| Summary: | The present investigation represents an exhaustive interpretation of the incident of the golden calf as it is related in Exodus 32. The study engages in a survey of hermeneutical paradigms from ancient to modern times to discover the insights of past generations of scholars, to aid in the understanding of the text, to provide a basis of continuity with the Jewish and Christian communities of faith through the centuries, and to determine the relationship between an interpreter and his Sitz im Leben. The history of the passages interpretation extends from the Old Testament scriptures through the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, the Hellenistic-Jewish writers, the Greek and Aramaic versions, the New Testament, the Patristic writers, the Rabbinical schools, mediaeval and post-Reformation eras to the rise and subsequent establishment of critical orthodoxy. The hermeneutical methods employed over this span of time vary greatly and have contributed to mutual suspicion within the theological academies. It is the attempt of the present investigation to clarify the issues confronting the academy and discern the contemporary or applicative significance that Exodus 32 has for the modern Church. Central to this investigation has been the work of Brevard S. Childs whose "canonical criticism" methodology is examined and its implications for the present study ascertained. The result in the final chapter is a detailed exegesis of the narrative of the golden calf, cognizant of the work of past scholarship and, hopefully, allowing the Biblical material to speak for itself within the context of its place in the sacred canon.
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