Exodus 32:15, commentary and pictures

Moses turned and came down from the mountain carrying the two tables of the testimony in his hand, written by God on both their front and back sides. They were God's own work, graven by His finger with a copy of the Ten Commandments to teach Israel, the symbol of His authority and embodiment of His will to dwell among them as their King. He descended after forty days communing with the divine glory, accompanied by Joshua, hearing the wild uproar of the camp below which was revelry and singing and not war. Coming near he saw the people dancing around a golden calf in heathen riot, and in hot anger he cast the tables down and broke them beneath the mount to show that as Israel had broken their covenant so recently made, so God had broken His covenant with them. Though the apostasy was treason and a daring insult aimed at Israel's ruin, God did not arbitrarily destroy them but gave opportunity for repentance, cutting off only those who persisted, so that swift punishment upheld justice and was mercy to Israel and the world.

Tables Brought Down

Moses turned and went down from the mount with the two tables of the testimony in his hand, the stone tables written on both their sides, on the one side and on the other. The tables were the work of God, and the writing was God's own writing graven upon them by His finger. They were a copy of the Decalogue, the law of the Ten Commandments, the tables of the covenant given to Moses with the law and commandments that he might teach them.

They were the symbol of God's authority and the embodiment of His will, to be sacredly enshrined in the sanctuary as the visible center of the nation's worship where His abiding presence would dwell among Israel as their King and God. During that same ascent Moses was also given directions for building a sanctuary and the pattern of the ark.

He descended after forty days in the mount communing with God, just come from the awful presence of the divine glory. He was accompanied by Joshua, having been absent with him on Sinai in the cloud of thick darkness and divine glory while Israel waited below. His delay in coming down caused the people waiting below to become discontented, and their unbelief began to reveal itself in a marked manner.

On the way down Moses and Joshua heard the shouts of the excited multitude in wild uproar from the camp. Joshua mistook the shouting for the noise of war, but Moses more truly judged it to be revelry and the noise of singing.

Covenant Broken in Idolatry

At the time Moses turned to come down, Israel below had been given days and weeks to meditate on the law they had heard and to prepare their hearts for further revelation, but instead they became careless, inattentive, lawless, and impatient to go forward to the land flowing with milk and honey. They lost sight that the goodly land was promised only on condition of obedience. Feeling helpless without Moses and led by the mixed multitude, they desired some image to represent God and to go before them in the place of Moses. At the suggestion of those practiced in Egyptian idolatry they made and worshiped a calf after the ox or calf regarded as a symbol of deity in Egypt.

They did this even though God had given no manner of similitude of Himself and had prohibited any material representation. The mighty miracles in Egypt and at the Red Sea had been designed to establish faith in Him as the invisible all-powerful Helper and only true God. He had already granted them a visible manifestation of His presence in the pillar of cloud and of fire that guided them, in the revealing of His glory on Sinai, and in the cloud of the Presence still before them.

When Moses came near the camp he saw the calf and the dancing, with the people shouting and dancing around the idol in excited heathen riot in imitation of the idolatrous feasts and idol-worshipers of Egypt, so unlike solemn and reverent worship of God. Although God had warned him that the people had corrupted themselves and made an idol and sacrificed to it, Moses was in a measure unprepared and was overwhelmed by the dreadful exhibition of Israel's degradation and great sin after coming from God's presence.

Aaron, left in charge, failed in the crisis by yielding to the people, joining their plans, and allowing revelry and wrongdoing instead of firmly resisting them, and that first concession opened the way to idolatry. He could have prevented the evil if he had stood for the right irrespective of consequences, unswervingly maintained his own allegiance to God, cited the people to the perils of Sinai, and reminded them of their solemn covenant to obey God's law. Instead his compliance and the calm assurance with which he carried out their plans emboldened them to go to greater lengths in sin than had before entered their minds. He would have been slain for joining the apostasy if Moses had not interceded for him, and his weakness in making a molten calf proves he and Miriam did not bear the burden of the work as Moses did, despite their claim that God had spoken by them as well as by Moses.

Moses felt his weakness and felt the greatness of the work committed to him as no other man had felt it, and God had ever been his counselor, granting his plea for Israel before he descended with the tablets of the covenant. In utter discouragement with hot anger, to show abhorrence of their crime, Moses by divine direction cast the tables out of his hands and broke them beneath the mount in the sight of all the people. Breaking the tables signified that as Israel had broken their covenant with God through idolatry so recently made, so God had broken His covenant with them.

At the very foot of Sinai, while God was writing His law to be committed to His covenant people who had pledged to obey it, Israel was denying loyalty to Jehovah and bowing in open defiance before a golden image. This was because Satan was exciting doubt, apostasy, and rebellion to overthrow God's law, carrying forward the same work he had begun in heaven. The moment was a daring insult and blasphemy by which Satan planned to cause Israel's ruin, to make God divorce them and devote them to destruction. Thus he sought to secure the extinction of the seed of Abraham, the seed of promise that was to preserve the knowledge of the living God and through whom He was to come, the true seed that was to conquer Satan.

Justice, Mercy, and Warning

This descent with the tables belongs to the account of Israel's apostasy at Sinai, which was treason against God who had loaded the people with benefits and whose authority they had pledged themselves to obey. God would not arbitrarily destroy Israel for worshiping the calf, but gave them a chance to return and place themselves on the Lord's side, giving opportunity for repentance so that only those who persisted in rebellion were cut off. Swift punishment in that crisis upheld divine justice and protected Israel and others from the greater ruin that persistent rebellion would bring, and was an act of mercy to the people, to the world, and even to the transgressors themselves.

The golden-calf rebellion was an experience whose lesson should have remained with Israel. God's displeasure was still evident in the people's broken ranks and reduced numbers after that punishment. Yet they failed to learn from what had been inflicted and again gave in to temptation.