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TREES. 261 



plant thee a grove of any trees, near unto the altar of the Lord thy 

 God,' Deut. xvi. 21. From their proneness to imitate the customs 

 of the surrounding nations, however, the Jewish people became 

 guilty of sacrificing in high places and in consecrated groves : and 

 one of their kings carried his impiety so far as to plant one of these 

 groves at Jerusalem, 2 Kings xxi. 7. 



Landseer has attempted to show, that the word rendered 'groves' 

 in our translation of the Scriptures, means rather a kind of orrery 

 or armillary machine used for purposes of divination, which he sup- 

 poses to have been about the height of a man. 



It is certain that the word translated ' groves' cannot always be 

 interpreted to mean a gi-ove of trees, since we read of setting up 

 groves ' under every green tree' (2 Kings, xvii. 8, &c.) ; nor can it 

 always be strictly taken as an image, for we also read that the peo- 

 ple * made them molten images, and made a grove, and worshipped 

 all the host of heaven,' and used divination, ver. 16, 17. (See also 

 Jufl^es vi. 25, 26, 28, '30). Hence Selden supposes, that the term 

 was used for the images worshipped in the groves, especially As- 

 tarte or Venus. Others have conjectured that as by Baal was 

 meant the sun, so by ashre or groves' was meant the moon, wor- 

 shipped as the * queen of heaven^' 



