Please read Exodus 32-34. How do the main stories here (the Gold Calf story and Moses in the "cleft of the rock") tie in to the theme of Exodus as part of one of the finest of all law codes and something more than just a law code? What does the writer here suggest about the way religious worship is tied to questions of law and justice? What's attractive about Golden Calf worship? Why is it a danger to building a just society?
Humans have an innate desire to worship, whether they realize they're worshipping or not. It didn't take long for the Israelites to think that Moses was never coming back from the mountain and that God had abandoned them as well, so they hastily created something, anything that they could pledge themselves to. The Golden Calf was a god they could see and touch, and so it was most likely easy for the Israelites to convince themselves that the Calf was an object worthy of worship. Perhaps they didn't really even believe it was a god, but it comforted them to have an object of worship. However, to build a god for yourself, or in your image like in the case of the Greek gods, does not set your society on a solid foundation. The gods constructed by imperfect humans will have flaws and are not perfect, moral creatures to be followed. Any law created by imperfect beings will be inherently imperfect as well.
ReplyDeleteRegarding Moses in the "cleft of the rock," this law is coming from a God that is so perfect and holy that Moses cannot even look upon Him without perishing. This law from God isn't just a dry set of rules that keep people in line. Rather it strikes at the heart of His creation and offers instruction on how we were always meant to live as His human beings. The One who created humans is the only One who knew exactly what they were created to be. And the fact that this perfect, holy God was still willing to lead the people of Israel after they had continually disobeyed Him is astounding. This law isn't meant to restrain the Israelites - it comes from a perfectly just God, and it's something the people should delight in fulfilling because of who it came from.
The main stories tie into theme of Exodus as one of the greatest law codes and something more because of the ten commandments. The ten commandments give a law code with policies such as do not steal and do not be jealous. It is more than a law code however, with the impacts on culture. For example, the policies of the 7th day of rest and lent are laws yes, but they are more they are culture norms. The writer suggests religious policy goes hand in hand with laws with no separation of powers. For example going back to the ten commandments again their are laws in it that are religious such as demanding the 7th day of rest and then their are laws that are non religious such as do not steal. Golden Calf worship is attractive because it deters greed to an extent with forcing people to throw gold out. However, it is also dangerous because sometimes materialism and greed can drive great accomplishments and social achievements. On a side note the Golden Calf Worship sounds like socialism with getting rid of greed and the world saw how well that went when it was attempted it got tarnished and turned into in oligarchy overall it is a nice idea however too idealistic to work in this world. - Trent Shuey
ReplyDeleteThe Golden Calf story ties back to Exodus being one of the finest law codes because it shows what people how quickly people abandon what they know to moral and true in absence of the law. Those Israelite saw what God did in Egypt but forgot when they thought Moses wasn't coming back and proved their innate instinct to worship with the Golden Calf. God shows that he has forgiveness in this story but won't necessarily take away consequences of sin which is hinting at a law. In the cleft in the rock story it shows God's mercy towards Moses allowing not to look upon his face so he would be spared and how closely he talked with Moses in the process of the 10 commandments.
ReplyDeleteThe Golden Calf worship I think is attractive because it is a celebration of their wealth and the whole group joining in on this endeavor and feeling the peer pressure to participate. The author connects worship and law and justice saying they go hand in hand as God is a the center of their laws so following the law and acting justly is worship.
I think that the story of the Golden claf is an example of how fickle and hypocritical humans are at the best of times. Ever since man had the ability to think for themselves, they had to come up with reasons for their existence as well as to try and explain the things that were happening around them. It is why the concepts of spirits and gods were created and why mankind as an obsession with cresting religious icons. When Moses went up the mountain and didn't come back for some time the people of Israeli who had praised God for taking them out of Egypt all of a sudden lost their trust in God so easily and instantly tried to find A new God to worship in order to fulfill that need that they needed to justify their current existence. It goes to show how people can change so quickly in a short amount of time and how they can declare one thin such as they would only worship God and then almost instantly do the exact opposite of that the next. -Christian Zetterlund
ReplyDeleteThe golden calf story reminds me of the unaware significance of faith. The laws were to worship no idol and although they made it to worship him it was still unlawful. I could see this in the eyes of someone like moses. As in why do we need to see something in order to follow, worship, and listen. The definition of faith is the belief in the unseen, God in many ways set israel out on that journey to teach the children exactly what that meant. kenneth dennisd
ReplyDeleteThe story of the Golden Calf is something I find ironic and kind of humorous. This is because while the people below are building the Golden calf and beginning to worship it, Moses was up there on Mount Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments, to which the second commandment is to not worship other gods. This is a fine example of a law code because it gives an example of the law and what NOT to do. - Christina Grettler
ReplyDeleteThese stories tie into the theme of the law code found in Exodus by establishing a people who had a problem, faced consequences and had to review the law which had given to them after creating a god before them, a golden calf. The differing types of people among them also highlight this; you have the bad (Israelites) and the good (Moses) who was in the presence of the Lord on Mt. Sinai and was able to look at Him from His posterior.
ReplyDeleteThe Lord brings out in scripture that justice is to be served at the disobedience of the law and if not to worship Him as Lord, then death should be upon them.
For me, lacking the taste for precious metals, golden calf worship does not look the slightest bit attractive. For the Israelites, I presume the attractiveness of the golden calf to be its mere appearance, maybe the thought of saving themselves by having something as a god before them.
The danger that may accompany the building of a just society may be that soon most will not agree on what is just and what is unjust. In time, a society would "do what is right in their own eyes" and much discord and hatred would be established among them.
Dylan Schimke
ReplyDeleteGod says that if you don't follow my religious laws, like making a treaty with another tribe, you will become corrupted by their ways. In order to not become like other tribes, you must not associate with them. The golden calf worship seemed like a short-term gratification move. The people that were just saved didn't have enough patience to wait for Moses to come back down, so they needed some other thing to worship in order to take their time, and that is when Aaron collected the golden jewelry and created the golden calf so it could be worshipped. Another example of this would be like Abraham and Sarah not waiting for God's promise and having a child with another woman. The lack of patience leads to situations and downgrading of culture. It is a danger to build a just society because in order to be just you have to do hard things, and some people will do anything to not do those hard things. This can lead to a lack of patience, which will cause a society to act quickly without thinking of the consequences, which can be dangerous.
For some reason, humans have always felt the need to place a face to the god they are worshipping. Even in the instances where the god is not human, we are still aware of what their faces appear to be. However, because of this, humans are quick to craft statues, figures, paintings, etc, in an effort to decorate and pray to a material object.
ReplyDeleteBut therein lies the problem. People will become greedy through these avenues. People who craft their god of gold will cherish the gold much more than the god they crafted it for. In a way, their religious values become tied to money, which is why many people are leaving churches today.
In the modern day, there are many churches that are bedecked in accessories, have paintings of Jesus, etc etc, or the mega churches with their fireworks and concerts. These are not real ways to pray and be close to God. At best, it is overcompensation, peacocking. At worst, it is forgetting and pushing away everything God has been trying to present to humans.
By building the golden calf, they are doing that - tying their religion to something material. And humans, despite many arguments that we don't, will oftentimes become greedy and want to obtain the material object for ourselves.
This greed and jealousy causes crimes to occur - theft on the lesser end and murder on the worse end.
It's why he made it to where Moses could not see his face - without it, Moses (being the only one to see God) is not able to recreate that same face into an idol, allowing God to remain untied to the mortal realm, as he should have stayed.
In the modern day, it's easy to think of laws being enforced solely by the government. But when thought of that way, we miss a key element of what makes a law, a law. A law is nothing besides a social contract between members in a society. When this social contract is broken, there are consequences for doing so. Typically this is done through the police, government official, or court system. But in the ancient world, when what we think of as police does not exist, laws, or social contracts, are enforced solely by the citizens of the land. If citizens refuse to enforce these social contracts, they effectively do not exist. It takes all, or a majority of citizens to buy into these social contracts, for them to be effective. What makes the nation of Israel unique, is that every citizen accepts the law unilaterally. They think these laws make sense and are necessary. I mentioned earlier, that the reputation of the Hebrew God is important. The Israelites think he's trustworthy and reliable. But uniquely, they can't physically see him. Unlike almost every other god in ancient history, they don't have any physical representation of their god. Furthermore, it's explicitly prohibited in the ten commandments to make an idol representing the Hebrew god. It's clear that god wants his people to adopt him into their lives. He wants them to be blessed by the law, because they truly believe in him and want to follow him. He doesn't want the Israelites to just go through the motions of following him, he wants to be a part of their daily lives. That's why, when Aaron makes a golden calf, it's such an affront to God. They're destroying the fabric that their society is going to be built on. But, I don't fully blame the Israelites. Especially at a time in history when idol worship was at its peak, its very difficult to grasp the idea of an invisible god. After all, they're familiar with the Egyptian gods. But when they make a physical idol, they miss the entire point of the ten commandments. They start to think justice comes from an inanimate golden calf, rather than a present god, active in their society.
ReplyDelete-Walker Larson
I think that the story of the golden calf has been used as an example in Sunday school classes for many years. Most of the time, the lesson is along the lines of "don't be impatient" or "don't worship earthly objects," and I think these are great. The people of Israel, throughout the Bible, had multiple hiccups and times of doubt and betrayel. In regard to this story relating back to a good law code, this shows what NOT to do in times of worry and doubt. Moses was not gone for very long, and Aaron convinced the rest of the people that he was never coming back, when in reality, even IF Moses never came back, that didn't mean that God wasn't there. In my opinion, the people seemed to rely on Moses (and Aaron) more than God Himself at some points. This shows a major flaw in humans. They could not see God, but they could see Moses. Therefore, Moses was just like God in their eyes (in some circumstances). God should have been consistently glorified by the Israelites, but instead, he was "overshadowed" by Moses (from the people's point of view). When Moses left, that was basically the Israelite's "God" leaving them, too, hence why they went and built another god that they could see and touch.
ReplyDeleteLauren Bland
I find the golden calf story quite interesting and disappointing. After the Israelites heard about the 10 commandments and all the other laws; they immediately disobey the first one given to them, "you shall have no other gods" and they fall into idol worship. The golden calf, although now sounds really dumb, was attractive due to its short time enjoyment. God doesn't seek to satisfy us with short time pleasure but long term. Therefore, people can get really impatient as seen with the Israelites. Moses frustration is very reasonable due to him seeing the living God and experiencing his power. This shows us that even though a law code can be as well constructed as this one, people mess up all the time. Therefore punishment is necessary!
ReplyDeleteThe people praying to the golden calf seem to symbolize materialism. Their fear of the unseen and their focus on what is visible have many implications for today's society. This is similar to how people today become obsessed with money, fame, and power, losing sight of what truly matters in life. It seems to warn us about humanity’s tendency to trust in what is tangible rather than in unseen values.
ReplyDeleteSophia Lee
The worship of the Golden Calf relates to the overall theme of Exodus, as it shows why the people need laws. God instructed the people not to worship other gods, and yet that is exactly what they did. The Israelites build the Golden Calf and worshiped it because unlike God, they could actually see this new god they had created. Worshiping a god that you can't actually see leaves a lot of mystery and uncertainty. Worshiping something like the Golden Calf, something that you can see and that you know isn't going to just get up and disappear, would take that mystery away. But the Israelites are punished for this act, showing ultimately how powerful the one true God is. This suggests that if you aren't worshiping God correctly, or in this case at all, you are committing a serious crime. This story shows how creating a just society, even if you are God's chosen people, is really hard because we are human and we make mistakes (many of them).
ReplyDeleteThe story of the Golden Calf stood out to me when relating the events of the later chapters of Exodus to the law code the book establishes. As soon as Moses leaves his people, they proceed to break one of the ten rules that God lays out for them. The law code that is established not only tells the Israelites what they can do physically, like don't kill, but it also lays out spiritual and ethical guidelines for them as well, like don't have any other gods and don't covet what is not yours. I think what attracted the people of Israel to the Golden Calf in particular is that it was a physical representation of their God in front of them. It may have been a hard transition for them to worship one God who you just have to believe is there because they lived in a world where most other representations of gods came with symbolism and idols.
ReplyDeleteJorja Whempner
Chapter 32 explains about Moses and Aaron. The prisoners and with their swords. Moses, noting the sins, returned it to the lord. The Lord says he is the one in charge. In the end, the lord sends out a plague. I like this chapter because it explains God's wrath and power.
ReplyDeleteChapter 33 talks about God giving land and going on his promise. The people of Isreal stripping themselves of their ornaments. So, Moses sets up a tent to fulfill on gods power, and people go to God. This chapter also sets up God and the promises he made for years to come.
Chapter 34 This chapter establishes the famous Ten Commandments, which were written on Stone and Moses must bring to the mountains. Moses became one of God's messengers after this. This final chapter sets up the rules and laws we know about today.
The main two stories tie into each other because of the ten commandments. The making of the Golden Calf was against God's first and second commandments., which are don't have any other gods before me and don't make any graven images. Gods lays everything out for the Israelites. He is saying that if you follow my Commandments, you will find justice. The Ten Commandments are well laid out and I feel they explain to the Israelites exactly what God's expectation are. The Golden Calf worship is attractive because it gives the people a picture of what their God look like and they can feel it as well as see it. Some humans find it hard to believe without actually seeing God and being able to touch it too. This is were Faith come into play. Having faith is hard because faith is believing in something you can't, yet believing in it. Building the Golden Calf is a danger to building a just society because there are no laws that it shares with the people, no right and wrong.
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