Exodus 32b Commentary
This chapter could as well be titled, “When Ignorance Governs”.
Israel forgot who saved them; it wasn’t Moses. They also forgot that images and physical objects couldn’t represent their God.
What happens when we feel God has delayed? When His representatives don’t show up, what happens?
Israel has a simple solution: Install another god. This god would provide guidance and freedom to indulge – play shamefully, without moral restraint. You get a picture of what it meant to worship Egyptian gods.
And Aaron? Yes, weak Aaron. Leadership failure. Lack of moral stability. Lack of faith and spine. Everything wrong about a leader combines in Aaron. This chapter’s big equation is how close Aaron was to the God of Abraham.
How dare Aaron think of reducing the God of Abraham into a golden calf – and even install himself as a priest for the same! Terrible.
As we reflect on Aaron’s weakness (and wickedness), we need to check ourselves. What do we do when we feel like the LORD has delayed? Do we install plan B and continue to perform priestly functions for a plan that isn’t God’s plan?
Do we imagine that by performing and doing ‘church’ the golden calf would become God? Is our experience of God based on the ‘man of God’ rather than God Himself? What happens when the man of God delays, is God still there? Who saved you, Moses or God?
Of course, God responds with a demand to “clean house”.
Interestingly, God appears to seek Moses’ opinion concerning His decision to clear the wicked nation. How God wants to govern with His children in mind! Their opinion is important! Prayer allows us to participate in the divine!
Here and in many other places elsewhere, the death sentence seems to be the ready-go punishment by the LORD God. The answer is partly found in Genesis Chapter 3. Man without God is dead. Man without the Spirit of God is dead. So even here, failure to accept the Spirit of God, or a decision to reject the Spirit of God is a decision to remain dead. So the death sentence for Israel confirms what has happened already. It’s a confirmation of a decision to reject life.
Interestingly, Moses is not exactly aware of the gravity and extent of Israel’s sin down in the valley. It appears the LORD allows him to intercede from a position of ignorance.
Not only has the Community abandoned the LORD, they no longer want to listen to Moses. After all, they have another god in the form of a golden calf who allows them revelry and a ‘good time’! To restore normality, Moses does exactly what he had asked the LORD not to do. At his command Levites move in to slaughter some of the sinners.
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