The Secrecy of Idolatry

A Meditation on Idolatry's Desire to be Hidden from God, and its own blindness.

“Cursed is the man that maketh any carved, or molten Image, an abhomination to the Lorde, the worke of the handes of the craftes man, and putteth it in a secrete place to worship it.”[1] So began Ash Wednesday in every English parish from 1559 to 1649. For 90 years, the English Church began its season of penitence with the words from Deuteronomy 27:15. Yet after a brutal civil war fought in no small part because an archbishop’s idolatry, the Church of England canonized the archbishop’s king and simplified its new Commination to “Cursed is the man that maketh any carved or molten image, to worship it.”[2] While still a verifiably accurate curse, it removed both the iniquitous degree of the sin and, more subtly, the way that idolatry creeps into the church: secretly.

Idolatry is the ubiquitous accusation of Evangelical preaching and writing. Nearly every week an Assemblies of God homeschool mom is accused of idolizing power by voting Republican, confessional Presbyterians of idolizing the nuclear family, urbanite church planters of idolizing sex, suburban dads of idolizing football, and children of idolizing their barbie dolls’ unrealistic body proportions. The list grows long: malls are forms of worship, Whiteness is an idol, abortion is a sacrifice, Confederate monuments are idols, American flags are idols, money is an idol, suburbia itself an idol.[3] Usually such things are lent credence by John Calvin’s famous dictum, “the human heart is a factory of idols,” or perhaps St. Augustine’s “disordered loves” lingo. But I, alongside Dr. Stephen Fowl, am skeptical of such accusations against fellow Christians.[4] This is not because idolatry is insignificant or some of these things might not be idolatry, but because Scripture actually suggests it is the preeminent sin into which God’s people are most likely to fall, and any accusation of idolatry from a Christian must be followed by swift action against the idolater or risk cursing the entire church where they attend and land where they dwell.[5] Since hardly any discipline is taken against the masses who are accused of idolatry (which would be impossible given the vast number of idols described), the accusation loses all meaning, and becomes the reductionistic and convictionless, “You shall not make for yourself any idol.”[6]

Discussing all the aspects of idolatry found in Deuteronomy 27:15 would be onerous for a paper of this length, but beginning with this warning in Holy Scripture against secret idolatry is appropriate, as it both opens the longest penitential season of the church year, and also begins the closing moments of Moses’ life with Israel and his passing to the young Israelites all the lessons their fathers failed to learn in the wilderness. It is the sober reminder God gives his people after twice depositing the Law—a sort of exclamation point to the Law—and prophecy about the future of Israel.[7]

For context, the entire series of curses is shown below, though the focus of this study will be on the opening curse as it relates to the theme of idolatry across the entire Law of God. While many themes of idolatry emerge across the book, the secrecy of deceit emerges as a prominent theme—all the below curses are things that would be done in private without witnesses.[8]

“‘Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the Lord, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.’ And all the people shall answer and say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his mother.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor's landmark.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who misleads a blind man on the road.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his father's wife, because he has uncovered his father's nakedness.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who lies with any kind of animal.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his sister, whether the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his mother-in-law.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who strikes down his neighbor in secret.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ “‘Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’[9]

These are the transgressions that cannot be seen by eyewitnesses or judged by priests, the sins that require a proper posture of the heart and are seen only by God. When Israel enters its inheritance, it must keep these laws, the laws not witnessed by man or enforced by social pressure. To keep these is to keep the Lord and his land, and to lose them is to be rooted out of the land as they rooted themselves out of God.[10]

The theme of secret idolatry is found throughout the Scriptures, and whenever sin begins, it begins with a closed heart, the desire to be unseen. Laban, a tricky man, who knew God and was at related to God-fearers, apparently hid multiple idols.[11] In a great twist of fate, his own eyes were blinded by his daughter who plundered and then hid them from his sight. Laban’s secret and hitherto unmentioned idolatry seems reflective of his entire life, and it makes the reader wonder if his idolatry was the cause or an object of his continual deception. Other Scriptural examples will further help us discern this pattern, as will later Scriptural commentary on the characteristics if idolatry.

Turning to Judges 17, we find a fascinating story with a number of the prohibited elements from Deuteronomy. An Ephraimite named Micah steals (presumably coveting) 1,100 pieces of silver from his mother, and upon confessing it to her, she blesses him, and makes out of two elevenths of the silver an idol from a craftsman and sets in in his house. Micah ordains his son as a priest first, but desiring a better priest and another son, he then bribes a Levite to become his son and priest on his behalf. What begins as a family cult begins to get out of hand. Shortly thereafter, 600 Danites, armed with weapons of war, hearing of this family cult, steal the crafted image and convince the Levite to steal the household gods and be to them “a father and a priest.”[12] When Micah realizes what has been stolen, he chases after them, “but they were too strong for him, [so] he turned and went back to his home.”[13] The Danites then set up the image, which outlasted both the priestly family and the entire period of the Judges, stretching until the time of King David as an alternative shrine to an alternative god for the mountainous tribes of the north.

Leaving aside the political implications of an alternative god for the supporters of King Saul’s lineage in the Israelite civil war between David and Ish-bosheth, we see a number of echoes of Laban and Jacob in the story. First and foremost, the return of household gods belonging to a deceitful man. Both are also manipulative, Micah going so far as to convince his mother to bless him for blatant sin, and then giving him possession of a crafted idol, and then manipulate a man to become like a son to him, not unlike Laban’s manipulating Jacob to live with him for fourteen years and manage his pastures. When the adopted “son” finally leaves the family (and his “brother”, the now second priest), he takes the household gods with him, the Hebrew word for household gods used in both cases being terephim.[14] The priest and his inherited Danite family then separate the children and livestock from the men, in a fashion reminiscent of Jacob’s division of his family prior to meeting Esau.[15] But in the following pages it is seen that the priest’s new Danite family is stronger than their enemies, scaring off Micah and the Ephraimites, and then burning a city to the ground and naming it after their forefathers instead of reconciling with their brothers like Esau and Jacob do. The Judges story echoes the building of the covenant people of Israel, but with an idolatrous key running through it. This is a new people, but it is a people built on deceit and idolatry, not on promises of God.

The Psalms have been rightly described as “The key to figurative and symbolic language of Holy Writ,” and it is there we will turn next.[16] Most of the sins mentioned in conjunction with idolatry, namely covetousness, deception, sexual immorality, abuse and manipulation of language, are mentioned in Psalm 10, where we see described the characters of Laban and Micah.[17] The “ungodly in his pride persecutes the poor [with] the crafty schemes that he has imagined…His mouth is full of cursing, deceit, and fraud, under his tongue are ungodliness and vanity…He has said in his heart, ‘God has forgotten; he hides away his face, and he will never see it.’”[18] Rightly did Calvin say of these men,

By these words I understand that through their heaven-daring presumption, they subvert all piety and justice as if there were no God sitting in heaven…Not that they plainly and distinctly deny the existence of a God, but then they strip him of his power. Now, God would be merely like an idol, if, contented with an inactive existence, he should divest himself of his office of judge.[19]

Calvin recognizes that the man of this character treats the divine God like an idol, and for good reason—the man who does so is himself an idolater. Man conceives of God as an idol when he himself is an idolater, the true reflection of the idol. Psalm 105:8 rightly observes that “Those who make them are like them, and so are all who put their trust in them.”[20] This synergistic relationship of idol and idolater is succinctly put in Wisdom of Solomon, “But that which is made with hands is accursed, as well as he that made it: he because he made it, and it because, being corruptible, it was called god. For the ungodly and his ungodliness are both alike hateful unto God, for that which is made shall be punished with him that made it.”[21] The idol and idolater become almost one flesh, and they fall under one punishment. They are spiritually united, often through literal intercourse, an act usually done in private, but in times of apostasy and rebellion, that too becomes a public affair.[22]

Secret worship is the first step to ensnarement. Idolatry repeatedly begins in Israel with secret and deceptive sin, and only later, sometimes years and sometimes generations later, does it bloom into open national apostasy. Secrecy is what gives idolatry its hold on man, and then it hardens his heart and in time blinds his eyes through union with it.[23] Secret, covetous idolatry yields blinding-yet-obvious idolatry.

First the idolater hides his idols, and appears righteous, such as Laban and Micah, then he is blinded by them, and his tyranny grows. Then he attributes to God the blindness which is his own, and to himself the knowledge which is God’s. Finally, he is destroyed in his blindness by his own folly through God’s appointed agents, sometimes through outside agents like Phineas or Babylon, but frequently through the very scheme designed to benefit the idolater, such as Laban’s manipulated daughter, Rachel or Micah’s bribed son, the Levite. In all cases Psalm 10 is again instructive, for it promises that God will “break the power of the ungodly and malicious; search out his ungodliness until [he has] brought it all to light.”[24]

Bringing the biblical theology to a close, a little historical commentary is needed. No false worshipper thought they were worshipping the statue in front of them. They were always images pointing towards a greater divinity. This is why the greatest defeats of pagan gods happen not to the images themselves, but to their collective spiritual power.[25]

In considering the role of union with idols, it is important to remember the worshipper does not intend to worship the crafted object in front of him: the idolater always has some image beyond that which he is trying to unite himself to in worship. But, as is repeatedly foretold in Scripture, despite the idolater’s best efforts, he always becomes like the physical object, not the spirit behind it. This is necessary for applying to ourselves.

Americans rarely craft images from stone and wood to worship. But when we partake secretly of the attendant sins of idolatry, we find ourselves becoming like inanimate objects nonetheless. The United States does not worship Baal, but we do give PornHub all the service of idolatrous worship. By only observing the act of creating from nature false images such an application seems absurd. But relying on methods of tested maximalist interpretation, we can faithfully observe the cluster of repeated and associated words and ideas around idolatry, and draw from that notions implicit in our own lives.[26]

When adults first hear, receive, and understand the gospel of the kingdom of God, it has been remarked the world over how zealous they are to share the truth. Frequently older Christians look back and if anything, shake their head at their arrogance of knowing more than they do. The Holy Spirit fills Christians with a love and zeal. Contrast this with the first contact a child has to pornography, about the age of twelve, and the response had upon seeing it.[27] It is always with shame. It is an idolatry that festers and creates guilt and inaction. But that inaction does not stay so inactive. It creates a hardness of heart towards God’s Law, and even an antipathy for righteousness. After engaging it, the exposing light of Psalm 10 dims, and Scripture’s prophecy loses its gravity. When an entire generation secretly nurtures an attachment to “fake” sex, it has a cataclysmic affect.[28] What begins as a secret shame hardens the heart toward Scripture, and then blinds the worshipper to reality altogether. The idolater can no longer see the world, or hear God’s word, or taste God’s grace. Its outworking is clear. It destroys families, leaves husbands unable to lead their families, makes women covetous of man’s identity and men covetous of other women. It encourages sexual deviancy as Wisdom 14 articulates in detail, and ultimately tears down any society which is engaged in it. It in every sense undermines the soul and the corrodes the society immersed in its grip.

When Jesus Christ saves us, he imputes his righteousness to us, and takes on our sin and shame. He is exposed and naked, we are clothed in glory. But the idolater reverses this, and imputes to God his blindness and foolish finitude, and imagines in his heart that he takes from God true knowledge and understanding, clothing himself in the rocks and trees that he worships.

The Garden of Eden expresses the inversion of worship perfectly. Adam and Eve first partook of false worship secretly, and then realizing their sin, they tried to hide its effects. But their deceit was ineffective, and they revealed themselves to God. But even after revealing the consequences of their actions, Adam and Eve still avoid responsibility, showing the incompletion of their repentance. The incomplete repentance and secretive nature of sin continues, such that Cain follows up his idolatrous, covetous sacrifice with a murder which he then evades taking responsibility for.[29] Even when disciplined for his sin he does not abate, but complains and flees from the Lord’s presence, never heeding God’s command to wander the earth, nor God’s blessing in protecting him. Instead, blindly, he furthers his own sin and builds a city for his son in his own disobedience, using God’s protection as license for further pride.

Man can only answer pride with greater pride, and he can only conceal his secret idolatry with more, even more egregious idolatry. Cain completely fails to see or hear God’s grace, and in the end his descendants are all killed. Cain’s line is barren and empty. Attempts to solve sexual immorality through appeals to masculinity or social policy apart from the life imputed and communicated in the crucified king are “build[ing] again the things…destroyed” and with Paul would be “mak[ing us] a transgressor.”[30] Like the Judaizers who saw in the law their salvation, many see through self-discipline or political action a way to minimize idolatry.[31] Indeed, while good laws can and should protect the citizenry, faith in law will yield the result of “an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.”[32]

No human worship, and no human action can liberate man from idolatry. It necessarily requires “the faith of the Son of God,” who alone can raise our idolatrous bodies and can give us ears that hear, eyes that see, and throats that sing.[33] “The problem with the law isn’t that it sets too high a bar; the problem is that it doesn’t liberate us at all. The law cannot raise the dead. Jesus can.”[34] It is only in union with Christ, giving thanks to Christ, being filled with the Spirit of Christ, that idolatry can finally be silenced, and the hearts of man purified “by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”[35]

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[1] Book of Common Prayer, 1559. The Churching of Women and Commination. http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/1559/Churching_of_Women_1559.htm.

[2] Book of Common Prayer, 1662. The Commination (John Baskerville, 1762), May 17, http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/1662/commination.pdf.

[3] Stephen E. Fowl, Idolatry (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2019), 127.

[4] Ibid., 125.

[5] All Covenants have attendant blessings and curses.

[6] Book of Common Prayer, 2019 (Anglican Liturgy Press, 2019), 100.

[7] Ajith Fernando, Deuteronomy: Loving Obedience to a Loving God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 584.

[8] Peter Craigie, The Book of Deuteronomy (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1976), 232-234.

[9] Deuteronomy 27:15-26, English Standard Version.

[10] Deuteronomy 28:63, ESV.

[11] Genesis 31:53, 34, ESV.

[12] Judges 18:19, ESV.

[13] Judges 18:26, ESV.

[14] Michael Wilcock, The Message of Judges (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992), 155. Bible Gateway’s Encyclopedia notes that “their possession constituted the headship of the household with all the rights attendant thereto.” If this is accurate, it would help explain why he went from being a “son” to a “father” whilst remaining static in his office.

[15] Genesis 33:2.

[16] Roderick Campbell, Israel and the New Covenant (Tyler, TX: Geneva Ministries, [1954] 1983), 60. quoted in James Jordan, Through New Eyes: Developing a Biblical View of the World (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 1999), 14-15.

[17] I Corinthians 6:9-10; Ephesians 5:5-6,17-18.

[18] Psalm 10:2,7,12, New Coverdale Psalter.

[19] John Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms, Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1981), 139.

[20] Psalm 115:8, New Coverdale Psalter.

[21] Wisdom 14:8-10, Third Millennium Bible.

[22] Wisdom 14:23-26; I Corinthians 6:16; Numbers 25:6.

[23] G.K. Beale, We Become What We Worship (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2008), 16.

[24] Psalm 10:17, New Coverdale Psalter.

[25] Alastair Roberts and Andrew Wilson, Echoes of Exodus (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2018), 42.

[26] Beale, We Become, 24-26. See also Roberts and Wilson, Echoes, 25-26.

[27] Cecilia King. “Three Quarters of Teenagers Have Seen Online Pornography by Age,” The New York Times, January 10, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/10/technology/porn-teens-online-report.html.

[28] Young, Bonnie, "The Impact of Timing of Pornography Exposure on Mental Health, Life Satisfaction, and Sexual Behavior" (2017). All Theses and Dissertations. 6727. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd/6727.

[29] Roberts and Wilson, Echoes, 108.

[30] Galatians 2:19, TMB.

[31] Beale, We Become, 177.

[32] Colossians 2:20 ESV. For contemporary application of this, consider the classic Romanist doctrine of conscience typified by Tommaso Maria Cardinal Zigliara, OP at https://thejosias.com/2015/11/23/on-liberty-of-conscience/ and compare over and against even the most extreme contemporary literature on Reformed politics of conscience in Stephen Wolfe, The Case for Christian Nationalism (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 2022), 353-396, “Liberty of Conscience.”

[33] Galatians 2:20, TMB. See also Psalm 115:7b New Coverdale Psalter.

[34] Peter Leithart, “Issue #298,” The Theopolitan Newsletter, 2023, https://mailchi.mp/25b6d11ed8f6/the-theopolitan-1141121?e=9efd39b94d.

[35] Galatians 2:20, TMB.