Psalms 106:13-22

They soon forgat his works; they waited not for his counsel:

-Three transgressions of Israel in the wilderness are detailed, rising in gradation of moral guilt, without respect to time:

(1) Their unbelieving impatience in demanding flesh (Psalms 106:13);

(2) Their joining Dathan and Abiram in the envious attack on Moses and Aaron, the consecrated servants of Yahweh (Psalms 106:16);

(3) Their direct affront to God Himself in forming a golden calf for worship. The sins of Israel in the wilderness are dwelt on at greatest length, because it was by them that the then existing generation forfeited Canaan, implying to their posterity, now captive in Babylon, that their exclusion from Canaan was due to the same cause.

Verse 13. They soon forgat his works - Hebrew, 'they hasted, they forgat.' The verbs, unconnected by a bull Mnevis as the prototype of the golden calf, and the offerings, dancings, and rejoicings of Israel to have been imitations of the ceremonial in honour of Mnevis ('Ancient Egypt').

Verse 20. Thus they changed their glory into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass. There may be an allusion to the Egyptian usage of bringing a bottle of hay when they consulted Apis (Godwyn, 'Moses and Aaron,' 4:5). Yahweh seems to have been the ostensible object of worship, under the form of the cherub-like calf; because Aaron says, , "These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. Tomorrow is a feast to the Lord (Yahweh)." The approximation to Egypt's idols was the more perverse, when it was so recently that 'upon their gods the Lord executed judgments' (). "Their glory," which distinguished them above other nations, was that Yahweh was peculiarly their God (; , "He is thy praise;" ; Jeremiah 2:10). God signified His presence with Israel by the Shechinah cloud of glory over the cherubim in the sanctuary. Though they meant to worship Yahweh under the symbol of the calf, yet, as any "similitude" is incompatible with His essence as Spirit (; ), they really gave up Him (), and were therefore given up by Him.

Verse 21,22. They forgat God their Saviour, which had done ... Wondrous works in the land of Ham - (; .) Here this strophe at its close reverts to what formed its beginning, .