Exodus 20:5

Read in context

Exodus 20:3–7 · Berean Standard Bible

3 You shall have no other gods before Me.

4 You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath.

5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

6 but showing loving devotion to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.

7 You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave anyone unpunished who takes His name in vain.

Hebrew words

Data created by STEPBible.org based on work at Tyndale House Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

Study Exodus 20:5

Read the commentary on Exodus 20

Cross-references

The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge lists these related verses. Scripture text comes from the Berean Standard Bible.

Exodus 23:24

You must not bow down to their gods or serve them or follow their practices. Instead, you are to demolish them and smash their sacred stones to pieces.

Leviticus 26:1

“You must not make idols for yourselves or set up a carved image or sacred pillar; you must not place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down to it. For I am the LORD your God.

Joshua 23:7

So you are not to associate with these nations that remain among you. You must not call on the names of their gods or swear by them, and you must not serve them or bow down to them.

Joshua 23:16

If you transgress the covenant of the LORD your God, which He commanded you, and go and serve other gods and bow down to them, then the anger of the LORD will burn against you, and you will quickly perish from this good land He has given you.”

Judges 2:19

But when the judge died, the Israelites became even more corrupt than their fathers, going after other gods to serve them and bow down to them. They would not give up their evil practices and stubborn ways.

2 Kings 17:35

For the LORD had made a covenant with the Israelites and commanded them, “Do not worship other gods or bow down to them; do not serve them or sacrifice to them.

2 Kings 17:41

So these nations worshiped the LORD but also served their idols, and to this day their children and grandchildren continue to do as their fathers did.

2 Chronicles 25:14

When Amaziah returned from the slaughter of the Edomites, he brought back the gods of the Seirites, set them up as his own gods, bowed before them, and burned sacrifices to them.

Isaiah 44:15

It serves as fuel for man. He takes some of it to warm himself, and he kindles a fire and bakes his bread; he even fashions it into a god and worships it; he makes an idol and bows down to it.

Isaiah 44:19

And no one considers in his heart, no one has the knowledge or insight to say, “I burned half of it in the fire, and I baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and I ate. Shall I make something detestable with the rest of it? Shall I bow down to a block of wood?”

Matthew 4:9

“All this I will give You,” he said, “if You will fall down and worship me.”

Exodus 34:14

For you must not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.

Deuteronomy 4:24

For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

Deuteronomy 6:15

For the LORD your God, who is among you, is a jealous God. Otherwise the anger of the LORD your God will be kindled against you, and He will wipe you off the face of the earth.

Deuteronomy 32:21

They have provoked My jealousy by that which is not God; they have enraged Me with their worthless idols. So I will make them jealous by those who are not a people; I will make them angry by a nation without understanding.

Joshua 24:19

But Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to serve the LORD, for He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your rebellion or your sins.

Psalms 78:58

They enraged Him with their high places and provoked His jealousy with their idols.

Proverbs 6:34

For jealousy enrages a husband, and he will show no mercy in the day of vengeance.

Proverbs 6:35

He will not be appeased by any ransom, or persuaded by lavish gifts.

Ezekiel 8:3

He stretched out what looked like a hand and took me by the hair of my head. Then the Spirit lifted me up between earth and heaven and carried me in visions of God to Jerusalem, to the entrance of the north gate of the inner court, where the idol that provokes jealousy was seated.

Daniel 1:2

And the Lord delivered into his hand Jehoiakim king of Judah, along with some of the articles from the house of God. He carried these off to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, where he put them in the treasury of his god.

Nahum 1:2

The LORD is a jealous and avenging God; the LORD is avenging and full of wrath. The LORD takes vengeance on His foes and reserves wrath for His enemies.

1 Corinthians 10:22

Are we trying to provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than He?

Exodus 34:7

maintaining loving devotion to a thousand generations, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin. Yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished; He will visit the iniquity of the fathers on their children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.”

Leviticus 20:5

then I will set My face against that man and his family and cut off from among their people both him and all who follow him in prostituting themselves with Molech.

Leviticus 26:29

You will eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters.

Leviticus 26:39

Those of you who survive in the lands of your enemies will waste away in their iniquity and will decay in the sins of their fathers.

Leviticus 26:40

But if they will confess their iniquity and that of their fathers in the unfaithfulness that they practiced against Me, by which they have also walked in hostility toward Me—

Numbers 14:18

‘The LORD is slow to anger and abounding in loving devotion, forgiving iniquity and transgression. Yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished; He will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon their children to the third and fourth generation.’

Numbers 14:33

Your children will be shepherds in the wilderness for forty years, and they will suffer for your unfaithfulness until the last of your bodies lies in the wilderness.

1 Samuel 15:2

This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘I witnessed what the Amalekites did to the Israelites when they ambushed them on their way up from Egypt.

1 Samuel 15:3

Now go and attack the Amalekites and devote to destruction all that belongs to them. Do not spare them, but put to death men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”

2 Samuel 21:1

During the reign of David there was a famine for three successive years, and David sought the face of the LORD. And the LORD said, “It is because of the blood shed by Saul and his family, because he killed the Gibeonites.”

2 Samuel 21:6

let seven of his male descendants be delivered to us so that we may hang them before the LORD at Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of the LORD.” “I will give them to you,” said the king.

1 Kings 21:29

“Have you seen how Ahab has humbled himself before Me? Because he has humbled himself before Me, I will not bring the calamity during his days, but I will bring it upon his house in the days of his son.”

2 Kings 23:26

Nevertheless, the LORD did not turn away from the fury of His burning anger, which was kindled against Judah because of all that Manasseh had done to provoke Him to anger.

Job 5:4

His sons are far from safety, crushed in court without a defender.

Job 21:19

It is said that God lays up one’s punishment for his children. Let God repay the man himself, so he will know it.

Psalms 79:8

Do not hold past sins against us; let Your compassion come quickly, for we are brought low.

Psalms 109:14

May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered before the LORD, and the sin of his mother never be blotted out.

Isaiah 14:20

You will not join them in burial, since you have destroyed your land and slaughtered your own people. The offspring of the wicked will never again be mentioned.

Isaiah 14:21

Prepare a place to slaughter his sons for the iniquities of their forefathers. They will never rise up to possess a land or cover the earth with their cities.

Isaiah 65:6

Behold, it is written before Me: I will not keep silent, but I will repay; I will pay it back into their laps,

Isaiah 65:7

both for your iniquities and for those of your fathers,” says the LORD. “Because they burned incense on the mountains and scorned Me on the hills, I will measure into their laps full payment for their former deeds.”

Jeremiah 2:9

Therefore, I will contend with you again, declares the LORD, and I will bring a case against your children’s children.

Jeremiah 32:18

You show loving devotion to thousands but lay the iniquity of the fathers into the laps of their children after them, O great and mighty God whose name is the LORD of Hosts,

Matthew 23:34

Because of this, I am sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify, and others you will flog in your synagogues and persecute in town after town.

Matthew 23:35

And so upon you will come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.

Matthew 23:36

Truly I tell you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Deuteronomy 7:10

But those who hate Him He repays to their faces with destruction; He will not hesitate to repay to his face the one who hates Him.

Deuteronomy 32:41

when I sharpen My flashing sword, and My hand grasps it in judgment, I will take vengeance on My adversaries and repay those who hate Me.

Psalms 81:15

Those who hate the LORD would feign obedience, and their doom would last forever.

Proverbs 8:36

But he who fails to find me harms himself; all who hate me love death.”

John 7:7

The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me, because I testify that its works are evil.

John 15:18

If the world hates you, understand that it hated Me first.

John 15:23

Whoever hates Me hates My Father as well.

John 15:24

If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have seen and hated both Me and My Father.

Romans 1:30

slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful. They invent new forms of evil; they disobey their parents.

Romans 8:7

because the mind of the flesh is hostile to God: It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.

James 4:4

You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God.