THE SECOND COMMANDMENT
"Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of
any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is
in the water under the earth; thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor
serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of
the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of
them that hate Me; and showing mercy unto thousands, of them that love Me and
keep My commandments." Exodus 20:
4-6.
The second commandment is by no
means a repetition of the first. It forbids a practice which becomes possible
only when the One God is believed in and worshipped.
The first forbids us to have any other gods besides the One
Who makes Himself known by the name, "I
am Jehovah Elohim, the Lord thy God." The second, taking it for
granted that there is no god but the one true God, forbids the creation of
anything which is supposed to be a representation of Him, to assist man in
worship.
First, let us consider the
commandment. Some there are who think that the Puritan fathers imagined that
what was forbidden was the making of the likeness of anything in the heavens
above or the earth beneath, and so they came to look upon every form of art as
idolatrous. I have known Christian folk who, because of this commandment, would
not have their photographs taken, and who refused to have a picture in their
houses!
This, however, could not have been
the Divine intention; for, immediately after the giving of this commandment,
among the pattern of things pertaining to the Tabernacle, in the very holiest
of all, two images of the cherubim overshadowed the mercy-seat. On the borders
of the garment of the High Priest, also, as he went into the Holy Place to
minister, there were bells and pomegranates. Man was not forbidden to make a
representation of anything: he is forbidden to use the representation as an aid
to worship.
In Westminster Abbey, today, there
may be seen a great many vacant niches where images once stood. They were
removed not because they were statues, but because lamps were burned in front
of them and worshippers knelt before them. That was essentially a violation of
this commandment. Man is not to make to himself "a graven image, nor the likeness of any form that is in heaven
above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them." In the
closing words lies the force of the commandment. It strikes at a desire that is
very deep-seated in the human heart.
Man declares that he must have
something to help him in his worship of God. Devout souls in the Roman Catholic
Church avow that they do not worship the image, but the God behind it: that
they do not worship the crucifix, but that it helps them to think of the
Christ. Yet this is exactly what is forbidden in this commandment. Not that man
should not actually worship image or crucifix, but that they should not be used
as representations to help in worship. "God
is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in
truth." The material cannot help the spiritual.
WHY MAN MAKES IMAGES
In order to a careful examination
of the reason of this commandment let us consider why man makes an image or a
picture to help him in his worship. The answer may be briefly stated—the
spiritual sense in man, that which realizes God, is dead. No man who knows God,
no man who is living in daily communion with Him, needs a picture to help him
to pray. None who know what it is to live and walk with God amid the work of
the week would derive help from an image placed in front of them when they
worship. By the new birth of the Spirit they have had the spiritual consciousness
restored; so that they know God, and are able to commune directly with Him.
If a man crave help, it is thereby
proven that he lacks the spiritual consciousness. This very lack renders him
incapable of creating anything which gives a proper representation of God.
Every attempt which man has made to represent God in any way has resulted in a
false picture of Him. When God said, "Thou
shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of any form ; thou
shalt not bow thyself unto them nor serve them," it was because he
knew that if men, who had lost their sense of Him and His presence, made
something to represent Him, it would be a false representation, and men would
thereby get false notions of Him, even as they sought to worship.
Look at the matter from another
point of view. In the instant that man sets up a representation of any
description to help him to realize God, he denies that which is essential in
God. Suppose that it is an image, a picture, or some system of worship,
concerning which he says, "This is
intended as an aid to my worship of the one God." See what he has
done! The image, the picture, or the system of worship is limited. The
essential fact of God is that He is limitless, that He is eternal, that He is
self-existent, there being no end to His being, and no limit to His power.
Limitlessness lies at the heart and center of the thought of God, and the
moment a man makes an image, he denies the essence of God. For that reason God
forbade that there should be the making of any images for, not only is the
image false, it is misleading.
Yet once again. If the image of
God that man has made—that which he puts in the place of God, that he may
understand Him—if that is false, and if it is limited, what is the effect
produced by worship upon character? "As
a man thinks in his heart, so is he." The thought of God produced by a
false representation of God will produce character that is false. There is
another scripture which says, concerning idols, "Noses have they, but they smell not: they have hands, but they
handle not: feet have they, but they walk not: neither speak they through their
throat." Then follows the philosophy of idol-worship: "They that make them are like unto
them." Every man is like his god. Man becomes like the thing that he
puts in the place of God. If man gets a false notion of God, through his idol
or image, he becomes as false as his god. Here then is the tremendous reason
for this enactment. It is not a merely capricious commandment; but, like all
the commands of God, it is based upon eternal principles. In effect God says
to man, "Thou shalt not attempt to
liken Me to anything, because every effort of that kind must result in failure,
and must react upon man to his abiding injury."
Are the men today in danger of
breaking this command? Most certainly they are. Consider a few of the ways in
which the second commandment is broken. The revival of priestism: the prevalent
passion for ritual; the elevation of the ordinances of the Christian religion
into undue place and prominence; the professed worship of nature; the worship
of humanity, which is becoming a cult and a religion; these are instances. In
all these things, men tell us that they worship God; but they are trying to
worship Him through some supposed expression of Him which they have made for
themselves.
What is the priest? An attempt to
reveal God to the heart, in order that man may worship Him. Wherever a man
gives his soul away to the priest, because lie imagines that he is getting to
know God through the priest, the latter becomes to the man an image and an
idol. In every case where this has been done, man's conception of God has
suffered, and the result has been the degradation of the worshipper.
That is a statement which is
easily made, but for its verification history may be appealed to. Look at the
nations of the world which have become priest-ridden, and what has been the
result? Take Spain as an instance. What is the meaning of its degradation?
Simply that the people have had a false view of God, because they have tried to
reach Him through the priest, instead of going directly to Him. The reign of
priestism has become one of the most prolific sources of evil. It has broken
the second commandment. God says, in the first commandment, "I am your God, worship Me";
He says in the second, "Come
directly to Me, and let no supposed help intervene between us." There
is to be nothing but direct communication between the soul and God.
The same danger is seen with
regard to ritual. An ornate service, beautiful and esthetic surroundings, is
supposed to create the conditions of true worship. What is the result of all
this upon the spiritual nature of man? Are the men and women who go over to
ritualism in any form becoming more spiritual? Do their lives manifest the
fruit of the Spirit, the character of Christ, the life of God? Most assuredly
not! Ritualism may be refined, but it begins and ends in the senses. When man
says he is helped to get nearer to God by merely aesthetic worship, it is
nearness to a false deity, not to the true God.
The same principle applies to Free
Church life. One loves the simplicity of worship which is seen when a great
congregation comes into the presence of God, and every man and every woman
exercises the right of priesthood in His presence. When ornate service is put
in the place of the rights of individual souls, men are as great idolaters as
were they of olden days, who made graven images or painted pictures, and fell
down in order to worship them.
In the present day, there is a
great danger of making the Lord's Supper something more than a simple memorial
service; and every such attempt is fraught with peril. Only recently, some men,
loved and respected, have given utterance to the statement that the Lord's
Supper has in it some sort of mystic element that assists the soul in worship.
The soul is assisted just as far as Christ is remembered, as He commanded in
the memorial feast spread upon the table, and great risk is run when anything
more than that is read into that simple service. The moment some special
influence is claimed for the Lord's Supper the ordinance is lifted into the
place of the Master, and as soon as that is done all the spiritual verities
which lie behind the observance are injured.
Turning from that higher level,
remember how much is said today about worshipping God through Nature. Let no
one undervalue the ministry of Nature. The flowers, the valleys, the hills, the
sunshine, the birds are full of beauty, but no man ever reaches God through
Nature. Men do get to Nature through the God Who made it. Let a man be right
with God, and he will find the mystic key that unlocks all Nature for him; but
the men who try to climb to God through Nature never succeed. Man cannot use a
flower as a representation of God for worship, without having a God Who is a
falsity, and thereby causing suffering to himself.
The new cult of humanitarianism is
really an attempt to worship God through human nature; but it is a sorry
business. If this new idea of God is expressed in the individual or in the
sum-total of the race, let it be remembered that God Himself becomes guilty of
all the awful things which have blotted the page of human history—a terrible
thought! God is far above humanity, but He loves it, and will redeem it, if it
will return to Him. To worship humanity in order to get to God is to be guilty
of the self-same sin of putting up as a representation of God something that
does not represent Him, but falsifies Him, and reacts in disaster upon the men
who worship.
Notice particularly the solemn
warning and the gracious promise linked to the commandment. This is one of
those passages of Scripture which are most often and constantly misused. God
says, "Thou shalt not make unto thee
a graven image, nor any form that is in the heaven above, or that is in the
earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow
down thyself unto them, nor serve them :for I the Lord thy God am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and
upon the fourth generation of them that hate Me; and showing mercy unto
thousands of them that love Me and keep My commandments." There are
persons who read the first part of that command and pass to the second part,
and declare that if a man be impure, God will punish his child on that account.
The subject of the result of the sin of a man as manifested in succeeding
generations is not now under discussion. What is the simple and plain meaning
of these concluding words? If a man put something in the place of his Creator,
that iniquity of making a representation of God is visited upon the children
of the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him. That is to say, if,
in worship, men put something in the place of God, if they come under the
influence of worship which is an attempt to put something between God and man,
then they are not only harming themselves but their children. The probability
is that their idea of worship will be transmitted to their children, and their
children's idea of worship will be transmitted to their children, so that the
wrong that men do themselves when they misrepresent God is a wrong which they
are doing to their children likewise. That is the first and simple meaning of
the words used in connection with this commandment.
It is a solemn thing thus to pass
on to children a wrong conception of God; it is the most awful thing a man can
do. Men often take lower ground, and talk about passing to their children evil
forces and habits. Nothing can minimize the awfulness of such conduct; but here
is the root of it all. When a man puts something, as the object of his worship,
in the place of God, he passes on the same practice to his offspring. What a
terrible heritage he is thus handing down to the child!
But proceed to notice the gracious
promise standing aide by side with the warning: "Showing mercy unto thousands." There is very little
doubt that the rendering ought to be, "Showing
mercy unto a thousand generations of them that love Me, and keep My commandments."
That is to say, that if a man sweeps the idols away, and gets into living
connection with God, worshipping Him without anything between, the result will
be that his child's child will, most likely, so worship. Here is a remarkable
comparison—God visits the iniquity to the third and fourth generation; hut He
shows mercy unto the thousandth generation! If a man will commit to his
posterity a worship which is true, strong, whole-hearted, and pure, and will
sweep away all that interferes between himself and God, he is more likely to
influence for good the thousandth generation that follows him, than a man of
the opposite character is to touch that generation with evil.
Granted that man has but one God,
it is still a question of supreme importance how he is worshipping Him. If he
is doing this through a priest, if he is doing it through ritual, if he is
doing it through some creation of his own, he is robbing himself of the
essential blessing that comes from true worship.
God calls men into His own
presence, to immediate worship. They worship, not when they listen to preaching,
not when they are attentive to the form and fashion of music, not when they are
thinking of a table upon which the emblems are spread; but when they pass
through the preaching, and when they pass beyond the emblems, and when they are
face to face with God. Whenever a man stops short of that face-to-face worship
of the Eternal God, he is working ruin to his own character, because he is
breaking the commandment of God.
Thank God, today, no man need stop
short. The veil has been rent, the priest has been swept away, ritual has been
put out of sight, and there is a direct pathway open from the place where man
is into the very presence-chamber of the Eternal God. Without priest, prophet
or preacher man can go right into the presence of God and worship Him. And
because He has opened the new and living way, every attempt to put something
between the soul and God is of the essence of idolatry, against which His face
was set in the days of His ancient people Israel, and against which His face is
as surely set today.
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