And you shall know that I am the Lord, when your slain shall be amongst your idols, round about your altars, in every high hill, and on all the tops of mountains, and under every woody tree, and under every thick oak, the place where they burnt sweet smelling frankincense to all their idols.
וִֽידַעְתֶּם֙ כִּֽי־אֲנִ֣י יְהוָ֔ה בִּֽהְי֣וֹת חַלְלֵיהֶ֗ם בְּתוֹךְ֙ גִּלּ֣וּלֵיהֶ֔ם סְבִיב֖וֹת מִזְבְּחֽוֹתֵיהֶ֑ם אֶל֩ כָּל־גִּבְעָ֨ה רָמָ֜ה בְּכֹ֣ל ׀ רָאשֵׁ֣י הֶהָרִ֗ים וְתַ֨חַת כָּל־עֵ֤ץ רַֽעֲנָן֙ וְתַ֙חַת֙ כָּל־אֵלָ֣ה עֲבֻתָּ֔ה מְק֗וֹם אֲשֶׁ֤ר נָֽתְנוּ־שָׁם֙ רֵ֣יחַ נִיחֹ֔חַ לְכֹ֖ל גִּלּוּלֵיהֶֽם׃
3 Church Fathers comment on this verse
Beneath the oak trees and among the foliage of every thicket lies a depiction of the foolishness of those who place their empty trust in idols that they have erected on every high mountain and beneath every leafy, wide-branched tree. This reflects the nature of deception—relying on superficial, borrowed praises.
It is evident from the plain meaning that the army of Israel fell on the heights of their land, among the altars and the groves dedicated to false idols, often referred to as branching trees, where their sins led to their punishment. In the sacramental context, we should adhere to the previously established order. When the misguided teachers of heresy are defeated by learned ecclesiastical authorities familiar with Scripture, we observe the fallen instructors of false teachings lying amidst the idols they created, and those who defy the will of God, sprawled across hills and mountains beneath every branching tree.
They were adorned with boastful rhetoric and leafy canopies yet produced no fruits of righteousness; they dwelled under each green oak, yielding no harvest for humanity but rather for unclean creatures, where they offered incense not to the Lord but to their idols. They could not articulate what is written concerning Noah, ‘The Lord smelled the stench of fragrance’ (Genesis 8:21), nor what Paul states, ‘We are the fragrance of Christ to God in every place’ (2 Corinthians 2:15). Just as a saint brings pleasure to God through his fragrance, a sinner, for whom the psalm expresses, ‘My wounds are dead and bent from the face of my folly’ (Psalm 37:6), offers foul incense to his idols. The phrases we have translated as on all the tops of the mountains, and shortly thereafter: and under every green oak, have been rendered by the Seventy.
Beneath the hay oak, I will offer a foul smell as a perfume to all my false gods. This also reveals the boundaries of desolation. For He declares:
Passages read together with this verse.
THEOSIS