And you shall overthrow their altars
Which were of stone, as Jarchi observes; whereas the altar
ordered to be made by the Lord, before the altar of burnt
offering in the tabernacle was made, was of earth, ( Exodus 20:24
) these were to be demolished, lest the Israelites should be
tempted to make use of them; and besides, the Lord would not have
any remains of idolatry in the land where his tabernacle and
worship were, as being abominable to him:
and break down their pillars;
or statues erected to the honour of their idols; according to
Jarchi it was a single stone hewed out at first for the basis of
a statue F25; perhaps such as were called
Baetulia, in imitation of the stone Jacob set up for a pillar at
Bethel, ( Genesis
28:18 Genesis
28:19 )
and burn their groves with fire;
which were planted about their temples, and under which also
their idols were placed, and where they privately committed the
most abominable lewdness under the notion of religion. The Targum
of Jonathan renders the word "abominations", meaning idols; and
so Jarchi interprets it by a tree that is worshipped; (See
Gill on
Deuteronomy 7:5)
and you shall hew down the graven images of their
gods;
which were made of wood:
and destroy the names of them out of the place;
by never making any mention of them in common discourse, and by
changing the names of places called from them; and especially by
destroying all the relics of them, and whatever appertained to
them, which might lead to the mention of them; see ( Hosea 2:17 ) .