and had walked in the customs of the nations whom the LORD drove out before the people of Israel, and of the kings of Israel which they had made — Israel's sin specifically consists of "walking in the customs of the nations" (בְחֻקּוֹת הַגּוֹיִם, *be-chukkot ha-goim*) that the LORD previously destroyed to make room for Israel's settlement. The irony is profound: Israel adopts the very practices that precipitated previous nations' destruction. The phrase "of the kings of Israel which they had made" indicates that kingship itself, and the kings' cultic choices, led Israel into apostasy. This theological interpretation suggests that Israel's political system, modeled on and inheriting the northern kingdom's dynasties, institutionalized apostasy.

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