פָּסִיל
pe.sil
idol
Lexicon Entry
Lexicon data from STEPBible TIPNR, Tyndale House, Cambridge. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
What Original Readers Understood
ExploredThe Hebrew word פָּסִיל (pe.sil) is a noun that translates to "idol" in the Bible. With 31 occurrences, it has a relatively wide range of usage. This term is part of the semantic domain related to Deity and the Divine, indicating its importance in conveying the concept of a false or false-like divine object or system of worship. Given its definition, a pe.sil likely refers to any object, statue, or concept that is revered or worshipped as if it were a divine entity. This includes but is not limited to man-made idols. The significance of pe.sil in the biblical text is its association with the notion of idolatry, highlighting the tendency for the Israelites (and others) to stray from the one true God and to worship false gods or substitutes. As such, it serves a critical function within the biblical narrative, illustrating the dangers of misplaced devotion and the importance of faith in one true, all-powerful deity.
Source data & methodology
Occurrences in Scripture
31 total occurrences across the text
He set the engraved image of the idol, which he had made, in God’s house, of which God said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever.
Psalms 97:7Let all them be shamed who serve engraved images, who boast in their idols. Worship him, all you gods!
Isaiah 40:19A workman has cast an image, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold, and casts silver chains for it.
Isaiah 40:20He who is too impoverished for such an offering chooses a tree that will not rot. He seeks a skillful workman to set up a carved image for him that will not be moved.
Isaiah 42:17“Those who trust in engraved images, who tell molten images, ‘You are our gods,’ will be turned back. They will be utterly disappointed.
Isaiah 44:9Everyone who makes a carved image is vain. The things that they delight in will not profit. Their own witnesses don’t see, nor know, that they may be disappointed.
Isaiah 44:10Who has fashioned a god, or molds an image that is profitable for nothing?
Isaiah 44:15Then it will be for a man to burn; and he takes some of it, and warms himself. Yes, he burns it, and bakes bread. Yes, he makes a god, and worships it; he makes it a carved image, and falls down to it.
Isaiah 44:17The rest of it he makes into a god, even his engraved image. He bows down to it and worships, and prays to it, and says, “Deliver me; for you are my god!”
Isaiah 45:20“Assemble yourselves and come. Draw near together, you who have escaped from the nations. Those have no knowledge who carry the wood of their engraved image, and pray to a god that can’t save.
Isaiah 48:5therefore I have declared it to you from of old; before it came to pass I showed it to you; lest you should say, ‘My idol has done them. My engraved image and my molten image has commanded them.’
Jeremiah 10:14Every man has become brutish and without knowledge. Every goldsmith is disappointed by his engraved image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.
Jeremiah 51:17“Every man has become brutish without knowledge. Every goldsmith is disappointed by his image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.
Nahum 1:14Yahweh has commanded concerning you: “No more descendants will bear your name. Out of the house of your gods, I will cut off the engraved image and the molten image. I will make your grave, for you are vile.”
Habakkuk 2:18“What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?
Exodus 20:4“You shall not make for yourselves an idol, nor any image of anything that is in the heavens above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
Leviticus 26:1“ ‘You shall make for yourselves no idols, and you shall not raise up a carved image or a pillar, and you shall not place any figured stone in your land, to bow down to it; for I am Yahweh your God.
Deuteronomy 4:16lest you corrupt yourselves, and make yourself a carved image in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female,
Deuteronomy 4:23Be careful, lest you forget the covenant of Yahweh your God, which he made with you, and make yourselves a carved image in the form of anything which Yahweh your God has forbidden you.
Deuteronomy 4:25When you shall father children and children’s children, and you shall have been long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves, and make a carved image in the form of anything, and shall do that which is evil in Yahweh your God’s sight to provoke him to anger,
Deuteronomy 5:8“You shall not make a carved image for yourself—any likeness of what is in heaven above, or what is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
Deuteronomy 27:15‘Cursed is the man who makes an engraved or molten image, an abomination to Yahweh, the work of the hands of the craftsman, and sets it up in secret.’ All the people shall answer and say, ‘Amen.’
Judges 18:17The five men who went to spy out the land went up, and came in there, and took the engraved image, the ephod, the teraphim, and the molten image; and the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men armed with weapons of war.
Judges 18:18When these went into Micah’s house, and took the engraved image, the ephod, the teraphim, and the molten image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?”
Judges 17:3He restored the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, then his mother said, “I most certainly dedicate the silver to Yahweh from my hand for my son, to make a carved image and a molten image. Now therefore I will restore it to you.”
Judges 17:4When he restored the money to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver, and gave them to a silversmith, who made a carved image and a molten image out of it. It was in the house of Micah.
Judges 18:14Then the five men who went to spy out the country of Laish answered and said to their brothers, “Do you know that there is in these houses an ephod, and teraphim, and a carved image, and a molten image? Now therefore consider what you have to do.”
Judges 18:20The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod, the teraphim, and the engraved image, and went with the people.
Judges 18:30The children of Dan set up for themselves the engraved image; and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses, and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land.
Judges 18:31So they set up for themselves Micah’s engraved image which he made, and it remained all the time that God’s house was in Shiloh.
2 Kings 21:7He set the engraved image of Asherah that he had made in the house of which Yahweh said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my name forever;