Exile Because of Idolatry

7 And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, ^fwho had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods 8 ^gand walked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, ^hand in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced. 9 And the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. They built for themselves high places in all their towns, ⁱfrom watchtower to fortified city. 10 They set up for themselves ^jpillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, 11 and there they made offerings on all the high places, as the nations did whom the Lord carried away before them. And they did wicked things, provoking the Lord to anger, 12 and they served idols, ^kof which the Lord had said to them, “You shall not do this.” 13 Yet the Lord ^lwarned Israel and Judah ^mby every prophet ⁿand every seer, saying, ^o“Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes, in accordance with all the Law that I commanded your fathers, and that I sent to you by my servants the prophets.”

14 But they would not listen, ^pbut were stubborn, as their fathers had been, who did not believe in the Lord their God. 15 They despised his statutes ^qand his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after ^rfalse idols ^sand became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the ^tLord had commanded them that they should not do like them. 16 And they abandoned all the commandments of the Lord their God, and made for themselves metal images of ^utwo calves; and they ^vmade an Asherah and ^wworshiped all the host of heaven and served ^xBaal. 17 ^yAnd they burned their sons and their daughters as offerings¹ and used ^zdivination and ^aomens and ^bsold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger. 18 Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel and removed them out of his sight. None was left but ^cthe tribe of Judah only.

19 ^dJudah also did not keep the commandments of the Lord their God, but walked in the customs that Israel had introduced. 20 And the Lord rejected all the descendants of Israel and afflicted them ^eand gave them into the hand of plunderers, until he had cast them out of his sight.

21 ^fWhen he had torn Israel from the house of David, ^gthey made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. And Jeroboam drove Israel from following the Lord ^hand made them commit great sin. 22 The people of Israel walked in all the sins that Jeroboam did. They did not depart from them, 23 until the Lord removed Israel out of his sight, ⁱas he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. ^jSo Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day.

1 ^kIn his days, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up, and Jehoiakim became his servant for three years. Then he turned and rebelled against him. 2 And the Lord sent against him bands of the ^lChaldeans and ^mbands of the Syrians and bands of the Moabites and bands of the Ammonites, and sent them against Judah to destroy it, ⁿaccording to the word of the Lord that he spoke by his servants the prophets. 3 Surely this came upon Judah at the command of the Lord, to remove them out of his sight, ^ofor the sins of Manasseh, according to all that he had done, 4 and also ^pfor the innocent blood that he had shed. For he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, and the Lord would not pardon.