraham leaves the home of his childhood and youth. 27 And Abram mocked them, and said, Surely the savory meat that I prepared has not pleased them, or perhaps it was too little for them, and for that reason they would not eat; therefore tomorrow I will prepare fresh savory meat, better and more plentiful than this, in order that I may see the result. How is one to deal with such a tremendous challenge? This is true even for a person who can digest the nuances of the ahistorical approach to the Torah. Note: This essay was translated and adapted by Rabbi Dr. Zev Farber, with the approval of Rabbi Dr. Kula, from the introduction to his book, Existential or Non-Essential. "Turn from Thy burning anger and change Thy mind about doing harm to Thy people. Donate. Exodus 23:13 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. 26 And Abram saw on the day when he was sitting amongst them, that they had no voice, no hearing, no motion, and not one of them could stretch forth his hand to eat. TheTorah.com is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.We rely on the support of readers like you. Bruce Feiler (Abraham) says that probably less than one per cent of the stories told about Abraham appear in the Bible, with an explosion of detail beginning to appear in Jewish tradition from the third century BCE onwards. And wilt thou and thy people rise up now and do like unto this work, in order to bring down the anger of the Lord God of the universe, and to bring evil upon thee and the whole earth? 18 And Abram went from them, and his anger burned within him. [1] Many commentaries throughout the generations have taken up this question; see, for example, Ramban on Genesis 11:28 and Maharal of Prague inNetzah Yisrael, ch. Sons were born to them after the flood. Abraham burns the idols unlike the Qur'anic account where we find Abraham smashing all but the largest idol. But the Lord inspired Abraham to leave there. New American Standard Bible (NASB). Abraham responds that people withstand wind. (For instance, not to say that God uses rational and beneficent thinking. Once he went on a trip and he placed Abraham in charge of the store in his place. Hebrews 11:10 says of Abram: "He was awaiting the city having real foundations, the builder and maker of which city is God.". The ant says to the elephant, Just look at the dust-clouds were making!. 2 Kings 23:14 And he brake in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men. 12-26 [Hebrew] and afterwards in his book.Pirkei Moadot(Jerusalem, 5746), p. 22 [Hebrew]. (Q) 24What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? If you have any questions, please review our Privacy Policy or email us at privacy@biblegateway.com. To attempt an answer, I suggest that dry mechanical lists of rules, such as do not murder and do not steal, couldnt accomplish the transmission of lofty values to humankind. But Abraham, inspired by the Lord, went on a certain occasion into the temple of these gods and smote them right and left, upsetting and breaking them in pieces. It is about humanitys religion and its faith, its moral struggles, its successes and failures, its hopes and aspirations for greatness, its dream of breaking into the world of the infinite and clinging to God. Establishing the pillars of faith upon the bedrock of the historicity of past events requires an honest person to evaluate, without bias, the question of the historical reality of the Torahs claims. The Bible tells us the Lord said to him: Get thee up from thy fathers house, from the land wherein thou wast born, and go up to a land I will show unto thee, and which I will afterwards give unto thee for an inheritance. And we are told that he went up, not knowing whither he went. 4, It is said Abrahams father was an idolater, and that he had a number of gods in his house. I simply believe it. The Idol Of Complacency. There have been responses that take a more conservative approach; see, for instance, Adam Zertal,A Nation is Born: The Altar on Mount Ebal and the Beginning of Israel(Israel: Yedioth Aharonot, 2000), 292 [Hebrew]; Yitzhak Meitlis,Excavating the Bible: New Archaeological Evidence for the Historical Reliability of Scripture(Bartleby, 2012). either making or worshiping idols or "other gods.". 3, There is something humorous in a history that we have in relation to this personage. The Torah describes various events from its own unique perspective. And why wilt thou not sense the God of the whole universe, who created thee and in whose power it is to kill and keep alive? 39 And Abram answered Terah his father and he said, Not so my lord, for I brought savory meat before them, and when I came nigh to them with the meat that they might eat, they all at once stretched forth their hands to eat before the great one had put forth his hand to eat. So Nimrod declares they worship water. Genesis 11:26 After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the NASB, Zondervan NASB Study Bible, Red Letter Edition, NASB, Charles F. Stanley Life Principles Bible, 2nd Edition, Comfort Print: Holy Bible, New American Standard Bible, NASB, Super Giant Print Reference Bible, Red Letter Edition, 1995 Text, Comfort Print, NASB, Thinline Bible, Large Print, Red Letter Edition, 2020 Text, Comfort Print, NASB, Thinline Bible, Red Letter Edition, 1995 Text, Comfort Print, NASB, Thinline Bible, Red Letter Edition, 2020 Text, Comfort Print. A similar point was made by R. Abraham Kook inEder ha-Yakkar, (Jerusalem, 5726), p. 42. Completely erase the names of their gods! And Abram hastened and went from the chamber to his fathers outer court, and he found his father sitting in the court, and all his servants with him, and Abram came and sat before him. Perhaps they even needed to be narrated in exactly the way the Torah itself narrates them. [20] Moreover, even if the Torah had been written from one perspective only, in one clear and flowing style, that would not have proven that it came from God. This is something best accomplished by narrative, not by list of laws or principles. NASB 1995 Now Rachel had taken the household idols and put them in the camel's saddle, and she sat on them. This point can be expressed in two different ways. My thanks to Hillel ben-Sasson for sharpening this point. 17 And Abram said, As the Lord liveth these images shall not remain in my fathers house; so shall the Lord who created me do unto me if in three days time I do not break them all. 1, pp. Terah responded by saying that they are only statues and have no knowledge. [4]There is a third as well, which I deal with in my book, in a later chapter. When Terah returned, he asked Abraham what happened to all the idols. 11, p. 68. Thou speakest lies to me. Shouldnt we expect from God a more coherent story, one that is free of the subtle and even blatant contradictions that can be found within it? Another participant argued that he still couldnt see, despite my explanation, why the Torah chose to speak to us in historical language. Commentating on this verse, Mufti Muhammad Shafi, the late Grand Mufti of Pakistan, writes, "According to Imam Qurtubi, this verse shows that to destroy the idols and other icons of paganism is Waajib (mandatory). Abraham's brother Haran sees what happened and says that he believes in the God of Abraham.