Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible
Exodus 32:7-14
Yahweh Informs Moses Of What Is Happening Below (Exodus 32:7).
a Yahweh said to Moses, “Go, get yourself down, for your people whom you brought up out of Egypt have corrupted themselves (Exodus 32:7).
b They have turned aside from His commandments (His covenant) and made themselves a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt' (Exodus 32:8).
c Yahweh said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold it is a stiffnecked people” (Exodus 32:9).
d “Now therefore leave me alone that my wrath might wax hot against them, and that I may consume them. And I will make of you a great nation” (Exodus 32:10).
d Moses pleads with Yahweh because He is angry with the people whom He has delivered with great power and with a mighty hand (Exodus 32:11).
c Moses expresses his concern about Yahweh's reputation, “For what reason should the Egyptians speak saying, He brought them forth with evil intent to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth?” (Exodus 32:12).
b He calls on Him to turn from His wrath and repent of this evil against His people, and to remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel, His servants, to whom He swore by His own self and said to them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of I will give to your seed, and they will inherit it for ever” (Exodus 32:13).
a And Yahweh repented of the evil which he had said he would do to his people (Exodus 32:14).
Note that in ‘a' Yahweh passes His judgment and tells Moses that the people have corrupted themselves, and in the parallel ‘changes His mind' about what He will do to them. In ‘b' he declares their wholehearted rebellion and idolatry and that they have turned aside from the covenant commandments, and in the parallel is countered with a reminder that He should remember His irreversible covenant. In ‘c' Yahweh passes His verdict on the people, and in the parallel Moses seeks to save Yahweh having a verdict past against Him. In ‘d' Yahweh asks that Moses leave Him alone so that He can express His anger (abhorrence of sin) and consume them with the intention of producing a great nation from him. In the parallel Moses seeks that He turn away His anger and reminds Him of the effort He has already put in on their behalf.
‘And Yahweh spoke to Moses, “Go, get yourself down, for your people whom you brought up out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, ‘This is your God (literally ‘these are your gods', but it is clearly a plural of intensity), O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.' ” '
Yahweh, aware of all that was going on, for contrary to the people's thoughts He had not taken His eye off them, now urged Moses to go down to his erring people. There was an irony in this. They had thought themselves overlooked. But He was perfectly aware of what was happening. Note the ‘your people.' They were no longer to be seen as Yahweh's people, for they had so quickly forsaken the covenant which forbade molten images.
“ Go, get yourself down.” This contrasts with the ‘Up' in the words addressed to Aaron (Exodus 32:1). Both contained a sense of urgency.
“ Your people whom you brought up out of Egypt.” Yahweh's words are designed to appeal to Moses' sense of responsibility. He had brought them, offering them certain promises, and he had been successful. Would he now turn his back on them?
“ Have corrupted themselves.” This is Yahweh's verdict on them. What they had done had come from their own inner yearnings. They had no one else to blame for leading themselves astray into false worship. They had become what they were from their own attitudes.
“ They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them.” Only a month and yet they had so quickly pushed to the back of their minds that covenant that they had entered into so enthusiastically. They have forgotten His covenant. They would have argued that they were still worshipping Yahweh. But they were overlooking the fact that they had ignored the first two commandments. They had deliberately disobeyed Him.
“ They have made themselves a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed to it.” That is, they have disobeyed the first two commandments. Notice Yahweh's contemptuous ‘a molten calf'. They had asked Aaron to ‘make us a god', but all he had produced was an infused metal image. They would have argued that it was Yahweh that they were worshipping but their behaviour demonstrated that this was not true Yahweh worship, for worship does not consist of using the correct name, but of how we see the object of worship. He was the gracious but demanding God of the covenant, and they now saw Him as just another nature and fertility god, malleable and well under control. They were at last on familiar, welcome ground. But God's anger is patent. They have worshipped and sacrificed to this thing that they have made instead of worshipping and sacrificing to Him.
“ This is your God (literally ‘these are your gods”, but it is often translated as a plural of intensity), O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.' The people would see the molten calf as a god, and probably as representing Yahweh. Yahweh sees it as a bunch of earrings belonging to superstitious people. So the plural is probably used to bring out the same double point as in Exodus 32:4. Firstly it can be seen as a plural of intensity expressing the multiplicity of the divine power (the name for God in the Old Testament, Elohim, is nearly always plural). But secondly it can be seen as having in mind the religiously infused earrings, with their connections with occult practises and with the gods who were seen as lying behind them. They see their molten image, Yahweh sees their earrings. All their image really represented was their old failing gods.
‘And Yahweh said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold it is a stiffnecked people. Now therefore leave me alone that my wrath might wax hot against them, and that I may consume them. And I will make of you a great nation.” '
The way that Yahweh speaks passes judgment on the people but gives the hint to Moses that it is up to Moses what happens. ‘Leave me alone' is basically saying, ‘if you wish to prevent me you can'. It is not Yahweh's intention at this stage to destroy this people (note the contemptuous ‘this people') but to test Moses to see what he will do, and to see whether he has the heart for the task that lies ahead.
So He tells him that He has observed the behaviour of this people and has found them wanting. Indeed has found them to be stubborn and rigid in their thinking, and even perverse. They are stiffnecked. They want their own way and not His. So He suggests that Moses lets Him exercise His anger against them so that He can consume them and then raise up a new nation from Moses' seed. But His very words were an indirect reminder of what He had promised to Abraham's seed (‘I will make of you a great nation'). That was indeed the basis of Moses' call. It was the descendants of Abraham that God had sent him to deliver (Exodus 2:24; Exodus 3:6; Exodus 6:5). The question is will Moses prove faithful to his calling, and to Abraham, or will he opt for his own glory?
“ And I will make of you a great nation.” This was God's constant promise to the fathers as Moses would well know (Genesis 12:2; Genesis 21:18; Genesis 46:3). But now Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will be supplanted, and Moses will take their place. Is this what he wants? It is designed by Yahweh to strike a cord in Moses' heart.
‘And Moses pleaded with Yahweh his God, and said, “Yahweh, why does your wrath wax hot against your people which you have brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? For what reason should the Egyptians speak saying, He brought them forth with evil intent to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth. Turn from your fierce wrath and repent of this evil against your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self and said to them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of I will give to your seed, and they will inherit it for ever.” '
How God's heart must have rejoiced to hear the faithful words of His servant. There was in Moses no desire for gain and advantage for his own heirs. His only concern was that Yahweh might be seen in a good light, and that Yahweh might be found faithful to His promises. He was concerned only for the good name of Yahweh.
“ And Moses pleaded with Yahweh his God.” What remarkable words these are. We can compare them with those of Abraham before Sodom (Genesis 18:23). And yet it was a response to the chink of hope that Yahweh had left him. Moses the servant was pleading with his King for the sake of his King's reputation, because his King had intimated that he had His permission to do so.
Moses did not realise that it was a test. His honest heart was filled with a determination that men should honour the God he loved, and so he pleaded with Him. Had He not delivered ‘His people' (note, not ‘this' people any more, but His people) ‘with great power and with a mighty hand'. Aaron might have forgotten and blurred what had happened, the people also might have done so, but he himself would never forget the reality. It was firmly implanted in his mind.
So his first plea was on the basis of what a sad thing it would be if such exertion of God's almighty power, resulting from His compassion for His people, should go to waste. How sad if Yahweh's love for them did not receive its reward. It is based on the idea that a sovereign God could surely not possibly have so acted without finally bringing about His ends.
And then, secondly, he thinks with horror of what the Egyptians might say as the rumours spread back to Egypt, and he cannot bear it. Smarting from their own wounds they would jeer and point out what kind of a God Yahweh was. They would say that He had delivered only to destroy. Powerful He may be, they would say, but He was also abundantly cruel. It is clear that His whole purpose in leading the people from Egypt had been in order to lead them into the mountains and destroy them. It was not true of course. And Moses knew that Yahweh was not like that. But he cannot bear to think of the Egyptians being able to say it. It would humiliate the One he loves. And so he pleads with Yahweh to ‘rethink'. He acknowledges that He has a right to be angry but pleads that He will assuage His anger for the sake of His own reputation and good name.
And finally he thinks of his ancestors. He thinks of Abraham, that faithful man of God. He thinks of Isaac and Jacob (Moses uses ‘Israel' for Jacob's name because he is pleading for the children of Israel). And he thinks of what Yahweh promised them. Why He had even sworn by Himself (Genesis 22:16), and he cannot bear to think that Yahweh will withdraw from what He has promised, and thus prove dishonourable. The people may have forgotten the covenant, but Yahweh cannot do so. So let Yahweh think again. Let Him remember His covenant. He had promised them the land. He had promised the survival of their seed. He had promised that they would be a great nation. How then could He possibly renege on it so that men could scoff at His failure to keep His promises and fulfil His covenants. What a great man was Moses. In it all he was genuinely concerned only for the glory of God.
‘And Yahweh repented of the evil which he had said he would do to his people.'
This is an anthropomorphism. It really means ‘for all outward purposes He appeared to have changed His mind for He would not now do what He had said He would do'. The stress here is on the fact that Yahweh responded to Moses. The actual physical evidence of the fact would come later. In other words Yahweh would not actually do what He had said He would do. He would not destroy what are now again described, not as ‘this people', but as ‘His people'. It is but looking from a human point of view. Humanly speaking this was how it appeared. He appeared to have changed His mind.
But it was only outward appearance, He had not really done so. His threats had in fact only been words. He had not intended to do what He had said at all, for he had known what Moses would do. All He had wanted to do was to discover whether Moses' heart was right for the work he still had to do, and to express His great displeasure at the behaviour of the people. It expresses how He wants the world to see things.