Exodus 32 The people saw that Moses was tardy to descend from the mountain. So the people assembled themselves against Aaron and said to him: Rise! Make for us elohim who shall go before us, for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we know not what has become of him.

CLV⁽ⁱ⁾ ¹ The people saw that Moses was tardy to descend from the mountain. So the people assembled themselves against Aaron and said to him: Rise! Make for us elohim who shall go before us, for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we know not what has become of him. ² Then Aaron said to them: Tear off the pendants of gold which are in the ears of your wives, your sons and your daughters, and bring them to me. ³ So all the people tore off the pendants of gold which were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. ⁴ He took it from their hands and formed it with a stylus and made of it a molten calf. And they said: These are your elohim, Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt. ⁵ When Aaron discerned this, he built an altar before it. Then Aaron called out and said: A celebration to Yahweh tomorrow! " ⁶ So they rose early on the morrow and brought up ascent offerings and brought close peace offerings. And the people sat to eat and drank and rose to make fun. ⁷ Then Yahweh spoke to Moses: Go! Go down, for your people whom you brought up from the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. ⁸ They have withdrawn quickly from the way I instructed them. They have made for themselves a molten calf and bowed themselves down to it. They have sacrificed to it and said: These are your elohim, Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt. ⁹ And Yahweh said to Moses: I have seen this people, and behold, they are a stiff-necked people. ¹⁰ And now, leave it to Me, that My anger may grow hot against them, so that I may finish them; and I shall make you into a great nation. ¹¹ Then Moses beseeched the face of Yahweh his Elohim and said: Why, Yahweh, has Your anger grown hot against Your people whom You have brought forth from the land of Egypt with great vigor and with a steadfast hand? ¹² Why should the Egyptians speak, saying: For evil He brings them forth to kill them in the mountains and to finish them off the surface of the ground? Turn back from the heat of Your anger and show mercy concerning the evil to Your people. ¹³ Remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel, Your servants to whom You swore by Yourself. You spoke to them, saying: I shall increase your seed as the stars of the heavens, and all this land, as I have said, I shall give it to your seed, and they will gain it as an allotment for the eon. ¹⁴ So Yahweh showed mercy concerning the evil which He spoke of doing to His people. ¹⁵ Then Moses turned around and descended from the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony in his hands, tablets written on two sides across them, on this and on that side were they written. ¹⁶ And the tables, they were the handiwork of Elohim; and the writing, it was the writing of Elohim, chiseled on the tablets. ¹⁷ When Joshua heard the voice of the people in their shouting, he said to Moses: The sound of battle is in the camp. ¹⁸ Yet he said: There is no sound of the response of mastery, and there is no sound of the response of defeat; the sound of responsive singing I hear. ¹⁹ And it came to be just as he drew near to the camp and saw the calf and the choruses that Moses' anger grew hot, and he flung from his hands the tablets and broke them below the mountain. ²⁰ Then he took the calf which they had made, burned it with fire and ground it until it was pulverized; he winnowed it upon the surface of the water and made the sons of Israel drink it. ²¹ Moses said to Aaron: What has this people done to you that you have brought on them a great sin? ²² And Aaron said: The anger of my lord must not grow hot. You know the people that they are unbridled, ²³ for they said to me: Make elohim for us who shall go before us, for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we know not what has become of him. ²⁴ And I said to them: Anyone who has gold tear it off yourself. So they gave it to me, and I flung it into the fire, and this calf came forth. ²⁵ When Moses saw the people that they were unbridled, that Aaron had let them become unbridled unto disrepute among those rising against them, ²⁶ then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said: Whoever is for Yahweh come to me! So all the sons of Levi gathered themselves to him; ²⁷ and he said to them: Thus says Yahweh Elohim of Israel: Each man place his sword on his thigh, cross over and return from gate to gate in the camp. Each man kill his brother and each man his associate and each man his nearest. ²⁸ The sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses, and there fell of the people in that day about three thousand men. ²⁹ Hence Moses said: They have filled your hands today to Yahweh, for each man has been against his son and against his brother so as to give a blessing over you today. ³⁰ It came to be after the morrow that Moses said to the people: You have sinned a great sin, and now I am going up to Yahweh. Perhaps I may make a propitiatory shelter about your sin. ³¹ So Moses returned to Yahweh and said: Oh! this people has sinned a great sin, and they made for themselves an elohim of gold. ³² And now, if You should bear their sin, bear it. Yet if not, wipe me, I pray, from Your scroll which You have written. ³³ Yahweh said to Moses: Anyone who has sinned against Me, I shall wipe him from My scroll. ³⁴ And now, go, guide the people to the place of which I spoke to you. Behold, My messenger shall go before you, and in the day of My visitation, then I will visit on them their sin. ³⁵ Then Yahweh struck the people down because they had used the calf which Aaron made.