Comentário sobre Êxodo 32:5

וירא אהרן AND WHEN AARON SAW that there was the breath of life in it — as it is said with reference to the golden calf, (Psalms 106:20) “[They changed their glory] into a similitude of an ox that ate grass” — and he realized that Satan’s work had succeeded and that he had no argument (lit., mouth) to put them (the people) entirely off.

AND AARON SAW. The meaning of this verse is that Aaron saw them set on evil, intent upon making the calf, and he arose and built an altar and proclaimed, Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Eternal,²⁷⁴Verse 5. so that they should bring offerings to the Proper Name of G-d upon the altar which he built to His Name, and that they should not build altars to the shameful thing,²⁹⁸Jeremiah 11:13. and that their intent in the offerings should be [to none] save unto the Eternal only.²⁹⁹Above, 22:19.
It is possible that Aaron said, Tomorrow [shall be a feast], in order to delay them, thinking that perhaps Moses would come in the meantime and they would abandon the calf. But they rose up early in the morning and offered burnt-offerings, and brought peace-offerings.³⁰⁰Verse 6. Now Scripture does not say “and they offered burnt-offerings to it, and brought peace-offerings to it.” The reason for that is that there were some people amongst them who intended them to be for the Name of the Holy One, blessed be He, as Aaron had said, but some of them became corrupted and sacrificed them to the calf. It is with reference to this latter group that the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses, they have worshipped it, and have sacrificed unto it,³⁰¹Verse 8. for it is they who were the sinners. And even if it was perhaps Aaron who performed the sacrifical rites, Scripture used an indefinite expression — saying, they offered burnt-offerings and brought peace-offerings³⁰⁰Verse 6. — in order to suggest that Aaron’s intention was directed towards the Name of the Eternal, whilst they set their mind towards the calf which they had made, and thus the owners [of the sacrifices] invalidated them.

חג לה' מחר. So that you will not mix the joy of serving the Lord with any other kind of joy.

וירא אהרון, And Aaron saw, etc. He "saw" something amazing; although he had only thrown gold into the fire, a calf emerged.

וירא אהרן, “now Aaron realized, etc.” The Torah did not complete the sentence about what it was that Aaron “saw,” i.e. that the people were bent on crediting the golden calf with much more than he had thought at first. In order to head off a major spiritual and subsequently physical disaster, Aaron now proclaimed the following day as a festival in honour of Hashem, and he proceeded to build an altar to accommodate the offerings to Hashem which he intended to sacrifice at that feast. By doing this he felt he would forestall people building altars on which they would offer sacrifices to this golden image of a calf. By temporizing he felt and hoped that Moses would return from the Mountain before a calamity would occur. However, seeing the people on whose behalf he was going to offer these sacrifices intended them for the golden calf, they would have turned them into פיגול unacceptable sacrifices. At any rate, the people preempted Aaron early on the following morning.

וירא אהרן, “Aaron saw.” The reason the Torah does not specify what he saw is that he saw many things. One of the things he saw was that Chur, the son of Miriam had already been murdered (for trying to stop the people from worshipping the calf).
ויבן מזבח לפניו, “he built an altar in front of it.” He realised that someone had already been slaughtered before this calf (Chur). Perhaps Aaron was afraid that if he too were to allow himself to become a martyr, all of the Israelites would become guilty of death. We have a verse in Lamentations 2,2 אם יהרוג במקדש ה’ כהן ונביא, “if a priest and (or) prophet were to be killed in the Sanctuary,” which suggests that this is the ultimate crime. He preferred to personally shoulder the guilt than have all the people become guilty.
Another consideration which might have accounted for Aaron’s conduct is that during the time it would take to build the altar, each Israelite bringing a stone, this would be accomplished very quickly. By undertaking to do the building himself he was stalling for time hoping that Moses would show up before too much spiritual damage had been done (compare Rashi). Still another reason prompting Aaron to act as he did was the fact that legally speaking the building of the altar was not something forbidden on pain of death requiring one to become a martyr rather than to respond to pressure. The prohibition to build such an altar per se is only in the order of the average negative commandment, possibly carrying a penalty of 39 lashes if performed with negative intent. The operative verse in the Torah is only “do not make for yourself a hewn image;” Aaron certainly did not make it for himself nor with intent to sacrifice to an idol.

As it is said, “in the form of an ox eating grass”. . . This refers to the Calf.

V. 5. וירא: Er sah, wie sie bereits die schmale Brücke von dem Wahne eines göttlichen Mittlers zu dem Wahne eines wirklichen Gottes überschritten und wollte diesem einen Damm durch positive Huldigung Gottes, des einen Einzigen, entgegensetzen, zugleich aber durch die Bestimmung des Festes für den anderen Tag Zeit gewinnen. — לפניו vor sich, nicht vor das Kalb. Die Wiederholung des Namens "Aaron" drückt aus, dass er dies im Gegensatz zu der Äußerung des Volkes und in der ganzen Energie seiner Persönlichkeit ausgerufen.

וירא אהרן, “when Aaron saw, (realised), etc.” the people had misinterpreted the apparent ability of this golden calf to speak; he was afraid that they might kill him (for having made an idol) and he built an altar for the Lord on which offerings would be offered on the morrow, by which time he thought Moses would surely have returned. According to our author, we find that the prophet Samuel when pressured to anoint a king for the people resorted to a similar stratagem in Samuel I 11,14, when he suggested that he would meet their request on the following day. [This comparison is invalid, as the prophet Samuel had consulted with G–d about how to deal with the people’s demand. Ed.]

וירא אהרן, “Aaron saw;” Aaron now realised the error the people had made and became afraid that as soon as they would realise that this golden calf could never be of any help to them, so that they would insist on appointing one of their midst as Moses’ successor; this spelled potential disaster. Therefore he proceeded to build an altar, ostensibly before that calf, in order to make the people believe that he was taking steps to worship the golden calf.

ויבן מזבח HE BUILDED AN ALTAR to put them off.

He thereby saw that the Satan’s act succeeded. . . Satan caused disorder in the world at the sixth hour, and his deeds succeeded, for he achieved his aim.

ויבן מזבח לפניו, he erected an altar in front of it, etc. It is noteworthy that the Torah did not write: ויבן לפניו מזבח. Had the Torah used the sequence of words we just mentioned this would have indicated that Aaron built the altar in the golden calf's honour. As it is the proximity of the golden calf to the altar Aaron built was purely incidental. Aaron's intention was totally Heaven-oriented. According to the Zohar volume 2 page 193, Aaron erected the altar in order to hold on to it so that the people should not be able to drag him away from there and execute him. The Torah legislated that [normally, when the crime of the accused had not been murder, Ed] the altar serves as a refuge for someone who is guilty of legal execution. While the guilty person holds on to it the messengers of the court cannot violate the sanctity of the altar in order to carry out the court's verdict.

חג לה' מחר, “there will be a feast for Hashem tomorrow!” He meant that on the following day they would celebrate the new leader that G-d had given them. In the meantime, he stalled the people with words.

ויקרא חג לה׳ מחר AND CALLED OUT … TO-MORROW IS A FESTIVAL TO THE LORD — to-morrow, not to-day, for he hoped that Moses might return before they would worship it (the calf). This is the plain meaning of the verse. The Midrashic explanation of it in Leviticus Rabbah 10:3 (— it supplies an object to the verb וירא —) is: Aaron saw many things; he saw Hur, his sister’s son, who had reprimanded them, and whom they had killed. This is the meaning of ויבן מזבח, viz., וַיָבֶן, he realized (taking the word as from the root בון, to understand, to realize) מִזָּבוּחַ לפניו from him who lay slaughtered before him (מזבח is vowelled to be read as מִזָּבוּחַ) what would happen to him if he offered resistance. A further explanation of וירא אהרן in the Midrash is: He saw what the situation was and said: It is better that the offence should attach itself to me than to them. And yet a further Midrashic explanation of וירא is: He looked into the matter and said: If they build this altar themselves, one will bring a clod and another a stone and the result will be that their work will be accomplished all at once; through myself building it and being dilatory in my work, in the meantime Moses may come.

Chur reprimanded them, they killed him. . . Explanation: Chur reprimanded them for making the Calf, and they killed him. Thus Aharon was afraid to reprimand them, lest they kill him. You might ask: Rashi explained above, “‘He built an altar’ — so as to stall them.” Rashi comments on this, “That is its plain meaning.” [Yet the midrash says, “Through my building it and procrastinating in my work, in the meantime Moshe will come.”] If so, is the midrash not saying the same as the plain meaning? The answer is: [At first] Rashi is answering the question: Why did Aharon build a new altar? There was one already built, as it is written at the end of parshas Mishpatim. Thus Rashi explains, “So as to stall them. . . that is its plain meaning.” Whereas the midrash’s interpretation answers the question: Why did Aharon build the altar, and not someone else?

חג לה׳ מחר, "To-morrow shall be a feast for the Lord." Aaron's intention was simply to stall the people and to gain time until Moses would return and control the situation. By using the Ineffable Name, Aaron had made it plain that he meant for the feast to be in honour of the One and Only G'd. He did not expect the Israelites to disagree as we pointed out already that no one had dared to deny the primacy of the G'd who had introduced Himself at the revelation at Mount Sinai as "I am the Lord Who has has taken you out of Egypt." All the people wanted was to take "part" of that G'd and look at it as a symbol of the invisible Lord in Heaven.

חג לה׳ A FESTIVAL TO THE LORD — not to the golden calf. In his heart it (the feast) was for Heaven (the Lord). He felt confident that Moses would return by the morrow and that they would worship the Omnipresent (Leviticus Rabbah 10:3).