2 Kings 17:27-31

The Message

²⁷The king of Assyria ordered, “Send back some priests who were taken into exile from there. They can go back and live there and instruct the people in what the god of the land expects of them.”

²⁸One of the priests who had been exiled from Samaria came back and moved into Bethel. He taught them how to honor and worship God.

^29-31But each people that Assyria had settled went ahead anyway making its own gods and setting them up in the neighborhood sex-and-religion shrines that the citizens of Samaria had left behind—a local custom-made god for each people:

for Babylon, Succoth Benoth;

for Cuthah, Nergal;

for Hamath, Ashima;

for Avva, Nibhaz and Tartak;

for Sepharvaim, Adrammelech and Anammelech (people burned their children in sacrificial offerings to these gods!).

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