The Pulpit Commentary — Exodus — Volume 2 — Section 304

1\1,-,,"" went up into the monnt,11.in, be knew not how long be would have to wll.it, th,11 "'"" not for him or ABron or Boy mBn to know. But however long he WII.S to be away all due pro,i~ion hRd been made for the people's welfare. The daily morning tnann; was there; and Aaron and Hur wore Bppointed to settle &ny disputes th&t might II.rise. There i~ no word of any ~xternal enemy approaching; there is no threatening of civil ~trife: there is not even a recurrence of murmuring after the fleshpots of Egypt. All that wai; needed was quiet waiting on the pa.rt of the people; if they had waited forty months instead of forty days, there would have been nothing to cause reason&b!e astonishment; for Jehovah and not man is the lord of times &nd seasons. 2. The f'eque.,t ilse(f. There i8 a certain unexpectedness in this request. Who is it that is missing? Moses, the visible le.ader," the man that brought us up out of the le.ndof Egypt." Hence we might suppose the first feeling of the people would be to put some one in Moses' place ; eYen a,; later they said, " Let us make a capta.in, and let us return into Egypt" (Num. xiv. 4). But instead of this their cry to A&ron is," Make us gods.'' How little <lid Moses expect, when he put Aa.ron to be counsellor of the people in his absence, that it was for image-wol'!lhip they would seek his help! And yet the more we ponder, the more we shall be led to feel that this wa.s just the kind of request that might be expected from the people. Their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob believed in the invisible Jehov-ah; but faith in the invisible will not go down from generation t.o generation, as if it were a blood quality. The God of Abraham was one whom, though Abraham could not see, he could hear as speaking with most miraculous organ. But these people at Sinai wanted above all things a god whom they could see, even though it was but 11, life- less, sightless, voiceless image. Great is the mystery of idolatry. How men have come to bow down to stocks and stones is not a question to be dismissed with a few contemp- tuous words. These idolatrous Israelites were seeking satisfaction for a desire of the hea.rt as imperious in its own way as bodily hunger and thirst. They wanted something to be a centre of worship and religious observances in general, and the quickest way eeemed to fabricate such a centre by the making of gods. Whereas, if they had only been patient and trustful and waited for Moses, they would have found that, even by the very absence of Moses, God himself was providing for the worship of the people. We have here ano~er illustration of the frequent _follies of popu!a,r d~isions. The greatest thing that required to be done for these Israelites was the thing tliat needed to be done in them. II. AAlloN's OOlll'LlANCE WITH THE REQUEST. He shewed great readiness in felling in with the request; and it has been suggested that his readiness was only in appear- ance, and that he hoped the women would refuse to surrender their cherished ornaments, thus making the construction of a suita.ble image impossible. It may have been so; but why should we not think that Aaron may have been as deeply infected with the idola- trous spirit as any of his brother Israelites ? There is everything t.o indicate that he went about the execution of the request with cordiality and gratification. And it must not be forgotten that in the midst of all his forgetfulness of the command against image- worship, he evidently did not think of himself as forsaking Jehovah. When the image and the altar were ready, it was to Jehovah he proclaimed the feast. What Aaron and the people along with him had yet_ to learn was ~t J eho!ah was not t.o be eerv~ by will-worship or by a copy of the ntes observed m honounng the gods of o~er n~t1ons. Thus all unconsciously, Israel demonstrated how needful were the patterns given m the mount. The feast to Jehovah, indicated in ver. 6, was nothing but an excuse for the most reckless and degrading self-indulgence. How different from the ideal of those solemn seasons which Jehovah himself in due time prescribed; seasons which were meant to lift the 1:fu1::bove their comm.on life into a more hearty appreciation of the Divine presence, g and favour, and thus lead them into joys worthy of the true people of God.-Y. Ven. 1-7.-The M of the gold.ffl caJ,f. Disastrous effects followed in the camp of Israel on the withdrawal of Moses to the mount. Moved as by a common impulse, the people "gathered themselves ~eth~r," and deman~ed. of Aa.ro°: that he should make them " a god," i.e. an idol, that 1t IDlght go--be earned m procession-before them (cf. Amos v. 26). It was a case of" band joined in hand" t.o do iniquity (Prov. xi. 21). }dai.y, doubtleu, looked on the mo,:ement with dismo.y and horror (cf. ver. 26); but CR. n:xu. 1-7.] TIIE BOOK OF EXODUS.