Deuteronomy 7:5

7:5 Instead, this is what you must do to them: You must tear down their altars, shatter their sacred pillars, ¹  cut down their sacred Asherah poles, ²  and burn up their idols.

Deuteronomy 12:3

12:3 You must tear down their altars, shatter their sacred pillars, ³  burn up their sacred Asherah poles, ⁴  and cut down the images of their gods; you must eliminate their very memory from that place.

Deuteronomy 7:25

7:25 You must burn the images of their gods, but do not covet the silver and gold that covers them so much that you take it for yourself and thus become ensnared by it; for it is abhorrent ⁵  to the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 9:21

9:21 As for your sinful thing ⁶  that you had made, the calf, I took it, melted it down, ⁷  ground it up until it was as fine as dust, and tossed the dust into the stream that flows down the mountain.

Deuteronomy 12:31

12:31 You must not worship the Lord your God the way they do! ⁸  For everything that is abhorrent ⁹  to him, ¹⁰  everything he hates, they have done when worshiping their gods. They even burn up their sons and daughters before their gods!

Deuteronomy 13:16

13:16 You must gather all of its plunder into the middle of the plaza ¹¹  and burn the city and all its plunder as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It will be an abandoned ruin ¹²  forever – it must never be rebuilt again.

[7:5]  ¹ 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 Lord (Gen 28:18, 22; 31:13; 35:14; Exod 24:4), these pillars were usually associated with pagan cults and rituals (Exod 23:24; 34:13; Deut 12:3; 1 Kgs 14:23; 2 Kgs 17:10; Hos 3:4; 10:1; Jer 43:13).

[7:5]  ² 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).

[12:3]  ³ sn Sacred pillars. These are the stelae (stone pillars; the Hebrew term is מַצֵּבֹת, matsevot) associated with Baal worship, perhaps to mark a spot hallowed by an alleged visitation of the gods. See also Deut 7:5.

[12:3]  ⁴ sn Sacred Asherah poles. The Hebrew term (plural) is אֲשֵׁרִים (’asherim). See note on the word “(leafy) tree” in v. 2, and also Deut 7:5.

[7:25]  ⁵ tn The Hebrew word תּוֹעֵבָה (to’evah, “abhorrent; detestable”) describes anything detestable to the Lord because of its innate evil or inconsistency with his own nature and character. Frequently such things (or even persons) must be condemned to annihilation (חֵרֶם, kherem) lest they become a means of polluting or contaminating others (cf. Deut 13:17; 20:17-18). See M. Grisanti, NIDOTTE 4:315.

[9:21]  ⁷ tn Heb “your sin.” This is a metonymy in which the effect (sin) stands for the cause (the metal calf).

[9:21]  ⁸ tn Heb “burned it with fire.”

[12:31]  ⁹ tn Heb “you must not do thus to/for the Lord your God.”

[12:31]  ¹⁰ tn See note on this term at Deut 7:25.

[12:31]  ¹¹ tn Heb “every abomination of the Lord.” See note on the word “his” in v. 27.

[13:16]  ¹¹ tn Heb “street.”

[13:16]  ¹² tn Heb “mound”; NAB “a heap of ruins.” The Hebrew word תֵּל (tel) refers to this day to a ruin represented especially by a built-up mound of dirt or debris (cf. Tel Aviv, “mound of grain”).