Zephaniah 1:5

An idol worshipped by some Jews who also professed to worship Jehovah. Zeph. 1:5. Some judge it to have been the same as Molech.

God could still see the followers of Baal there. He could see the Chemarim, the idol priests named in 2 Kings 23:5 and Hosea 10:5, margin. He could see those who worshipped the host of heaven, and those who swore by Jehovah and by Malcham, or "their king," that is, Baal.

Verses 5 and 6 name other forms of idolatry. They worshipped the host of the heavens from their housetops. They worshipped the stars and studied their movements, as if the stars could help them and give them a revelation. Astrology, still practised so widely among civilized nations today, is an ancient cult (2 Kings 21:3, 5; Jer. 8:2; 19:13). Others used the Holy Name of Jehovah and at the same time used the name of Malcham. It was all a turning back from Jehovah and a dishonouring of His Name.

What made this idolatry so offensive was that they joined the idols of the nations to Jehovah. To be a plain, outright idolater was not nearly as evil as to show that you know the true God and yet put false gods on a level with Him. It is exactly this outrage against God that the verse describes here.

There may be no deliberate plan to abandon His worship. It may only be what they count a small thing: occasional conformity to idolatry while they still profess His name. But God refuses any such unholy compromise. He refuses it quite apart from the danger, for those who allow it, of full revolt from Him. It strikes at His majesty, at holiness and truth, and He will not tolerate it.

Josiah was a deeply godly man. He was strict and zealous against whatever dishonoured the name of Jehovah, and above all he bowed his own heart to the word of God. None of this set the nation right. No doubt there were then, as always, bright hopes among the best people of the land. So it mattered greatly that God should make His mind on the matter known. Then no one, even if fooled for a moment, would be bitterly disappointed in the end.

But why could God not be satisfied with the outward improvement in Judah in Josiah's day? He looked beneath the surface. He looked for something real, for a tender conscience, for hearts bowed to His word. He did not find them.

For most professing Christians today it is the Lord and some form of the world, some addition to Himself. It is the mixed worship of the Samaritans, who served the Lord and their own gods at the same time (2 Kings 17:33). It is a sad admission that the Lord is not enough to satisfy, and a love of pleasure more than a love of God.