Good day. I hope all is well with you.
“You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments."
This Exodus 20:4-6 verses, along with Leviticus 26:1, Deuteronomy 4:15-18, Deuteronomy 5:8, and others that I might have forgotten - what does the image include? Does it pertain to all and any images? Or only those that are likely to be worshipped as idols and replace the worship of God? What about photos, sculptures, paintings, toys, action figures, etc.?
Thank you very much.
Exo 20:4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
Exo 20:5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
Exo 20:6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
Deu 4:15 Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the LORD spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire:
Deu 4:16 Lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female,
Deu 4:17 The likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the air,
Deu 4:18 The likeness of any thing that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the waters beneath the earth:
Deu 4:19 And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the LORD thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven.
Act 17:29 Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.
Act 17:30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent.
Joh 4:24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
The graven image has to do with worshipping the graven image to worship a false god, a false deity.
Like Babylon, and the nations did, that they wanted a physical image to worship a god they cannot see.
Also God said do not make a graven image to worship Him for you do not know what He looks like.
We are not to worship God by a physical object and we are not to worship a false god, or anything that we think is important by a physical object.
We do not worship nature like the occultists who honor the God of forces the Cosmos.
Luk 14:26 If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.
Mat 6:24 No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
Photos, sculptures, paintings, toys, and action figures do not apply as a graven image if you are not worshipping it as a deity.
But if you put those things above Jesus or anything else as more important than it is wrong.
Jesus does not mean to actually hate your family but do not put them above Jesus as more important in your life.
2Ti 3:4 lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
2Ti 3:5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.
2Ti 3:7 Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Some people love sin more than God.