1 Then he said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, ^uNadab, and Abihu, and ^vseventy of the elders of Israel, and worship from afar. 2 Moses ^walone shall come near to the Lord, but the others shall not come near, and the people shall not come up with him.”

3 Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and ^xall the rules.¹ And all the people answered with one voice and said, ^y“All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do.” 4 And ^zMoses wrote down all the words of the Lord. He rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve ^apillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 And he sent young men of the people of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the Lord. 6 And ^bMoses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw against the altar. 7 Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it in the hearing of the people. And they said, ^x“All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.” 8 ^cAnd Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

9 Then Moses and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and ^dseventy of the elders of Israel ^ewent up, 10 and they ^fsaw the God of Israel. There was under his feet as it were a pavement of ^gsapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. 11 And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ^hate and drank.

12 The Lord said to Moses, ⁱ“Come up to me on the mountain and wait there, that I may give you the ^jtablets of stone, with the law and the commandment, which I have written for their instruction.” 13 So Moses rose with his assistant ^kJoshua, and Moses went up ^linto the mountain of God. 14 And he said to the elders, “Wait here for us until we return to you. And behold, Aaron and ^mHur are with you. Whoever has a dispute, let him go to them.”

15 Then Moses went up on the mountain, and ⁿthe cloud covered the mountain. 16 ^oThe glory of the Lord dwelt on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days. And on the seventh day he called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud. 17 Now the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a ^pdevouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel. 18 Moses entered the cloud and went up on the mountain. And Moses ^qwas on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

1 When the people saw that Moses ^vdelayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, ^w“Up, make us gods who shall ^xgo 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 So Aaron said to them, “Take off the ^yrings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” 3 So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. 4 ^zAnd he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden¹ calf. And they said, ^a“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 ^bmade a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord.” 6 And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And ^cthe people sat down to eat and drink and rose up ^dto play.

7 And the Lord said to Moses, ^e“Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have ^fcorrupted themselves. 8 They have turned aside quickly out of the way that ^gI 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!’” 9 And the Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, ^hit is a stiff-necked people. 10 Now therefore ⁱlet me alone, that ^jmy wrath may burn hot against them and ^kI may consume them, in order that ^lI may make a great nation of you.”

11 But ^mMoses 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? 12 ⁿWhy 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 ^orelent from this disaster against your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you ^pswore by your own self, and said to them, ^q‘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.’” 14 And the Lord ^rrelented from the disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people.

15 Then ^sMoses turned and went down from the mountain with the ^ttwo tablets of the testimony in his hand, tablets that were written on both sides; on the front and on the back they were written. 16 ^uThe tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. 17 When ^vJoshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.” 18 But he said, “It is not the sound of ^wshouting for victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear.” 19 And as soon as he came near the camp and ^xsaw 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. 20 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.

21 And Moses said to Aaron, ^y“What did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them?” 22 And Aaron said, “Let not the anger of my lord burn hot. ^zYou know the people, that they are set on evil. 23 For ^athey 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.’ 24 So ^bI 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.”

25 And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose (for Aaron had let them break loose, ^cto the derision of their enemies), 26 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. 27 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 ^dkill his brother and his companion and his neighbor.’” 28 And the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses. And that day about three thousand men of the people fell. 29 And Moses said, “Today you have been ^eordained 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.”

30 The next day Moses said to the people, ^f“You have sinned a great sin. And now I will go up to the Lord; ^gperhaps I can make atonement for your sin.” 31 So Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Alas, ^fthis people has sinned a great sin. They have ^hmade for themselves gods of gold. 32 But now, if ⁱyou will forgive their sin—but if not, please ^jblot me out of ^kyour book that you have written.” 33 But the Lord said to Moses, ^l“Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. 34 ^mBut now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you; ⁿbehold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them.”

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