In Deuteronomy, chapter twelve, verse two, the Israelites receive an order to destroy all the worship places of the pagan nations and to worship God only at the divinely appointed area in the manner He commanded. To leave the altar of pagan worship in place would tempt the Israelites into taking up pagan worship practices.
First of all, these requirements are the destruction of every vestige of idolatry. In the land of Jehovah, there must be no trace of any other god but Him. The non-fulfillment of this command in the early history of Israel has led some to suppose it belongs to later times. However, the instruction for the destruction of these things is connected.
It was part of the work assigned by Joshua to the several tribes of Israel for the division of the land. His work was to conquer the Canaanitish armies and give Israel possession of their chief cities. He then assigned the land to several tribes to make it their own. If every tribe had insisted upon destroying all monuments of idolatry in its territory, one of two results would possibly follow. Either the remnant of the Canaanitish nations must have been excited to the acts of rebellion and hostility, resulting in their extermination, or else they must have yielded themselves entirely to the worship of Jehovah.
But Israel disobeyed the order. They did not themselves yield to idolatry in Joshua’s time. The disturbance respecting the altar in Joshua chapter twenty-two is sufficient against strange altars. But the Canaanites left undisturbed after they ceased to resist openly, and their objects of worship being left unmolested, there were constant temptations to idolatry, to which Israel yielded. Therefore, it was not until Hezekiah and Josiah that the implementation of these laws was in effect.