e. In the same vision the prophet saw women weep- ing for Tammuz (ver. 13, 14), known to be the same as Adonis, from whom the fourth month of the Syrian year was named. Tliis worship was. probably intro- duced by Ahaz from Syria. See Tajoiuz.
f. The image of jealousy, nitpj??! ?^&, spoken of in the same passage, which was placed in the Temple, has not been satisfactorily explained. The meaning may only be tliat it was an image of a false god, or there may be a play in the second part of the appellation upon the proper name. We cannot, however, suggest any name that might be thus intended. See Jealousy, Image of.
(J. The brazen serpent, having become an object of idolatrous worship, was destroyed by Hezeldah (2 Kings xviii, 4). See Brazex Seri'ent.
/(. jNIoloch-worship Avas not only celebrated at the high place Solomon had made, but at Tophcth, in the valley of the sons of Hinnom, where children were made to ]iass through the fire to the Ammonitish abomination. This place, as well as Solomon's altars, Josiah defiled, and we read of no later worship of Moloch, Cheraosh, and Ashtoreth. See jMolocii.
i. For the supposed divinity inx of Isa. Lxvi, 17 (compare Meier, Be uno deo Assijriorum, Helmst. 1734), see AcHAD.
The new population placed by the king of Assyria in the cities of Samaria adopted a strange mixtiu-c of re- ligions. Terrified at the destruction by lions of some of their number, they petitioned the king of jVssyria,
ard an Israelitish priest was sent to them. They then adopted the old worship at high places, and still ser\'ed their own idols. The people of Babylon made Succoth- benoth; the Cuthites, Nergal ; the Ilamathites, Ashima; the Avites, Nibhaz and Tartak ; and the people of Se- pharvaim burned their chilchen to their native gods, Adramnielecli and Anammeledi. Nergal is a well- known Babylonian idol, and the occurrence of the ele- ment mtkch (king) in the names of the Molechs of Se- pharvaim is very remarkable (2 Kings xvii, 24-41). — Kitto.
4. The Babylonian Exile was an effectual rebuke or the national sin. It is true that even during the cap- tivity the devotees of false worship plied their craft as prophets and diviners (Jer. xxix, 8; Ezek. xiii), and the Jews who fled to Egypt carried with them recollec- tions of tlio material prosperity which attended their idolatrous sacrifices in Judah, and to the neglect of which they attributed their exiled condition (Jer. xliv, 17, 18). One of the first difficulties, indeed, with which Ezra had to contend, and which brought him wellnigh to despair, was the haste with which his countrymen took them foreign Avives of the people of the land, and followed them in all their abominations (Ezra ix). Tlie priests and rulers, to whom he looked for assistance in liis great enterprise, were among the first to fall away (Ezra ix, 2 ; x, 18 ; Neh. vi, 17, 18 ; xiii, 23). StiU, the post-exilian prophets speak of idolatry as an evil of the past, Zechariah foretelling the time when the very names of the false gods would be forgotten (xiii, 2). In Malachi we see that a cold formalism Avas already the national sin, and such was ever after the case A\ith the Jewish people. The Babylonian Exile, therefore, may be said to have purified the Jcavs from their idolatrous tendencies. How this great change Avas wrought does not appear. Partly, no doubt, it Avas due to the pious examples of Ezra and Nehemiali; partly, perhaps, to the Persian contempt for the lower kinds of idolatrj', Avhich insured a respect for the HebrcAV religion on the part of the goA'ernment ; partly to the sight of the ful- filment of God's predicted judgments upon the idolatrous nations Avhich the Jews had either sought as allies or feared as enemies. See Exile.
5. Years passed by, and the names of the idols of Ca- naan had been forgotten, Avhen the Hebrews Avere as- sailed by a ncAv danger. Greek idolatry under Alexan- der and his successors Avas practised throughout the civilized Avorld. The conquests of Alexander in Asia caused Greek influence to be extensively felt, and Greek idolatry to be first tolerated and then practised by the .Jews (1 Mace, i, 43-50, 54). Some place-hunting Jbavs Avere base enough to adopt it. At first the Greek princes Avho ruled Palestine Avisely forbore to interfere with the Hebrew religion. The politic earlier Ptole- mies CA'en encouraged it; but Avhen the country had fall- en into the hands of the Seleucida>, Antiochus Epipha- nes, reversing his father's policy of toleration, seized Jerusalem, set up an idol-altar to Jupiter in the Temple itself, and forbade the observance of the lav,: Wcaldy supported by a miserable faction, he had to depend AvhoHy upon his military power. The attempt of An- tiochus to establish this form of Avorship Avas vigorously resisted by Mattathias (1 INIacc. ii, 23-26), Avho Avas joined in his rebellion by the Assidsans (A^er. 42), and destroyed the altars at Avhich the king commanded them to sacrifice (1 Mace, ii, 25, 45). The erection of synagogues has been assigned as a reason for the com- parative purity of the Jewish Avorship after the Captiv- ity (Prideaux, Conn, i, 374), Avhilc another cause has been discovered in the hatred for images acquired by the JeAvs in their intercourse Avith the Persians. The Maccabtean rcA'olt, small in its beginning, had the na- tional heart on its side, and, after a long and varied struggle, achieved more than the nation had cA-er before effected since the days of the Judges. Thenceforward idolatry was to the Jcav the religion of his enemies, au^- naturally made no perverts.