other gods

¹³Preserve all that I have said to you. And by the names of foreign gods you shall not swear; neither shall these be heard from your mouth.

¹⁴You shall not go after the strange gods of all the Gentiles, who are around you.

⁶Jesus said to him: “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.

¹¹Who is like you in strength, O Lord? Who is like you: magnificent in sanctity, terrible and yet praiseworthy, accomplishing miracles?

⁶Thus says the Lord, the King and Redeemer of Israel, the Lord of hosts: I am the first, and I am the last, and there is no God apart from me.

¹⁷They immolated to demons and not to God, to gods whom they did not know, who were new and recent arrivals, whom their fathers did not worship.

¹⁹And this is the judgment: that the Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness more than light. For their works were evil.

¹Now concerning those things that are sacrificed to idols: we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but charity builds up. ²But if anyone considers himself to know anything, he does not yet know in the way that he ought to know. ³For if anyone loves God, he is known by him. ⁴But as to the foods that are immolated to idols, we know that an idol in the world is nothing, and that no one is God, except One. ⁵For although there are things that are called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, (if one even considers there to be many gods and many lords) ⁶yet we know that there is only one God, the Father, from whom all things are, and in whom we are, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things are, and by whom we are.

⁹so as to steal, to murder, to commit adultery, to swear falsely, to offer libations to Baal, and to go after strange gods, which you do not know.

³You shall not have strange gods before me.

¹Most beloved, do not be willing to believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are of God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world.

²And the Philistines took the ark of God, and carried it into the temple of Dagon. And they stationed it beside Dagon. ³And when the Ashdodites had risen up at first light on the next day, behold, Dagon was lying prone on the ground before the ark of the Lord. And they took Dagon, and they set him again in his place. ⁴And again, on the next day, rising up in the morning, they found Dagon lying on his face upon the ground, before the ark of the Lord. But the head of Dagon, and both palms of his hands had been cut off upon the threshold. ⁵Moreover, only the trunk of Dagon remained in its place. For this reason, the priests of Dagon, and all who enter his temple, do not tread upon the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod, even to this day. ⁶Now the hand of the Lord weighed heavily upon the Ashdodites, and he destroyed them. And he struck Ashdod and its borders at the inner part of the buttocks. And in the villages and fields, in the midst of that region, mice rose up and burst forth. And this caused a great tumult unto death in the city. ⁷Then the men of Ashdod, seeing this kind of plague, said: “The ark of the God of Israel shall not remain with us. For his hand is harsh, over us and over Dagon, our god.”

¹And the Lord spoke all these words: ²“I am the Lord your God, who led you away from the land of Egypt, out of the house of servitude. ³You shall not have strange gods before me. ⁴You shall not make for yourself a graven image, nor a likeness of anything that is in heaven above or on earth below, nor of those things which are in the waters under the earth. ⁵You shall not adore them, nor shall you worship them. I am the Lord your God: strong, zealous, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the sons to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,