John Calvin Commentary Exodus 32:4

"And he received it at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, and made it a molten calf: and they said, These are thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." — Exodus 32:4 (ASV)

And he received them at their hand. He briefly narrates this base and shameful deed. Yet, he sufficiently shows that while Aaron yielded to their madness, he still desired to cure it. At the same time, however, he was weak and frightened, pretending to give his assent because he feared the personal consequences of the tumult. For why does he not command the earrings to be thrown into some chest, so that he would not pollute himself by the contagion of the sacrilege? Since, therefore, he received them into his own hands, it was a sign of a servile and effeminate mind. Thus, he is said to have been the founder, or sculptor, of the calf, even though it is probable that workmen were employed on it. But the infamy of the crime is justly brought upon him, inasmuch as he was its main author and, by his guilt, betrayed the religion and honor of God.

The Hebrew word ³²⁹חרט, cheret, some translate as a stylus or graving-tool, and some as a mould. The former think that the rough mass was formed by sculpture into the shape of a calf; the latter, that the calf was cast or founded, as we say, jetter en mousle, to cast in a mould. Ridiculous, however, is the fable that when the gold was thrown into a furnace, it came forth like a calf without human workmanship; but thus unrestrainedly do the Jews trifle with their fond inventions. The more probable conjecture is that Aaron intentionally sought a remedy for the people’s folly.

It was a disgraceful thing to prostrate themselves before a calf, in which there was no connection or affinity with the glory of God. With this, the Prophet expressly reproaches them, saying that they changed their glory (i.e., God, in whom alone they should have gloried) into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass (Psalms 106:20). For, if it is insulting to God to force Him into the likeness of men, with how much greater and more inexcusable ignominy is His majesty defiled when He is compared to brute animals? Still, it had no effect in bringing them to repentance. This is expressed with much force immediately afterwards, when they said to each other, These be thy gods, O Israel. Surely the hideousness of the spectacle should have struck them with horror, inducing them voluntarily to condemn their own madness. But, on the contrary, they mutually exhorted one another to obstinacy. For there is no doubt that Moses indicates that they were like fans to each other, and thus their frenzy was reciprocally excited.

For, as Isaiah and Micah exhort believers that each of them should stretch out his hand to his brother and say to each other, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord (Isaiah 2:3; Micah 4:2), so perverse rivalry provokes unbelievers mutually to excite each other to progress in sin.

Still, they neither speak ironically nor in mockery of God, nor have any intention of falling away from Him. Instead, they cover their sin against Him under a deceitful pretext. It is as if they denied that by their new and unusual mode of worship, they desired to detract from the honor of their Redeemer; rather, they claimed it was magnified because they worshipped Him under a visible image.

Thus, nowadays, the Papists boldly obtrude their fictitious rites upon God and boast that they do more for Him by their additions and inventions than if they merely continued within the bounds He Himself prescribed. But let us learn from this passage that whatever coloring superstition may give to its idols, and by whatever titles it may dignify them, they remain idols still. For, however those who corrupt the pure worship of God by their inventions may pride themselves on their good intentions, they still deny the true God and substitute devils in His place.

The conjecture of those who suppose that Aaron devised the calf in accordance with Egyptian superstition is probable. For it is well known with what senseless worship that nation honored its god ³³⁰Anubis. It is true that they kept ³³¹a live bull to be consulted as the supreme god. But, since the people were accustomed to this fictitious deity, Aaron seems, in obedience to their madness, to have followed that old custom from which they had contracted the error so deeply rooted in their hearts. Thus, from bad examples, contagion easily creeps into the hearts of those who were otherwise untainted. Nor is it without good reason that David protests that idols should be held in such abomination by him that he would not even take up their names into his lips (Psalms 16:4). For, unless we seriously abhor the ungodly and withdraw ourselves as far as possible from their superstitions, they immediately infect us with their pestilential influence.

³²⁹ Professor Robinson says a graving tool; but more properly to be rendered a ; but more properly to be rendered a bag here. here. C. alludes to what . alludes to what S..M. tells us, that the Rabbins, wishing to excuse their forefathers, said that there came forth a calf, not wrought by any workmen, but produced by the magical arts, which some of the Egyptians, mixed with the people, now employed to introduce idolatry. — . tells us, that the Rabbins, wishing to excuse their forefathers, said that there came forth a calf, not wrought by any workmen, but produced by the magical arts, which some of the Egyptians, mixed with the people, now employed to introduce idolatry. — W. Lightfoot has a characteristic note on this: “Expositors cannot tell what to say of their intent, for they cannot think they were such calves, (as to turn the glory of God into a calf,) and yet what else can we say? Jonathan saith, ‘The devil got into the metal, and fashioned it into a calf.’ The devil, indeed, was too much there; but it was in their fancies more than in the metal.” Explan. of divers difficult passages of Scripture. Decad, 1. 4. He elsewhere also refers to the probability, stated below by . Lightfoot has a characteristic note on this: “Expositors cannot tell what to say of their intent, for they cannot think they were such calves, (as to turn the glory of God into a calf,) and yet what else can we say? Jonathan saith, ‘The devil got into the metal, and fashioned it into a calf.’ The devil, indeed, was too much there; but it was in their fancies more than in the metal.” Explan. of divers difficult passages of Scripture. Decad, 1. 4. He elsewhere also refers to the probability, stated below by C., that the idol was made after an Egyptian pattern: “Israel cannot be so long without Moses, as Moses can be without meat. The fire still burneth on the top of Mount Sinai, out of which they had so lately received the Law; and yet so suddenly do they break the greatest commandment of that Law to extremity; — of Egyptian jewels they make an Egyptian idol, because, thinking Moses had been lost, they intended to return for Egypt.” — A handful of gleanings out of Exod., sect. 32.., that the idol was made after an Egyptian pattern: “Israel cannot be so long without Moses, as Moses can be without meat. The fire still burneth on the top of Mount Sinai, out of which they had so lately received the Law; and yet so suddenly do they break the greatest commandment of that Law to extremity; — of Egyptian jewels they make an Egyptian idol, because, thinking Moses had been lost, they intended to return for Egypt.” — A handful of gleanings out of Exod., sect. 32.

³³⁰ This appears to have been either a slip of the pen, or of the memory. It was not Anubis, but Osiris, “who was worshipped under the form of Apis, the Sacred Bull of Memphis, or as a human figure with a bull’s head, accompanied by the name Apis. Osiris.” — See Sir Gardner Wilkinson’s “Ancient Egyptians,” vol. 4, p. 347; 3d edition.

³³¹ It is a strange notion of R. Salomon Jarchi, that the molten calf was alive; because it is said in Psalm 106:20, that it was the “similitude of an ox that eateth grass.” See also Breithaupt’s note , that it was the “similitude of an ox that eateth grass.” See also Breithaupt’s note in loco..