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In lugnet.build.ancient, Stéphane Simard writes:
> It looks like Aaron finally got his dessert from Yawheh.
>
> Oh wait. When exactly did he sin against Yawheh?
>
> Oh, the golden calf.
I don't claim to understand Yahweh's system of justice, but as far as I
know, there's no evidence in the Bible that Aaron ever took any blame for
the whole Golden Calf incident. Somehow he got off scott-free while 4,000
of his fellow Israelites paid for it with their lives, even thought he
*made* the calf and even *sacrificed to it*!
> But then, Yawheh killed his two sons for no reason whatsoever.
Sure there's a reason. It's right there in the story. Unauthorized fire.
Whatever that means. But clearly it warrants death by immolation.
> I also don't get how did Moses and Aaron "doubted" Yawheh when they made
> water appear from a rock.
I've reread that story time and time again, trying to understand just what
exactly they did wrong at the Waters of Meribah that would warrant God
dooming them to die in the desert instead of bringing them into the
bountiful land he'd been promising them throughout their 80 years of
faithful service to Him.
Finally a friend of mine pointed it out to me. Yahweh tells Moses to take
his staff and *command* the rock to release its water. But what does Moses
do? He *strikes* the rock with the staff instead. Twice.
In this, he is, admittedly, disobeying the precise orders Yahweh gave him.
Although it should be pointed out that striking the rock with the staff had
previous been established as the standard bringing-forth-water-from-rock
procedure back at the confusingly similarly named Desert of Sin.
How striking a rock and miraculously getting water from it is all that
different from commanding it to release its water has never been very clear
to me, and certainly seems like an extreme technicality on which to doom two
faithful servants to death. But apparently Yahweh feels otherwise.
Now I know there have been coutless attempts to read more into this story --
to discren what *really* must have happened. This is often the case when
Bible stories make God out to be petty, arbitrary, and cruel when taken
prima facie. But any such interpretations are based on later theology, and
when applying a later theology to old Bible stories, you can pretty much
make them *really mean* whatever you want them to really mean. I prefer to
read the stories and *then* form my beliefs about God rather than start with
beliefs about God and then try to make the stories square with those beliefs.
> Great work Brendan. :-)
Thanks, Stéphane.
-Rev. Smith
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