What is inherantly wrong in Idol worship?

Question

If a religious commandment says things like do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not kill, do not commit adultary...one can see why. It is wrong because it hurts someone. If a person feels comfortable worshiping an Idol in privacy of home or in a public place, whom and how does he harm?
Please do not give answer like: because God said so or because our Prophet said so or because it is written so in our scripture that is a sin. Give me logic! What was God's or the scripture's or the prophet's logic?
If it was said more than a thousand years ago, does that still hold true -once again do not give an answer like -God said so and therefor it is final. Give me logic. If you don't want people to do what they would otherwise do - give them a logical answer why!

Someone said Materialism DUMDASS. Has this dude seen the Mosques, Synagouges, Churches that are built with Marble and Gold and are valued at 100s of Millions of Dollars? SMART***?

Answer 1

There is no harm in idol worshipping. Here people reject other faiths who worship idols.

But who does not worship idols. The christ on the cross or mother marry with little jesus...are they not idols ?

Muslim worshiping a stone is it not an uncut idol?

We keep photos of our parents and grandparents...talk to them, salute them or just pay respect to them. Is it not idol worshipping?

Idol is an external stimulii to fix our concentration to start meditation. We need something external where we can fix our attention.

idol worshipping in fact the first step of meditation....the next step being mentally seeing the god, but every common man cant do it directly.

Instead of just making fun of idol worshipping, we should see the great psychological explanation behind

Answer 2

Unfortunately, you do have to start from the premise that G-d prohibited idol worship. Now, one may ask, why would a monotheistic G-d prohibit this activity?

In Jewish thinking, we believe the first idol worshippers actually worshipped the stars. The thinking of those people was that these thousands of lights were the real power in the universe. Star worship progressed to worship of idols symbollic of stars, and then symbollic of other objects of nature.

Most idol worshipping activites back then were pretty horrific. They involved child-sacrifice, feces eating, and many other horrible and disgusting practices.

Idol worshipping took away from the primary responsibility of a person to have a relationship with G-d, not a piece of sculptured rock, clay or wood, and not a natural object like the sun or a tree.

Since the moral imperative of commandments like don't steal, etc, came from G-d, not idols, it was not logical to worship idols. People, however, wanted physical, tangible objects to worship, not an invisible G-d. Although Jews believe that the entire Universe and all it contains is all imbued with G-dliness, worshipping some specific object as representative of the entire imubed G-dliness is considered a lack of understanding of the true nature of G-d.

Answer 3

Idol worshipping takes you away from the love of God. When you worship idols you are not worshipping God, who gave you life and who sent his son to die for your sins. The word of God never changes, therefore although it was said many years ago it still hold true today and should be obeyed. I guess if your parents told you not to smoke crack ten years ago, you would assume because it was years ago you could do it now.

You come asking a question based on someones faith and mention God, then do not want an answer with God involved, this is utter nonsense. God made the heavens and the earth and even the free will to speak the ignorant things you are speaking the least you could do is obey his commandments.

You will not only be hurting yourself worshipping idols, because these idols are a distraction sent by the devil to draw you away from God. You will also be hurting your family and inviting evil in their lives for generation to come. The devil will believe he has a claim on your family because of the sins you commit today. The bible said the sins of the father will go to children's, children to the third and fourth generation.

I will pray that you will make the right decisions and not invite evil in your life

Answer 4

What is wrong with it is the fact you're putting other things above God. I am sorry to say, but we have to put God in this equation, whether you believe he exists or not, he will destroy all those whom chooses false worship/idols . Look at 1kings when Elisha the prophet gave the balem prophets a chance to ask their gods for help before he asked God almighty. What happened when they didn't get an answer? in the end they died.
As far as in the privacy of our own home, God still sees us even if others do not. You can do what you want,it is freewill, but I would rather obey God seeing the events throughout history instead of reliying on some idol that can't do anything.

Answer 5

Well, I found a couple scriptures on it. 1 John 4:12 shows how there is no image of God possible. Psalms 106:36 shows how worship of idols brought destuction upon them. If you think about it, why would you worship something that merely represents God when you can just do it directly. Some find it easier to whorship something they can physically see, but are you not in fact glorifying the object and not giving that glory to God? If you just finished reading a great book would you praise the book or the author?

Answer 6

It is logically absurd to mix water and clay, shape it into a cow, then worship it. If you are asking why is it wrong to worship God in this way, then I would ask you, if you were a doctor or professor, and I would always approach you and say, how are you doing today beggar? Is that not debasing you? God is not the God of emotion, He is the God of logic as well as higher forms of metaphysical knowledge we are not aware of, and all. If your logic says that you must see God to worship b/c you are limited, then this is illogical as well. Besides the million of other reasons, one is when the first person was created, how did he worship God? Did God also create a statue? Idol worship is a flaw in the Essenes of human intellect. God is greater than what we can imagine. If you can see, taste, feel, smell, hear God, that is not God, but a fragment of your imagination and your perception. Why would you want to worship a statue? Raise your hands to the One God and ask for guidance to the truth and you will not be saddened.

Answer 7

In ancient days, people really did think that a statue was in fact a living thing, in a manner of speaking. The Jews were the first to realize that idols were nothing more than whatever they were made of, stone or brass or whatever. And there was from time to time some backsliding in the popular culture regarding idols, so the rabbis and prophets had to keep reminding their people about this and return them to worship of what was thought to be a living entity.

There is nothing wrong with practicing idol worship, per se. It just isn't regarded as sensible from either a religious viewpoint or a scientific viewpoint - it just about the only thing that religion and science have in common.

Answer 8

There is nothing wrong in Idol worship.In fact if you want to concentrate on something you have to think in that direction.For this purpose Idol worship was introduced,as when one sees the Idol of any sacred thing/God he starts thinking in that direction only,but even then our mind which is so indifferent and can not be controlled without doing much labour in that direction only,goes off the track and thinks about other things,therefore just to concentrate idol or the atmosphere helps .Therefore Idol worship was introduced at the very early stage of worship.therefore i can say there is no wrong in idol worship.to experience these things one has to try for himself and see the results.

Answer 9

Well, aside from scripture and other rehtoric. I would say that God created us so that he could have a relationship with someone. Sure he had the angels... but they just do what they are told. God knew that the only way to have a true relationship with someone was to give them free will. Idol worship... well its like cheating. We're suppose to have a relationship with God, not the idol.

Answer 10

Worshiping an idol or any materialistic value (like money) is wrong because it hurts *yourself.* You are placing your trust and morality upon a figure that has never done anything for you before -- it is a manmade creation. This is different from praying to a statue of someone, like a Saint, because the image of the person is there to give you a visual conception of the person you are praying through -- you are certainly not worshipping the Saint *or* its image, but you are praying to God by speaking to a person who you feel an easier connection to, like a Saint -- a person who has been on this earth, and has endured similar experiences to your own. An idol, a statue, being worshipped in and of itself is like investing all of your life and trust upon something that can never do anything for you -- it will sit there.

Answer 11

The Lord most high does not like people to associate lies to Him. Imagine if I made an idol of gravity, another of air and another of the Ocean! It is such an insult not only to gravity, air or the ocean, but also your intelligence. So, Allah/God does not expect those who associate themselves to Him Almighty to do stupid things, and relate those stupid things on top of everything to the LORD MOST HIGH Himself.

If I took a photograph of myself when I was a teenager and send it to a female who is also a teenager, when I am a grown up man and say this is my picture. Am I fooling her? Is that not my picture? It is my picture, yet it is surely a lie and a deceit, because I am not a teen aged boy any more but a grown up man. So, pictures lie. Even in this example you can see how you can deceive someone with a REAL PICTURE that was taken from a REAL CAMERA, but it distorts time!

Therefore it is silly and even dangerous to make a picture or worst an idol of the MOST HIGH. Imagine if I used some cow dung that really stinks or used feces of a human to make a figure of yours and call it you, is that not an insult to you.

The MOST HIGH is so holy, that using matter to describe him is to insult Him in that way.

I hope this makes sense to you.