Calf

The calf walks through Scripture in two opposing roles. As a creature of the herd it is food set before honored guests, an unblemished sin-offering at the altar, a figure for an unbroken Ephraim, and an image of joy "leaping" in the day of Yahweh's healing. As an image cast in metal it is the standing emblem of Israel's apostasy: the molten calf at Horeb, and the golden pair set up at Beth-el and Dan. The same animal that Abraham hurries to dress for the visitors becomes, in another scene, the thing the workman makes and the people kiss.

Tender Calf for the Guests

When the three visitors come to Mamre, Abraham's hospitality settles on the herd. "And Abraham ran to the herd, and fetched a tender and good calf, and gave it to the attendant; and he hurried to dress it. And he took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree, and they ate" (Gen 18:7-8). The calf is the centerpiece of a meal of welcome, picked for its tenderness and prepared in haste.

The same generosity surfaces at Endor on the night before Saul's last battle. The medium "had a fatted calf in the house; and she hurried, and killed it; and she took flour, and kneaded it, and baked unleavened bread of it: and she brought it before Saul, and before his slaves; and they ate" (1Sam 28:24-25). A fatted calf is the food brought out for an unexpected guest.

The prophets keep the picture but turn it against the careless wealthy of Samaria, who "lie on beds of ivory, and stretch themselves on their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall" (Amos 6:4).

Calf at the Altar

In the inaugural sacrifices of Aaron's priesthood, Yahweh prescribes the calf for the very sin Sinai had committed: "Take yourself a calf of the herd for a sin-offering, and a ram for a burnt-offering, without blemish, and offer them before Yahweh. And to the sons of Israel you will speak, saying, Take⁺ a he-goat for a sin-offering; and a calf and a lamb, both a year old, without blemish, for a burnt-offering" (Lev 9:2-3). The "calf a year old" stays in view as the prophetic ideal of acceptable approach to God: "How shall I come before Yahweh, and bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves a year old?" (Mic 6:6).

The calf also figures in covenant ratification. In Jeremiah's oracle against the broken slave-release, those who profaned the covenant "cut the calf in two and passed between its parts" (Jer 34:18) — the standing rite of the self-imprecatory oath, now turned against them.

The Molten Calf at Horeb

The image-making at Horeb becomes a disaster the later canon keeps returning to. While Moses is on the mountain, the people pressure Aaron: "Get up, make us gods, which will go before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we don't know what has become of him" (Ex 32:1). Aaron collects the gold rings, "and he received it at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, and made it [into] a molten calf: and they said, These are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt" (Ex 32:4). An altar is built before it, and the people "rose up early on the next day, and offered burnt-offerings, and brought peace-offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play" (Ex 32:6).

Yahweh's verdict to Moses is flat: "they have made themselves a molten calf, and have worshiped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, These are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt" (Ex 32:8). Moses descends, "saw the calf and dancing: and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and broke them beneath the mount. And he took the calf which they had made, and burned it with fire, and ground it to powder, and strewed it on the water, and made the sons of Israel drink of it" (Ex 32:19-20). Aaron's account of the manufacture is famously evasive: "I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf" (Ex 32:24).

Moses repeats the indictment in the second telling: "you⁺ had made yourselves a molten calf: you⁺ had turned aside quickly out of the way which [the Speech of] Yahweh had commanded you⁺" (De 9:16). Israel's later confessional history holds the calf up as a paradigm of provocation. "Yes, when they had made themselves a molten calf, and said, This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt, and had wrought great provocations" (Ne 9:18). The Psalter is sharper still: "They made a calf in Horeb, And worshiped a molten image. Thus they exchanged his glory For the likeness of an ox that eats grass" (Ps 106:19-20).

The Golden Calves at Beth-el and Dan

The Horeb sin is replayed institutionally under Jeroboam. Fearing that pilgrimage to Jerusalem will recover the people for the house of David, "the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold; and he said to them, It is too much for you⁺ to go up to Jerusalem: here are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt. And he set the one in Beth-el, and the other he put in Dan" (1Ki 12:28-29). The wording deliberately echoes Aaron at Sinai. Jeroboam stocks the new shrines with a non-Levitical priesthood, fixes a rival feast in the eighth month, and goes up himself to the Beth-el altar to burn incense (1Ki 12:31-33). The Chronicler adds that "he appointed for himself priests for the high places, and for the he-goats, and for the calves which he had made" (2Ch 11:15), and Abijah denounces the northern rebellion by pointing to "the golden calves which Jeroboam made you⁺ for gods" (2Ch 13:8).

The calves outlast Jeroboam. Jehu, who purges Baal from Israel, will not break with Beth-el and Dan: "Nevertheless from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, with which he made Israel to sin, Jehu didn't depart from after them, [to wit,] the golden calves that were in Beth-el, and that were in Dan" (2Ki 10:29). The summary of the northern kingdom's fall names the same image: "they forsook all the commandments of Yahweh their God, and made themselves molten images, even two calves" (2Ki 17:16).

The Prophetic Verdict on the Calves

A man of God from Judah comes against the Beth-el altar in Jeroboam's own presence: "O altar, altar, thus says Yahweh: Look, a son will be born to the house of David, Josiah by name; and on you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places that burn incense on you, and man's bones they will burn on you" (1Ki 13:2). The altar splits, and the king's hand withers (1Ki 13:3-5). The judgement-word is held in reserve: "the saying which he cried by the word of Yahweh against the altar in Beth-el, and against all the houses of the high places which are in the cities of Samaria, will surely come to pass" (1Ki 13:32).

Hosea takes up the same image. "He has cast off your calf, O Samaria; my anger is kindled against them: how long will it be before they attain to innocence? For from Israel is even this; the workman made it, and it is not God; yes, the calf of Samaria will be broken in pieces" (Hos 8:5-6). The calves of Beth-el — renamed Beth-aven, "house of wickedness" — face exile with their priests: "The neighbor of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth-aven; for its people will mourn over it, and its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it. It also will be carried to Assyria for a present to the great king" (Hos 10:5-6). The whole industry is summed up in Hos 13:2: "they have made for themselves molten images of their silver, even idols according to their own understanding, all of them the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let man who sacrifices kiss the calves." Jeremiah's Moab-oracle uses Beth-el as the proverb of misplaced trust: "Moab will be ashamed of Chemosh, as the house of Israel was ashamed of Beth-el their confidence" (Jer 48:13).

The reform under Josiah closes the long account. Hilkiah and the priests "bring forth out of the temple of Yahweh all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the Asherah, and for all the host of heaven, and he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron, and carried the ashes of them to Beth-el" (2Ki 23:4). Then Josiah turns north: "the altar that was at Beth-el, and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, had made, even that altar and the high place he broke down; and he burned the high place and beat it to dust, and burned the Asherah" (2Ki 23:15). He defiles the altar with bones from the surrounding tombs, "according to the word of Yahweh proclaimed by the man of God when Jeroboam stood at the feast on the altar" (2Ki 23:16) — the long-deferred fulfillment of 1Ki 13. He spares the tomb of the prophet himself (2Ki 23:17-18) and extends the purge through "all the houses of the high places that were in the cities of Samaria" (2Ki 23:19-20).

The Fatted Calf in the Parable

The calf of welcome returns at the climax of the parable of the two sons. When the younger comes home, the father commands his slaves: "Bring forth quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet: and bring the fatted calf, [and] kill it, and let us eat, and make merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found" (Lu 15:22-24). The elder brother hears the music and learns that "your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has received him safe and sound" (Lu 15:27). His complaint sets the calf and the kid against each other: "you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends: but when this your son came, who has devoured your living with prostitutes, you killed for him the fatted calf" (Lu 15:29-30). The father's answer keeps the feast: "it was meet to make merry and be glad: for this your brother was dead, and is alive [again]; and [was] lost, and is found" (Lu 15:32).

Calves as Figure

The calf serves as a figure several other times. Ephraim repents "as a calf unaccustomed [to the yoke]: turn me, and I will be turned; for you are Yahweh my God" (Jer 31:18) — the unbroken animal as the picture of a chastened son. Isaiah's deserted city becomes pasture: "there the calf will feed, and there he will lie down, and consume its branches" (Isa 27:10). Ezekiel's living creatures stand on feet "like the sole of a calf's foot" that "sparkled like burnished bronze" (Ezek 1:7). And Malachi promises that on the day of Yahweh's healing, "you⁺ who fear my name the sun of righteousness will arise with healing in its wings; and you⁺ will go forth, and leap as calves of the stall" (Mal 4:2). Hosea's call to repentance asks Israel to bring not literal animals: "Take with you⁺ words, and return to Yahweh: say to him, Take away all iniquity, and accept that which is good: so we will render [as] bullocks [the offering of] our lips" (Hos 14:2). The offering is the sound of return.