Exo 23:23 For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off.
Exo 23:24 Thou shalt not bow down
to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images.
The first thing that I question.. if "gods" in this verse refers only to manmade idols, statues, inanimate objects,
then how can one do "after their works" ?
In Genesis the serpent tells Eve:
Gen 3:5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened,
and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
Not that man will construct images to bow down to, but they themselves will be bowed down to. Making themselves gods.
Exo 23:31 And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee.
Exo 23:32 Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.
Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, Jebusites, and Philistines.
Think Politicians. Those in authority over the "common" people.
They are held in high esteem. They make the laws, they make the rules.
They have power to punish you if you break them.
These are those gods that the serpent told Eve we would become.
It was no lie. He never said we would become God. But that we would be as gods. Passing both laws and judgements on eachother.
"My question is strange gods the same as strange flesh…as in gods and lords that are flesh who will not continue by reason of their infirmities? "
But they hand that "power" down to their sons, or daughters. They select people to lead them and set them up as "gods"
Every country, Every nation today has gods in position of power that rule over them.
They make laws, they pass judgements, they determine punishments, and even have the power of pardon.
This "authority" gets passed to others, whether by death or conquest.
Here in the States we have "elections" . We believe it is the people who are choosing who will reign over them in their name.
But the truth is, whoever gets elected has already been pre-selected. So whoever you choose is given by those who make those choices available.
Until somebody comes and upsets the system. Then all hell breaks loose lol.
This whole world is controlled by the babylonian system. We create for ourselves who we follow.
We are our own gods.
This is why one must lay down their life, "their authority even over themselves" and give it to God to handle it.
In the case of Israel, God was their God. Period.
Then they met other woman from the nations around them, they married them, and the wives brought the husbands under their systems.
They began to do the works of the nations around them forgetting God's ways and God's laws.
The rulers of those nations became their rulers. Their kings, their priests.
This would be a case of the Sons of God, (those that believed in God) came in uton the daughters of men, (Those that did not know God)
becoming unequally yoked with them.
This is where cultures clash. You have the ways of God, intermingling with the ways of the world.
They both can't exist simultaneously in peace because they are opposed to each other.
One way is God's way, His Laws, His rules, His Justice. The other way is man's and how he believes it should be.
"Speaking of strange wives …what is a strange woman whose end is bitter as wormwood? "
A woman, theoretically in the bible represents a church or a congregation, a group of people who all come under one "tent" , one belief system.
So to me a "strange woman" whose end is bitter as wormwood, means it's teachings and it's "religion" is on the broad path away from God and on it's way to hell.
This is how I understand it.
Hugs
