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November 7, 2010 |
| Old Habits | ||
"You can take the boy out of the country but you can't take the country out of the boy." We've all heard this saying before. It tells us that some attitudes and practices can be very deeply ingrained in us. The Israelites ran into exactly this problem soon after leaving Egypt.
"The exodus was the event that brought the nation of Israel out of Egypt. But getting Egypt out of Israel was quite another matter."1 The Israelites had just received the 10 Commandments from God but they would fall back on the old habits they had learned in Egypt.
1 When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him."
"At this point, Moses has been on mount Sinai for 40 days. When he announced his plan earlier to ascend the mountain, he had not given any specific time that he would come back. He had simply told the elders to wait until he and Joshua returned."2
Moses was 80 years old and there were lightning flashes and sounds from the mountain where he had gone. After 40 days the people naturally wondered if something had happened to him. They were also living in a desert with their lives hanging by a thread of sustenance that was the daily provision of manna. Although they had seen great power demonstrated by God in their exodus from Egypt they were still not used to the idea that God would protect and preserve Moses and them.
When they become fearful, immediately they forget God and begin to doubt. They become concerned about how well they really know Moses. And they only remember that Moses brought them out of Egypt, forgetting that it was God that made it possible.
As a result of their fears and doubts they return to the habits they had learned in Egypt – idolatry.
2 Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me."
"[Likely these golden earrings] were a part of the spoils which they brought out of Egypt. How strange, that the very things which were granted them by [the] providence of God, should be now [used for] […] idolatrous purposes."3
Scholars are surprised at the quickness with which Aaron gives in to their request. As you recall, Aaron had worked closely with Moses from the start and had seen all the works of God to free his people. These scholars wonder if Aaron was actually trying to change the Israelites minds by showing there would be a price for their request. But this seems dubious in light of Aaron's other actions.
3 So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. 4 He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. […]
Not only had Aaron approved the construction of the idols, he organized the construction. Although the Israelites would have had the knowledge and tools to do the work, it still would have taken days to complete, lots of time to reconsider their actions. It is not as Aaron would later claim, "I threw [the gold] into the fire, and out came this calf"
We have to wonder why Aaron did this.
Note that the text says that they were "fashioning it with a tool". This is one of those clauses in the Bible that you can skip over and miss if you aren't careful. Why does the text bother to mention that a tool was used?
The reason is similar to the reason that God intentionally never revealed a physical form to his people and the New Testament writers never described the physical appearance of Jesus. It was so people would be less likely to construct idols.
Similarly, God's instructions for making an altar commanded that no tool should be used in its construction (Exodus 20:25, Deuteronomy 27:5-6). When the first temple was constructed under Solomon, the stones were shaped at the quarry and not at the temple site (1 Kings 6:7). God's desire was that people should worship him and not the things that people made, even if those things were made for his worship.
[…] Then they said, "These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt."
As long as you are going to break the second commandment, I suppose you might as well go for the third. Of course I'm joking. "In a sense, this is the ultimate blasphemy; the people are attributing God's mighty act of deliverance"4 to a lump of gold shaped like a calf, by men.
5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in front of the calf and announced, "Tomorrow there will be a festival to the LORD." 6 So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings. Afterward they sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.
Having built an idol, Aaron proceeds to organize the people in the worship of it. By using the word Yahweh, Aaron seems to be thinking that the idol is an idol to use in the worship of God. But that is the thinking of man and not the will of God. But note that the Israelites have not stopped worshipping their God for another, which would break the first commandment.
The Israelites had been given the Ten Commandments shortly before this but it's clear that they had not fully understood them. "But it must be borne in mind, that though by election and in name they were the people of God, they were as yet, in feelings and associations, in habits and tastes, little, if at all different, from Egyptians"5
The Israelites had sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings to God before. But now, after offering these to the idol they had created they began to indulge in revelry. "Ominously, […] the Hebrew verb [used here] often has sexual connotations. Illicit sexual activity is often part of pagan worship ceremonies."6
7 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. 8 They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, 'These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.'
God is disappointed with his people.
9 "I have seen these people," the LORD said to Moses, "and they are a stiff-necked people. 10 Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation."
God is really disappointed with his people. It's certain that Moses was also disappointed with them. But God makes an interesting offer – he will destroy the Israelites and recreate his people from the line of Moses.
It is unlikely that God would have done so. It is much more likely that God's intention was to prove Moses in his role as the intercessor for the Israelites. A secondary purpose may have been to warn the Israelites that their sins were a breach of the covenant and could cause God to reject them and deprive them of their privileges under the covenant.
11 But Moses sought the favor of the LORD his God. "LORD," he said, "why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, 'It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth'? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people.
Moses puts together a solid argument here. It had not been that long since the Israelites left Egypt. If the Egyptians were to find the dead bodies of the Israelites in the desert they would have to wonder that God had brought them out of Egypt in order to kill them. The Egyptians would think the Israelite's God was an evil God. Moses does not say it, but the Egyptians would also have to think that the Israelite's God was a fickle God who was not to be trusted.
13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: 'I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.'"
The next argument Moses puts forward is to remind God of his promises.
14 Then the LORD relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.
1. What were the conditions that caused the Israelites to feel insecure and so to desire an idol? When we feel insecure do we tend to take action to make ourselves feel secure?
2. Bad old habits are hard to recognize within ourselves. Often they only appear in the situations where the old habits were once useful. What can we do to identify them?
3. Why do you think Aaron was so quick to give in to the request for an idol? What can we learn from that?
4. Aaron saw the golden calf as an idol to Yahweh (God) and therefore acceptable. But God did not find that acceptable. The Roman Catholic Church uses images and statues. "The people worship [them]; but the pope says it is only to keep God in remembrance."7 What do you think?
5. Does God need to be told how his actions would be understood by other nations or to be reminded of his promises? Why would God be pleased to hear these pleadings from Moses?
1 NIV Standard Lesson Commentary, Fall 2010, Unit 1, September 19, Introduction, A
2 NIV Standard Lesson Commentary, Fall 2010, Unit 1, September 19, Section I, A
3 http://www.godrules.net/library/clarke/clarkeexo32.htm
4 NIV Standard Lesson Commentary, Fall 2010, Unit 1, September 19, Section II, B
5 http://www.searchgodsword.org/com/jfb/view.cgi?book=ex&chapter=032
6 NIV Standard Lesson Commentary, Fall 2010, Unit 1, September 19, Section II, C