The golden calf is Israel’s worst moral catastrophe. At the very moment of God’s giving the law, the people are breaking all ten commandments. If we Christians see the worst sin in Genesis 3 with the fall of Adam and Eve, our Jewish neighbours see it here, with the golden calf. Nothing worse has ever happened.
Here’s why it’s such a catastrophe. The point of God’s calling of Israel is to make a priestly people. That is, a people who pray for the whole world. We don’t use the word “priest” much in many Protestant settings, so let me explain. A priest goes to God on behalf of the people and goes to the people on behalf of God. A priest conducts traffic between heaven and earth. Israel is a priestly people for the world. God doesn’t call Israel for Israel’s sake. God calls Israel for everybody else’s sake.
Here’s the problem. What happens when Israel, God’s priestly people, fails? One scholar compares this to a terrible worldwide fire. The world’s fire crew (Israel) races off. But the firetruck gets stuck in a ditch. The rescuers . . . need rescuing. And meanwhile the world burns.
This story about God’s priestly people shows the best reason to go to church. Not for a spiritual pick-me-up. We actually go to church to pray for everybody else. To drag people before God and demand that God bless and heal them. And, my fellow priests, we have in this passage two very different portraits of a priest. Two ways to fail.
One, Aaron. The people say Moses has been gone too long, who knows if he’s ever coming back? “Make gods for us.” Aaron does. Makes no argument against this proposal. Takes their gold, melts it down, puts it in a mold, makes two calves—calves are symbols of Israel’s enemies’ gods. The people acclaim “these are your gods O Israel, who led you out of Egypt!” and Aaron builds an altar and announces a festival. They have the story right: someone led them out of Egypt, they’re right to want a festival, an altar, to give thanks. Those are all good things God directs elsewhere in Exodus. But they attribute their redemption from slavery to these hand-made shiny inanimate objects. A teacher of mine calls the golden calf an “abominable metal cow.”
Israel wants a god it can control. Moses wanders off. The calf cannot. In Exodus, God constructs elaborate means to be present with the people but also invisible: in the tabernacle, but veiled. With beautiful and elaborate decorations doing the veiling. Holy days appointed by God. Altars and festivals that require great care. Free offerings from the people, not manipulated. Exodus takes chapter after chapter to lay all this out. But the people want a visible god. That they can move around. And control. Rituals they make. It’s all done in a rush job without care or tenderness. Idols are not usually the opposite of God. Idols are good things that we mistakenly worship. Evil is stealthy that way. It dresses up as good.
The clear villain in this passage is Aaron. Brother of Moses. Priest in Israel, forebear of all the priests after him. Know anybody with a last name like Cohen? It means priest, they’re likely in this family line. Aaron gives the people the idols they want. When Moses challenges him later, what have you done, Aaron says hey, don’t look at me, you know how bad these people are, all I did was throw their gold in the fire and out jumped this calf! And Aaron goes unpunished for it! Eve gets lambasted forever after Genesis 3. But giving people the gods they want and then disclaiming responsibility that’s pathetic, passive-aggressive failure.
But Moses is not much better.
Moses starts out this story great. God wants to destroy the people and start over with Moses. And Moses won’t let it happen. God says “let me alone, so my wrath may burn hot against them, and I will make of you a great nation.” Let me at em. Im gon’ kill em! (that’s my translation directly from the Hebrew). And Moses . . . won’t. God says to Moses Israel is “your people [Moses], whom you led out of the land of Egypt.” God is washing his hands. But Moses corrects God. No no no, they’re your people God, whom you led out of the land of Egypt. You don’t want the Egyptians to say you led them out to murder them, do you? God pauses. ‘You’re right. I’m vain. I do care about my reputation.’ Moses later offers to be blotted out of God’s book of life if God will spare Israel. Moses will not let God give up on Israel. That’s prayer. That’s being a priest. That’s demanding goodness when God would rather punish. That’s leadership. It’s brilliant.
And then . . . Moses does worse even than Aaron.
For most of us human beings, our strength is very close to our weakness. Two sides of a coin. That’s true of people, institutions, nations. Aaron gives the people what they want. That’s good at times. He’d have been good in sales. Except Aaron gives them the idols they crave. Like a pharmacist who forks over poison because the customer demands it. Moses browbeats God into sticking by Israel when Israel cheats on him on their wedding night. That’s good. Until Moses sees what Israel has done with his own eyes. And then, Moses loses his mind.
He destroys the two tablets. God didn’t tell him to do that, Moses just does. Moses melts down the golden calf, mixes it with water, and makes the people drink it. Moses demands to know what side the people are on. And when they choose against the Lord again, the Levite priests kill the people on the wrong side. God didn’t tell him to do that either, Moses just does it. This is religious fanaticism. God doesn’t order it. Moses just acts. He’s cleansing the contagion from Israel, treating idolatry like we would treat a biological pathogen or a pest infestation in our house. No tolerance. Get rid of it. Kill them all.
So these are two different bad ways to be a priest. Aaron goes along to get along. Whatever man, y’all can have any idol you want. Moses shows zeal and rectitude. Too much of both. I’m right, everyone else is wrong. Kill anyone who disagrees. Aaron is the know-nothing liberal who agrees with everyone. It’s all good, who cares? Moses is the fanatic who insists on purity no matter who is injured in the process. The Lord demands it! No compromise! So which way will Israel, our priest, collapse? The firetruck is in the ditch, and one fire captain is saying ah, there is probably not a fire anyway, who cares? The other is saying keep spinning the wheels! And burning out the motor.
Our world is still on fire.
But there’s one more character in this story. One more who has a response to our dreadful spiritual state. This one is not like Aaron. He doesn’t just give us what we want. Samwise Gamgee in the Lord of the Rings loves gardens. And when Sam imagines taking the ring of power, he realizes he would choke the earth with gardens. Too much of a good thing. That’s what most of us want. A God like Aaron. A Santa Claus where every day is Christmas. Aaron shows what happens with that sort of god. Golden calves. Idols everywhere. Give the people what they want and they’ll like you.
The other character is not like Moses either. He has Moses’ zeal and passion for the truth. But doesn’t break things or people to get it. Moses rushes around saving the world, killing those who deserve death, saving very little actually, making clear who’s saved and who’s not. And if you’ve ever been a fundamentalist (and most of us have at some point about something) you recognize Moses. Moses shows the Trump phenomenon. Just raise your voice, bang the table, drown out the dissenters, and the world will snap back to the 1950s, when the men were men, the women were women, and everyone knew their place. Which was great if you had all the power you wanted—and almost no one did.
The other character in the story is . . . God. The one who creates the world in love. When the world disintegrates into chaos, God is tempted to wash his hands. But God lets Moses talk him out of it. God is willing to let us change God’s mind—look! It’s in the book! Verse 14! God changes his mind, but not his character. God’s goodness never changes—even God can’t change his goodness. So God is tempted to wipe us out. You will agree we human beings deserve that at times. But God won’t do it. God lets Moses hold him back. When Moses offers to let himself be blotted out of the book of life in place of Israel, God says no. I’m not killing someone who did no wrong. And then this makes me nuts y’all: God doesn’t punish Aaron! Aaron is the figure who makes me maddest in this story. But God makes a place even for Aaron! God says ok, here we are. All the different kinds of idolaters, Aaron in his way, Moses in his. The people in theirs. Worshiping things made by hand. That’s death. That’s a world on fire unrelieved. So God wonders what to do?
Start over with new, better people this time? No, I tried that with Noah, and ten minutes after Noah's ark lands, Noah is drunk and naked and cursing his own children. Well that didn’t work. So i’ll stick with this compromised people. The only kind of people there are. For better or worse, precisely when they don’t deserve it. And I’ll work from within to make them holy. To get the firetruck out of the ditch, and on the way to repairing the world, putting out the fire, making all things new. I’ll do it even with flawed zealous Moses, killing willy nilly to show he’s right. I’ll do it even with flawed Aaron, live and let live, whatever man, not noticing the destruction that results. I’ll do it even with my compromised church in North America and Europe. My overly zealous church in other times and places. My liberals and my conservatives—both being liberal and conservative are great ways to avoid doing business with the living God. God says ‘these atrocious sinners are all my people.’
And there are hints how God will do this. The offer to suffer in place of Israel. To be blotted out instead of the people. Moses can’t actually do that. But God could. And one day God will, in Jesus, be blotted out, so undeserving atrocious humanity can go free. If a human priest can fail, Christ as high priest cannot. A third glimpse: Moses’ refusal to let God punish. If Moses can hold God back, how much more can Jesus. And He will, one day. Only God made us. Only God can repair us. And God is working on that now, through such flawed people as you and me. So we pray, get this firetruck out of the ditch, Lord. Your world is ablaze. Heal us, and everyone else, and make all things new, God of Moses, and Aaron, and Jesus, and you and me. Amen.