Why should the Egyptians speak, and say, For misfortune he has brought them out, to slay them on the mountains, and to annihilate them from the face of the earth? Turn from the heat of thine anger, and repent of this evil against thy people!
Israel has just made a golden calf, and God has told Moses to leave Him alone while His anger burns against them — He will make a great nation of Moses instead. Moses does not defend the people; he pleads what the Egyptians would say, and the promise God swore to the fathers.
God had called Israel Moses' people — the ones Moses brought up out of Egypt. Moses hands them straight back.
He does not for a moment make light of the people's sin — that he could not do. Nor does he ask for mercy, for there was no room for mercy in the covenant of Sinai. So what he does is throw himself on God, and on what His glory required in connection with the people He had redeemed. First he presses the dishonour that would be done to His name among the Egyptians if Israel were destroyed. He reminds the Lord of the link made with His people through redemption. God had said to Moses, "your" people; but Moses pleads that they are "His" people.
Why does that link still hold, after a sin like this?
They were the Lord's people despite everything, and His name, His glory, His oath were all bound up with what became of them. The moment the Lord links Himself with a people, His character is involved, and faith will always look at Him on this solid ground.
Moses does not argue that the judgment would be unjust. He asks how it would look to Egypt, which had just felt God's power.
In verse 12 he shows his zeal for the name of the Lord, in case its glory should be dimmed in the minds of the Egyptians. They had felt the mighty power of the Lord's arm in the deliverance of His people. Were they now to hear that those He had acknowledged as His people were destroyed too? The proposed act of judgment would be right; but would it have the appearance of being right in the eyes of men?
Moses then names Abraham, Isaac and Israel. In doing so he moves off one ground and onto another.
In verse 13 we have a third thing of great significance. Moses was the servant of God through whom the law was given. Yet he falls back, not on the law covenant — all was lost on that basis — but on the unconditional covenant made much earlier with Abraham, Isaac and Israel. He uses that name, and not Jacob, the name after the flesh. By an instinct given him by God, Moses in his plea left law for grace. On that ground his plea prevailed.
His prayer wins its case because it agrees with God about the guilt.
Moses stood in the place of righteous judgment, but he was also in the very atmosphere of grace. There he could take the place of intercession and prevail, because his plea was the honour of the Lord Himself. This must always be a prevailing plea, because it admits that God's judgment is righteous. Moses can neither excuse nor lessen the people's sin. It is not the place of intercession to do this, because everything before God must be truthful. What comfort for us to know of Christ that "He is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us"! He knows the righteous judgment of God. He knows too the evil of our sin. But His intercession rests on this: He Himself has vindicated the righteousness of God by putting away our sin.
The last phrase of the verse asks God to turn back from what He has said. Older translations read "repent of this evil." The ESV has "relent from this disaster." Commentators are careful about what that does not mean.
God is not a man, that He should repent of His eternal and unchangeable counsels and unconditional promises. Those "are irrevocable." But in His grace He may repent of — that is, not carry out — a threatened judgment, as in the case of Nineveh. We must remember that the Spirit of God stoops to speak in the human way, because of our weakness.
- Cause. God offered Moses greatness at Israel's expense. Moses passed it by and pleaded for the honour of the Lord instead.
- Gift. He handed the people back to God — they were the Lord's people, not his own. When God links Himself to a people, His character is bound up with what becomes of them.
- Reach. His concern ran as far as Egypt. The judgment would have been right — but would it have looked right to those who had just seen God's power save them?
- Ground. The law had nothing left to give, so Moses fell back on the promise sworn to Abraham, Isaac and Israel. That is why the plea won.
- Result. God relented. That is not a change in His eternal purpose. It is grace not carrying out a threatened judgment. And it points to Christ, who intercedes without ever excusing our sin.
Remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel, thy servants, to whom thou sworest by thyself, and saidst to them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give to your seed, and they shall possess [it] for ever!
Israel had just made the golden calf, and God offered to destroy them and make Moses a great nation instead. Moses answers with three names and an oath sworn long before — a plea Israel's own record could never support.
Moses does not argue that Israel deserves sparing. He points to something older than the law they had just broken.
Look at the ground Moses took — the unconditional promises of God's mercy, the grace assured to the fathers. It was impossible for Jehovah to set aside such a plea.
Naming Abraham, Isaac and Israel is not sentiment. One writer treats this prayer as the key to how the whole Bible speaks about Israel's future.
Having followed the references to this covenant, there is one very important remark to make. The prayer Moses made at the time of their sin in making the golden calf gives rise to it. It is this: whenever the Spirit of God speaks of the true hopes of Israel, He points to the unconditional covenant made with Abraham.
Two arrangements stand side by side in Israel's history. Only one of them depends on Israel.
God's covenant to take away Israel's sins is sure… As far as the gospel goes, they are enemies — the nation is rejected for now. But as far as God's election goes, they are loved as a people, always and without change. That love is tied not to law, but to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The law offered blessing on a condition: "if you will indeed obey my voice… you shall be my treasured possession." With Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, it was purpose, and unconditional gift and calling. This difference runs through Scripture… The final restoration of Israel will be on the ground of the promises made to the fathers, "for his steadfast love endures forever."
Three pictures describe Abraham's offspring: stars, dust and sand. Moses picks the stars, and one writer thinks the choice was deliberate.
As pointed out earlier, the "stars" were connected with Isaac, the son who guaranteed the unconditional promise God made to Abraham. Both the "dust" and the "sand" go with Jacob, the man who stands for human responsibility. Isaac was the son of promise… Might not these servants have had enough light to see this? If God was going to bless Israel, it had to be on the ground of His unconditional promise, and not on the ground of their responsibility.
God had just offered to make Moses himself into a great nation. Moses hands the offer back and holds God to the older promise.
God had said to Abraham, "I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven"… Moses had taken hold of that promise and remembered it. After Israel's sin of the golden calf, God says: "let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you." Moses replies, in effect, "Lord, in that case You will have to take back what You said to Abraham."… Moses had no thought for himself. He was devoted to God's interests and to Israel's blessing as His people. Otherwise he would have said, This is a fine chance for me. But look at that man. He declines his own advancement, and reminds God of the promise He had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Moses draws every argument from God's own character and promises. Not one comes from Israel's record, and he never pretends the sin is small.
The prayer of Moses was based upon the character of God — a most important matter in true mediation between God and man. He pleaded for God's people, because they were His. He pleaded because God had redeemed them, and had brought them out from their bonds with His powerful hand. He pleaded because of God's promise to the fathers. He pleaded because the nations might otherwise say that Jehovah was not true to His word. And he pleaded because they were His inheritance, despite their sin and their stubbornness, since He had made them so. Such were his arguments, and he used them while fully admitting the depth of Israel's sin.
- Remember. Moses asks God to remember, not Israel to repent — the prayer rests on what God had already said.
- Sworn. God swore this promise by Himself. Setting it aside would cost Him His own word, and writers treat that covenant as the anchor of Israel's hope.
- Unconditional. Sinai promised blessing if Israel obeyed. The promise to the fathers gave blessing outright, and the stars picture that side of it.
- Self-forgetful. Moses was offered a nation of his own. He turned that offer into an argument for sparing the people who had just disgraced him.
- Forever. The plea rested on those promises, and so does Israel's final restoration — not on Israel's performance.