The sin of Cain

I recently viewed Sunburned, a YouTube video that looks at why the Israelites made a golden calf to worship at the foot of Sinai. It was interesting, so I took notes (condensed in this post). The purpose of the video was to consider the Christian and nonChristian elements have come into Christmas and Easter holidays, considered by many to be the holiest times of the year.

We all know that there are components of Christmas and Easter that have pagan origin. I don't need to go over that again, because many who know and continue the traditions don't think it matters, because the purpose of these holidays is to honor God and His workings in our lives. I believed the same, but the following verses (and more), made me stop and think:

Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” ~ John 4:23,24

The LORD says, "Do not start following pagan religious practices. ~ Jeremiah 10:2

You must not worship the Lord your God in their way. ~ Deuteronomy 12:4

Now to the video. See endnote below regarding my conclusion as the chronology of the symbol. These are my condensed and edited notes about the golden calf and why the Israelites chose that symbol:

Two Hebrew words are commonly translated as God: el, and el-oah.

The word el was originally written with two pictographic letters, one an ox head and the other a shepherd staff. The ox represented strength, and the staff of the shepherd represented authority. The ancient Hebrews saw God as the strong one of authority. 

The ox head and the shepherd staff, means the strong authority, as explained by the Ancient Hebrew Research Center. When visiting that website, look at the symbols and commentary for the letters A-L.

The Israelites said they were going to make elohim, who shall go before us. Their pictographic letters make perfect sense as to why they chose to make a calf to represent the God who had led them out of Egypt. Moses had been on the mountain a long time, and their leader who communicated with God may not ever return. They were in a panic. They fell back on the Egyptian practice of making an image of God so that they could connect and speak to him. Their intent was not to make an Egyptian god, but an image of their own understanding of the true God.

And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us. ~ Exodus 32:2

The plural form of el'oah, elohim, is often translated as God, singular, in English. While English plurals only identify quantity, as in more than one, the Hebrew plural can identify quantity as well as quality. Something of great size or stature can be written in plural form, as in elohim.

Aaron made one calf, but the translation is plural:

And he received them at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: and they said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. ~ Exodus 32:4

The English translation makes it appear they are presenting the golden calf as gods. But when we understand their symbolism, they are saying, "This is the one true God who brought you up out of the land of Egypt." They had already declared Yahweh to be their only God. In addition, only one God took them out of Egypt, and the Israelites knew this. The translators used the plural form, gods, as in false gods, but that would not make sense. Aaron only presented one golden calf; the plural gods does not fit.

It is important to set aside English writing conventions and understand the ancient Hebrew symbols. The translators were misled, in this case, by the word elohim, which is translated God over 2,000 times in the KJV, and lower-case god less than 300 times. They looked at the context and thought that the calf meant a pagan god, and with the plural elohim, translated it as gods.

They were intending to worship and connect with Yahweh, the true God, through the calf. We can see this in Exodus 32:5-6:

And when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, Tomorrow is a feast to the Lord.

And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.

Aaron declared the feast was for Yahweh, and they offered gifts to Him.

This was the sin of Cain.

They chose to worship God in their own way instead of in God's way. They sincerely thought they were doing the right thing. They thought it was okay to make up their own holiday and worship God as they chose.

But in spite of their sincerity, dedicating the day to him and giving gifts to him, God did not see it that way. They were worshiping God through the pagan practice of using things to worship God and putting into effect a false holiday. They gave their own offerings to Yahweh, just like Cain did.

The main issue of the problem at hand is this: Because they decided to do things their way instead of God's way, they made themselves out to be their own gods. They fully and sincerely wanted to follow Yahweh but they followed themselves and their own heart instead.

This is exactly what we do with Christmas and Easter. We take the ways of man, the ways of false gods, and offer them all up to god and expect him to smile while we please ourselves in the process.

We can still be claiming to worship the one true God, but when we abandon His way and do it our own way, we are worshipping our selves, bowing down to ourselves and following our own instructions instead of His.

Jeremiah 10:2 and Deuteronomy 12:4, quoted at the beginning of this post, eliminates Christmas and Easter.

Christmas and Easter are not rooted in truth. They are the ways of the nations, ways he has told us not to learn.

We must learn from Israel and Cain. They were sincere. Our intent in celebrating Christmas and Easter may be very sincere as well, but the problem is, in spite of all the theologians saying it's okay, God himself said No, it is not okay, it is not how I want to be worshipped.

He sent His own son that we might live. Let's live for him, in his way, not our way. Let's love him back in the way that he has told us he wants to be loved.

End of video notes.

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Endnote

Regarding chronology of the symbol: Did the calf/staff symbol meaning "God" in the Ancient Hebrew pictographic writing come from their understanding of their own deity, or did their pictograph for God develop during their centuries in Egypt, taking on Egyptian bull worship's symbol to symbolize the God of Israel? I think that is the likely scenario. More research is needed.