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“The Tanakh directs many polemics against Israelites who practice polytheism and idolatry. Isaiah 44:9 declares, “All who make idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit.” The polemic continues when the chapter mocks the construction of such images: He cuts down cedars [to be used as fuel]. . . . Part of it he takes and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Then he makes a god and worships it, makes it a carved image and bows down before it. Half of it he burns in the fire; over this half he roasts meat, eats it and is satisfied. . . . The rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, bows down to it and worships it; he prays to it and says, “Save me, for you are my god!” (44:14–17) The unit concludes by stating about anyone who would worship such idols that “a deluded mind has led him astray” (44:20). We suspect, were there a Canaanite Anti-Defamation League, they would protest such claims as bigoted polemic. We have heard these verses deployed against Roman Catholics, for whom art can function as a focus of prayer, and Hindus, who depict their gods through artwork. We find such deployments equally unhealthy.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, The Bible With and Without Jesus: How Jews and Christians Read the Same Stories Differently