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When God revealed Himself upon Mount Sinai, all Israel sang a song of jubilation to the
Lord, for their faith in God was on this occasion without bounds and unexampled, except
possibly at the time of the Messiah, when they likewise will cherish this firm faith. The
angels, too, rejoiced with Israel, only God was down-cast on this day and sent His voice
"out of thickest darkness," in token of His sorrow. The angels hereupon said to
God: "Is not the joy that Thou hast created Thine?" But God replied: "You
do not know what the future will bring." He knew that forty days later Israel would
give the lie to the words of God: "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me," and
would adore the Golden Calf. 261 And truly, God had sufficient cause to grow sad at this
thought, for the worship of the Golden Calf had more disastrous consequences for Israel
than any other of their sins. God had resolved to give life everlasting to the nation that
would accept the Torah, hence Israel upon accepting the Torah gained supremacy over the
Angel of Death. But they lost this power when they worshipped the Golden Calf. As a
punishment for this, their sin, they were doomed to study the Torah in suffering and
bondage, in exile and unrest, amid cares of life and burdens, until, in the Messianic time
and in the future world, God will compensate them for all their sufferings. 262 But
until that time there is no sorrow that falls to Israel's lot that is not in part a
punishment for their worship of the Golden Calf. 263
Strange as it may seem that Israel should set out to worship this idol at the very time
when God was busied with the preparation of the two tables of the law, still the following
circumstances are to be considered. When Moses departed from the people to hasten to God
to receive the Torah, he said to them: "Forty days from to-day I will bring you the
Torah." But at noon on the fortieth day Satan came, and with a wizard's trick
conjured up for the people a vision of Moses lying stretched out dead on a bier that
floated midway between earth and heaven. Pointing to it with their fingers, they cried:
"This is the man Moses that bought us up out of the land of Egypt." 264 Under
the leadership of the magicians Jannes and Jambres, they appeared before Aaron, saying:
"The Egyptians were wont to carry their gods about with them, to dance and play
before them, that each might be able to behold his gods; and now we desire that thou
shouldst make us a god such as the Egyptians had." When Hur, the son of Miriam, whom
Moses during his absence had appointed joint leader of the people with Aaron, owing to his
birth which placed him among the notables of highest rank, beheld this, he said to them:
"O ye frivolous ones, you are no longer mindful of the many miracles God wrought for
you." In their wrath, the people slew this pious and noble man; and, pointing out his
dead body to Aaron, they said to him threateningly: "If thou wilt make us a god, it
is well, if not we will dispose of thee as of him." Aaron had no fear for his life,
but he thought: "If Israel were to commit so terrible a sin as to slay their priest
and prophet, God would never forgive them." He was willing rather to take a sin upon
himself than to cast the burden of so wicked a deed upon the people. He therefore granted
them their wish to make them a god, but he did it in such a way that he still cherished
the hope that this thing might not come to pass. Hence he demanded from them not their own
ornaments for the fashioning of the idol, but the ornaments of their wives, their sons,
and their daughters, thinking: "If I were to tell them to bring me gold and silver,
they would immediately do so, hence I will demand the earrings of their wives, their sons,
and their daughters, that through their refusal to give up their ornaments, the matter
might come to nought." But Aaron's assumption was only in part true; the women indeed
did firmly refuse to give up their jewels for the making of a monster that is of no
assistance to his worshippers. As a reward for this, God gave the new moons as holidays to
women, and in the future world too they will be rewarded for their firm faith in God, in
that, like the new moons, they too, may monthly be rejuvenated. But when the men saw that
no gold or silver for the idol was forthcoming from the women, they drew off their own
earrings that they wore in Arab fashion, and brought these to Aaron. 265
No living calf would have shaped itself out of the gold of these earrings, if a disaster
had not occurred through an oversight of Aaron. For when Moses at the exodus of Israel
from Egypt set himself to lifting the coffin of Joseph out of the depths of the Nile, he
employed the following means: He took four leaves of silver, and engraved on each the
image of one of the beings represented at the Celestial Throne, - the lion, the man, the
eagle, and the bull. He then cast on the river the leaf with the image of the lion, and
the waters of the river became tumultuous, and roared like a lion. He then threw down the
leaf with the image of man, and the scattered bones of Joseph united themselves into an
entire body; and when he cast in the third leaf with the image of the eagle, the coffin
floated up to the top. As he had no use for the fourth leaf of silver with the image of
the bull, he asked a woman to store it away for him, while he was occupied with the
transportation of the coffin, and later forgot to reclaim the leaf of silver. This was now
among the ornaments that the people brought to Aaron, and it was exclusively owing to this
bull's image of magical virtues, that a golden bull arose out of the fire into which Aaron
put the gold and silver. 266
When the mixed multitude that had joined Israel in their exodus from Egypt saw this idol
conducting itself like a living being, they said to Israel: "This is thy God, O
Israel." 267 The people then betook themselves to the seventy members of the
Sanhedrin and demanded that they worship the bull that had led Israel out of Egypt.
"God," said they, "had not delivered us out of Egypt, but only Himself, who
had in Egypt been in captivity." The members of the Sanhedrin remained loyal to their
God, and were hence cut down by the rabble. 268 The twelve heads of the tribes did not
answer the summons of the people any more than the members of the Sanhedrin, and were
therefore rewarded by being found worthy of beholding the Divine vision. 269
But the people worshipped not only the Golden Calf, they made thirteen such idols, one
each for the twelve tribes, and one for all Israel. More than this, they employed manna,
which God in His kindness did not deny them even on this day, as an offering to their
idols. 270 The devotion of Israel to this worship of the bull is in part explained by
the circumstance that while passing through the Red Sea, they beheld the Celestial Throne,
and most distinctly of the four creatures about the Throne, they saw the ox. It was for
this reason that they hit upon the notion that the ox had helped God in the exodus from
Egypt, and for this reason did they wish to worship the ox beside God. 271
The people then wanted to erect an altar for their idol, but Aaron tried to prevent this
by saying to the people: "It will be more reverential to your god if I build the
altar in person," for he hoped that Moses might appear in the meantime. His
expectation, however, was disappointed, for on the morning of the following day, when
Aaron had at length completed the altar, Moses was not yet at hand, and the people began
to offer sacrifices to their idol, and to indulge in lewdness. 272
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