Exodus 32

I find the story of the golden calf to be one of the most disturbing in the entire Bible. Sure, it's yet another instance of the Israelites evincing their waywardness and ingratitude, and that's the part that church-going kiddies get taught in Sunday school. But I find other elements of the story even more discomfiting--chiefly, both God's and Moses's reactions.

Of course, what the Israelites do is rather imbecilic; it takes a real ninny to witness the miracles of the plagues, the parting of the Sea of Reeds, and the stentorian rumbling coming from the top of Mount Sinai, and yet suddenly think, "Oh! God hasn't been around for a while. Let's worship our nose rings, which have probably gotten all snotty and disgusting, by fashioning them into the shape of an animal that has to regurgitate its food in order to digest it properly." Aaron makes a particularly moronic excuse that probably causes Moses to look askance at him and say, "Really, bro?" In verse 24, Aaron claims that the Israelites gave him the gold, which he threw "into the fire, and out came this calf!" Like magic! Not that it would have been any better, but you'd think that Aaron would've been smart enough to say something like, "I couldn't stop them from making this calf" instead of digging himself further into his wretched little pit.

So yes, God justifiably gets apoplectic, threatening to smite everyone. What disturbs me is that Moses's argument to save His people actually makes more sense to me. Moses reminds God of His covenant and explains that the Egyptians would have a field day if they learned that God had taken the Israelites away only to kill them in the desert. All reasonable explanations, which God apparently agrees with, as he doesn't kill everyone after all. But did Moses have to make this argument? It's not like he's saying anything that God hasn't already considered. Is God testing Moses? I guess that makes the most sense, but something about this interaction still disquiets me a bit.

After Moses sings a little ditty about the delightful noises the Israelites are making (verse 18), he sees for himself what's going on and promptly has his own little fit, breaking the tablets of the law in the process. But then, he commands those loyal to him to kill everyone else. Verse 26 specifies the Levites as the loyal ones, but we know they actually didn't literally kill everybody else, or else there would have been only one tribe of Israel--the Levites. Still, 3,000 people died, which seems rather a shame. Maybe God directed them to kill only those who were incorrigibly idolatrous, but I know that's a naive thing to say, because innocent people die all the time. We don't get all the information here, so I just have to trust that God knew what He was doing. But still, this is not a story to warm the cockles of your heart.

As a cherry on top, God strikes everyone with a plague (verse 35), which I guess is only fair. You would think this would be enough to get the Israelites to heed Him now, but alas…. I don't envy God's position. Sure, there are the problems so eruditely explored in the movie Bruce Almighty, but how does one go about getting people, all of whom have a seed of original sin, to love each other and acknowledge Jesus' sacrifice while also giving them free will? I can only thank God that He has extended His grace to everyone.