How many gods did Israel really have?

Though Israel is typically portrayed as having always been monotheistic this does not appear to be the case when reading the Old Testament of the Bible. Israelites commonly served many gods and goddesses of which Yahweh was only one. In fact, one of the main themes of the Old Testament seems to be that of Yahweh repeatedly telling the Israelites not to worship other gods. His repeated threats are frequently to no avail as shown below. Therefore it seems that, at best, Israel was a henotheistic society rather than a monotheistic one.

 

Jeremiah 11
13 You have as many gods as you have towns, O Judah; and the altars you have set up to burn incense to that shameful god Baal are as many as the streets of Jerusalem.'

Exodus 32
1 When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him."

Exodus 32
4 He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt."

Exodus 32
8 They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.'

Exodus 32
23 They said to me, 'Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him.'

Numbers 25
1 While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with Moabite women,
2 who invited them to the sacrifices to their gods. The people ate and bowed down before these gods.
3 So Israel joined in worshiping the Baal of Peor. And the Lord's anger burned against them.

Deuteronomy 29
26 They went off and worshiped other gods and bowed down to them, gods they did not know, gods he had not given them.

Deuteronomy 31
16 And the Lord said to Moses: "You are going to rest with your fathers, and these people will soon prostitute themselves to the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake me and break the covenant I made with them.

Deuteronomy 31
18 And I will certainly hide my face on that day because of all their wickedness in turning to other gods.

Deuteronomy 31
20 When I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, the land I promised on oath to their forefathers, and when they eat their fill and thrive, they will turn to other gods and worship them, rejecting me and breaking my covenant.

Deuteronomy 32
16 They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols.

Joshua 24
2 Joshua said to all the people, "This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: 'Long ago your forefathers, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the River and worshiped other gods.

Joshua 24
14 "Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your forefathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.

Joshua 24
15 But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord."

Judges 2
11 Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. 12 They forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They provoked the Lord to anger 13 because they forsook him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.
12 They forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They provoked the Lord to anger

Judges 2
17 Yet they would not listen to their judges but prostituted themselves to other gods and worshiped them. Unlike their fathers, they quickly turned from the way in which their fathers had walked, the way of obedience to the Lord 's commands.

Judges 2
19 But when the judge died, the people returned to ways even more corrupt than those of their fathers, following other gods and serving and worshiping them. They refused to give up their evil practices and stubborn ways.

Judges 5
8 When they chose new gods,
war came to the city gates,
and not a shield or spear was seen
among forty thousand in Israel.

Judges 3
6 They took their daughters in marriage and gave their own daughters to their sons, and served their gods.

Judges 6
1 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites.

Judges 6
10 I said to you, 'I am the Lord your God; do not worship the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you live.' But you have not listened to me."

Judges 10
6 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. They served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, and the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites and the gods of the Philistines. And because the Israelites forsook the Lord and no longer served him,

Judges 10
13 But you have forsaken me and served other gods, so I will no longer save you.
14 Go and cry out to the gods you have chosen. Let them save you when you are in trouble!"

1 Samuel 7
3 And Samuel said to the whole house of Israel, "If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines."

1 Samuel 8
8 As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you.

1 Kings 9
9 People will answer, 'Because they have forsaken the Lord their God, who brought their fathers out of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them-that is why the Lord brought all this disaster on them.' "

1 Kings 11
1 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh's daughter-Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites.
2 They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, "You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods." Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love.
3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray.
4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been.
5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites.
6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord ; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done.
7 On a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable god of Moab, and for Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites.
8 He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their gods.

1 Kings 12
28 After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, "It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt."

1 Kings 14
9 You have done more evil than all who lived before you. You have made for yourself other gods, idols made of metal; you have provoked me to anger and thrust me behind your back.

2 Kings 17
7 All this took place because the Israelites had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up out of Egypt from under the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt. They worshiped other gods
8 and followed the practices of the nations the Lord had driven out before them, as well as the practices that the kings of Israel had introduced.
9 The Israelites secretly did things against the Lord their God that were not right. From watchtower to fortified city they built themselves high places in all their towns.
10 They set up sacred stones and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every spreading tree.
11 At every high place they burned incense, as the nations whom the Lord had driven out before them had done. They did wicked things that provoked the Lord to anger.
12 They worshiped idols, though the Lord had said, "You shall not do this."
13 The Lord warned Israel and Judah through all his prophets and seers: "Turn from your evil ways. Observe my commands and decrees, in accordance with the entire Law that I commanded your fathers to obey and that I delivered to you through my servants the prophets."
14 But they would not listen and were as stiff-necked as their fathers, who did not trust in the Lord their God.
15 They rejected his decrees and the covenant he had made with their fathers and the warnings he had given them. They followed worthless idols and themselves became worthless. They imitated the nations around them although the Lord had ordered them, "Do not do as they do," and they did the things the Lord had forbidden them to do.
16 They forsook all the commands of the Lord their God and made for themselves two idols cast in the shape of calves, and an Asherah pole. They bowed down to all the starry hosts, and they worshiped Baal.
17 They sacrificed their sons and daughters in the fire. They practiced divination and sorcery and sold themselves to do evil in the eyes of the Lord, provoking him to anger.

2 Kings 18
4 He removed the high places, smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles. He broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to it. (It was called Nehushtan.)

2 Kings 22
17 Because they have forsaken me and burned incense to other gods and provoked me to anger by all the idols their hands have made, my anger will burn against this place and will not be quenched.'

2 Kings 23
24 Furthermore, Josiah got rid of the mediums and spiritists, the household gods, the idols and all the other detestable things seen in Judah and Jerusalem. This he did to fulfill the requirements of the law written in the book that Hilkiah the priest had discovered in the temple of the Lord.

1 Chronicles 5
25 But they were unfaithful to the God of their fathers and prostituted themselves to the gods of the peoples of the land, whom God had destroyed before them.

2 Chronicles 28
23 He offered sacrifices to the gods of Damascus, who had defeated him; for he thought, "Since the gods of the kings of Aram have helped them, I will sacrifice to them so they will help me." But they were his downfall and the downfall of all Israel.

2 Chronicles 28
25 In every town in Judah he built high places to burn sacrifices to other gods and provoked the Lord , the God of his fathers, to anger.

2 Chronicles 34
25 Because they have forsaken me and burned incense to other gods and provoked me to anger by all that their hands have made, my anger will be poured out on this place and will not be quenched.'

2 Chronicles 33
15 He got rid of the foreign gods and removed the image from the temple of the Lord, as well as all the altars he had built on the temple hill and in Jerusalem; and he threw them out of the city.

Psalm 82
1 God presides in the great assembly;
he gives judgment among the "gods":

Psalm 86
8 Among the gods there is none like you, O Lord;
no deeds can compare with yours.

Psalm 95
3 For the Lord is the great God,
the great King above all gods.

Psalm 96
4 For great is the Lord and most worthy of praise;
he is to be feared above all gods.

Psalm 138
1 I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart;
before the "gods" I will sing your praise.

Jeremiah 2
11 Has a nation ever changed its gods?
(Yet they are not gods at all.)
But my people have exchanged their Glory
for worthless idols.

Jeremiah 2
25 Do not run until your feet are bare
and your throat is dry.
But you said, 'It's no use!
I love foreign gods,
and I must go after them.'

Jeremiah 2
28 Where then are the gods you made for yourselves?
Let them come if they can save you
when you are in trouble!
For you have as many gods
as you have towns, O Judah.

Jeremiah 3
13 Only acknowledge your guilt-
you have rebelled against the Lord your God,
you have scattered your favors to foreign gods
under every spreading tree,
and have not obeyed me,' "
declares the Lord.

Jeremiah 3
24 From our youth shameful gods have consumed
the fruits of our fathers' labor-
their flocks and herds,
their sons and daughters.

Jeremiah 7
9 " 'Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known,

Jeremiah 7
18 The children gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough and make cakes of bread for the Queen of Heaven. They pour out drink offerings to other gods to provoke me to anger.

Jeremiah 11
10 They have returned to the sins of their forefathers, who refused to listen to my words. They have followed other gods to serve them. Both the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken the covenant I made with their forefathers.

Jeremiah 11
12 The towns of Judah and the people of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods to whom they burn incense, but they will not help them at all when disaster strikes.

Jeremiah 11
13 You have as many gods as you have towns, O Judah; and the altars you have set up to burn incense to that shameful god Baal are as many as the streets of Jerusalem.

Jeremiah 13
10 These wicked people, who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the stubbornness of their hearts and go after other gods to serve and worship them, will be like this belt-completely useless!

Jeremiah 13
25 This is your lot,
the portion I have decreed for you,"
declares the Lord ,
"because you have forgotten me
and trusted in false gods.

Jeremiah 16
19 O Lord, my strength and my fortress,
my refuge in time of distress,
to you the nations will come
from the ends of the earth and say,
"Our fathers possessed nothing but false gods,
worthless idols that did them no good.

Jeremiah 19
3 and say, 'Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem. This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Listen! I am going to bring a disaster on this place that will make the ears of everyone who hears of it tingle.
4 For they have forsaken me and made this a place of foreign gods; they have burned sacrifices in it to gods that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah ever knew, and they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent.
5 They have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as offerings to Baal-something I did not command or mention, nor did it enter my mind.

Jeremiah 19
12 This is what I will do to this place and to those who live here, declares the Lord. I will make this city like Topheth.
13 The houses in Jerusalem and those of the kings of Judah will be defiled like this place, Topheth-all the houses where they burned incense on the roofs to all the starry hosts and poured out drink offerings to other gods.' "

Jeremiah 22
8 "People from many nations will pass by this city and will ask one another, 'Why has the Lord done such a thing to this great city?'
9 And the answer will be: 'Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God and have worshiped and served other gods.' "

Jeremiah 32
28 Therefore, this is what the Lord says: I am about to hand this city over to the Babylonians and to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who will capture it.
29 The Babylonians who are attacking this city will come in and set it on fire; they will burn it down, along with the houses where the people provoked me to anger by burning incense on the roofs to Baal and by pouring out drink offerings to other gods.
30 "The people of Israel and Judah have done nothing but evil in my sight from their youth; indeed, the people of Israel have done nothing but provoke me with what their hands have made, declares the Lord .

Jeremiah 35
14 'Jonadab son of Recab ordered his sons not to drink wine and this command has been kept. To this day they do not drink wine, because they obey their forefather's command. But I have spoken to you again and again, yet you have not obeyed me.
15 Again and again I sent all my servants the prophets to you. They said, "Each of you must turn from your wicked ways and reform your actions; do not follow other gods to serve them. Then you will live in the land I have given to you and your fathers." But you have not paid attention or listened to me.
16 The descendants of Jonadab son of Recab have carried out the command their forefather gave them, but these people have not obeyed me.'

Jeremiah 44
2 "This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: You saw the great disaster I brought on Jerusalem and on all the towns of Judah. Today they lie deserted and in ruins
3 because of the evil they have done. They provoked me to anger by burning incense and by worshiping other gods that neither they nor you nor your fathers ever knew.
4 Again and again I sent my servants the prophets, who said, 'Do not do this detestable thing that I hate!'

Jeremiah 44
4 Again and again I sent my servants the prophets, who said, 'Do not do this detestable thing that I hate!'
5 But they did not listen or pay attention; they did not turn from their wickedness or stop burning incense to other gods.
6 Therefore, my fierce anger was poured out; it raged against the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem and made them the desolate ruins they are today.
7 "Now this is what the Lord God Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Why bring such great disaster on yourselves by cutting off from Judah the men and women, the children and infants, and so leave yourselves without a remnant?
8 Why provoke me to anger with what your hands have made, burning incense to other gods in Egypt, where you have come to live? You will destroy yourselves and make yourselves an object of cursing and reproach among all the nations on earth.
9 Have you forgotten the wickedness committed by your fathers and by the kings and queens of Judah and the wickedness committed by you and your wives in the land of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem?

Jeremiah 44
15 Then all the men who knew that their wives were burning incense to other gods, along with all the women who were present-a large assembly-and all the people living in Lower and Upper Egypt, said to Jeremiah,

Jeremiah 48
35 In Moab I will put an end
to those who make offerings on the high places
and burn incense to their gods,"
declares the Lord.

Ezekiel 8
9 And he said to me, "Go in and see the wicked and detestable things they are doing here." 10 So I went in and looked, and I saw portrayed all over the walls all kinds of crawling things and detestable animals and all the idols of the house of Israel. 11 In front of them stood seventy elders of the house of Israel, and Jaazaniah son of Shaphan was standing among them. Each had a censer in his hand, and a fragrant cloud of incense was rising.
12 He said to me, "Son of man, have you seen what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the darkness, each at the shrine of his own idol? They say, 'The LORD does not see us; the LORD has forsaken the land.' " 13 Again, he said, "You will see them doing things that are even more detestable."
14 Then he brought me to the entrance to the north gate of the house of the LORD , and I saw women sitting there, mourning for Tammuz. 15 He said to me, "Do you see this, son of man? You will see things that are even more detestable than this."

Hosea 3
1 The Lord said to me, "Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes."

Hosea 14
1 Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God.
Your sins have been your downfall!
2 Take words with you
and return to the Lord.
Say to him:
"Forgive all our sins
and receive us graciously,
that we may offer the fruit of our lips.
3 Assyria cannot save us;
we will not mount war-horses.
We will never again say 'Our gods'
to what our own hands have made,
for in you the fatherless find compassion."

Amos 2
4 This is what the Lord says:
"For three sins of Judah,
even for four, I will not turn back {my wrath}.
Because they have rejected the law of the Lord
and have not kept his decrees,
because they have been led astray by false gods,
the gods their ancestors followed,

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