Exodus 32:4
And when he had received them, he fashioned them by founders' work, and made of them a molten calf. And they said: These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.
Open Exodus 32:4 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Quas cum ille accepisset, formavit opere fusorio, et fecit ex eis vitulum conflatilem : dixeruntque : Hi sunt dii tui Israël, qui te eduxerunt de terra Ægypti.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ ἐδέξατο ἐκ τῶν χειρῶν αὐτῶν καὶ ἔπλασεν αὐτὰ ἐν τῇ γραφίδι, καὶ ἐποίησεν αὐτὰ μόσχον χωνευτὸν καὶ εἶπεν Οὗτοι οἱ θεοί σου, Ἰσραήλ, οἵτινες ἀνεβίβασάν σε ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיִּקַּ֣ח מִיָּדָ֗ם וַיָּ֤צַר אֹתוֹ֙ בַּחֶ֔רֶט וַֽיַּעֲשֵׂ֖הוּ עֵ֣גֶל מַסֵּכָ֑ה וַיֹּ֣אמְר֔וּ אֵ֤לֶּה אֱלֹהֶ֨יךָ֙ יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אֲשֶׁ֥ר הֶעֱל֖וּךָ מֵאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרָֽיִם
Haydock's commentary
Received them, "in a purse, (as Gideon did afterwards, Judges viii. 25,) he made a molten calf." (Jonathan)
Perhaps he engraved on it the peculiar marks of the Egyptian idol, Apis; a square white spot on the forehead, and a crescent upon the side. For it is generally believed, that this calf was designed to imitate that object of worship, to which the Hebrews had been too much accustomed. (Acts vii. 39, 41.; St. Jerome in Osee iv.) The Egyptians adored not only the living ox, but also its image, which they kept in their temple. (Porphyrius, Abst. ii. Mela. i. 8.) Some of the fathers think, that the head of a calf only appeared. (St. Ambrose; Lactantius, &c.) The rest of the figure was perhaps human, as Osiris was represented with the head of an ox, as well as Astarte and Serapis. Monceau pretends that Aaron represented the true God, under the form of a cherub, in which he falsely asserts he had appeared on Mount Sinai, and that his fault consisted only in giving occasion of superstition to the people. But his opinion (though adopted by many Protestants, who excuse all from the guilt of idolatry, but papists; Haydock) has been condemned at Rome, and refuted by Visorius, &c.
Thy gods, &c. Thus spoke the infatuated ringleaders. (Calmet)
And they changed their glory, the true God, into the likeness of a calf that eateth grass, Psalm cv. 19.
They forgot God, who saved them, (Psalm cv. 21,) and forsook Him, (Deuteronomy xxxii. 18,) to adore the calf. (Worthington)
Haydock wrote amid the controversies of his day. The Church teaches that those born into communities separated from her cannot be charged with the sin of separation, and embraces them as brothers (CCC 818).
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Hippolytus On Daniel, Section II
28. And who was he that spake, but the angel who was given to the people, as he says in the law of Moses: “I will not go with you, because the people is stiff-necked; but my angel shall go before along with you?” This (angel) withstood Moses at the inn, when he was bringing the child uncircumcised into Egypt. For it was not allowed Moses, who was the elder (or legate) and mediator of the law, and who proclaimed the covenant of the fathers, to introduce a child uncircumcised, lest he should be deemed a false prophet and deceiver by the people. “And now,” says he, “will I show the truth to thee.” Could the Truth have shown anything else but the truth?
The Apostolic Constitutions Book V, Sec. II. All Association with Idols is to Be Avoided
XII . Nor do the legislators give us only prohibitions concerning idols, but also warn us concerning the luminaries, not to swear by them, nor to serve them. For they say: “Lest, when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, thou shouldest be seduced to worship them.” And elsewhere: “Do not ye learn to walk after the ways of the heathen, and be not afraid of the signs of heaven.” For the stars and the luminaries were given to men to shine upon them, but not for worship; although the Israelites, by the perverseness of their temper, “worshipped the creature instead of the Creator,” and acted insultingly to their Maker, and admired the creature more than is fit. …
The Apostolic Constitutions Book VI, Sec. IV. Of the Law
XX . Now the law is the decalogue, which the Lord promulgated to them with an audible voice, before the people made that calf which represented the Egyptian Apis. And the law is righteous, and therefore is it called the law, because judgments are thence made according to the law of nature, which the followers of Simon abuse, supposing they shall not be judged thereby, and so shall escape punishment. This law is good, holy, and such as lays no compulsion in things positive. For He says: “If thou wilt make me an altar, thou shalt make it of earth.” It does not say, “Make one,” but, “If thou wilt make.” It does not impose a necessity, but gives leave to their own free liberty. For God does not stand in need of sacrifices, being by nature above all want. …
St Augustine Book VII, Chapter IX
15. And therefore also did I read there, that they had changed the glory of Thy incorruptible nature into idols and divers forms, “into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things,” namely, into that Egyptian food for which Esau lost his birthright; for that Thy first-born people worshipped the head of a four-footed beast instead of Thee, turning back in heart towards Egypt, and prostrating Thy image, their own soul, before the image “of an ox that eateth grass.” These things found I there; but I fed not on them. For it pleased Thee, O Lord, to take away the reproach of diminution from Jacob, that the elder should serve the younger; and Thou hast called the Gentiles into Thine inheritance. …
St Augustine The Enchiridion, In Speaking of Sin, the Singular Number is Often Put for the Plural, and the Plural for the Singular
But even these latter are frequently said to die to sin, though undoubtedly they die not to one sin, but to all the numerous actual sins they have committed in thought, word, or deed: for the singular number is often put for the plural, as when the poet says, “They fill its belly with the armed soldier,” though in the case here referred to there were many soldiers concerned. And we read in our own Scriptures: “Pray to the Lord, that He take away the serpent from us.” He does not say serpents though the people were suffering from many; and so in other cases. …
St Augustine Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John, Chapter I. 15-18
19. Expel, therefore, from your hearts carnal thoughts, that you may be really under grace, that you may belong to the New Testament. Therefore is life eternal promised in the New Testament. Read the Old Testament, and see that the same things were enjoined upon a people yet carnal as upon us. For to worship one God is also enjoined upon us. “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain” is also enjoined upon us, which is the second commandment. “Observe the Sabbath-day” is enjoined on us more than on them, because it is commanded to be spiritually observed. For the Jews observe the Sabbath in a servile manner, using it for luxuriousness and drunkenness. How much better would their women be employed in spinning wool than in dancing on that day in the balconies? God forbid, brethren, that we should call that an observance of the Sabbath. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm XCIX
10. Come, my brethren; if we ask how these were punished, the Lord will aid me to tell you. Let us consider these three persons, Moses, Aaron, and Samuel: and how they were punished, since he said, “Thou hast punished all their own affections:” meaning those affections of theirs, which the Lord knew in their hearts, which men knew not. For they were living in the midst of the people of God, without complaint from man. But what do we say? That perhaps the early life of Moses was sinful; for he fled from Egypt, after slaying a man. The early life of Aaron also was such as would displease God; for he allowed a maddened and infatuated people to make an idol to worship; and an idol was made for God’s people to worship. What sin did Samuel, who was given up when an infant to the temple? He passed all his life amid the holy sacraments of God: from childhood the servant of God. …
St Jerome The Letters of St. Jerome, To Salvina
A noble alternative truly which is only to be embraced in preference to Satan! In old days even Jerusalem went a-whoring and opened her feet to every one that passed by. It was in Egypt that she was first deflowered and there that her teats were bruised. And afterwards when she had come to the wilderness and, impatient of the delays of her leader Moses, had said when maddened by the stings of lust: “these be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt,” she received statutes that were not good and commandments that were altogether evil whereby she should not live but should be punished through them. …
St Cyril of Jerusalem On Repentance and Remission of Sins, and Concerning the Adversary
10. Nay more, if a whole people sin, this surpasses not the loving-kindness of God. The people made a calf, yet God ceased not from His loving-kindness. Men denied God, but God denied not Himself. These be thy gods, O Israel , they said: yet again, as He was wont, the God of Israel became their Saviour. And not only the people sinned, but also Aaron the High Priest. For it is Moses that says: And the anger of the Lord came upon Aaron: and I prayed for him , saith he, and God forgave him . …
St Ephrem the Syrian Ephraim Syrus: Three Homilies, On Our Lord
6. But Israel crucified our Lord, on the plea that verily He was seducing us from the One God. But they themselves used constantly to wander away from the One God through their many idols. While then they imagine they crucify Him Who seduces them from the One God, they are found to be led away by Him from all idols to the One God; to the end that because they did not voluntarily learn of Him that He is God, they might by compulsion learn of Him that He is God; when the good which had accrued to them through Him should accuse them concerning the evil which their hands had done. Thus even though the tongue of the oppressors denied, yet the help with which they were helped convicted them. For grace loaded them beyond their power, so that they should be ashamed, while laden with Thy blessings, to deny Thy person. …
The Fathers are given as they wrote. Where a passage lays the Passion on the Jewish people, the Church teaches that it cannot be charged against all the Jews then living, nor against the Jews of today, and that all sinners were its authors (CCC 597, 598).