He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the pagan shrines and on the hills and under every green tree.
Parallel translations
- WEB He sacrificed and burned incense in the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.
- KJV And he sacrificed and burnt incense in the high places, and on the hills, and under every green tree.
- BSB And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.
- NKJV And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.
- NASB And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Ahaz sacrificed and burned incense at the high places, hills, and under every green tree. He fully embraced Canaanite-style idolatry.
Overview
The phrase 'under every green tree' is shorthand for the pervasive fertility worship of the Canaanites that Israel was commanded to destroy. Ahaz not only tolerated but actively practiced this idolatry throughout the land. His promotion of false worship corrupted Judah and provoked the LORD, setting the spiritual backdrop for the Assyrian crisis.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Deut 12:2You shall surely destroy all the places in which the nations that you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree.
- 1 Kgs 14:23For they also built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.
- Isa 66:17“Those who sanctify themselves and purify themselves to go to the gardens, behind one in the middle, eating pig’s meat, abominable things, and the mouse, they shall come to an end together,” says Yahweh.
- Isa 57:5–7you who inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every green tree; who kill the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?
- 2 Kgs 14:4However the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.
- Jer 17:2Even their children remember their altars and their Asherah poles by the green trees on the high hills.
- Isa 65:4who sit among the graves, and spend nights in secret places; who eat pig’s meat, and broth of abominable things is in their vessels;
- Ezek 20:28–29For when I had brought them into the land, which I swore to give to them, then they saw every high hill, and every thick tree, and they offered there their sacrifices, and there they presented the provocation of their offering; there also they made their pleasant aroma, and they poured out there their drink offerings.
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Christ at the center
Amid the long decline toward exile, the promise to David's house refuses to die; the flickering lamp kept burning anticipates the coming King who will not fail or be cut off.
How 2 Kings 16:4 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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