There they made offerings on all the high places, as the nations did whom the LORD had carried away before them. They did wicked things, provoking the LORD to anger — Israel's sacrificial practices on high places mirrored those of the nations previously displaced by the LORD. The phrase "the nations did whom the LORD had carried away" (אֲשֶׁר־גָּלָה יְהוָה לִפְנֵיהֶם, *asher galah YHWH lifnehem*, literally "whom the LORD had exiled before them") invokes the Canaanite displacement: the LORD removed nations to make room for Israel, yet Israel adopted those very nations' practices. The theological tragedy is complete: Israel becomes a replica of the nations it displaced, inviting the same judgment—exile—that befell them.

COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS

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