Bible Strands
2 Kings 17:29
Nevertheless, the people of each nation continued to make their own gods in the cities where they had settled, and they set them up in the shrines that the people of Samaria had made on the high places.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator describes the religious practices of foreign peoples resettled in Samaria by Assyria. This account follows the arrival of a deported priest sent to Bethel to instruct them in the worship of the LORD.
The words — The Hebrew עֹשִׂים (‘osim, "making") and בָּמֹת (bāmōt, "high places") anchor the verse. These terms denote the active crafting of idols and their placement in the unauthorized shrines previously constructed in the region.
The thread — This syncretistic pattern repeats Jeroboam’s earlier establishment of high place shrines and non-Levitical priests (1 Kings 12:31) and stands in direct contrast to the declaration that nations may follow their gods, but Israel alone will walk in the name of the LORD (Micah 4:5). It also mirrors the prophetic condemnation of altars on high places (1 Kings 13:32).
Why it lands — The text states that external religious instruction does not erase indigenous idolatry. It requires readers to identify and reject any accommodation that blends foreign worship with the worship of the LORD.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Howbeit every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt.
Cross-references
- 1 Kings 12:31 Jeroboam also built shrines on the high places and appointed from every class of people priests who were not Levites.
- Micah 4:5 Though all the nations may walk in the name of their gods, yet we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever.
- 1 Kings 13:32 for the message that he cried out by the word of the LORD against the altar in Bethel and against all the shrines on the high places in the cities of Samaria will surely come to pass.”
- Psalms 115:4 Their idols are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.
- Psalms 135:15 The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.
- Isaiah 44:9 All makers of idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless. Their witnesses fail to see or comprehend, so they are put to shame.
- Jeremiah 10:3 For the customs of the peoples are worthless; they cut down a tree from the forest; it is shaped with a chisel by the hands of a craftsman.
- Hosea 8:5 He has rejected your calf, O Samaria. My anger burns against them. How long will they be incapable of innocence?
- Romans 1:23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images of mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.