Account
Noah's altar
After leaving the ark, Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and every clean bird and offered burnt offerings. When the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, He said in His heart, "I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
Abram's altars
Abram built an altar at Shechem, at the oak of Moreh, in Canaan, after the Lord appeared to him and promised that land to his offspring. He also built an altar and called upon the name of the Lord in the hill country on the east of Bethel, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. (Genesis 12)
Abraham's altar
In response to God's test, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you," Abraham traveled to Mount Moriah and built an altar there, laid the wood in order, bound Isaac his son, laid him on the altar, on top of the wood, and took the knife to slaughter his son. The angel of the Lord stopped him and provided a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns behind him, so Abraham offered it up in Isaac's place. (Genesis 22)
The altar on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite
The LORD sent a plague for three days. When David asked the LORD to let His hand be against him and his father's house, Gad came that day and said, "Go up, raise an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” David obeyed and bought the threshing floor from Araunah and oxen for 50 shekels of silver. He offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and the Lord responded to the plea for the land. The plague was averted from Israel.
Joab flees execution
When his king candidate Adonijah failed and was executed, Joab to the tent of the LORD and caught hold of the horns of the altar. He refused to come down, so he was killed there. (1 Kings 2:28-35)