What An Idol Is

It’s an easy commandment to check off our list.  It’s the second out of the top 10, so it must be important.  And yet most of us feel like it’s a non-issue, so we don’t think much about it.  I’ve never carved a statue out of wood that I intended to worship, nor cast one out of gold or silver.  I’m fairly sure that you haven’t either.  And the very thought of it makes our modern minds wonder why this was such a struggle for the people of the past.  Why would they think that the little statue they just carved would now have the power to answer their prayers?  A few hours ago it was just another stick I’d found on the ground, but now I believe with all my heart that it has divine spiritual power; so much so that I’m willing to sacrifice my animals to it, or even my children.  Doesn’t that sound crazy?  This kind of cultural disparity can lead us to mistrust the Bible and categorize its stories as unrelatable and useless. 

So let’s seek some understanding about why idolatry was such an attractive sin to the ancient peoples of the Bible. 

The first thing we have to understand about idolatry is that the power of an idol was very real to the people.  Artistic images surround us.  Pictures and symbols are everywhere.  From icons on our phones to the billboards on the highway to the photos on your social media account.  We are surrounded by imagery that represents some kind of truth.  “Handicapped parking.”  “Check engine.”  “Apple, inc.”  We immediately know what these symbols mean.  But somewhere back in time there was an artist who invented those symbols, and our society has imbued them with meaning and power.  But the minds of pre-modern people were much more concrete.  They did not appreciate symbolism in the same ways we do.  So something that was artistic and representative held a magical quality… especially if it was presented in gold or other precious media.  We look at statues and might appreciate them for their beauty or for the skill involved in crafting them.  The idea of statues coming to life is the stuff of horror stories for us.  But the skill to cast or sculpt an idol was seen as a gift from the gods and, thus, an avenue to worship them.

The idol, itself, was sometimes seen as the physical body of the god being worshiped, but many cultures viewed it simply as a representation of the god.  In cultures with many idols of the same god, as with Baal in the Old Testament era, this second philosophy seems to be the case.  The idol was an image of the invisible god, and if you treated the image with respect and honor, you were treating the god with respect and honor.  Since the idol obviously didn’t move or speak, then it was not the idol itself that was making the rain or empowering the army or blessing the fertility of the people, but the invisible and powerful god that the idol represented.  The people needed a physical place to show their devotion to their invisible gods, and a temple or shrine was a great place to house an idol of the god they wanted to honor.

At its most basic, an idol is a visible image of a god with which worshipers can connect.  And the Lord God expressly forbids using idols to worship Him.  Other gods demanded beautiful shrines or statues, but the Lord God demanded that no worshiper try to capture his image in artwork.  There seem to be at least three reasons why.  First, God is simply too great to be captured in any physical medium.  No painting or statue can convey His majesty, power, beauty, and authority.  We belittle and insult Him when we do this.  Secondly, the use of idols in worship places the divine at the mercy of the worshiper.  Fear of a god’s curse is the only power keeping the human worshiper from applying fire to melt the idol down.  If the fear of that god ever dissolves, then the idol is powerless.  But our eternal Lord stands above our whims or manipulations.  And thirdly, the Lord God already has image-bearers in this world.  God created human beings in His own image.  When we want to see what God is like, we need only look in the face of our neighbor.  To sculpt a statue and say, “This is the image of God,” is to undercut our own position.  We are made in the image of God, we develop the mind of Christ as we feed on God’s Word, and we are indwelt and empowered by the Holy Spirit.  The Christian’s body, mind, and spirit reflect our Lord’s glory.  We need not seek His face in any worldly device