Ye shall destroy their altars.... — This course, if adopted in a conquered territory, would be certain to bring matters to a crisis. The inhabitants must rise in defence of the objects of their worship — a course which would end in their extermination — or they must adopt the worship of Jehovah.
Their groves. — Here the grove itself in which the idol was worshipped, and so in Deuteronomy 16:21. Sometimes the word is used for the image.
Burn their graven images with fire. — David treated the images of the Philistines thus (1 Chronicles 14:12). Compare Isaiah 37:19.