not at all. Aaron SAID it was to the Lord, while he, & mose likely the rest of Israel, knew it wasn't. Moses knew it wasn't; in fact, God told him to get off the mountain, for the people had corrupted themselves.
Whom Did the Israelites Worship in the Golden Calf Incident?
Discussion in 'Baptist Theology & Bible Study' started by Scripture More Accurately, Jul 17, 2021.
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Yahweh
2 vote(s)15.4% -
One or more false gods
9 vote(s)69.2% -
Yahweh and one or more false gods
2 vote(s)15.4%
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Scripture More Accurately Well-Known Member
Ps. 106:21, which you seem to be ignoring, explicitly says that the people forgot the true God who was their Savior, which proves that they were not thinking of Yahweh in their worship. People who have forgotten someone are by definition not thinking of that person. -
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Scripture More Accurately Well-Known Member
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Sir, there is no imagination needed to observe what is written. -
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God saw their worship as corrupt. It is similar to "progressive churches" today. -
Martin Marprelate Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
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Scripture More Accurately Well-Known Member
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Martin Marprelate Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
What exactly is the specific and vital command to NT Christians that you are seeing here? You might like to reference Ephesians 5:5 in your answer. -
Scripture More Accurately Well-Known Member
Instead of citing their making of the idol, worshiping it, and sacrificing to it, as God speaks of in Exod. 32:8 as their having done in their having corrupted themselves and having turned aside from the way that He had commanded, the Spirit cites not the first part of Exodus 32:6 but the latter two parts, which I have bolded below:
Exodus 32:6 And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.
Because the Spirit explicitly directs the attention of Christians to their idolatrous eating and drinking and their idolatrous playing in the GCI, those are the aspects of their idolatry that the Spirit directly highlights that Christians must not do, as they did. -
Martin Marprelate Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
My point is that these Israelites may well have been telling themselves that they were worshipping Yahweh, just having a lot more fun doing it than they did when that Moses fellow was about.
'Prosperity Gospel' preachers claim to be preaching and worshipping Christ and are deceiving thousands, yet Ephesians 5:5 tells than that they are committing idolatry, supposing that godliness is a means of gain (1 Timothy 6:5).
You yourself seem to be saying (correctly :)) that idolatry is not just about worshipping physical idols. -
The people n the ancient near East generally believed in “regional gods”, that is gods that were powerful in specific areas (usually associated with mountains).
So they believe certain gods controlled Egypt and other gods controlled Canaan and so forth. It was not unusual to worship whatever “god” was popular in a particular area.
Aaron clearly attempted to bring their focus of worship upon YHWH, even though he greatly sinned/errored in making the calf to represent the one true God.
The people probably sought to worship several “gods”, depending which they believed would give them the most benefit and some were focused on YHWH if not singularly, then as part of many to worship.
It is probably wrong to think the Hebrew people were of one mind in attempting to determine who they intended to worship during this event.
Peace to you -
Scripture More Accurately Well-Known Member
Psalm 106:19 They made a calf in Horeb, and worshipped the molten image. 20 Thus they changed their glory into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass. 21 They forgat God their saviour, which had done great things in Egypt;
Those who had forgotten someone were by definition of the verb "to forget" neither thinking of that One whom they had forgotten nor telling themselves that they were worshiping the One whom they had forgotten. -
Martin Marprelate Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
20. 'They said that they meant to worship the true God under a fitting and suggestive similitude by which His great power would be set forth to the multitude; they pleaded the great Catholic revival which followed upon this return to a more ornate ceremonial, for the people thronged around Aaron, and danced before the calf with all their might. But in the very deed they had given up the true God...........
21. Remembering the calf involved forgetting God. He had commanded them to make no image, and in daring to disobey, they forgot His commands. Moreover, it is clear that they must have altogether forgotten the nature and character of Jehovah, or they could never have likened Him to a grass-eating animal. Some men hope to keep their sins and their God too.........'
['Treasury of David']
I think we've probably reached an impasse here. Thanks for an interesting discussion.:Thumbsup
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