16. As time went on, this ungodly custom became stronger. Finally it became law, and idols were being worshipped at the command of powerful rulers.
17. When people lived too far away to honour a ruler in his presence but were eager to pay honour to this absent king, they would imagine what he must look like, and would then make a likeness of him.
18. The ambitious artists who made these likenesses caused this worship to spread, even among people who did not know the king.
19. An artist might want to please some ruler, and so he would use his skill to make the likeness better looking than the actual person.
20. Then people would be so attracted by the work of art, that the one whom they had earlier honoured now became the object of their worship.
21. So all this became a deadly trap, because people who were grieving, or under royal authority, would take objects of stone or wood, and give them the honour reserved for the one God.
22. One thing led to another. It was not enough to be wrong about the knowledge of God. They lived in a state of evil warfare, but they were so ignorant that they called it peace.
23. They murdered children in their initiation rituals, celebrated secret mysteries, and held wild ceremonial orgies with unnatural practices.
24. They no longer kept their lives or their marriages pure. A man might kill another by an act of treachery or cause him grief by committing adultery with his wife.
25. Everything was a complete riot of bloody murder, robbery, deceit, corruption, faithlessness, disorder, falsehood,
26. harassment of innocent people, ingratitude, moral decay, sexual perversion, broken marriages, adultery, and immorality.
27. The worship of idols, whose names should never be spoken, is the beginning and the end, the cause and the result of every evil.
28. People who worship them lose control of themselves in ecstasy, or pass off lies as prophecies, or live wickedly, or break their word without hesitation.
29. They tell lies under oath and expect no punishment, because the idols they put their trust in are lifeless.