Abomination

Abominations are the catch-all category Josiah is eliminating — every detestable practice that violates God's Law, from consulting mediums to keeping household idols, swept away to honor the words of the rediscovered scroll.

The abomination of desolation is set up in the Temple's holiest space — the ultimate act of sacrilege, replacing covenant worship with an object of desecration that renders the sanctuary defiled.

Abomination here designates cult prostitution and its earnings as categorically incompatible with God's character — the term signals not mere rule-breaking but a fundamental distortion of what worship and relationship with God are meant to be.

Abomination appears here as God's verdict on dishonest business — Moses reserves this strongest possible condemnation not for dramatic religious sins but for the everyday fraud of rigged scales and deceptive transactions.