short story about IDOLATRY in 5 images

Nicolas Poussin, the golden calf

The best way to make people forget an idolatrous rite is to put another rite in its place.

Enguerand Quarton, piéta

The Christians followed the same principle by building their churches on the ruins of pagan temples and by observing their feasts on the dates of pagan festivals.

Hanri Jacobs, midi / solange, paysage losange

For the same reason, Moses had to institute many dietary and sacrificial prescriptions in order to occupy the terrain held by the Sabians and their idolatrous ways,

Henri Jacobs, quartet

"so that all these rites and cults that they practised for the sake of the idols, they now came to practise in the honor of god."

Henri Jacobs, two drawings of a symbolon

The divine strategy was so successful that the Sabians and their once mighty community fell into oblivion. (Jan Assmann, Moses the Egyptian)

the idol shop

Illustration from a Moravian haggadah of 1737, based on the printed Amsterdam haggadah of 1712.

Abraham and the idol shop of his father Terah.

Terah, Abraham's father, was an idol worshipper. One day Terah had to leave the store in which he sold idols. He left Abraham to manage the store in his absence. A man came and wanted to buy an idol. Abraham asked him "How old are you?" And the man responded "Fifty or sixty years old." Abraham then said "Pitiful is the man who is sixty and worships idols that are only one day old." So the man left in embarrassment.
Once came a woman with an offering of fine flour. She said to Abraham "Here, take it and bring it before the idols." Abraham stood up, took a stick, broke all the idols, and put the stick back in the hands of the biggest idol among them. When his father returned he asked "Who did this to them?" Abraham answered "I will not deny you the truth. A woman came with an offering of fine flour and asked me to bring it before them. So I brought it before them and each said "I shall eat first." Then the biggest one stood among them, he took a stick in his hand and broke them all." So Terah said to him "Why do you mock me? Do these idols know anything to speak and move?" And Abraham replied "Won't your ears hear what your mouth speaks?"

Midrash Rabbah, Noah, portion 38, section 13, translated by Shai Lavi

second commandment

The exhibition "iconoclash, beyond the image wars in science, religion and art" in the "Center for Art and Media" in Karlsruhe from May to August 2002 is about the second commandment: "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters below". Bruno Latour proposes the following questions:
Are we sure we have understood it correctly?
Have we not made a long and terrifying mistake about its meaning?
How can we reconcile this request for a totally an-iconic society, religion and science with the fabulous proliferation of images that characterizes our media-filled cultures?
If images are so dangerous, why do we have so many of them?
If they are innocent, why do they trigger so many and such enduring passions?