Posted on 02/25/2013 9:02:12 PM PST by Phinneous
Link is to an audio class on understanding the sin of the golden calf. How the heck could people who heard G-d speak 40 days prior do such a sin?!
The sin of the golden calf takes place within the weekly portion (as divided by Jews) of the Torah that is read this week.
Enjoy!
Can you just tell us why?
I thought the reason they built a golden calf was because the Jews were stingy and wouldn’t fork over enough gold to build a whole cow.
I hope you take comment #3 in the way I meant it. It is to provide a little levity and promote some conversation on the subject, which is actually very interesting.
Thanks for posting this thread.
It was because of Aaron’s poor leadership.
Today’s teachings of false
doctrines in so many churches are a direct reflection of this.
We a humans and we sin
This is such a bum rap against the Israelites! Even Aaron said that it ‘just crawled out of the fire’. How could anyone think the first High Priest lied? /sar
Thank you so very much for this link.
While I do a lot of reading from Chabad’s website, I pretty much avoid video/audio lessons. Not from their site in particular, just in a general sense. That’s because no matter the topic, I inadvertantly disengage after a minute or so and can’t maintain focus.
But this topic was especially intriguing, so I clicked anyway. This rabbi’s lesson was so engaging that I was completely engrossed for the entire hour +. He has a talent for making his side topics and tangents so interesting that I wasn’t impatiently waiting for him to “get to the point”. He then tied every one of his tangents into his summary and conclusion. Now *that’s* the kind of speaker I can listen to 24/7. And I will be spending as much time as I am able catching up with his lessons.
There is much I could comment about the lesson, but where to start? I’ll just say that his brief remarks at the end drew to mind words from the derailed’s own sources, that witness to the truth of Rabbi Kaplan’s comments.
Thanks again.
Let me take Aaron’s statement a little further. What if the golden calf that emerged from the pot was self forming and animated (at least initially), that would certainly trick the nervous people into worshiping it. Was that an opening the devil took advantage of?
Actually, the excuse "it jumped out of the fire" was Aaron's flimsy excuse for making it and leading the children of Israel astray.
Moses response was to grind the calf to powder, added water, and made them drink it.
For the real problem was, that they had seen 10 plagues on Egypt, been delivered out of Egypt through the waters, been given water and food (6 days out of 7) in the desert, a cloud to follow by day and a pillar of fire by night, and yet with all this, they quickly turned to a false idol.
The sin of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, was to erect two golden calves for the Northern tribes to sacrifice at, rather than the temple in Jerusalem. In essence, repeating the offense of the golden calf before Gd.
For this the northern tribes eventually had to back to slavery in Egypt. The southern tribes succumbed later to idolatry and human sacrifice and were taken to Babylon. It is a picture of the Total Depravity of Man, that man will sink to the lowest state that Gd permits.
The amazing thing was that both the Northern and Southern tribes were returned. Those who came back from Egypt did not learn their lesson and continued as Samaritans. Those who came back from Babylon, restored Jerusalem and the temple and continue, yet after being exiled once again, to this day.
As it says in the Scriptures, "I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy, and compassion upon whom I will have compassion".
Repentance and returning to Gd is essential. In our day, we are turning to the golden calf of self. Pregnant women to Combat, the Marriage of Gys in the military, making us pay for the blood of the unborn - all these point to the fact that the golden calf is among us once again.
And human sacrifice is right around the corner unless we Repent as a nation and turn back to the Lord our Gd.
we already have human sacrifice.what else is abortion but sacrificing our children to the god of convenience?
Correct, but I am saying of Biblical Proportions.
That was great! Thank you so much for the link.
You obviously either didn't watch the video, or else got nothing out of it.
There is so much more to the Torah than just what is written on the surface.
The Israelites copied the worship of the calf from the Egyptians, who worshiped the god “Hapi” under the form of a male calf.
This in turn was copied from the Babylonians,who used the bull as a symbol of Nimrod. Not only was a bull chosen
because it symbolized might and strength, the Chaldee word
for “bull” also carried a double meaning. Nimrod as a king
was a ruler of the people, and the name for “ruler” is “Tur,” that also means “bull” in Chaldee. Thus the bull
was chosen to symbolize Nimrod in his worship.
That’s also a great explanation Dave Tesla. But the innermost (Chassidic translation of the “real” reason) is that weeks earlier at the giving of the Torah, the Jews saw a figure of the face of an ox on the angels carrying G-ds throne. They thought—good enough for G-d....good enough for us! And no human frailties! (they were disappointed that Moses chose (seemingly to them) to stay in heaven rather than come back and lead.
Great insight...the Dem Party as the modern Baal.
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