Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]
[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

e

23 For they said unto me, Make us gods, which shall go before us: for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what has become of him. 24 And I said unto them, Whosoever hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave

b Deut. ix. 21. - Gen. xx. 9; xxvi. 10.xv. 24; xvi. 2, 20, 28; xvii. 2, 4.- e Ver. 1.

d Chap. xiv. 11; f Ver. 4.

Ab.

25 And when Moses saw that the people were naked, (for Aaron had made them naked, unto their shame, among their enemies :)

i

26 Then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Who is on the LORD's side? let him come unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him. 27 And he said unto them,. Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbour.

28 And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses: and there fell of the

Chap. xxxiii. 4, 5.- h2 Chron. xxviii. 19. iHeb. those that rose up against them.—k Num. xxv. 5; Deut., xxxiii. 9.

was rash and irreverent; God's writing should not Uzziel makes a similar excuse for him: "And I said have been treated in this way. unto them, Whosoever hath gold, let him break it off and give it to me; and I cast it into the fire, and Satan entered into it, and it came out in the form of this calf!" Just like the popish legend of the falling of the shrine of our Lady of Loretta out of heaven! These legends come from the same quarter. Satan can provide more when necessary for his purpose.

Verse 20. He took the calf—and burnt—and ground it to powder, &c.] How truly contemptible must the object of their idolatry appear when they were obliged to drink their god, reduced to powder and strewed on the water!"6 But," says an objector, "how could gold, the most ductile of all metals, and the most ponderous, be stamped into dust, and strewed on water?" In Deut. ix. 21 this matter is fully explained: I took, says Moses, your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, that is, melted it down, probably into ingots, or gross plates, and stamped it, that is, beat into thin lamina, something like our gold leaf, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust, which might be very easily done by the action of the hands, when beat into thin plates or leaves, as the original words N eccoth and p dak imply. And I cast the dust thereof into the brook, and being thus lighter than the water, it would readily float, so that they could easily see, in this reduced and useless state, the idol to which they had been lately offering Divine honours, and from which they were vainly expecting protection and defence. No mode of argumentation could have served so forcibly to demonstrate the folly of their conduct, as this method pursued by Moses.

Verse 21. What did this people unto thee.] It seems if Aaron had been firm, this evil might have been prevented.

Verse 22. Thou knowest the people] He excuses himself by the wicked and seditious spirit of the people, intimating that he was obliged to accede to their desires.

Verse 24. I cast it into the fire and there came out this calf.] What a silly and ridiculous subterfuge! He seems to insinuate that he only threw the metal into the fire, and that the calf came unexpectedly out by mere accident. The Targum of Jonathan ben

Verse 25. Moses saw that the people were naked] They were stripped, says the Targum, of the holy crown that was upon their heads, on which the great and precious name M JEHOVAH was engraved. But it is more likely that the word y parua implies that they were reduced to the most helpless and wretched state, being abandoned by God in the midst of their enemies. This is exactly similar to that expression, 2 Chron. xxviii. 19: For the Lord brought Judah low, because of Ahaz king of Israel: for he made Judah NAKED, yn hiphria, and transgressed sore against the Lord. Their nakedness, therefore, though in the first sense it may imply that several of them were despoiled of their ornaments, yet it may also express their defenceless and abandoned state, in consequence of their sin. That they could not literally have all been despoiled of their ornaments, appears evident from their offerings. See chap. xxxv. 21, &c.

Verse 26. Who is on the Lord's side?] That is, Who among you is free from this transgression?

And all the sons of Levi, &c.] It seems they had no part in this idolatrous business.

Verse 27. From gate to gate] It is probable that there was an enclosed or intrenched camp, in which the chief rulers and heads of the people were, and that this camp had two gates or outlets; and the Levites were commanded to pass from one to the other, slaying as many of the transgressors as they could find.

Verse 28. There fell—about three thousand men.] These were no doubt the chief transgressors; having

[blocks in formation]

brother; that he may bestow upon you a and said, O, this people have sinned a great

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

broken the covenant by having other gods besides Jehovah, they lost the Divine protection, and then the justice of God laid hold on and slew them. Moses doubtless had positive orders from God for this act of justice, (see ver. 27;) for though, through his intercession, the people were spared so as not to be exterminated as a nation, yet the principal transgressors, those who were set on mischief, ver. 22, were to be put to death..

[blocks in formation]

me,

r

point which he knew was fixed when this list or musterroll was made, namely, that those who should break the covenant should be blotted out, and never have any inheritance in the promised land: therefore he says, This people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold; thus they had broken the covenant, (see the first and second commandments,) and by this had forfeited their right to Canaan. Yet now, he Verse 29, For Moses had said, Consecrate your adds, if thou wilt forgive their sin, that they may yet selves] Fill your hands to the Lord. See the reason attain the promised inheritance —; and if not, blot of this form of speech in the note on chap. xxix. 19. pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast writVerse 31. Moses returned unto the Lord] Before ten-if thou wilt blot out their names from this regishe went down from the mountain God had acquainted ter, and never suffer them to enter Canaan, blot me him with the general defection of the people, where-out also; for I cannot bear the thought of enjoying upon 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.

Verse 32. Forgive their sin -; and if not, blot me-out of thy book] It is probable that one part of Moses' work during the forty days of his residence on the mount with God, was his regulating the muster-roll of all the tribes and families of Israel, in reference to the parts they were respectively to act in the different transactions in the wilderness, promised land, &c.; and this, being done under the immediate direction of God, is termed God's book which he had written, (such muster-rolls or registers, called also genealogies, the Jews have had from the remotest period of their history;) and it is probable that God had told him, that those who should break the covenant which he had then made with them should be blotted out of that list, and never enter into the promised land. All this Moses appears to have particularly in view, and, without entering into any detail, immediately comes to the VOL. I. ( 31 )

that blessedness, while my people and their posterity shall be for ever excluded. And God, in kindness to Moses, spared him the mortification of going into Canaan without taking the people with him. They had forfeited their lives, and were sentenced to die in the wilderness; and Moses' prayer was answered in mercy to him, while the people suffered under the hand of justice. But the promise of God did not fail; for, although those who sinned were blotted out of the book, yet their posterity enjoyed the inheritance.

[ocr errors]

This seems to be the simple and pure light in which this place should be viewed; and in this sense St. Paul is to be understood, Rom. ix. 3, where he says: For I could wish that myself were ACCURSED from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh; who are ISRAELITES, to whom perlaineth the ADOPTION, and the GLORY, and the COVENANTS. Moses could not survive the destruction of his people by the neighbouring nations, nor their exclusion from the promised land; and St. Paul, seeing the Jews about to be cut off by the Roman sword for their rejection of the Gospel, was willing to be deprived of every earthly blessing, and even to become a sacrifice for them, if this might contribute to the preservation and salvation of the Jewish state. Both those eminent men, engaged in the same work, influenced by a spirit of unparalleled patriotism, were willing to forfeit every blessing of a secular kind, and even die for the welfare of the people. But certainly, neither of them could wish to go to eternal perdition, to save their countrymen from being cut off, the one by the sword of the Philistines, the other by that of the Romans. Even the supposition is monstrous.

On this mode of interpretation we may at once see 465

Moses is commanded

A. M. 2513.

B. C. 1491.

An. Exod. Isr. 1. hast written.

Ab.

[ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]

A. M. 2513.
B. C. 1491.

"out of thy book which thou behold, mine angel shall go
before thee: nevertheless, in An. Exod. Isr. 1.
the day when I visit, I will visit
their sin upon them.

33 And the LORD said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.

34 Therefore now go, lead the people unto the place of which I have spoken unto thee:

u Psa. lvi. 8; cxxxix. 16; Dan. xii. 1; Phil. iv. 3; Rev. iii. 5; xiii. 8; xvii. 8; xx. 12, 15; xxi. 27; xxii. 19.- Lev. xxiii. 30; Ezek. xviii. 4.

what is implied in the book of life, and being written in or blotted out of such a book. In the public registers, all that were born of a particular tribe were entered in the list of their respective families under that tribe. This was the book of life; but when any of those died, his name might be considered as blotted out from this list. Our baptismal registers, which record the births of all the inhabitants of a particular parish or district, and which are properly our books of life; and our bills of mortality, which are properly our books of death, or the lists of those who are thus blotted out from our baptismal registers or books of life; are very significant and illustrative remains of the ancient registers, or books of life and death among the Jews, the Greeks, the Romans, and most ancient nations. It is worthy of remark, that in China the names of the persons who have been tried on criminal processes are written in two distinct books, which are called the book of life and the book of death: those who have been acquitted, or who have not been capitally convicted, are written in the former; those who have been found guilty, in the latter. These two books are presented to the emperor by his ministers, who, as sovereign, has a right to erase any name from either: to place the living among the dead, that he may die; or the dead, that is, the person condemned to death, among the living, that he may be preserved. Thus he blots out of the book of life or the book of death according to his sovereign pleasure, on the representation of his ministers, or the intercession of friends, &c. An ancient and extremely rich picture, in my own possession, representing this circumstance, painted in China, was thus interpreted to me by a native Chinese.

:

Verse 33. Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out] As if the Divine Being had said: "All my conduct is regulated by infinite justice and righteousness in no case shall the innocent ever suffer for the guilty. That no man may transgress through ignorance, I have given you my law, and thus published my covenant; the people themselves have acknowledged its justice and equity, and have voluntarily ratified it. He then that sins against me, (for sin is the tranrgression of the law, 1 John iii. 4, and the law must be published and known that it may be binding,) him will I blot out of my book." And is it not remarkable that to these conditions of the covenant God strictly adhered, so that not one soul of these transgressors ever entered into the promised rest? Here was justice. And yet, though they deserved death, they were spared! Here was mercy. Thus, as far as justice would permit, mercy extended; and as far as mercy would permit, justice proceeded. Be

[blocks in formation]

Ab.

35 And the LORD plagued the people, because they made the calf, which Aaron made.

W

Chapter xxxiii. 2, 14, &c.; Numbers xx. 16.- - Deut. xxxii. 35; Amos iii. 14; Romans ii. 5, 6.—y 2 Samuel xii. 9; Acts vii. 41.

hold, O reader, the GOODNESS and SEVERITY of GOD! MERCY saves all that JUSTICE can spare; and JUSTICE destroys all that MERCY should not save.

Verse 34. Lead the people unto the place] The word place is not in the text, and is with great propriety omitted. For Moses never led this people into that place, they all died in the wilderness except Joshua and Caleb; but Moses led them towards the place, and thus the particle el here should be understood, unless we suppose that God designed to lead them to the borders of the land, but not to take them into it.

I will visit their sin] I will not destroy them, but they shall not enter into the promised land. They shall wander in the wilderness till the present generation become extinct.

Verse 35. The Lord plagued the people] Every time they transgressed afterwards Divine justice seems to have remembered this transgression against them. The Jews have a metaphorical saying, apparently founded on this text: "No affliction has ever happened to Israel in which there was not some particle of the dust of the golden calf.”

1. THE attentive reader has seen enough in this chapter to induce him to exclaim, How soon a clear sky may be overcast! How soon may the brightest prospects be obscured! Israel had just ratified its covenant with Jehovah, and had received the most encouraging and unequivocal pledges of his protection and love. But they sinned, and provoked the Lord to depart from them, and to destroy the work of his hands. A little more faith, patience, and perseverance, and they should have been safely brought into the promised land. For want of a little more dependence upon God, how often does an excellent beginning come to an unhappy conclusion! Many who were just on the borders of the promised land, and about to cross Jordan, have, through an act of unfaithfulness, been turned back to wander many a dreary year in the wilderness. Reader, be on thy guard. Trust in Christ, and watch unto prayer.

2. Many people have been greatly distressed on losing their baptismal register, and have been reduced in consequence to great political inconvenience. But still they had their lives, and should a living man complain? But a man may so sin as to provoke God to cut him off; or, like a fruitless tree, be cut down, because he encumbers the ground. Or he may have sinned a sin unto death, 1 John v. 16, 17, that is, a sin which God will punish with temporal death, while he extends mercy to the soul.

( 31 )

The Lord promises to send

CHAP. XXXIII.

3. With respect to the blotting out of God's book, on which there has been so much controversy, is it not evident that a soul could not be blotted out of a book in which it had never been written? And is it not farther evident from ver. 32, 33, that, although a man

an angel before the people.

be written in God's book, if he sins he may be blotted out? Let him that readeth understand; and let him that standeth take heed lest he fall. Reader, be not high-minded, but fear. See the notes on verses 32 and 33.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

Moses is commanded to depart from the mount, and lead up the people towards the promised land, 1. An angel is promised to be their guide, 2. The land is described, and the Lord refuses to go with them, 3. The people mourn, and strip themselves of their ornaments, 4-6.- The tabernacle or tent is pitched without the camp, 7. Moses goes to it to consult the Lord, and the cloudy pillar descends on it, 8, 9. The people, standing at their tent doors witness this, 10. The Lord speaks familiarly with Moses; he returns to the camp, and leaves Joshua in the tabernacle, 11. Moses pleads with God, and desires to know whom he will send to be their guide, and to be informed of the way of the Lord, 12, 13. The Lord promises that his presence shall go with them, 14. Moses pleads that the people may be taken under the Divine protection, 15, 16. The Lord promises to do so, 17. Moses requests to see the Divine glory, 18. And God promises to make his goodness pass before him, and to proclaim his name, 19. Shows that no man can see his glory and live, 20; but promises to put him in the cleft of a rock, and to cover him with his hand while his glory passed by, and then to remove his hand and let him see his back parts, 21-23.

A. M. 2513.

B. C. 1491.

An. Exod. Isr. 1.
Ab.

AND the LORD said unto Moses, Depart, and go up hence, thou and the people which thou hast brought up out of the land of Egypt, unto the land which I sware unto Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, "Unto thy seed will I give it :

2 And I will send an angel before thee; d and I will drive out the Canaanite, the Amorite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite:

a Chap. xxxii. 7. b Gen. xii. 7; chap. xxxii. 13.- - Chap. xxxii. 34; xxxiv. 11. Deut. vii. 22; Joshua xxiv. 11. Chap. iii. 8.- Ver. 15, 17.- Chap. xxxii. 9; xxxiv. 9. Deut. ix. 6, 13.—h Chap. xxiii. 21; xxxii. 10; Numbers xvi.

e

NOTES ON CHAP. XXXIII.

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

tiful garments too. Moses says nothing of this last Verse 1. Unto the land] That is, towards it, or to circumstance; but as it is a modern practice, so it the borders of it. See chap. xxxii. 34. Verse 2. I will send an angel] In chap. xxiii. 20 God promises to send an angel to conduct them into the good land, in whom the name of God should be; that is, in whom God should dwell. See the note there. Here he promises that an angel shall be their conductor; but as there is nothing particularly specified of him, it has been thought that an ordinary angel is intended, and not that Angel of the Covenant promised before. And this sentiment seems to be confirmed by the following verse.

Verse 3. I will not go up in the midst of thee] Consequently, the angel here promised to be their guide was not that angel in whom Jehovah's name was and so the people understood it; hence the mourning which is afterwards mentioned.

Verse 5. Now put off thy ornaments from thee] “The Septuagint, in their translation, suppose that the children of Israel not only laid aside their ear-rings, and such like ornaments, in a time of professed deep humiliation before God, but their upper or more beau

appears by their version to have been as ancient as their time, and probably took place long before that. The Septuagint gives us this as the translation of the pas sage: The people, having heard this sad declaration, mourned with lamentations. And the Lord said unto the children of Israel, Now, therefore, put off your robes of glory, and your ornaments, and I will show you the things I will do unto you. And the children of Israel put off their ornaments and robes by the mount, by Horeb.'

"If it had not been the custom to put off their upper garments in times of deep mourning, in the days that the Septuagint translation was made, they would not have inserted this circumstance in the account Moses gives of their mourning, and concerning which he was silent. They must have supposed too that this practice might be in use in those elder times.

"That it is now practised in the east, appears from the account Pitts gives of the ceremonies of the Mohammedan pilgrimage to Mecca. A few days after this we came to a place called Rabbock, about four

The tabernacle is pitched, and

I

A. M. 2513. B. C. 1491.

Ab.

n

EXODUS.

midst of thee in a moment, and An. Exod. Isr. 1. consume thee; therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that may know what to do unto thee. 6 And the children of Israel stripped themselves of their ornaments by the mount Horeb. 7 And Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp, afar off from the camp, and called it the tabernacle of the congregation. And it came to pass, that every one which sought the LORD went out unto the

[ocr errors]

0

the cloudy pillar descends on it.

A. M. 2513.

B. C. 1491. An. Exod. Isr. 1. Ab.

tabernacle of the congregation, which was without the camp. 8 And it came to pass, when Moses went out unto the tabernacle, that all the people rose up, and stood every man at his tent door, and looked after Moses, until he was gone into the tabernaclę.

9 And it came to pass, as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle, and the LORD talked with Moses.

Chapter xxix. 42, 43. Numbers xvi. 27.

"Deut. viii. 2; Psalm cxxxix. 23. 、P Deut. iv. 29; 2 Sam. xxi. 1.

days' sail on this side of Mecca, where all the hagges or pilgrims, (excepting those of the female sex) do enter into hirrawem or ihram, i. `e., they take off all their clothes, covering themselves with two hirrawems, or large white cotton wrappers; one they put about their middle, which reaches down to their ancles; with the other they cover the upper part of their body, exeept the head; and they wear no other thing on their bodies but these wrappers, only a pair of grimgameca, that is thin-soled shoes like sandals, the over-leather of which covers only the toes, the insteps being all naked. In this manner, like humble penitents, they go from Rabbock until they come to Mecca, to approach the temple, many times enduring the scorching heat of the sun until the very skin is burnt off their backs and arms, and their heads swollen to a very great degree.' ―pp. 115, 116. Presently after he informs us that the time of their wearing this mortifying habit is about the space of seven days.' Again, (p 138 :) It was a sight, indeed, able to pierce one's heart, to behold so many thousands in their garments of humility and mortification, with their naked heads, and cheeks watered with tears; and to hear their grievous sighs and sobs, begging earnestly for the remission of their sins, promising newness of life, using a form of penitential ex: pressions, and thus continuing for the space of four or five hours.'

"The Septuagint suppose the Israelites made much the same appearance as these Mohammedan pilgrims, when Israel stood in anguish of soul at the foot of Mount Horeb, though Moses says nothing of putting off any of their vestments.

[ocr errors]

"Some passages of the Jewish prophets seem to confirm the notion of their stripping themselves of some of their clothes in times of deep humiliation, particularly Micah i. 8: Therefore I will wail and howl; I will go stripped and naked; I will make a wailing like the dragons, and mourning as the owls.

"Saul's stripping himself, mentioned 1 Sam. xix. 24, is perhaps to be understood of his assuming the appearance of those that were deeply engaged in devotional exercises, into which he was unintentionally brought by the prophetic influences that came upon him, and in which he saw others engaged."-Harmer's Observat., vol. iv., p. 172.

The ancient Jewish commentators were of opinion that the Israelites had the name in Jehovah inscribed

[blocks in formation]

on them in such a way as to ensure them the Divine protection; and that this, inscribed probably on a plate of gold, was considered their choicest ornament; and that when they gave their ornaments to make the golden calf, this was given by many, in consequence of which they were considered as naked and defenceless. All the remaining parts of their ornaments, which it is likely were all emblematical of spiritual things, God commands them here to lay off; for they could not with propriety bear the symbols of the Divine protection, who had forfeited that protection for their transgression.

That I may know what to do unto thee.] For it seems that while they had these emblematic ornaments on them, they were still considered as under the Divine protection. These were a shield to them, which God commands them to throw aside. Though many had parted with their choicest ornaments, yet not all, only a few comparatively, of the wives, daughters, and sons of 600,000 men, could have been thus stripped to make one golden calf. The major part still had these ornaments, and they are now commanded to laythem aside.

Verse 7. Moses took the tabernacles eth haohel, the TENT; not eth hammishcan, the tabernacle, the dwelling-place of Jehovah, see chap. xxxv. 11, for this was not as yet erected; but probably the tent of Moses, which was before in the midst of the camp, and to which the congregation came for judgment, and where, no doubt, God frequently met with his servant. This is now removed to a considerable distance from the camp, (two thousand cubits, according to the Talmudists,) as God refuses to dwell any longer among this rebellious people. And as this was the place to which all the people came for justice and judgment, hence it was probably called the tabernacle, more properly the tent, of the congregation.

Verse 9. The cloudy pillar descended] This very circumstance precluded the possibility of deception. The cloud descending at these times, and at none others, was a full proof that it was miraculous, and a pledge of the Divine presence. It was beyond the power of human art to counterfeit such an appearance; and let it be observed that all the people saw this, ver. 10. How many indubitable and irrefragable proofs of its own authenticity and Divine origin does the Pentateuch contain !

[ocr errors]
« AnteriorContinuar »