Chapter 32
Aaron, who was to be God's High Priest, makes golden calves for the people to worship. Interesting that Aaron had not yet been consecrated as High Priest. There is no indication in vs 1-6 that Aaron even hesitated to do these things. In fact, it implies that once he saw the people intended to make sacrifices to the calves he had fashioned, he also fashioned an altar to put before it. He "helped" to found this cult of the golden calf.
2023 - Couple of things here: in vs. 1, the people say "Up, make us gods...", so what they ask for is plural, as they had known in Egypt. The Hebrew word is Elohim, which is masculine plural absolute. It is elsewhere used, with a capital letter, of God Himself. God is one, but he has this plural name. So possibly, even at this early stage, there was an idea that a single idol could represent many gods, and so could be called Elohim.
2023 - Then in vs 4: 4 And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!" [Exo 32:4 ESV]. Aaron made A golden calf, not SOME golden calves...yet later in that same verse, Calf, in the first part, is singular, but at the end of the verse, Elohim is used again, and so the ending is plural - gods. It is hard to know what is going on here. BUT, I think our interpretation should always be that there was a single golden calf made, and that is how we ought to see things when it says calf. But if it is talking about false gods, we ought to see them as represented in that one golden idol - though in itself it was singular.
2023 - Through the next verses, Aaron declares a feast for the next day, the object of which is to worship the LORD - LORD is the Hebrew Yehova. So what we have is Aaron making an idol to REPRESENT God. This was just as the Egyptians did with statues to Isis and Osiris, and many others. Sacrifices were laid at the feet of the idols, though there was a recognition that the god Isis was actually off somewhere else. They worshiped the idol as representative of a god. So what we have here is a perversion of Yehova worship. Aaron has "translated" the Egyptian worship customs into worship of Yehova. And that may be the source of the mixed up singular/plural references here. They knew Elohim was plural for God. So when Aaron made them Elohim, they saw that single god as representing the God they saw as plural. Such distortion. And remember...that had all heard God's own voice saying "Though shalt not make unto thee ANY graven image". Yet in vs 4, Aaron fashions the calf with a graving tool.
2023 - In vs 8, God refers to the calf (singular), and said they are calling the calf "your gods". They worshiped and sacrificed to the calf, while seeing it as "their gods". They were pretty messed up.
2026 - Look at 32:2:
2 So Aaron said to them, "Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me." [Exo 32:2 ESV]. Doesn't say take of "all" your earrings - guys too - just the ones your wives and kids are wearing. ESV says this, LSB, says this, in fact they all say it this way. Some say "tear off" the earrings, others say "break off". But none say or even really imply that the men were to give theirs up. I think later, when the contributions for the construction of the Temple are taken, it says the men gave their earrings.
2026 - Yes, here it is, a few chapters later:
22 So they came, both men and women. All who were of a willing heart brought brooches and earrings and signet rings and armlets, all sorts of gold objects, every man dedicating an offering of gold to the LORD. [Exo 35:22 ESV]. Implies here that some of the women still had earrings, and the men still had theirs.
2026 - This verse:
6 And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. [Exo 32:6 ESV].
In vs 5 the feast day to Yahweh was declared. And vs 6 says they worshiped him...but I think they did so in an idolatrous way, offering sacrifices to the calf as representative of the invisible God. And their worship didn't "take". They went to church first, and then from there they went to the bars and brothels. Worshiping the wrong way does nothing to change you, sanctify you, it just doesn't count at all when the object of your worship is not directly, uniquely God.
2026 - Vs 8:
8 They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!'" [Exo 32:8 ESV].
This references the spoken 10. Those are the only commands God had given them. He spoke directly to them, they all heard, and now they are breaking those rules. They have no excuse at all.
Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you."
Exodus 32:10 ESV
These people had heard the voice of God Himself speaking from a mountain top only weeks before. Each one heard it. It was not a rumor that a few people told them about. They heard it. And yet, they are so fickle (my word, God's word for them was stiff-necked) that they turn away almost immediately. Israel came this close to being wiped out except for Moses.
Moses talks God out of it. Moses' argument is that if God does indeed destroy these people, then the Egyptians will say that the only reason God freed them from bondage was to take them out and kill them in the desert. This would be a very different kind of God than the one we have. The Egyptians, and indeed the world, would have thought that this was a mean, angry, killing kind of God, who destroys whole peoples for reasons unknown. A God lacking logic, justice, or pity. God did not go to all this trouble to get Israel loose from Egypt in order to be completely misrepresented in character because the people he chose were not really so great a people. And further, Moses reminds God of his promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and that this mass of people is in fact already the fulfillment of much of the promise He had made. To wipe out the fulfillment of the promise also shades the power that brought it about. Did he do as he promised in a fickle way, just to say "Ok, I did it, but now I'm just going to wipe them out." Is the fulfillment of God's promise a transient fulfillment or is it the real deal, ongoing, and forever? These are deep arguments that Moses has presented to God. Arguments that perhaps could only be made by one who was raised with full knowledge of the workings of Egyptian religion and so understanding of how they will interpret God's actions.
2023 - Vss 15,16 tell us a lot about the tablets. Two tablets, written on both sides, front and back. So four "pages", unlike the two that we always see depicted as written only on one side. God had made the tablets, they weren't produced by Moses then written by God. God made the tablets, and the finger of God wrote on them. God's own handwriting. In Hebrew? We have no info.
Moses has the people drink the gold of the calves, no doubt causing many problems later. (2023 - This is two places now where I have written calves, plural. In the movie, there is only one. In Israel when the kingdom is divided, there are two. So I will be paying close attention t how many there are in Exodus 32...and I will go back and correct myself if needed.)
2023 - Aaron's pathetic lie...:24 So I said to them, 'Let any who have gold take it off.' So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf." [Exo 32:24 ESV]. Whoosh! Aaron is claiming, almost...sort of, that he thought it was God who made the magic calf because it just "jumped out of the fire". But we know, and Aaron knew, that he made it with a graving tool. This is so very juvenile. Like he didn't think this lie could be easily disproved. Yet Aaron still becomes High Priest...and everyone knew he was the one that shaped the calf.
This verse:
25 And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose (for Aaron had let them break loose, to the derision of their enemies), [Exo 32:25 ESV]
Not sure how we are to understand this "breaking loose". It would seem to me to be apostasy. Maybe what has happened to many of the Hebrews is along the same lines as what is spoken here:
3 Let no one deceive you by any means; for [that Day will not come] unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, [2Th 2:3 NKJV]
Are breaking loose and falling away the same thing? Perhaps a very large portion of these people, having worshiped the calves (ok this is the THIRD time I've made this plural...and this, 2023, is the first time I've questioned it! - SEE 2023 notes on vss 1, 4 above), have forever and irrevocably abandoned God, and so must be purged from the people.
2021 - NASB phrases it "let them get out of control". They were essentially without rules, discipline, or thought. They were sort of "ecstatic" in the NT sense of pagan worship. They were just out of their minds, in trances, that sort of thing. It may well be implied here that even after Moses appeared back in camp, many of the people continued in this "out of control" state. They continued to behave with complete abandon, unbridled by any consideration of propriety. Orgiastic behavior might be the best word.
2023 - NASB note says this phrase literally means "let loose". MacA makes no comment on vs 25. Perhaps a husbandry reference. Like sheep or cattle "let loose" from their keepers to wander and indulge themselves...and there is still that "to the derision of their enemies". Wouldn't these enemies have been right there in camp with them? Perhaps that mixed multitude that went with them were hooting and hollering at the behavior of these so-called holy people, behaving just like their former captors?
Then this sequence of verses:
26 then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, "Who is on the LORD's side? Come to me." And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. [Exo 32:26 ESV]
Moses orders the Levites to kill those close to them - to kill their brother, his companion, and his neighbor. Three each? Or figurative? In any case, they killed those in their family and those close around them who had broken away. A hard thing. A VERY hard thing to do. In fact, the Levites kill 3000 people. And then, almost as a "blessing" for their willingness to do something so difficult, we get this verse:
29 And Moses said, "Today you have been ordained for the service of the LORD, each one at the cost of his son and of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day." [Exo 32:29 ESV]
These were all Levites who stepped forward and said they were on the Lord's side. Only the Levites stepped forward. This was Moses' and Aaron's tribe also. The Levites become a tribe of priests - servants really - keepers of the temple, separate and apart from the Aaronic priesthood, though all from the same tribe. And this right here is where it started. They stepped away from the crowd, and did a very difficult thing, as ordered by God through Moses.
2023 - But, note that in vs 26, ALL the sons of Levi came to Moses side. THEN, Moses told them to kill HIS brother, HIS companion, and HIS neighbor. HIS, not YOUR. Could just be how this would be translated...but my point is that they were not killing Levites - so not their literal brothers - because ALL the Levites came to Moses' side. So we have to understand brother, neighbor, and companion all in the same sense - other Hebrews. No more than that.
Moses goes back up to try and make atonement for the people directly with God. Moses asks to be blotted out himself if God will not forgive the people. I believe God denies this request from Moses. God says He knows who sinned against Him, and those who did He will blot out. So there is a division of saved and unsaved within Israel already at this point. There are faithful and unfaithful.
2023 - Because of Cecil B. DeMille, we think of this rebellion as pretty much universal within the camp, including even Aaron. We think that they ALL behaved this way. The Levites kill only 3,000...remember that in Ex 12:37, it says that 600,000 men left Egypt. So 3,000 dead here is a pittance. Then this next verse:
...
Israel probably thinks it is all over, and they'll be on their way, but then this verse:
Then the Lord sent a plague on the people, because they made the calf, the one that Aaron made.
Exodus 32:35 ESV
(Only one calf in this verse...)
2023 - Do we get any idea how many died here? No matter, it wasn't just a whole lot I don't think. However, it is probably also wrong to say that between the 3,000 and this plague everyone who participated - all who broke away - are now dead. Aaron certainly is not, and he was very high up in the circle of those who broke away. We might ought to "remember ahead" here that not one of these people - other than the spies - will enter the promised land, and the spies only see it, they never live in it. So perhaps the real punishment for this breaking away was death for many, but denial of milk and honey for all the rest...and it started right here, not at the border of Canaan. And see the analogy to salvation. They had sinned, and heaven was denied them....? No, not really a good analogy there...it is lack of repentance, submission, and service that close heaven off from the lost.
It is true that God has decided to move on. He has blotted out the guilty, and is moving on with His promises to Abraham about the land. However, just because God has decided to move His plan forward doesn't mean He has forgotten about the sin. Being forgiven for sin does not make the consequences of sin go away. This seems to be the same principle that was applied after the fall. Adam and Eve were forgiven - they did not die immediately - but life was never the same. Life now included thorns, pain, back breaking work...sickness, disease and so on. The sentence for Adam's sin was death, as is the sentence for our sins. But God did not immediately carry out that sentence. He was merciful and let them continue their lives, but He did not remove the consequences of their sin. The principle is that being forgiven for sins does not remove the consequences of that sin.
Possible FB post.