Then they rose early on the next day, offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.
Parallel translations
- WEB They rose up early on the next day, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.
- KJV And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.
- BSB So the next day they arose, offered burnt offerings, and presented peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink, and got up to indulge in revelry.
- NASB So the next day they got up early and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and got up to engage in lewd behavior.
- NLT The people got up early the next morning to sacrifice burnt offerings and peace offerings. After this, they celebrated with feasting and drinking, and they indulged in pagan revelry.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The people offer sacrifices and then feast and 'rise up to play,' descending into revelry. It shows how quickly false worship leads to moral corruption.
Overview
The worship that began with offerings degenerates into indulgence, the 'play' likely carrying connotations of immoral celebration. Paul cites this very verse in 1 Corinthians 10:7 as a warning to the church against idolatry. It illustrates that worship and conduct are inseparable: what we worship shapes how we live.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- 1 Cor 10:7Don’t be idolaters, as some of them were. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.”
- Num 25:2for they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods. The people ate and bowed down to their gods.
- Acts 7:41–42They made a calf in those days, and brought a sacrifice to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their hands.
- Exod 32:17–19When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is the noise of war in the camp.”
- Exod 24:4–5Moses wrote all Yahweh’s words, and rose up early in the morning, and built an altar under the mountain, and twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel.
- Rev 11:10Those who dwell on the earth rejoice over them, and they will be glad. They will give gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth.
- Judg 16:23–25The lords of the Philistines gathered them together to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god, and to rejoice; for they said, “Our god has delivered Samson our enemy into our hand.”
- Amos 2:8and they lay themselves down beside every altar on clothes taken in pledge; and in the house of their God they drink the wine of those who have been fined.
- Amos 8:10I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will make you wear sackcloth on all your bodies, and baldness on every head. I will make it like the mourning for an only son, and its end like a bitter day.
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Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 32:6 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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