When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the
mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said
to him, “Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this
Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do
not know what has become of him.” So Aaron said to them, “Take off
the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons,
and your daughters, and bring them to me.” So all the people took
off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to
Aaron. And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it
with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, “These
are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of
Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron
made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the
LORD.” And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt
offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to
eat and drink and rose up to play.
And the LORD said to Moses, “Go down, for your people, whom you
brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves.
They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded
them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have
worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, ‘These are your gods, O
Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’” And the LORD
said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-
necked people. Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn
hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a
great nation of you.”
But Moses implored the LORD his God and said, “O LORD, why does
your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out
of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why
should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent did he bring them out,
to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of
the earth’? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this
disaster against your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel,
your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to
them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and
all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring,
and they shall inherit it forever.’” And the LORD relented from the
disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people.
Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain with the two
tablets of the testimony in his hand, tablets that were written on
both sides; on the front and on the back they were written. The
tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of
God, engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the
people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war
in the camp.” But he said, “It is not the sound of shouting for
victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of
singing that I hear.” And as soon as he came near the camp and saw
the calf and the dancing, Moses' anger burned hot, and he threw the
tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the
mountain. He took the calf that they had made and burned it with
fire and ground it to powder and scattered it on the water and made
the people of Israel drink it.
And Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you that you
have brought such a great sin upon them?” And Aaron said, “Let not
the anger of my lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are
set on evil. For they said to me, ‘Make us gods who shall go before
us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of
Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ So I said to them,
‘Let any who have gold take it off.’ So they gave it to me, and I
threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.”
And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose (for Aaron
had let them break loose, to the derision of their enemies), then
Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, “Who is on the LORD's
side? Come to me.” And all the sons of Levi gathered around him.
And he said to them, “Thus says the LORD God of Israel, ‘Put your
sword on your side each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate
throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his
companion and his neighbor.’” And the sons of Levi did according to
the word of Moses. And that day about three thousand men of the
people fell. And Moses said, “Today you have been ordained for the
service of the LORD, each one at the cost of his son and of his
brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day.”
The next day Moses said to the people, “You have sinned a great
sin. And now I will go up to the LORD; perhaps I can make atonement
for your sin.” So Moses returned to the LORD and said, “Alas, this
people has sinned a great sin. They have made for themselves gods
of gold. But now, if you will forgive their sin—but if not, please
blot me out of your book that you have written.” But the LORD said
to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my
book. But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have
spoken to you; behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless,
in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them.”
Then the LORD sent a plague on the people, because they made the
calf, the one that Aaron made.
