THE

GOLDEN

See also:

• CALF
• THE GOLDEN CALF

CALF  , a molten image made by the Israelites when Moses had ascended the Mount of Yahweh to receive the Law (Ex. xxxii.) . Alarmed at his lengthy absence the people clamoured for " gods " to lead them, and at the instigation of Aaron, they brought their jewelry and made the calf out of it . This was celebrated by a sacred festival, and it was only through the intervention of Moses that the people were saved from the wrath of Yahweh (cp . Dent. ix . 19 sqq.) . Nevertheless 3000 of them fell at the hands of the Levites who, in answer to the summons of Moses, declared themselves on the side of Yahweh . The origin of this particular form of worship can scarcely be sought in Egypt; the Apis which was worshipped there was a live bull, and image-worship was common among the Canaanites in connexion with the cult of Baal and Astarte (qq.v.) . In early Israel it was considered natural to worship Yahweh by means of images (cp. the story of Gideon, Judg. viii . 24 sqq.), and even to Moses himself was attributed the bronze-serpent whose cult at Jerusalem was destroyed in the time of Hezekiah (2 Kings xviii . 4, Num. xxi . 4-9) . The condemnation which later writers, particularly those imbued with the spirit of the Deuteronomic reformation, pass upon all image-worship, is in harmony with the judgment upon Jeroboam for his innovations at Bethel and Dan (1 Kings xii .

28 sqq., xvi . 26, &c.) . But neither

Elijah nor Elisha raised a voice against the cult; then, as later, in the time of Amos, it was nominally Yahweh-worship, and Hosea is the first to regard it as the fundamental cause of Israel's misery . See further, W . R . Smith, Prophets of Israel, pp . 175 sqq.; Kennedy, Hastings' Dict . Bib. i . 342; and HEBREW RELIGION . . (S . A .