Or HaChaim on Exodus 32:19/אור החיים על שמות ל״ב:י״ט

1 ויהי כאשר קרב אל המחנה, It was, when he came close to the camp, etc. Our sages have already told us in Megillah 10 that whenever the word ויהי introduces a paragraph this is an allusion to a painful experience. In this instance Shemot Rabbah 46,1 describes that Moses noted the letters on the Tablets "flying away." This caused us all the subsequent grief our forefathers and we ourselves have experienced ever since, including the experience of death itself. Had the original Tablets survived, every sorrow and calamity would have disappeared from the earth, and the world would have experienced freedom from the angel of death (compare section 41 in that Midrash.) The word ויהי also refers to the anguish experienced by Moses personally when he saw with his own eyes what was taking place. The word also alludes to the feelings of shame experienced by the Israelites who felt like a thief who is caught in the act of stealing when they saw Moses approaching. The word even alludes to the קליפה, the spiritually negative radiations which now bombarded the camp of the Israelites and which presaged death and destruction. These negative emanations had been called forth by the words: "these are your gods O Israel, etc."

2כאשר קרב אל המחנה, as he approached the camp. Perhaps the Torah wished to tell us that Moses espied the calf even before he actually entered the camp. This had to be so in order for the sacred Tablets not to have to share the same domain with the epitome of impurity, the golden calf. When the Torah writes: "and it was as he approached the camp he saw the calf and the dances (or the musical instruments used during dances)," our attention is drawn to the immediacy of Moses seeing the calf and the activities surrounding it.

3וירא את העגל ומחלות, he saw the calf and the musical instruments, etc. Perhaps the Torah describes that with the approach of Moses the spirit of impurity took fright and flew away so that the calf became inert and lost its ability to utter the words "these are your gods, etc." Even the spirit of impurity which had fashioned the calf unassisted by any artisan or goldsmith departed out of fear of Moses. The words עגל ומחלות side by side conjure up an image of the calf becoming as inert as the מחלות, the musical instruments, once the spirit which had misled the Jewish people into believing that the calf possessed powers of its own had departed from it.

4Alternatively, the Torah uses the wording וירא את העגל instead of וירא העגל, to draw our attention to the fact that Moses did not only behold the calf but also the spirit of impurity it contained, i.e. את. The righteous have the ability to recognise evil; a person of the stature of Moses was certainly able to recognise evil when he faced it. According to our rabbis in Tikkunim 142, Moses asked the calf who had made it to which the calf responded that it had been made by the mixed multitude. Seeing that inert things cannot speak, the meaning of that statement is that Moses realised that the calf contained the spirit of impurity. When the Torah describes Moses as seeing the dances, the word את in front of the word מחלות is absent. This lends credence to the statement that Moses perceived the spirit of impurity as being within the calf.

5It is also possible that the Torah wished to inform us that at the time Moses approached the camp he did not encounter a single person as they were all too ashamed to face him. All Moses was able to see therefore were the calf and the musical instruments used to accompany the dances.

6ויחר אף משה וישלך מידיו את הלוחות, Moses became very angry and he threw the Tablets from his hands, etc. We need to understand why Moses took it upon himself to smash the Tablets ignoring the immeasurable damage this would cause to the Jewish people. Clearly he would not have destroyed something unless he was convinced that by the destruction of whatever it was he would perform something infinitely more useful than that which he destroyed. We are told in Avot de Rabbi Natan chapter 2 that Moses did not shatter the Tablets until told to do so by G'd. This view is confirmed by Rabbi Meir who cites Deut. 10,5 as support for this view. He derives this from Moses saying "they remained therein as G'd had commanded me." If so, we must understand why G'd withheld the good contained in the Tablets from His people. [the question is appropriate in view of the Torah having told us that G'd decided not to carry out His plan to destroy the people. Ed.]

7We must remember that at the time of the revelation at Mount Sinai any residual pollutant of the original serpent had been expunged from the people as we know from Shabbat 146. This is the reason G'd prepared for them legislation engraved i.e. charut on the Tablets. The word חרות which we read in the Torah with the vowel kametz under the first letter may also be read with the vowel tzeyreh instead; as a result of this change it means "freedom." The alternate spelling is an allusion to the freedom from the angel of death which the Jewish people had attained as a result of their ready acceptance of G'd's Torah. Mortality, after all, had only been due to the pollutants with which the original serpent had injected Eve through her eating of the tree of knowledge. The golden calf episode reversed this process and the Israelites became infected with something like the original pollutant once more, though not to the same degree as previously. As a result of their idolatry they became mortal once more and a set of laws designed for immortal people was no longer appropriate for them. This is why those Tablets had to be smashed. All of this is based on the opinions that Moses had not acted of his own accord when he smashed the Tablets.