Iconoclasm

Passages on this topic

From Nave’s Topical Bible (1896), a historical reference index. The groupings are Nave’s; the verses are shown in the text used across this site.

Idols to be destroyed

• Exodus 23:24 You must not bow down to their gods or serve them or follow their practices. Instead, you are to demolish them and smash their sacred stones to pieces.
• Exodus 34:13 Rather, you must tear down their altars, smash their sacred stones, and chop down their Asherah poles.
• Numbers 33:52 you must drive out before you all the inhabitants of the land, destroy all their carved images and cast idols, and demolish all their high places.
• Deuteronomy 7:5 Instead, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn their idols in the fire.
• Deuteronomy 7:25–26 You must burn up the images of their gods; do not covet the silver and gold that is on them or take it for yourselves, or you will be ensnared by it; for it is detestable to the LORD your God. And you must not bring any detestable thing into your house, or you, like it, will be set apart for destru…
• Deuteronomy 12:1–4 These are the statutes and ordinances you must be careful to follow all the days you live in the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess. Destroy completely all the places where the nations you are dispossessing have served their gods— atop the high mountains, on the h…
• Judges 2:2 and you are not to make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall tear down their altars.’ Yet you have not obeyed My voice. What is this you have done?
• Jeremiah 50:2 “Announce and declare to the nations; lift up a banner and proclaim it; hold nothing back when you say, ‘Babylon is captured; Bel is put to shame; Marduk is shattered, her images are disgraced, her idols are broken in pieces.’

Destroyed by

Jacob

• Genesis 35:2–4 So Jacob told his household and all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods that are among you. Purify yourselves and change your garments. Then let us arise and go to Bethel. I will build an altar there to God, who answered me in my day of distress. He has been with me wherever I have gone…

Moses

• Exodus 32:19–20 As Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, he burned with anger and threw the tablets out of his hands, shattering them at the base of the mountain. Then he took the calf they had made, burned it in the fire, ground it to powder, and scattered the powder over the face of the wat…

Gideon

• Judges 6:28–32 When the men of the city got up in the morning, there was Baal’s altar torn down, with the Asherah pole cut down beside it and the second bull offered up on the newly built altar. “Who did this?” they said to one another. And after they had investigated thoroughly, they were told, “Gideon son of Jo…

David

• 2 Samuel 5:21 There the Philistines abandoned their idols, and David and his men carried them away.
• 1 Chronicles 14:12 There the Philistines abandoned their gods, and David ordered that they be burned in the fire.

Jehu

• 2 Kings 10:26–28 They brought out the sacred pillar of the temple of Baal and burned it. They also demolished the sacred pillar of Baal. Then they tore down the temple of Baal and made it into a latrine, which it is to this day. Thus Jehu eradicated Baal from Israel,

Jehoiada

• 2 Kings 11:18 So all the people of the land went to the temple of Baal and tore it down. They smashed the altars and idols to pieces, and they killed Mattan the priest of Baal in front of the altars. And Jehoiada the priest posted guards for the house of the LORD.

Hezekiah

• 2 Kings 18:3–6 And he did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, just as his father David had done. He removed the high places, shattered the sacred pillars, and cut down the Asherah poles. He also demolished the bronze snake called Nehushtan that Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had burned inc…

Josiah

• 2 Kings 23:4–20 Then the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, the priests second in rank, and the doorkeepers to remove from the temple of the LORD all the articles made for Baal, Asherah, and all the host of heaven. And he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron and carried their ashes to Bethel.…

Asa

• 2 Chronicles 14:3–5 He removed the foreign altars and high places, shattered the sacred pillars, and chopped down the Asherah poles. He commanded the people of Judah to seek the LORD, the God of their fathers, and to observe the law and the commandments. He also removed the high places and incense altars from all the…
• 2 Chronicles 15:8–16 When Asa heard these words and the prophecy of Azariah son of Oded the prophet, he took courage and removed the detestable idols from the whole land of Judah and Benjamin and from the cities he had captured in the hill country of Ephraim. He then restored the altar of the LORD that was in front of…

Jehoshaphat

• 2 Chronicles 17:6 And his heart took delight in the ways of the LORD; furthermore, he removed the high places and Asherah poles from Judah.
• 2 Chronicles 19:3 However, some good is found in you, for you have removed the Asherah poles from the land and have set your heart on seeking God.”

Jews

• 2 Chronicles 30:14 They proceeded to remove the altars in Jerusalem and to take away the incense altars and throw them into the Kidron Valley.

Manasseh

• 2 Chronicles 33:15 He removed the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the LORD, along with all the altars he had built on the temple mount and in Jerusalem, and he dumped them outside the city.

See Idolatry