But at Adam they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt faithlessly with me. Gilead is a city of evildoers, tracked with blood. As robbers lie in wait for someone, so the priests are banded together; they murder on the road to Shechem, they commit a monstrous crime. In the house of Israel I have seen a horrible thing; Ephraim’s whoredom is there, Israel is defiled. For you also, O Judah, a harvest is appointed. (Hosea 6: 7-11)

When Abraham first arrived in Canaan he pitched his tent at Shechem beneath a great oak tree.

When Jacob returned to Canaan he erected an altar to God at Shechem.

Joseph was buried here.

Here Jacob collected the idols worshiped in his household and buried them under an oak tree, perhaps the same tree where Abraham had worshiped.

At Shechem Joshua gathered the tribes beneath a great oak tree and drew up the statutes of the Mosaic religion.

After the death of Solomon it was at Shechem that all the tribes gathered and from this meeting the Northern Kingdom was formed.

Shechem almost certainly remained a cult center for Canannite worship. The murder on the road to Shechem may be spiritual rather than literal.

The priests of God also served as priests of the ancient fertility cult. To worship a false understanding of reality is a monstrous crime.

Above is a Canannite fertility goddess.