34 But now, go, take the people into that place of which I have given you word; see, my angel will go before you: but when the time of my judging has come, I will send punishment on them for their sin.
See, I am sending an angel before you, to keep you on your way and to be your guide into the place which I have made ready for you.
Punishment is mine and reward, at the time of the slipping of their feet: for the day of their downfall is near, sudden will be their fate.
You may not go down on your faces before them or give them worship: for I, the Lord your God, am a God who will not give his honour to another; and I will send punishment on the children for the wrongdoing of their fathers, to the third and fourth generation of my haters;
And I will send an angel before you, driving out the Canaanite and the Amorite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite:
How long am I to put up with this evil people and their outcries against me? The words which they say against me have come to my ears. Say to them, By my life, says the Lord, as certainly as your words have come to my ears, so certainly will I do this to you: Your dead bodies will be stretched out in this waste land; and of all your number, all those of twenty years old and over who have been crying out against me, Not one will come into the land which I gave my word you would have for your resting-place, but only Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua, the son of Nun.
And the Lord gave ear to the voice of our cry, and sent an angel and took us out of Egypt: and now we are in Kadesh, a town on the edge of your land;
It was no sent one or angel, but he himself who was their saviour: in his love and in his pity he took up their cause, and he took them in his arms, caring for them all through the years.
Am I not to give punishment for these things? says the Lord: will not my soul take payment from such a nation as this?
For in the day when I give Israel punishment for his sins, I will send punishment on the altars of Beth-el, and the horns of the altar will be cut off and come down to the earth.
So that on you may come all the blood of the upright on the earth, from the blood of upright Abel to the blood of Zachariah, son of Barachiah, whom you put to death between the Temple and the altar.
Or is it nothing to you that God had pity on you, waiting and putting up with you for so long, not seeing that in his pity God's desire is to give you a change of heart? But by your hard and unchanged heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of the revelation of God's judging in righteousness; Who will give to every man his right reward:
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Exodus 32
Commentary on Exodus 32 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 32
It is a very lamentable interruption which the story of this chapter gives to the record of the establishment of the church, and of religion among the Jews. Things went on admirably well towards that happy settlement: God had shown himself very favourable, and the people also had seemed to be pretty tractable. Moses had now almost completed his forty days upon the mount, and, we may suppose, was pleasing himself with the thoughts of the very joyful welcome he should have to the camp of Israel at his return, and the speedy setting up of the tabernacle among them. But, behold, the measures are broken, the sin of Israel turns away those good things from them, and puts a stop to the current of God's favours; the sin that did the mischief (would you think it?) was worshipping a golden calf. The marriage was ready to be solemnized between God and Israel, but Israel plays the harlot, and so the match is broken, and it will be no easy matter to piece it again. Here is,
Exd 32:1-6
While Moses was in the mount, receiving the law from God, the people had time to meditate upon what had been delivered, and prepare themselves for what was further to be revealed, and forty days was little enough for that work; but, instead of that, there were those among them that were contriving how to break the laws they had already received, and to anticipate those which they were in expectation of. On the thirty-ninth day of the forty, the plot broke out of rebellion against the Lord. Here is,
Exd 32:7-14
Here,
Exd 32:15-20
Here is,
Exd 32:21-29
Moses, having shown his just indignation against the sin of Israel by breaking the tables and burning the calf, now proceeds to reckon with the sinners and to call them to an account, herein acting as the representative of God, who is not only a holy God, and hates sin, but a just God, and is engaged in honour to punish it, Isa. 59:18. Now,
Exd 32:30-35
Moses, having executed justice upon the principal offenders, is here dealing both with the people and with God.