On the next day, Moses said to the people, “You have sinned a great sin. Now I will go up to Yahweh. Perhaps I shall make atonement for your sin.”
Moses returned to Yahweh, and said, “Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made themselves gods of gold. Yet now, if you will, forgive their sin—and if not, please blot me out of your book which you have written.”
Yahweh said to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot him out of my book. Now go, lead the people to the place of which I have spoken to you. Behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I punish, I will punish them for their sin.”
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv32–33 So much he esteemed the glory of God, that…
So much he esteemed the glory of God, that he preferred it even to his own salvation.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv30–34 Exo 32:30 And it came to pass on the…
Exo 32:30 And it came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the LORD; peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin.
Ver. 30. And now I will go up unto the Lord.] As angry as he was, he could pray for them: as when our children, through their own fault have got some sickness, for all our angry speeches we go to the physician for them.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv30, 32, 33, 34 He speaks doubtfully, partly because he was uncertain how…
He speaks doubtfully, partly because he was uncertain how far God would pardon them, and partly to quicken them to the more serious practice of repentance.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v30 Moses, having executed justice upon the principal offenders, is…
Moses, having executed justice upon the principal offenders, is here dealing both with the people and with God.
I. With the people, to bring them to repentance, Exo 32:30.
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1. When some were slain, lest the rest should imagine that, because they were exempt from the capital punishment, they were therefore looked upon as free from guilt, Moses here tells the survivors, You have sinned a great sin, and therefore, though you have escaped this time, except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. That they might not think lightly of the sin itself, he calls it a great sin; and that they might not think themselves innocent, because perhaps they were not all so deeply guilty as some of those that were put to death, he tells them all, You have sinned a great sin. The work of ministers is to show people their sins, and the greatness of their sins. "You have sinned, and therefore you are undone if your sins be not pardoned, for ever undone without a Saviour. It is a great sin, and therefore calls for great sorrow, for it puts you in great danger." To affect them with the greatness of their sin he intimates to them what a difficult thing it would be to make up the quarrel which God had with them for it. (1.) It would not be done, unless he himself went up unto the Lord on purpose, and gave as long and as solemn attendance as he had done for the receiving of the law. And yet, (2.) Even so it was but a peradventure that he should make atonement for them; the case was extremely hazardous. This should convince us of the great evil there is in sin, that he who undertook to make atonement found it no easy thing to do it; he must go up to the Lord with his own blood to make atonement. The malignity of sin appears in the price of pardons.
2. Yet it was some encouragement to the people (when they were told that they had sinned a great sin) to hear that Moses, who had so great an interest in heaven and so true an affection for them, would go up unto the Lord to make atonement for them. Consolation should go along with conviction: first wound, and then heal; first show people the greatness of their sin, and then make known to them the atonement, and give them hopes of mercy. Moses will go up unto the Lord, though it be but a peradventure that he should make atonement. Christ, the great Mediator, went upon greater certainty than this, for he had lain in the bosom of the Father, and perfectly knew all his counsels. But to us poor supplicants it is encouragement enough in prayer for particular mercies that peradventure we may obtain them, though we have not an absolute promise. Zep 2:3, It may be, you shall be hid. In our prayers for others, we should be humbly earnest with God, though it is but a peradventure that God will give them repentance, Ti2 2:25.
II. He intercedes with God for mercy. Observe,
1. How pathetic his address was. Moses returned unto the Lord, not to receive further instructions about the tabernacle: there were no more conferences now about that matter. Thus men's sins and follies make work for their friends and ministers, unpleasant work, many times, and give great interruptions to that work which they delight in. Moses in this address expresses, (1.) His great detestation of the people's sin, Exo 32:31. He speaks as one overwhelmed with the horror of it: Oh! this people have sinned a great sin. God had first told him of it (Exo 32:7), and now he tells God of it, by way of lamentation. He does not call them God's people, he knew they were unworthy to be called so; but this people, this treacherous ungrateful people, they have made for themselves gods of gold. It is a great sin indeed to make gold our god, as those do that make it their hope, and set their heart on it. He does not go about to excuse or extenuate the sin; but what he had said to them by way of conviction he says to God by way of confession: They have sinned a great sin; he came not to make apologies, but to make atonement. "Lord, pardon the sin, for it is great," Psa 25:11. (2.) His great desire of the people's welfare (Exo 32:32): Yet now it is not too great a sin for infinite mercy to pardon, and therefore if thou wilt forgive their sin. What then Moses? It is an abrupt expression, "If thou wilt, I desire no more; if thou wilt, thou wilt be praised, I shall be pleased, and abundantly recompensed for my intercession." It is an expression like that of the dresser of the vineyard (Luk 13:9), If it bear fruit; or, If thou wilt forgive, is as much as, "O that thou wouldest forgive!" as Luk 19:42, If thou hadst known is, O that thou hadst known. "But if not, if the decree has gone forth, and there is no remedy, but they must be ruined; if this punishment which has already been inflicted on many is not sufficient (Co2 2:6), but they must all be cut off, blot me, I pray thee, out of the book which thou hast written;" that is, "If they must be cut off, let me be cut off with them, and cut short of Canaan; if all Israel must perish, I am content to perish with them; let not the land of promise be mine by survivorship." This expression may be illustrated from Eze 13:9, where this is threatened against the false prophets, They shall not be written in the writing of the house of Israel, neither shall they enter into the land of Israel. God had told Moses that, if he would not interpose he would make of him a great nation, Exo 32:10. "No," says Moses, "I am so far from desiring to see my name and family built up on the ruins of Israel, that I will choose rather to sink with them. If I cannot prevent their destruction, let me not see it (Num 11:15); let me not be written among the living (Isa 4:3), nor among those that are marked for preservation; even let me die in the last ditch." Thus he expresses his tender affection for the people, and is a type of the good Shepherd, that lays down his life for the sheep (Joh 10:11), who was to be cut off from the land of the living for the transgression of my people, Isa 53:8; Dan 9:26. He is also an example of public-spiritedness to all, especially to those in public stations. All private interests must be made subordinate to the good and welfare of communities. It is no great matter what becomes of us and our families in this world, so that it go well with the church of God, and there be peace upon Israel. Moses thus importunes for a pardon, and wrestles with God, not prescribing to him ("If thou wilt not forgive, thou art either unjust or unkind"); no, he is far from that; but, "If not, let me die with the Israelites, and the will of the Lord be done."
2. Observe how prevalent his address was. God would not take him at his word; no, he will not blot any out of his book but those that by their wilful disobedience have forfeited the honour of being enrolled in it (Exo 32:33); the soul that sins shall die, and not the innocent for the guilty. This was also an intimation of mercy to the people, that they should not all be destroyed in a body, but those only that had a hand in the sin. Thus Moses gets ground by degrees. God would not at first give him full assurances of his being reconciled to them, lest, if the comfort of a pardon were too easily obtained, they should be emboldened to do the like again, and should not be made sensible enough of the evil of the sin. Comforts are suspended that convictions may be the deeper impressed: also God would hereby exercise the faith and zeal of Moses, their great intercessor. Further, in answer to the address of Moses, (1.) God promises, notwithstanding this, to go on with his kind intention of giving them the land of Canaan, the land he had spoken to them of, Exo 32:34. Therefore he sends Moses back to them to lead them, though they were unworthy of him, and promises that his angel should go before them, some created angel that was employed in the common services of the kingdom of providence, which intimated that they were not to expect any thing for the future to be done for them out of the common road of providence, not any thing extraordinary. Moses afterwards obtained a promise of God's special presence with them (Exo 33:14, Exo 33:17); but at present this was all he could prevail for. (2.) Yet he threatens to remember this sin against them when hereafter he should see cause to punish them for other sins: "When I visit, I will visit for this among the rest. Next time I take the rod in hand, they shall have one stripe the more for this." The Jews have a saying, grounded on this, that henceforward no judgment fell upon Israel but there was in it an ounce of the powder of the golden calf. I see no ground in scripture for the opinion some are of, that God would not have burdened them with such a multitude of sacrifices and other ceremonial institutions if they had not provoked him by worshipping the golden calf. On the contrary, Stephen says that when they made a calf, and offered sacrifice to the idol, God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven (Act 7:41, Act 7:42); so that the strange addictedness of that people to the sin of idolatry was a just judgment upon them for making and worshipping the golden calf, and a judgment they were never quite freed from till the captivity of Babylon. See Rom 1:23-25. Note, Many that are not immediately cut off in their sins are reserved for a further day of reckoning: vengeance is slow, but sure. For the present, the Lord plagued the people (Exo 32:35), probably by the pestilence, or some other infectious disease, which was a messenger of God's wrath, and an earnest of worse. Aaron made the calf, and yet it is said the people made it, because they worshipped it. Deos qui rogat, ille facit - He who asks for gods makes them. Aaron was not plagued, but the people; for his was a sin of infirmity, theirs a presumptuous sin, between which there is a great difference, not always discernable to us, but evident to God, whose judgment therefore, we are sure, is according to truth. Thus Moses prevailed for a reprieve and a mitigation of the punishment, but could not wholly turn away the wrath of God. This (some think) bespeaks the inability of the law of Moses to reconcile men to God and to perfect our peace with him, which was reserved for Christ to do, in whom alone it is that God so pardons sin as to remember it no more.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv30–34 And Moses returned unto the Lord,.... On the mount…
And Moses returned unto the Lord,.... On the mount where he was in the cloud:
and said, oh, this people have sinned a great sin; which to following words explain; he confesses the same to God he had charged the people with in Exo 32:30,
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and have made them gods of gold; the golden calf, which they themselves called "Elohim", gods.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv31–34 Oh, this people have sinned a great sin -…
Oh, this people have sinned a great sin - God had first told him of it, ver. 7, and now he tells God of it by way of lamentation. He doth not call them God's people, he knew they were unworthy to be called so, but this people. This treacherous ungrateful people, they have made them gods of gold.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv31–34 Verse 31. Moses returned unto the Lord] Before he…
Verse 31. Moses returned unto the Lord] Before he went down from the mountain God had acquainted him with the general defection of the people, whereupon he immediately, without knowing the extent of their crime, began to make intercession for them; and God, having given him a general assurance that they should not be cut off, hastened him to go down, and bring them off from their idolatry. Having descended, he finds matters much worse than he expected, and ordered three thousand of the principal delinquents to be slain; but knowing that an evil so extensive must be highly provoking in the sight of the just and holy God, he finds it highly expedient that an atonement be made for the sin: for although he had the promise of God that as a nation they should not be exterminated, yet he had reason to believe that Divine justice must continue to contend with them, and prevent them from ever entering the promised land. That he was apprehensive that this would be the case, we may see plainly from the following verse.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv31–34 Exo 32:31. O, this people have sinned a great…
Exo 32:31. O, this people have sinned a great sin — God had first told him of it, (Exo 32:7,) and now he tells God of it, by way of lamentation. He doth not call them God’s people, he knew they were unworthy to be called so, but, this people. This treacherous, ungrateful people, they have made them gods of gold.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv30, 32, 33 You. Many who had not been slain, had followed…
You. Many who had not been slain, had followed the bad example, and Aaron, in particular, had brought upon them a most heinous sin, ver. 21. Yet on account of their repentance, they were not subjected to immediate punishment; but they were visited afterwards, ver. 34. Though God was appeased, (ver. 14,) so as not to destroy the whole multitude, Moses thought it a very arduous task to obtain a full reconciliation, notwithstanding the exemplary vengeance he had taken of the ringleaders. Hence he addresses himself to God with the greatest humility, and with such earnestness as scarcely seems justifiable, if we understand that he put his own eternal salvation at stake. But he makes an impossible supposition, or proposal, which he knew God would not admit, to extort as it were the requested favour. As he is willing to die for his people, God pardons them for his sake. (St. Augustine, q. 147, &c.) (Haydock)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv30, 32 Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a…
Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin--Moses labored to show the people the heinous nature of their sin, and to bring them to repentance. But not content with that, he hastened more earnestly to intercede for them.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv30, 31, 33, 34 30. On the morrow — After that fearful day…
30. On the morrow — After that fearful day of retribution.
Ye have sinned a great sin — It was important that they should realize the gravity and magnitude of their transgression, and these words of Moses were adapted to impress this upon them. Lest further punishment fall he proposes to go up unto the Lord, and seek, if possible, to make an atonement for their sin. He hopes to cover or expiate their sin by further intercession. Comp. Exo_32:11-14. He accordingly went up again into the mount, and made supplication before Jehovah there.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv30–34 30. Ye] the pron. is emphatic.
30. Ye] the pron. is emphatic.
make propitiation] viz. by intercession. The word (kipper) is used, not in the technical sense which it has in P (see on Exo_30:10), but in that of propitiating or appeasing—here by intercession, Gen_32:20 by a present, Pro_16:14 by conciliatory behaviour, Isa_47:11 (fig., of propitiating calamity) by either a bribe or some religious ceremony (EVV. ‘put it away’). Cf. DB. iv. 129a, § 5.
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30–34. Moses, with noble disinterestedness, offers his own life, if he can thereby secure his people’s pardon: Jehovah replies that He cannot on these terms take the life of the innocent; but He yields so far as to permit Moses to lead the people on to Canaan, though without His own personal presence. The passage (esp. vv. 30, 31) hardly reads as if it had been preceded by in vv. 9–14: still, the two passages are so far consistent that whereas in vv. 11–13 Moses had only petitioned that the people might not be destroyed, he now petitions for its entire forgiveness.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv30–34 (30-35) When Moses had, on first hearing of God’s…
MOSES’ INTERCESSION ON BEHALF OF THE PEOPLE.
(30-35) When Moses had, on first hearing of God’s intention to destroy the people, interceded for them (Exo_32:11-13), his prayers had received no direct answer—he had been left in doubt whether they were granted or no. Having now put an end to the offence, and to some extent punished it, he is bent on renewing his supplications, and obtaining a favourable reply. Once more he ascends into the mount to be quite alone, and so best able to wrestle with God in prayer; and this time he not merely intercedes, but offers himself as an atonement for the people, and is willing to be “blotted out of God’s book,” if on this condition they may be spared. God refuses the offer, but makes known to Moses that He relents—that He will spare the people, and allow them to continue their journey to the promised land; only He will send an angel to lead them instead of leading them Himself, and He will punish the sinners by a different punishment from that originally threatened (Exo_32:10).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv30–34 Vers. 30-35. MOSES ONCE MORE INTERCEDES WITH GOD FOR…
Vers. 30-35. MOSES ONCE MORE INTERCEDES WITH GOD FOR THE PEOPLE GOD ANSWERS HIM. No distinct reply seems to have been given to the previous intercession of Moses (vers. 11-13). He only knew that the people were not as yet consumed, and therefore that God"s wrath was at any rate held in suspense. It might be that the punishment inflicted on the 3000 had appeased God"s wrath: or something more might be needed. In the latter case, Moses was ready to sacrifice himself for his nation (ver. 32). Like St. Paul, he elects to be "accursed from God, for his brethren, his kinsfolk after the flesh". (Rom_9:3) But God will not have this sacrifice. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die". (Eze_18:4) He declares, "Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my. (Exo_32:33) Moses shall not make himself a victim. Without any such sacrifice, God will so far spare them, that they shall still go on their way towards the promised land, with Moses as their earthly, and an Angel as their heavenly leader. Only, their sin shall still be visited in God"s own good time and in his own way. How, is left in obscurity; but the decree is issued the day that I visit, I will visit their sin upon them" (ver. 34). And, writing long years after the event, the author observes God did plague the people because they made the calf which Aaron made" (ver. 35).
On the morrow. The day must have been well-nigh over when the slaughter of the 3000 was completed: and after that the corpses had to be buried, the signs of carnage to be effaced, and the wounded, of whom there must have been many, cared for. Moses would have had to direct, if not even to superintend, everything, and therefore could not reascend Sinai until the next day. Moses said unto the people, Not now to the elders only, as in Exo_24:14, but to all the people, since all had sinned, and. each man is held by God individually responsible for his own sin. Ye have sinned a great sin. One which combined ingratitude and falseness with impiety. Peradventure I shall make an atonement. Moses has formed the design, which he executes (ver. 32); but will not reveal it to the people, from modesty probably.
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Vers. 30-34. Moses as the forerunner of Christ.
prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you like unto me," said the great lawgiver, ere he left the earth; (Deu_17:15, Deu_17:18) and the parallelism between Christ and Moses is in many respects most striking.
1. Both were of obscure birth son of a carpenter the son of "aman of the house of Levi.
2. Both were in great peril in infancy their life sought by the civil ruler Herod Pharaoh.
3. Both passed their youth and early manhood in obscurity Christ forthirty, Moses for forty years.
4. Both felt they had a mission, but on coming forward were rejected bytheir brethren. "He came unto his own, and his own received him not". (Joh_1:11) "He supposed his brethren would have understood how that God by his hand would deliver them: but they understood not". (Act_7:25)
1. Both showed "signs and wonders," such as have rarely been seen uponearth, and thus made it manifest that their missions were from God.
2. Both were law-givers promulgators of a new moral code Mosesof an imperfect, Christ of a perfect law ("the perfect law of love").
3. Both were founders of a new community Moses of the Hebrew State,christ of the Christian Church.
4. Both were great deliverers and great teachers Moses delivered hispeople from Egypt and Pharaoh, and led them through the wilderness to Canaan; Christ delivers his from sin and Satan, and. leads them through the wilderness of this life to heaven.
5. Both willed to be a sacrifice for their brethren God could not acceptthe one sacrifice (ver. 33), but could and did accept the other.
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
Vers. 30-35. The second intercession.
This second intercession of Moses is even more wonderful than the first. The question raised on that former occasion Is Moses more merciful than God? will, indeed, no longer occur. Those who might have been disposed to press that question then will probably not be disposed to press it now. They have since had sufficient evidence of Moses" severity. They have found that, whatever elements of character are lacking to him, he is not wanting in energy of indignation at patent wickedness. The temptation, on the contrary, may now be to accuse the lawgiver of unjustifiable and unholy anger of reckless disregard of human life. The charge is groundless; but if, for a moment, it should appear natural, the reply to it is found in the study of this second scene upon the mount. Surely, if ever human heart laid bare its intense and yearning love for those whose sin fidelity to duty yet compelled it to reprobate and loathe, it is the heart of Moses in this new, and altogether marvellous, juncture in his history. Consider
I THE CONFESSION MADE (vers. 30, 31). Moses makes a full confession of the sin of the people. This confession was
1. Holy. He has just views of the demerit of the sin for which he seeks forgiveness. His impressions of its enormity are even stronger than at the time of his first intercession. So heinous does it now appear to him that he is mentally in doubt whether God possibly can forgive it.
2. Perfectly truthful Moses fully admits the people"s sin. He does not make light of it. He does not seek to minimise it. Not even to secure the salvation of the people over whom he yearns with so intense an affection will he unduly palliate their offence, or feign an excuse where he knows that there is none to offer. Mark how, in both of these respects, Moses answers to the true idea of a mediator. "A mediator is not a mediator of one". (Gal_3:20) It is his function, in conducting his mediation, to uphold impartially the interests of both of the parties between whom he mediates. Both are represented in his work. He stands for both equally. He must do justice by both. His sympathy with both must be alike perfect. He must favour neither at the expense, or to the disadvantage, of the other. These acts of intercession show in how supreme a degree this qualification of the mediator is found in Moses. He has sympathy with the people, for whose sin he is willing, if need be, even to die; he has also the fullest sympathy with God. He looks at the sin from God"s standpoint. He has sympathy with God"s wrath against it. He is as jealous for God"s honour as he is anxious for the forgiveness of the people. He is thus the true daysman, able to lay his hand upon both.
3. Vicarious. He confesses the people"s sin for them. On the depth to which this element enters into the idea of atonement, and on the place which it holds in the atonement of Jesus, see J. McLeod Campbell"s work on The Nature of the Atonement.
II THE ATONEMENT OFFERED (ver. 32). The new and awful impressions Moses had received of the enormity of the people"s conduct gave rise in his mind to the feeling of the need of atonement. "Now I will go up to the Lord," he says to them, "peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin" (ver. 30). That the intercessory element entered into Moses" idea of "making an atonement" is not to be denied. But it is not the only one. So intensely evil does the sin of the people now appear to him that he is plainly in doubt whether it can be pardoned without some awful expression of God"s punitive justice against it; whether, indeed, it can be pardoned at all. This sense of what is due to justice resolves itself into the proposal in the text a proposal, probably, in which Moses comes as near anticipating Christ, in his great sacrifice on Calvary, as it is possible for any one, beating the limitations of humanity, to do. (cf. Rom_9:3)
Observe
1. The proposal submitted. It amounts to this, that Moses, filled with an immense love for his people, offers himself as a sacrifice for their sin. If God cannot otherwise pardon their transgression, and if this will avail, or can.be accepted, as an atonement for their guilt, let him Moses perish instead of them. The precise meaning attached in Moses" mind to the words, "If not, blot me, I pray thee, out of the book which thou hast written," must always be a difficulty. Precision, probably, is not to be looked for. Moses" idea of what was involved in the blotting out from God"s book could only be that afforded him by the light of his own dispensation, and by his sense of the exceeding greatness of God"s wrath. His language is the language of love, not that of dogmatic theology. Infinite things were to be hoped for from God"s love; infinite things were to be dreaded from his anger. The general sense of the utterance is, that Moses was willing to die; to be cut off from covenant hope and privilege; to undergo whatever awful doom subjection to God"s wrath might imply; if only thereby his people could be saved. It was a stupendous proposal to make; an extraordinary act of self-devotion; a wondrous exponent of his patriotic love for his people; a not less wondrous recognition of what was due to the justice of God ere sin could be forgiven a glimpse even, struck out from the passionate yearning of his own heart, of the actual method of redemption. A type of Christ has been seen in the youthful Isaac ascending the hill to be offered on the altar by Abraham his father. A much nearer type is Moses, "setting his face" (cf. Luk_9:51) to ascend the mount, and bearing in his heart this sublime purpose of devoting himself for the sins of the nation. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends". (Joh_15:13)
2. The alternative desired. If the people must perish this meaning also seems to be conveyed in the words Moses would wish to perish with them. Not only has the proposal to make of him "a great nation" (Exo_32:10) no allurement for his mind, but, if the people are to be destroyed, he would prefer to die with them. He desires no life outside of theirs. Patriotic devotion could no further go. Noble Moses! Yet only the type of the nobler than himself, who, devoting himself in the same spirit, has actually achieved the redemption of the world. See in this incident
(1) The connection of a feeling of the need of atonement with just views of sin"s demerit.
(2) The certainty, when just views of sin are entertained, of this feeling of the need of atonement arising. In declining the proposal of Moses, God does not say that atonement is not needed. He does not say that his servant has exaggerated the enormity of the sin, or the difficulties which stand in the way of its forgiveness. He does not say that it is not by means of atonement that these difficulties connected with the forgiveness of sins are ultimately to be removed. On the contrary, the spirit of Moses in this transaction is evidently in the very highest degree pleasing to Jehovah, and so far as atonement is made for the people"s sins, it is by Jehovah accepting the spirit of his sacrifice, even when rejecting the proposal in its letter.
(3) The naturalness of this method of salvation. The proposal sprang naturally from the love of Moses. It expressed everything that was grandest in his character. It shadowed forth a way in which, conceivably, a very true satisfaction might be offered to Divine justice, while yet mercy was extended to the sinner. The fulfilment of the prophecy is the Cross.
III THE REPLY GIVEN.
1. The atonement is declined in its letter. God declares that so far as there is to be any blotting from the book of life, it will be confined to those who have sinned. It may be noted, in respect to this declinature of the proposal of Moses that, as above remarked, it does not proceed on the idea that atonement is not needed, but
(1) Moses could not, even by his immolation, have made the atonement required.
(2) God, in his secret counsel, had the true sacrifice provided.
(3) Atonement is inadmissible on the basis proposed, viz. that the innocent should be "blotted out from the book of life." Had no means of salvation presented itself but this, the world must have perished. Even to redeem sinners, God could not have consented to the "blotting from his book" of the sinless. The difficulty is solved in the atonement of the Son, who dies, yet rises again, having made an end of sin. No other could have offered this atonement but himself.
1. While declining the atonement in its letter, God accepts the spirit of it. In this sense Moses, by the energy of his self-devotion, does make atonement for the sins of Israel. He procures for them a reversal of the sentence. Further intercession is required to make the reconciliation complete.
2. God makes known his purpose of visiting the people for their sin (ver. 34). The meaning is
(1) That the sin of the people, though for the present condoned, would be kept in mind in reckoning with them for future transgressions.
(2) That such a day of reckoning would come. God, in the certainty of his foreknowledge, sees its approach. J.O.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v31 If Thou wilt forgive their sin.
Exo_32:31-32
If Thou wilt forgive their sin.
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Moses interceding for the people
It was a very happy thing for Israel that they had an intercessor. It is not that God needs it. God does not need the intercession of Jesus Christ--Christ told us so. I say not that I will pray the Father for you, for the Father Himself loveth you. And we believe that as the death of Jesus Christ availed for the believers in the Old Testament so did His intercession--that there was an anticipation of the intercession of Christ when Abraham interceded, or Moses.
I. And first let me give you three reasons why intercession is a very high duty.
1. It is a power given to every man to wield--a power of love, a mighty instrument for which we are responsible.
2. St. Paul puts it very prominently. You will remember that, writing to Timothy, he says, I exhort that first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions, giving of thanks be made for all men. What would we give for love that does not speak in prayer?
3. And you are never so exactly a copy of Christ as when you are praying for a fellow-creature.
II. The privilege of it is exceeding great. Let me mention one or two of the privileges.
1. It is such a beautiful way of giving expression to love.
2. It revives the spirit of prayer in ourselves.
III. Let me give you one or two words of practical advice respecting intercessory prayer.
1. Like other prayer, it must have intensity.
2. It should be accompanied with thanksgiving.
3. Let me also suggest to you that without which no duty is ever well performed--your method with your intercessory prayer.
Of course it must be left to every ones own judgment how to do it. Only, have method, and have a period of the day, one of your stated prayers, which shall be, if not entirely, yet to a great extent, given to intercession. The method will be helpful, and it will give strength to the action, for what we do with design and plan we do always better than that which is left to the feelings of the moment. And amongst the arrangements of prayer it will be well to settle with yourselves when, and where, and how much shall be given to intercession. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
The forlorn hope
Moses was one of those who had greatness forced upon him, not being capable of pursuing it--the meekest and most retiring of men by nature, while appointed the leader of a rebellious multitude. Immovable as a rock, courageous as David, where the honour of God was concerned, his own honour, in the ordinary sense, was not his care, and for it he seemed to have no sensibility. Happy those who learn to forget themselves, and to have God only in their eye! And shall not God acknowledge and recompense the grace which, flowing from Himself, turns its streams to Him again? Is it not fit that He should distinguish those who withhold nothing from Him; who achieve no honour that they do not cast forthwith at His feet?
2. Look at another attribute of a heaven-formed character. Where among us are the men that have the gift of intercessory prayer in any measure like the Lords servant Moses? Who are they, in a day of general defection and rebuke, that, like Moses, uncontaminated with the sins, unseduced by the errors of their generation, find it their part to ascend alone into the mount, if peradventure they may make an atonement?
3. It has been conjectured by some that Moses here uses the language of desperation, and invokes upon himself the irremediable sentence of final perdition. But when we consider all that this includes in it, of eternal separation from the Fountain of happiness, of alienation matured into enmity, of abandoned association with the cursed and blaspheming spirits of the infernal world, it is impossible that so revolting a wish entered his soul, or that his heavenly spirit, held in the bonds of unchanging love, was violated by the intrusion of so cruel and abhorred a sentiment. It is probable he refers to the declaration made above, that in rejecting Israel God would make of him a great nation. This interpretation is quite natural, for how could his heart sustain the alternative? Could he, so true, so loyal an Israelite, separate his lot from that of Israel? Could he, bereft and bespoiled of the fruit of years of anxious toil, and of faith founded on inviolable promises, accept of this as an indemnification for his loss, or consent to console himself with new projects of happiness, or erect his name and found his greatness on the ruins of forgotten Israel? No; rather let the grave yield him a refuge from such parricidal honours. Life had cost him already too many pangs to leave him energy to commence it anew. It was enough now to be allowed to share the common desolation, and having sustained for a moment the dreaded consummation of his woes, that his life and hopes should be extinguished together. Faithful Moses! Thy interests as well as thy wishes were safe, left for decision at the righteous tribunal of the heart-searching God. ( H. Grey, D. D.)
The training of the missionary spirit
I. The Church contemplative.. Consider the communion of Moses on the mountain with God. No wonder that Moses should delay to come down. When the sublime truths of the Godhead find a lodgment and settled home in our hearts, so that we can treat them as the familiar things of our faith, and not as passing imaginations, we have great confidence towards God. Selfishness is purged out from us, and with selfishness goes fear. The pure in heart see the Holy One; the unselfish see the Eternal Son.
II. The Church militant. The spiritual life is vast and varied; quietism alone cannot express it, even though it be the fellowship of Gods own peace. The change which is wrought in Moses is immediate and startling. He who, alone with God, can venture on remonstrances with God, in the assurance that his pleadings will be accepted; when he sees the turbulent levity of the people, and hears their licentious singing, is transported with indignation. The degradation of idolatry is illustrated in Israels transgression.
1. It is, first, a revelation of the profound unbelief of the people. Moses was unto them instead of God. Speak thou with us, and we will hear, they had said, amid the lightnings of Sinai; but let not God speak with us, lest we die. Here was their first declining, and from this point the descent was facile. Moses instead of God, and a calf instead of Moses.
2. Next, the fatuity of the people is exposed. Ignominious as is their worship, still more ignominious is Aarons stupid account of it.
3. And then there is the peoples permanent demoralization. They are unconvicted by the remonstrances of Moses, unmoved by his earnestness; fear and the darkness of night alone could quiet them. Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up unto a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting. How different is the sight of sin from our hearing of it: sin as it affects God seems so easily condoned; sin, when it affects ourselves, appears so heinous.
III. The Church sacrificial. The next day displays a new composure in Moses. A graver, wiser man, his conflicting emotions steadied under the constraint of a solemn purpose. He goes to commune with the Lord. The words declare his sense of the wickedness of the people, his feeling that nothing can be said to abate the heinousness of their transgressions. Submission is the only offering which their intercessor can present, and out of the submission comes a trembling hope. There is here the utmost tenderness of a human heart; there is also an absolute resignation to the will of God. They are truly sacrificial words, sacrificial in the self-devotion they bespeak, sacrificial in the force of their appeal to heaven. Some sort of premonition that his sacrificial purpose would not be ratified by God appears in Moses language. It does not mar the sincerity of his self-offering, but the words halt upon his lips in which a simple faith that he could be in the room of Israel would have been expressed. If Thou wilt forgive their sins--; and if not--what? Not, blot me, instead, out of Thy book which Thou hast written!--but, blot me--that is blot me with my people--let me share their forfeiture; I ask no destiny but theirs. It seems to me that one of the hardest lessons which saintly souls have to learn to-day is that they cannot sacrifice themselves for the sins of the world. It is hard, because the sympathy which impels them is so pure and deep; it has so much of the spirit of Christ in it. To the sacrificial Church God is able to reveal the true atonement, to makes us preachers of Him, in whom, according to the riches of His grace, the world may have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
IV. The mystery of the Divine sacrifice. He that is willing, says Christ, to lose his life for My sake shall find it. Moses was accepted for the people in a deeper sense than he had thought of. He was reinstated in his post as leader, his passion of self-devotedness transformed into faith and patience. The qualified blessing of an angel to go before him was changed--as Moses, in his pleading for the people, revealed his undaunted confidence in Gods fidelity, and his quenchless affection for the people--into a larger promise: My presence shall go with thee; and I will give thee rest. And when, emboldened by all the love from God, he goes on to ask for more, there is more vouchsafed him. The Lord declared that He would make all His goodness pass before His servant; and intimated to him that beyond even this was a deep, unutterable secret, which none might rend, but of which, if we could but rend it, we should see the burden to be grace. To such surpassing heights of human efficiency do those attain who are willing to give themselves away. The reward of the Church sacrificial will be victory over the powers of evil. (A. Mackennal, D. D.)
The prayer of Moses
I. We are to inquire to what book moses refers in the text. He says to God, Blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book which Thou hast written. I would observe that Moses could not mean the book of Gods remembrance. The prophet Malachi speaks of such a book. Moses must have known that there was not only a moral, but a natural impossibility of Gods blotting his name out of the book of His remembrance. God cannot cease to remember any more than He can cease to exist. And there is another book of God, often mentioned in Scripture, which is called the book of life, and contains the names of all whom He designs to save from the wrath to come, and admit to heaven. It plainly appears by Gods answer to Moses, that this is the book he meant.
II. What was the import of his request, when he said to God, Yet now, if Thou wilt, forgive their sin; and if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book which Thou hast written. Here are two things requested, and both conditionally. Moses prays, if it were consistent with the will of God, that He would pardon the sin of His people in making the golden calf. Now if Thou wilt, forgive their sin. He prayed for the exercise of pardoning mercy towards the people conditionally, because God had seemed to intimate that He intended to destroy them, by saying, Let Me alone, that My wrath may wax hot against them. Moses had reason to fear that God would, at all events, withhold His pardoning mercy. And therefore to render his intercession more prevalent, and to express his most ardent desire for their forgiveness, he prays again conditionally: And if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book which Thou hast written. This was implicitly saying, O Lord, since Thou hast proposed to spare me and destroy Thy people, I pray that Thou wouldest rather blot me out of the book of life, and spare them. If Thy glory require that either they or I must be destroyed, I pray Thee spare them and destroy me. Their salvation is unspeakably more important than mine; and I am willing to give up my salvation, if it might be a means, or occasion, of preventing their final ruin.
III. Whether this petition of Moses, taken in the sense in which it has been explained, is a proper one.
1. It appears to have been perfectly acceptable to God. He did not rebuke him for a rash request, but, on the other hand, plainly intimated that He was highly pleased with his noble, disinterested desire. And since God did not condemn it, we may safely conclude that it was highly acceptable in His sight.
2. It was perfectly agreeable to the dictates of reason and conscience, that Moses should have been willing to give up all his own personal interests, to promote the glory of God and the future and eternal good of his nation. He supposed that the glory of God was greatly concerned in the preservation of His people from deserved destruction; and he plead this as the most powerful argument to move God to forgive and spare them.
3. The petition of Moses was agreeable to the very law of love. God requires all men to love Him with all their heart, and their neighbour as themselves.
4. The request of Moses was perfectly agreeable to the spirit which Christ uniformly expressed through the whole course of His life on earth. He always gave up a less good of His own for a greater good of others.
5. That the prayer of Moses was proper, because it was agreeable to the prayers and practice of other good men. Paul said, My hearts desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. Yea, he did solemnly declare, I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh.
Improvement:
1. If the prayer of Moses in the text was proper and acceptable to God, then true love to God and man is, strictly speaking, disinterested love. Moses expressed a love which was not only without interest but contrary to interest.
2. If the conditional prayer of Moses was proper, then it is impossible to carry the duty of disinterested benevolence too far.
3. If the prayer of Moses was proper, then none ought to be willing to be lost, only conditionally.
4. If the prayer of Moses was proper and sincere, then those who possess his spirit are the best friends of sinners.
5. If the prayer of Moses was proper and sincere, then none can pray sincerely for any good without being willing to do whatever is necessary on their part to obtain it.
6. If the conditional prayer of Moses was proper and acceptable to God, then the prayers of the people of God are always heard and answered. It is their wisdom as well as their duty always to pray conditionally and submissively; for then they may be assured that their prayers will be graciously answered.
7. If the conditional prayer of Moses was acceptable to God, then the prayers of sinners are always sinful and unacceptable to God. They are not willing to be denied on account of Gods glory. (N. Emmons, D. D.)
The broken sentence
I. The problem with which he had to deal.
1. Their idolatry. The great lawgiver and leader, acting on their request, thereupon withdrew himself into the Divine pavilion, and was absent for about six weeks. At first, without doubt, the people were well content. Better to be temporarily deprived of their leader, than be exposed to those terrible thunderings. But, after a while, they became uneasy and restless. From one to another the word passed, Where is he? He did not take food enough with him to sustain him for so long. And then turning to Aaron, the man of words, sure that neither he nor twenty like him could fill the gap which the loss of Moses had caused, they cried, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us. We may notice, as we pass, the essential nature of idolatry. For in this marvellous chapter we have its entire history, from the first cry of the soul, which betrays a mighty yearning for an idol, to the draining of the last bitter dregs, with which, when ground to powder, the idolater has to drink its very dust. It is an attempt on the part of the human spirit which shrinks from the effort of communion with the unseen and spiritual, to associate God with what it can own and handle, so as to have a constant and evident token of the presence and favour of God. This was the case of Israel. It was only three months since they had stood by the Red Sea, and seen its waters roll in pride over the hosts of Pharaoh. Every day since then Gods love had followed them. But notwithstanding all, they had been carried away before that imperious craving of the human heart which cries out for a sensible image of its worship. Their idolatry, then, was a violation, not of the First, but of the Second, Commandment. They did not propose to renounce Jehovah--that was left for the days of Ahab; but they desired to worship Jehovah under the form of a calf, and in distinct violation of the emphatic prohibition which said, Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or the likeness of any form that is in heaven above, or the earth beneath; thou shalt not bow down thyself to them nor serve them. This was the sin also of Jeroboam.
2. Their degradation. There can be no doubt that the worship of the calf was accompanied with the licentious orgies which were a recognized part of Egyptian idolatry. As much as this is implied in the narrative. The people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play. It is an awful thing when a single man throws the reins on the neck of inordinate desire, but how passing terrible it must have been when a whole nation did it.
3. The claims of God. There was every reason to believe that God would exact the full amount of penalty, not because He was vindictive, but because the maintenance of His authority seemed to demand it. How could God maintain His character with His own people without imperilling it with the Egyptians? If He spared the people they would begin to think that neither His threats nor His promises were worth their heed. And if He destroyed them, His glory would be dimmed, and He might seem to have become unmindful of the oath which He swore by Himself to His servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Israel. It would almost seem as if this proposal was like the suggestion made to Abraham that he should offer up his only son Isaac. In each case God tried or tested His servant. But there is this great difference between the temptations of the devil and of God. The former seeks to bring out all the evil, and to make it permanent, as the streams of lava poured from the heart of a volcano; the latter seeks to bring out all the good, and to make it ours; for moral qualities never become ours till we have put them into practice.
II. The emotions with which his soul was stirred. In the mount he acted as intercessor. It was not against the people, but against their sin, that his anger flamed out. Moses anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount. Those splintered bits leaping from crag to crag are an apt symbol of mans inability to keep intact the holy law of God. When he reached the camp he seems to have strode into the astonished throng and broke up their revelry, overturned their calf, ordering it to be destroyed, and the fragments mingled with the water they drank. But as it would seem that this did not avail to stay the inveterate evil, he was compelled to use more drastic measures, and by the sword of Levi to extinguish the evil with the life-blood of three thousand men. Then when the next day came, when the camp was filled with mourning over those new-made graves, when the awful reaction had set in on the people and himself, the tide seems to have turned. His indignation was succeeded by bitter sorrow and pity. Ye have sinned a great sin, and now I will go up unto the Lord, peradventure I shall make atonement for your sin; but he did not tell them the purpose which was in his heart, nor the price which he was purposing to pay.
III. The offer that he made. He went quietly and thoughtfully back to the presence-chamber of God, as the people stood beholding. Peradventure, he had said. He was not sure. He felt that the sin was very great. He could not see how God could go back from His solemn threatenings. He was convinced that if the merited judgments were averted, it must be in consequence of an atonement. Yet, what atonement could there be? Animals could not avail, though they were offered in hecatombs. There was only one thing he could suggest--he could offer himself. And it was this which made him say, Peradventure. He could not be sure that the ransom price would be large enough. It may be asked how came he to think of atonement? But we must remember that probably there had already been much talk between God and himself about the sacrifices which the people were to offer. And Moses confessed his peoples sin to God, and added: Yet now, if Thou wilt forgive their sin-- He would not finish that sentence. He could not trust himself to depict the blessed consequences that would ensue, if only God would forgive. But the dark fear oppressed him that free pardon was too much to expect. Ah! how little did he realize the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. Of course, the offer was not accepted. No one can atone for his own sin, much less for the sins of others. Yet the people were spared. The passing by of their transgression was rendered possible by the propitiation which was to be offered in the course of the ages on the cross (Rom_3:25). (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Moses intercedes for Israel
Notice--
I. The sin of Israel. This was a dreadful compound of ingratitude, folly, and impiety. Its greatness will be easily imagined from the indignation which both God and Moses expressed against it.
II. The intercession of Moses.
1. He reminds God of His relation to them.
2. He reminds Him also of His promise to their fathers.
3. He expresses his concern respecting Gods honour among the heathen.
4. He humbly confesses the greatness of their sin.
5. He wishes to be punished in their stead.
III. The reply of God. He remits their punishment. (C. Simeon, M. A.)
The godliness of Moses
The indication of an impetuous, fiery spirit in Moses, only reveals the beauty of the meek patience which marked his life.
I. In the story of the golden calf we see--
1. Mans natural tendency to worship.
2. The Israelites employing the very tokens of their deliverance to build a god for themselves. The very gifts of heaven--wealth, intellect, power--men turn into idols.
2. In worshipping a golden calf the Israelites utterly degraded themselves.
II. The godliness of Moses manifested itself in self-sacrificing sympathy. Fronting death and its mystery, he stood sublimely willing even to be cut off from God if the sin of the people might thereby be forgiven.
1. His revulsion from their sin mingled with his own love for the people. The holiest men ever feel most deeply the sin of their fellows--they see its seeds in themselves; they find its shadow falling across their heaven.
2. He felt the promise of his peoples future. In them lay the germ of the worlds history; through them might be unfolded the glory of Jehovah before the face of all nations. Gathering these feelings together, we understand his prayers. (E. L. Hull, B. A.)
Blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book
:--There are various ways in which this passage may be understood. You may take it quite literally, and say that Moses really would sacrifice himself for a time, or fatally, but not sacrifice himself for ever. Christ made Himself a curse, but not for ever. If it would be possible to make myself a curse for a season for others, I should be within the pattern of Christ--for He made Himself for a season a curse. But I should transgress the boundary, I should go out into a sinful extravagance, if I wished to be accursed for ever--for after all I am not to love another soul more than mine--that is never commanded. And there is to be high measure of right self-love, because the love of a fellow-creature is to be proportioned to the self-love, and if I have no great self-love, I cannot have love to a fellow-creature. Therefore, I must love myself greatly--in the right way. How, then, are we to understand it? When Moses prayed that God would blot his name out of the book, it may have been out of the register of those who were to inhabit the earthly Canaan--that he would give up all the enjoyments of the land flowing with milk and honey, all the promised blessings of Palestine, for the sake of the forgiveness of the guilty Israelites. And if that was it--for securing their eternal happiness he was willing to give up all happiness here, I suppose he would not have been sinful. And I suppose our earnestness should go to that point--that I would give up all earthly happiness so that my child, my friend, my enemy, might be saved. Or, again, it may simply be the language of intensity--the expression of exceeding feeling. But, whichever it be--if you would intercede, it must not be in a light way, it must not be in commonplaces, it must not be superficial and cold. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
Intercession for others
Never think lightly of this matter of intercession. There is a very light way in which people say, Pray for me, and a very light way in which people answer, Yes, I will. Be careful as to asking the favour, or promising to grant it. You may find it a good rule to promise, indeed, whenever you are asked by any one to pray for them, but to promise with this limitation--I will do it once, I will do it the next time that I am on my knees before God, I will remember to pray for you. That you will be able to do. But to undertake always to pray for all who ask it is a burden of the conscience--a thing impossible. You will have those for whom, doubtless, you do pray continually, and many; but as respects the ordinary request that you will pray, I would suggest to you not to withhold the promise, but with the limitation that you will pray once. For it is a blessed thing to have intercessors. And how blessed a thing it is God seems to teach us in that He has revealed to us that we have the Holy Ghost an intercessor, and the Lord Jesus Christ an intercessor. We have an intercessor always within us, and one always above us. The Spirit maketh intercession for us [and in us] with groanings which cannot be uttered. And here is the comfort--that He that searcheth the heart, God in heaven, knows the mind of the Spirit in the man. The Holy Ghost in the man asks everything that is according to the will of God. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
Effective intercession
Amongst the many touching and interesting incidents that occurred in Stanleys last journey, there are but few to equal the following:--Stanley had much trouble with his men on account of their current propensity to steal, the results of which brought upon the expedition much actual disaster. At last he doomed the next man caught stealing to death. His grief and distress were unbounded when the next thief was found to be Uledi, the bravest, truest, noblest of his dusky followers. Uledi had saved a hundred lives, his own among the number. He had performed acts of the most brilliant daring, always successful, always faithful, always kind. Must Uledi die? He called all his men around him in a council. He explained to them the gravity of Uledis crime. He reminded them of his stern decree, but said he was not hard enough to enforce it against Uledi. His arm was not strong enough to kill Uledi; some other punishment, and a hard one, must be meted out. What should it be? The council must decide. They took a vote. Uledi must be flogged. When the decision was reached, Stanley standing, Uledi crouching at his feet, and the solemn circle drawn closely around them, one man whose life Uledi had saved under circumstances of frightful peril, stood forth and said: Give me half the blows, master. Then another said, in the faintest accent, while tears fell from his eyes, Will the master give his slave leave to speak? Yes, said Stanley. The Arab came forward and knelt by Uledis side. His words came slowly, and now and then a sob broke them. The master is wise, he said. He knows all that has been, for he writes them in a book. Let your slave fetch the book, master, and turn its leaves. Maybe there is something that tells how Uledi saved Zaidi from the white waters of the cataract; how he saved many men--how many I forget--Bin Ali, Mabruki, Koni Kusi, others too; how he is worthier than any three of us; how he always listens when the master speaks, and flies forth at his word. Look, master, at the book. Then, if the blows must be struck, Shumari will take half and I the other half. Saywas speech deserves to live for ever. Stanley threw away his whip. Uledi is free, he said. Shumari and Saywa are pardoned.
Self-sacrificing devotion
An extraordinary act of devotion is described in the Spirit of Missions, as it was related by Bishop Boone, while on a visit to this country. He said: I had a very valuable Chinese servant in my employ, upon whom I leaned with implicit confidence, and one day he came to me and said: I shall be obliged to ask you to find some one to take my place, as in the course of a few weeks I am to be executed in place of a rich gentleman, who is to pay me very liberally for becoming his substitute--such a mode of exchange, as the reader may know, being in accordance with the law of the empire. I then inquired what possible inducement there could be for him to forfeit his life for any amount of money, when he replied: I have an aged father and mother, who are very poor, and unable to work, and the money that I am to receive will make them comfortable as long as they live. I think, therefore, it is my duty to give up my life for the sake of accomplishing this.
Pardoned, yet punished
The Lord may grant pardon, and yet there is a sense in which He will still plague the people for their sin. The drunkard may give up his sin and become a Christian, and yet come to a premature grave because of his former evil course. The man who has squandered vast estates in evil.doing may repent, but his repentance will not bring back that which he has lost. The boy who spends foolishly the time in which he should be gaining knowledge and virtue will feel the effects of that misspent time all his life. Some opportunities which me have carelessly allowed to slip by unimproved will never come again to us to all eternity. In that sense each of us must bear his own iniquity. (S. S. Times.)
An example of intercession
Said a servant to President Bacchus, The physician said, sir, that you cannot live to exceed half an hour. Is it so? Then take me out of my bed, and place me upon my knees; let me spend that time in calling upon God for the salvation of the world. It was done. He died upon his knees, praying for the salvation of sinners.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v30 MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Exo_32:30-35
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Exo_32:30-35
RELIGIOUS PATRIOTISM
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It has often been brought as a charge against Christianity that it is adverse to patriotism. It is true that the spirit of Christianity is cosmopolitan, but yet the love of humanity does not exclude the sentiment of nationality, and the Word of God presents us with instances of the most sublime patriotism. The true Christian is a true patriot; the patriotism inspired by religion is of the noblest type. The text is a case in point.
I. Religious patriotism recognises national sin, ver
Exo_32:30. “Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin.” There is a patriotism whose motto is: Our country—right or wrong. Such patriotism is spurious and quite misleading. There is a patriotism which is ever dwelling in a vain-glorious temper on the wealth and victories and power of a nation, and which cannot tolerate the rebuking of the national vices. This is a kind of patriotism which leads to evil issues. Religious patriotism discerns and rebukes the sins of the times, and is therefore the true patriotism. True love is not blind, neither is true patriotism. It is sensitive to those errors and vices by which national greatness is eventually destroyed. He may seem the greatest patriot who is always vaunting the power and prowess, the wealth and magnificence, of his country; but he is really the truest friend to his country who protests against the iniquitous laws which are on its statute book, the errors which are taught in its schools and temples, the vices which disgrace its streets.
II. Religious patriotism is prepared to make the greatest sacrifices for the national welfare. We see this in Moses in the text, Exo_32:31-32. See also Exo_32:11-14. Moses set the nation above his personal interests, above his family glory. His temptation to become the founder of a great nation reminds us of Christ’s vision of the kingdoms. He loves his nation; he will not merely die for it, he is ready to suffer unknown sorrows on its behalf. See also Apostle Paul, Rom_9:3. Thus the Christian Church is ever making great sacrifices on behalf of the nation. A religion that does not issue in practical patriotism, is not the religion of Christ. The nation is of God as well as the family, and the true Christian in the spirit of self-sacrificing love, gives time, money, influence, and often life itself, that the nation may be educated and free and pure.
III. Religious patriotism is most precious to the state, Exo_32:33-35. We find that God was moved by the prayer of Moses to spare Israel. It is often thought that the grandest power in the state is the power which fights; but really the grandest power is the power which prays. The patriotism which seeks to spread the knowledge of God; which seeks to secure the keeping of God’s laws; which vindicates the sanctity of God’s day; which pleads with God on behalf of the nation, as it sins and suffers—this patriotism is of essential preciousness. The patriotism which seeks to bring God and the nation closer together, is far more precious than the tongue of the eloquent, the sword of the valiant, or the wisdom of the ancient.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
REV. WILLIAM ADAMSON
Idol-Idiosyncrasy. Exo_32:1-35.
(1.) Material idolatry has passed away among civilised nations in its literal import. As Macmillan says, the old worship of stocks and stones is now impossible among a professedly Christian people. But although the outward mode has passed away, the essence of the temptation remains the same. Human society is changed, but human nature is unchanged. The impulse which led Israel to seek the golden calf is as strong as ever, and images are set up and worshipped now as fantastic as any pagan fetish or joss. For what is idolatry! Is it not in its essence the lowering of the idea of God and of God’s nature, and the exaltation of a dead image above a man’s own living spirit! Is not an idol whatever is loved more than God, whatever is depended upon for happiness and help independent of God?
(2.) Sooner or later, as Moses pounded the calf and gave the Israelites the dust to drink in punishment of their idolatry, will all such moral idolaters have to drink the dust of their idols. Our sin will become our punishment, our idols our scourges. God is a jealous God, and every soul that turns aside from His love to the lying vanities of the world must drink the bitter water of jealousy, filled with the dust of the bruised and mutilated idols of spiritual idolatry: “This shall ye have at My hand, ye shall lie down in sorrow.”
“Thou art the man within whose heart’s deep cell
All evil sleeping lies;
Lust, in a dark hour waking, breaks the spell,
And straightway there arise
Monsters of evil thoughts and base desire.”
—Greok.
Mosaic Intercession! Exo_32:30.
(1.) There is a sublime grandeur in the form of Moses, as we behold him holding forth his rod over the billowy sea, or raising that rod towards heaven. The stormy tempest and the beetling waters obeyed the Leader, who was invested with power by that God who made the sea and stretched out the firmament on high.
(2.) There is more than human majesty in the appearance of Moses when we behold the great Lawgiver descending from Sinai, bearing aloft those holy commandments which not a nation alone, but a world should observe, his countenance radiant with such glory as never before had beamed from human face.
(3.) But though he was mighty as the Leader, illustrious as the Legislator, it is with more of interest and admiration that we view him as the Intercessor for Israel. Power, it has been well said, excites wonder, holiness, awe. But it is love which attracts the soul.
“’Mid visions of eternal light
That glow on Eden’s plain,
Where never comes the shade of night
In spirit realms to reign;
Where robe and crown of angels glow,
There’s ONE in tears alone—
One interceding for our woe—
’Tis JESUS by the Throne.”
Book of Life! Exo_32:23.
(1.) The book here spoken of is the Book of Life. It was even then the custom of every city to keep a list of the burgesses. The Israelites were familiar with the custom of keeping a register of families; as appears in Gen_5:1. Hence Moses uses a familiar figure in speaking of God’s book. It has been supposed that a similar reference occurs in Psalms 29, 69; and in Dan_12:1.
(2.) It seems that in China they have two books—one the Book of Life, and the other the Book of Death. These are presented to the Emperor by his ministers, who is at liberty to blot out from either book any names he pleases. Those whose names he blots out from the Book of Life are doomed to die; and those whom he erases from the Book of Death are allowed to live.
“And then and there the likeness as of books
Before the awful presence of the Judge
Was seen—the massive chronicles of time,
The Law—the Gospel and the Book of Life.”
—Bickersteth.
Intercession! Exo_32:31-34. In one of the lovely Swiss villages, bordered on its most romantic lake, dwelt an aged Christian and his granddaughter—a maiden of simple beauty and lofty imagination. Two Englishmen visited the locality; when the attention of one was attracted to this German girl. After some weeks’ residence, the English stranger discovered that he was loved by the village maiden. He, therefore, induced her to leave her grandfather’s roof, under the promise of a marriage. For a month they continued travelling from one place to another, partly for concealment and partly to view the beautiful scenery. At length, the yearning to see the aged grandfather became intense; but he had sternly refused. In this painful crisis, the English friend undertook to intercede. His intercession proved effectual; and on the regular marriage of the two runaways, she was restored to her old home. Here husband and wife lived happily, until the summons came for the veteran Christian to leave this passing world.
“We dare not think what earth would be,
O Intercession! but for thee;
A howling chaos, wild and dark—
One flood of horrors, while no ark,
Upborne above the gloom-piled wave,
From one great death-abyss might save.”
Intercessory Prayer! Exo_32:34.
(1.) It has been well said, Prayer is not an endeavour to wrest from God what He is reluctant to bestow. It is the approach of the heart to Him to claim what He has promised, and what He delights to give. It was God Himself who directed Moses to stand in the beach. And it is the Father who has given the Son to be our Intercessor. All true prayer is inspired by the Holy Spirit, and therefore cannot fail to be presented and accepted.
(2.) If such is true of the intercessory prayer of Moses, how much more so is it of Christ? He pleads for our forgiveness at the throne of God. When the word went forth against the fruitless fig-tree: “Cut it down,” the voice was heard of the prevailing advocate, “Let it alone this year also.” How often may such prayers have been offered on our behalf!—Luk_6:12.
“Ended is the day’s work now,
Jesus seeks the mountain’s brow;
He, from early dawn, His sheep
Hath, as Shepherd, toiled to keep.
Doth He close in sleep His days!
Nay, He watches still, and prays.”
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v30 Exo 32:1 - - Exo 32:8; Exo 32:30 -…
Exodus
THE GOLDEN CALF
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Exo 32:1 - - Exo 32:8; Exo 32:30 - - Exo 32:35.
It was not yet six weeks since the people had sworn, ‘All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedient.’ The blood of the covenant, sprinkled on them, was scarcely dry when they flung off allegiance to Jehovah. Such short-lived loyalty to Him can never have been genuine. That mob of slaves was galvanised by Moses into obedience; and since their acceptance of Jehovah was in reality only yielding to the power of one strong will and its earnest faith, of course it collapsed as soon as Moses disappeared.
We have to note, first, the people’s universal revolt. The language of Exo 32:1 may easily hide to a careless reader the gravity and unanimity of the apostasy. ‘The people gathered themselves together.’ It was a national rebellion, a flood which swept away even some faithful, timid hearts. No voices ventured to protest. What were the elders, who shortly before ‘saw the God of Israel,’ doing to be passive at such a crisis? Was there no one to bid the fickle multitude look up to the summit overhead, where the red flames glowed, or to remind them of the hosts of Egypt lying stark and dead on the shore? Was Miriam cowed too, and her song forgotten?
We need not cast stones at these people; for we also have short memories for either the terrible or the gracious revelations of God in our own lives. But we may learn the lesson that God’s lovers have to set themselves sometimes dead against the rush of popular feeling, and that there are times when silence or compliance is sin.
It would have been easy for the rebels to have ignored Aaron, and made gods for themselves. But they desired to involve him in their apostasy, and to get ‘official sanction’ for it. He had been left by Moses as his lieutenant, and so to get him implicated was to stamp the movement as a regular and entire revolt.
The demand ‘to make gods’ {or, more probably, ‘a god’} flew in the face of both the first and second commandments. For Jehovah, who had forbidden the forming of any image, was denied in the act of making it. To disobey Him was to cast Him off. The ground of the rebellion was the craving for a visible object of trust and a visible guide, as is seen by the reason assigned for the demand for an image. Moses was out of sight; they must have something to look at as their leader. Moses had disappeared, and, to these people who had only been heaved up to the height of believing in Jehovah by Moses, Jehovah had disappeared with him. They sank down again to the level of other races as soon as that strong lever ceased to lift their heavy apprehensions.
How ridiculous the assertion that they did not know what had become of Moses! They knew that he was up there with Jehovah. The elders could have told them that. The fire on the mount might have burned in on all minds the confirmation. Note, too, the black ingratitude and plain denial of Jehovah in ‘the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt.’ They refuse to recognise God’s part. It was Moses only who had done it; and now that he is gone they must have a visible god, like other nations.
Still sadder than their sense-bound wish is Aaron’s compliance. He knew as well as we do what he should have said, but, like many another man in influential position, when beset by popular cries, he was frightened, and yielded when he should have ‘set his face like a flint.’ His compliance has in essentials been often repeated, especially by priests and ministers of religion who have lent their superior abilities or opportunities to carry out the wishes of the ignorant populace, and debased religion or watered down its prohibitions, to please and retain hold of them. The Church has incorporated much from heathenism. Roman Catholic missionaries have permitted ‘converts’ to keep their old usages. Protestant teachers have acquiesced in, and been content to find the brains to carry out, compromises between sense and soul, God’s commands and men’s inclinations.
We need not discuss the metallurgy of Exo 32:4. But clearly Aaron asked for the earrings, not, as some would have it, hoping that vanity and covetousness would hinder their being given, but simply in order to get gold for the bad work which he was ready to do. The reason for making the thing in the shape of a calf is probably the Egyptian worship of Apis in that form, which would be familiar to the people.
We must note that it was the people who said, ‘These be thy gods, O Israel!’ Aaron seems to keep in the rear, as it were. He makes the calf, and hands it over, and leaves them to hail it and worship. Like all cowards, he thought that he was lessening his guilt by thus keeping in the background. Feeble natures are fond of such subterfuges, and deceive themselves by them; but they do not shift their sin off their shoulders.
Then he comes in again with an impotent attempt to diminish the gravity of the revolt. ‘When he saw this,’ he tried to turn the flood into another channel, and so proclaimed a ‘feast to Jehovah’ !-as if He could be worshipped by flagrant defiance of His commandments, or as if He had not been disavowed by the ascription to the calf, made that morning out of their own trinkets, of the deliverance from Egypt. A poor, inconsequential attempt to save appearances and hallow sin by writing God’s name on it! The ‘god’ whom the Israelites worshipped under the image of a calf, was no less another ‘god before Me,’ though it was called by the name of Jehovah. If the people had their idol, it mattered nothing to them, and it mattered as little to Jehovah, what ‘name’ it bore. The wild orgies of the morrow were not the worship which He accepts.
What a contrast between the plain and the mountain! Below, the shameful feast, with its parody of sacrifice and its sequel of lust-inflamed dancing; above, the awful colloquy between the all-seeing righteous Judge and the intercessor! The people had cast off Jehovah, and Jehovah no more calls them ‘My,’ but ‘thy people.’ They had ascribed their Exodus first to Moses, and next to the calf. Jehovah speaks of it as the work of Moses.
A terrible separation of Himself from them lies in ‘thy people, which thou broughtest up,’ and Moses’ bold rejoinder emphasises the relation and act which Jehovah seems to suppress {Exo 32:11}. Observe that the divine voice refuses to give any weight to Aaron’s trick of compromise. These are no worshippers of Jehovah who are howling and dancing below there. They are ‘worshipping it, and sacrificing to it,’ not to Him. The cloaks of sin may partly cover its ugliness here, but they are transparent to His eyes, and many a piece of worship, which is said to be directed to Him, is, in His sight, rank idolatry.
We do not deal with the magnificent courage of Moses, his single-handed arresting of the wild rebellion, and the severe punishment by which he trampled out the fire. But we must keep his severity in mind if we would rightly judge his self-sacrificing devotion, and his self-sacrificing devotion if we would rightly judge his severity.
No words of ours can make more sublime his utter self-abandonment for the sake of the people among whom he had just been flaming in wrath, and smiting like a destroying angel. That was a great soul which had for its poles such justice and such love. The very words of his prayer, in their abruptness, witness to his deep emotion. ‘If Thou wilt forgive their sin’ stands as an incomplete sentence, left incomplete because the speaker is so profoundly moved. Sometimes broken words are the best witnesses of our earnestness. The alternative clause reaches the high-water mark of passionate love, ready to give up everything for the sake of its objects. The ‘book of life’ is often spoken of in Scripture, and it is an interesting study to bring together the places where the idea occurs {see Psa 69:28; Dan 12:1; Php 4:3; Rev 3:5}. The allusion is to the citizens’ roll {Psa 87:6}. Those whose names are written there have the privileges of citizenship, and, as it is the ‘book of life’ {or ‘of the living’}, life in the widest sense is secured to them. To blot out of it, therefore, is to cut a man off from fellowship in the city of God, and from participation in life.
Moses was so absorbed in his vocation that his life was less to him than the well-being of Israel. How far he saw into the darkness beyond the grave we cannot say; but, at least, he was content, and desirous to die on earth, if thereby Israel might continue to be God’s people. And probably he had some gleam of light beyond, which enhanced the greatness of his offered sacrifice. To die, whatever loss of communion with God that involved here or hereafter, would be sweet if thereby he could purchase Israel’s restoration to God’s favour. We cannot but think of Paul willing to be separated from Christ for his brethren’s sake.
We may well think of a greater than Moses or Paul, who did bear the loss which they were willing to bear, and died that sin might be forgiven. Moses was a true type of Christ in that act of supreme self-sacrifice; and all the heroism, the identification of himself with his people, the love which willingly accepts death, that makes his prayer one of the greatest deeds on the page of history, are repeated in infinitely sweeter, more heart-subduing fashion in the story of the Cross. Let us not omit duly to honour the servant; let us not neglect to honour and love infinitely more the Lord. ‘This man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses.’ Let us see that we render Him
‘Thanks never ceasing,
And infinite love.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv30, 34 (See Scofield "Exo 29:33").
atonement
(See Scofield "Exo 29:33").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v30 Moses Again Intercedes for the People
Moses Again Intercedes for the People
v. 30. And it came to pass on the morrow that Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin; and now I will go up unto the Lord; peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin. He indicates that their crime may still be covered by means of an expiation, and states his willingness to make an effort to obtain this atonement.
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v. 31. And Moses returned unto the Lord and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold! It was a flagrant case of idolatry in a form which the Lord had expressly condemned, Exo 20:23.
v. 32. Yet, now, if Thou wilt forgive their sin-. The greatness of his love for the people, on the one hand, and his awe of God, on the other, does not permit him to finish the sentence. It was a most profound appeal for mercy. And if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book which Thou hast written, out of the book of life. Here is a case of magnanimous nobleness equaled only by Paul, Rom 9:3, and surpassed only by Christ in His unexcelled devotion, in His incomprehensible sacrifice.
v. 33. And the Lord said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against Me, him will I blot out of My book. He would not accept the sacrifice offered by Moses, He would not offer up the just for the unjust in this case.
v. 34. Therefore go now, lead the people unto the place of which I have spoken unto thee, all of which indicated that He would spare the people at this time. Behold, Mine Angel shall go before thee, the Son of God Himself accompanied the army on its march; nevertheless in the day when I visit I will visit their sin upon them. The time would come when their period of grace would be at an end, when the Lord’s revenge would strike them, when His judicial visitation would be upon them.
v. 35. And the Lord plagued the people because they made the calf, which Aaron made. The punishment meted out by the children of Levi was sufficient for the time being. God has patience with the sinners, with those that reject the Savior, for the sake of that very Redeemer. But when the sinners persist in refusing the grace offered to them, and despise the patience of God, death and destruction will finally come upon them.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv30, 33 You have committed a very great sin
You have committed a very great sin
They worshiped an idol.
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Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin
Moses spoke of persuading God to forgive the people as if he could make atonement for their sin. AT: "Perhaps I can persuade Yahweh to forgive you" (See: Metaphor)
blot me out of the book
The word "me" here refers to the name of Moses. AT: "erase my name from the book" (See: Metonymy)
the book that you have written
What God had written in the book can be stated clearly. AT: "the book in which you have written the names of your people" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
translationWords
sin
atonement
false god
gold
forgive
blot out
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv30, 32, 33, 34 32:30-35 This further intercession for the people may have…
32:30-35 This further intercession for the people may have been needed because of Moses’ new recognition of how serious the sin really was.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.