From the Israel Institute of Biblical Studies: "Why did both Aaron and Jeroboam decide to erect golden statues of specifically of calves? Why this animal and not another? Likely, this has to do with a conscious attempt to imitate a common practice found in the temples of many of the nations in the Ancient Near East. For example, in Egypt it was common to worship a calf idol known as Apis. In some cases a king was depicted seated upon the calf as a way of emphasizing his divinity. Perhaps Aaron’s purpose in creating a golden calf was not to create an idol of God but a platform upon which the invisible God would sit."
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The calf of Samaria started back in Exodus 32 with the golden calf. It was the main idol of Baal worship.
Hosea 13:2: [2] And now they sin more and more, and have made them molten images of their silver, and idols according to their own understanding, all of it the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let the men that sacrifice kiss the calves.
"So you’ve got this idol-worshipping program going on and it’s going on in Hosea 10 in Beth-aven:
[5] The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.
[6] It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.
“If you go to Hosea 8: [4] They have set up kings, but not by me: they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off.
[5] Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency?
[6] For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces.
[7] For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up.
[8] Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure.
“When you read commentaries they read that word ‘Beth-aven’ and start looking for it and there’s no place that they know of that’s called Beth-aven," explains Richard Jordan.
“Look at Hosea 10: 8: [8] The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed: the thorn and the thistle shall come up on their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us.
“That term ‘Aven’ there, the word itself means ‘emptiness, vanity, wickedness.’ ‘Beth’ means ‘the house,’ and ‘aven’ means ‘of the sin of Israel.’
“The calves were at Bethel but Bethel, the house of God, has now become Beth-aven, the house of wickedness.
Verse 15: [15] So shall Bethel do unto you because of your great wickedness: in a morning shall the king of Israel utterly be cut off.
“The place where Jacob had spent the night--saw the ladder and so forth and got up the next morning and said, ‘This is the house of God; this is the gate of heaven’--has been corrupted into the very seat of the satanic religion. That’s how thoroughly Israel had been corrupted spiritually.
Verse 5: [5] The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.
“So they’re going to lose it all; it’s going to be wiped out. The people are going to see the great loss of it for them. When it says the priests ‘rejoiced on it,’ you see how that’s past tense? They used to rejoice in it because it made them rich; it made them powerful, but now it’s gone.
“When it says “for the glory thereof,’ that’s sarcasm. It didn’t have any godly glory but it had man-made glory. God took the glory off of Israel and He wrote ‘Ichabod’ over the nation Israel. He’s going to take the false glory the priests and people attributed to Beth-aven and write ‘Ichabod’ over that too.
“Verse 6: [6] It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.
“Even the calves are going to be carried away to the Assyrian; going to be given to king Jareb. They made a covenant with the Assyrian that he would deliver them and keep them safe and it winds up he’s going to betray them; come in and take them and all that stuff’s going to be carried off as a present to make him wealthy. That’s exactly what the Antichrist is going to do with them.
“Notice it says, ‘Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.’ Where did the destruction come from? From following their own way; rejecting God’s Word and walking in their own way.
“Look at it in history over in II Kings 17: [10] And they set them up images and groves in every high hill, and under every green tree:
[11] And there they burnt incense in all the high places, as did the heathen whom the LORD carried away before them; and wrought wicked things to provoke the LORD to anger:
[12] For they served idols, whereof the LORD had said unto them, Ye shall not do this thing.
[13] Yet the LORD testified against Israel, and against Judah, by all the prophets, and by all the seers, saying, Turn ye from your evil ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets.
[14] Notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their necks, like to the neck of their fathers, that did not believe in the LORD their God.
[15] And they rejected his statutes, and his covenant that he made with their fathers, and his testimonies which he testified against them; and they followed vanity, and became vain, and went after the heathen that were round about them, concerning whom the LORD had charged them, that they should not do like them.
[16] And they left all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them molten images, even two calves, and made a grove, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served Baal.
“I mean, they just sunk down into the lowest pits of this stuff. They were going to do what they wanted to do, God’s Word be hanged.”
(new article tomorrow)
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