Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

GOLDEN CALF

The story of the golden or molten calf (Exod. 32) is part of the revelation of divine law and establishment of covenant at Mt. Sinai in Exod. 19-34. The account begins with Moses separated from the people on top of Mt. Sinai, where he is receiving the revelation of the tabernacle cult and a copy of the Decalogue on stone tablets. Moses’ absence worries Israel, who request from Aaron gods to lead them, because they do not know what happened to Moses. Aaron collects the people’s gold jewelry, only recently acquired from the Egyptians upon leaving Egypt, and he apparently fashions a golden calf in the form of a young male bovine. It is described as molten, emphasizing that it was made out of liquid metal. Construction of the calf breaks the Sinai covenant between God and Israel, as is symbolized when Moses shatters the tablets.

The golden calf becomes a central symbol of Israel’s disobedience. It comes to symbolize, in particular, the danger of idolatry for ancient Israel and, through negative example, illustrates how worship of Yahweh must be image-free (aniconic). Repeated references to Exod. 32 throughout the OT reinforce this point. As a result of the construction of the golden calf, Israel loses the jewelry that symbolized their triumph over the Egyptians (Exod. 33:1-6). Moses underscores that not only did Israel make a metal or molten image but this very act of image-making was a rejection of Yahweh (Deut. 9:6-21). The sin of the golden calf is historicized in 1 Kgs. 11-12, , when Jeroboam I, the first king of the northern kingdom, is condemned for building two golden calves at Dan and Bethel (1 Kgs. 12:28-29). So great is this sin that it seals the destruction of his kingship and becomes the central symbol of evil rule in the Deuteronomistic history. The prophet Hosea, too, condemns the worship of the golden calf as idolatry (Hos. 8:5; 10:5-6; cf. Ps. 106:19).

The negative symbol of the golden calf lives on in Jewish and Christian tradition. In Pseudo-Philo the blame is placed solely on the leaders of the people rather than on Aaron (LAB 12). Stephen refers to the incident as an illustration of Israel’s stiff-necked character (Acts 7; ; cf. Deut. 9:6-21).

Bibliography. M. Aberbach and L. Smolar, “Aaron, Jeroboam and the Golden Calves,” JBL 86 (1967): 129-40; J. M. Sasson, “Bovine Symbolism in the Exodus Narrative,” VT 18 (1968): 380-87; “The Worship of the Golden Calf,” in Orient and Occident, ed. H. A. Hoffner. AOAT 22 (Neukirchen-Vluyn, 1973), 151-59.

Thomas B. Dozeman

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

GOLDEN CALF

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)