2 Kings 17:14
Notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their necks, like to the neck of their fathers, that did not believe in the LORD their God. Notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their necks, like to the neck of their fathers, that did not believe in the LORD their God.
The verse belongs to the account of Assyria's capture of Samaria and the scattering of the ten tribes. It means Israel would not hear the Lord but hardened their necks like their fathers who did not believe in the Lord their God, repeating the stubborn unbelief of their ancestors and earlier generations. That refusal was a rejection of His statutes and His covenant made with their fathers and His testimonies against them.
The rejection meant leaving all the commandments of the Lord their God to make molten images of two calves and a grove, to worship all the host of heaven and serve Baal, working wicked things and turning to other wicked and heathen practices. Despite plain warnings sent by all His servants the prophets, they steadfastly refused to repent, obeying not the voice of the Lord their God but transgressing His covenant and all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded. Because of this continued grievous rebellion, the Lord afflicted them and delivered them into the hand of spoilers and enemies until He had cast them out of His sight.
He carried them away out of their own land to Assyria, giving them into hands that spoiled their land and took the people captive. Their refusal of God's ways began their downfall, and it continued until they became subject to and made prey to the very nations whose practices they had adopted and chosen to follow. That defeat in Samaria led surrounding nations to question the power of Israel's God.