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When a 22-foot golden statue of President Donald Trump was unveiled at Trump National Doral Miami last month, the internet quickly reached for a biblical comparison: the golden calf of Exodus. Marshall Cunningham, Assistant Instructional Professor of Bible and the Ancient Near East, tells Newsweek that the parallel is apt and worth taking seriously.

"It is a representation of something that can be worshipped, aside from the God who expressly says, 'Don't build things to worship aside from me,'" Cunningham said.

He also notes that the statue doesn't stand alone. Taken alongside Trump's recent AI-generated self-portrait as a Jesus-like figure, the pattern becomes harder to read as coincidental. "One might be able to give him the benefit of the doubt if this were a one-off," Cunningham observed.

The piece situates the statue within a broader tradition of biblical prohibitions against idolatry and draws on Cunningham's expertise in ancient Near Eastern religious contexts to explain why the comparisons have resonated so widely.

Read the full piece in Newsweek.