The Bank of the Golden Calf: Difference between revisions
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| You should not ''live at the expense'' of your neighbor as [[Polybius]] warned and [[John the Baptist]] told us, nor [[covet]] ur neighbors' goods nor [[Bite|bite one another]] nor desire the [[wages of unrighteousness]]. | | You should not ''live at the expense'' of your neighbor as [[Polybius]] warned and [[John the Baptist]] told us, nor [[covet]] ur neighbors' goods nor [[Bite|bite one another]] nor desire the [[wages of unrighteousness]]. | ||
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| | | '''Questions''' | ||
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| ''' | | If the '''[[golden calf]]''' was a depository of wealth to bind the people together then what is the true definition of '''[[idolatry]]'''? | ||
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| What was the [[Temple of Diana]] at [[Ephesus]]? | | What was the '''[[Temple of Diana]]''' at [[Ephesus]]? | ||
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| What was the [[Christian conflict]] with [[Rome]] and what was [[public religion]] and [[Pure Religion]]? | | What was the '''[[Christian conflict]]''' with [[Rome]] and what was [[public religion]] and [[Pure Religion]]? | ||
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| Why did the [[Levites]] have no [[vow of poverty|personal estate]] and have [[All things common]]? | | Why did the [[Levites]] have no [[vow of poverty|personal estate]] and have [[All things common]]? | ||
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| What were they doing in pagan [[temples]]? | | What were they doing in pagan '''[[temples]]''' that differed from [[The Way]] of [[Christ]] and the [[early Church]]? | ||
|} | |} | ||
Revision as of 23:11, 5 July 2018
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<mp3player width="300">http://www.hisholychurch.net/audio/FCR-180626goldenalf.mp3</mp3player>
Comments |
The Altars of clay and stone. Golden calf and and the Red Heifer were all symbols that reprented institutions of men. |
The Golden calf was One purse depository, a central treasury, which leads in part to a socialist state. |
The Church in the wilderness were called out and had All things common but did not exercise authority one over the other. |
You should not live at the expense of your neighbor as Polybius warned and John the Baptist told us, nor covet ur neighbors' goods nor bite one another nor desire the wages of unrighteousness. |
Questions |
If the golden calf was a depository of wealth to bind the people together then what is the true definition of idolatry? |
What was the Temple of Diana at Ephesus? |
What was the Christian conflict with Rome and what was public religion and Pure Religion? |
Why did the Levites have no personal estate and have All things common? |
What were they doing in pagan temples that differed from The Way of Christ and the early Church? |
The Bank of the Golden Calf
It is historical naivety to imagine that this calf of gold at Sinai was anything more than a depository of wealth designed to bind the people together into a loyal community of contributors and investors. By depositing all their wealth in the Golden Calf they were assured that no one would desert without departing destitute. Gates were set up and men and wealth were kept in as well as the enemy kept out.
This practice was used in city states like Athens who called their golden statue the “reserved fund”. In the year 406 B.C., at the close of the Peloponnesian War, after a great naval disasters, Athens equipped and manned its new fleet by sending the gold statues of Nike in the Parthenon to the mint.311 They deposited their wealth in a central vault controlled by government, as a “reserve fund”.312 Moses understood how it was a wicked thing to bind the people by anything more than love for one another, a passion for mercy and justice and the way of God the Father. These reserve funds were established to protect them against trade deficits and guarantee loyalty. It also secured the power of the ruling elite. The walls served the purpose of keeping the people in as well as intruders out.
The king of Sodom had put more value on the people than the treasure of his city, when Abraham liberated the people along with his nephew Lot. The king offered all the stuff in exchange for the people, but Abraham would not touch even a buckle. Abraham desired to free people with his living altars.
These city states had a system of accounting for the contributions of the enfranchised citizenry and some form of exchange amongst the persons of the city was issued, but they also regulated its value. They also had a method for accounting for their subjects for the people were a surety for the Kings of the city states and considered human resources.
Aaron knowing the “arts of the temple” accommodated with an alternative monetary system. He became the trustee of the temple, high priest and benefactor of the people in a cestui que charitable trust.
Moses was outraged because he understood the ways of God and where the way of the common purse313 would mislead the people. He called the people to turn from their sinful ways of entrusting their family wealth in this unrighteous mammon, of binding their neighbor in a common purse that runs toward death, of delegating a responsibility that God intended each of us to hold dear.
Moses called out men to serve the LORD. The Levites as a people answered that call. By the authority of Moses they passed in and out of the gates of this new civil state maintain an entrance and exit.314 Soon the people were free again to choose to follow the ways of God in their hearts and minds. The Golden Calf was dismantled and consumed.
Some system was needed to edify and aid the people in the ways of the God of Abraham. Moses established an assembly of Levites in the wilderness. They were called out to minister to the congregations of the people. The Levites had proved their faith and courage, but Moses still forbade them to own land as a personal estate. The Levites were the first born of the Kingdom in the days of Moses.
Footnotes
311Athens, under the leadership of Pericles, was driven to her golden goddess, their reserve fund, and compelled to melt it down and coin it into money to pay for the Peloponnesian Wars. They eventually minted a plated bronze tetradrachms in Athens during the hard times which followed the Athenian collapse, viz. from B.C. 406-393. “In 393 the wretched bronze money of necessity was cried down, the Town Crier being sent round to proclaim that silver was once more to be the only legal tender :” ARIST. Eccl. 819.
312Aerarium (from Lat. aes, in its derived sense of “money”) the name (in full, aerarium stabulum, treasure-house) given in ancient [[Rome]] to the public treasury, and in a secondary sense to the public finances. The treasury contained the moneys and accounts of the state, and also the standards of the legions; the public laws engraved on brass, the decrees of the senate and other papers and registers of importance. These public treasures were deposited in the temple of Saturn, on the eastern slope of the Capitoline hill... In addition to the common treasury, supported by the general taxes and charged with the ordinary expenditure, there was a special reserve fund, also in the temple of [[Saturn]], the aerarium sanctum (or sanctius), probably originally consisting of the spoils of war, afterwards maintained chiefly by a 5% tax... The later emperors had a separate aerarium privatum, containing the moneys allotted for their own use, distinct from the fiscus, which they administered in the interests of the empire.” From a 1911 Encyclopedia
313Proverbs 1:14,18 “Cast in thy lot among us; let us all have one purse: My son, walk not thou in the way with them; refrain thy foot from their path: For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood. Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird. And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives.”
314Ex 32:27 “... Put every man his sword by his side, [and] go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbour.”
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