Exodus 32–34

The Golden Calf

³²When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered around Aaron and said to him, “Come, make gods for us, 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.”^{* 2}Aaron said to them, “Take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters and bring them to me.”^{* 3}So all the people took off the gold rings from their ears and brought them to Aaron. ⁴He took these from them, formed them in a mold,^j and cast an image of a calf, and they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!”^{* 5}When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it, and Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord.” ⁶They rose early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being, and the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to revel.^*

⁷The Lord said to Moses, “Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely;^{* 8}they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a 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!’ ”^{* 9}The Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are.^{* 10}Now let me alone so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, and of you I will make a great nation.”^*

¹¹But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, “O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?^{* 12}Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people.^{* 13}Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’ ”^{* 14}And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.^*

¹⁵Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain, carrying the two tablets of the covenant in his hands, tablets that were written on both sides, written on the front and on the back.^{* 16}The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved upon the tablets.^{* 17}When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.” ¹⁸But he said,

“It is not the sound made by victors

or the sound made by losers;

it is the sound of singing that I hear.”

¹⁹As soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses’s anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets from his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain.^{* 20}He took the calf that they had made, burned it with fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on the water, and made the Israelites drink it.^*

²¹Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you that you have brought so great a sin upon them?”^{* 22}And Aaron said, “Do not let the anger of my lord burn hot; you know the people, that they are wicked.^{* 23}They said to me, ‘Make gods for us, 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.’^{* 24}So I said to them, ‘Whoever has gold, take it off’; so they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”^*

²⁵When Moses saw that the people were out of control (for Aaron had lost control of them, prompting derision among their enemies), ²⁶then 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. ²⁷He said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Put your sword on your side, each of you! Go back and forth from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill your brother, your friend, and your neighbor.”^{* 28}The sons of Levi did as Moses commanded, and about three thousand of the people fell on that day. ²⁹Moses said, “Today you have been ordained for the service of the Lord, each one at the cost of a son or a brother, and so have brought a blessing on yourselves this day.”

³⁰On the next day Moses said to the people, “You have sinned a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.”^{* 31}So Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Alas, this people has sinned a great sin; they have made for themselves gods of gold.^{* 32}But now, if you will only forgive their sin—but if not, please blot me out of the book that you have written.”^{* 33}But the Lord said to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book.^{* 34}But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you; see, my angel shall go in front of you. Nevertheless, when the day for punishment comes, I will punish them for their sin.”^*

³⁵Then the Lord sent a plague on the people, because they made the calf—the one that Aaron had made.^*

The Command to Leave Sinai

³³The Lord said to Moses, “Go, leave this place, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, and go to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your descendants I will give it.’^{* 2}I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.^{* 3}Go up^k to a land flowing with milk and honey, but I will not go up among you, or I would consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”^*

⁴When the people heard these harsh words, they mourned, and no one put on ornaments.^{* 5}For the Lord had said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, and I will decide what to do to you.’ ” ⁶Therefore the Israelites stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward.

The Tent outside the Camp

⁷Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp; he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp.^{* 8}Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise and stand, each of them, at the entrance of their tents and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent.^{* 9}When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord^l would speak with Moses.^{* 10}When all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise and bow down, all of them, at the entrance of their tent. ¹¹Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Then he would return to the camp, but his young assistant, Joshua son of Nun, would not leave the tent.^*

Moses’s Intercession

¹²Moses said to the Lord, “See, you have said to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’^{* 13}Now if I have found favor in your sight, please show me your ways, so that I may know you and find favor in your sight. Consider, too, that this nation is your people.”^{* 14}He said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”^{* 15}And he said to him, “If your presence will not go, do not bring us up from here. ¹⁶For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people, unless you go with us? In this way, we shall be distinct, I and your people, from every people on the face of the earth.”^*

¹⁷The Lord said to Moses, “I will also do this thing that you have asked, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”^{* 18}Moses^m said, “Please show me your glory.” ¹⁹And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you the name, ‘The Lord,’ⁿ and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.^{* 20}But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one shall see me and live.”^{* 21}And the Lord continued, “See, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, ²²and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; ²³then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”^*

Moses Makes New Tablets

³⁴The Lord said to Moses, “Cut two tablets of stone like the former ones, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the former tablets, which you broke.^{* 2}Be ready in the morning and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai and present yourself there to me on the top of the mountain.^{* 3}No one shall come up with you, and do not let anyone be seen throughout all the mountain, and do not let flocks or herds graze in front of that mountain.”^{* 4}So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the former ones, and he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tablets of stone. ⁵The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name, “The Lord.”^{o* 6}The Lord passed before him and proclaimed,

“The Lord, the Lord,

a God merciful and gracious,

slow to anger,

and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,^*

⁷keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation,^p

forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,

yet by no means clearing the guilty,

but visiting the iniquity of the parents

upon the children

and the children’s children

to the third and the fourth…