Keluaran 32:19-24

32:19 When he approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses became extremely angry. ¹  He threw the tablets from his hands and broke them to pieces at the bottom of the mountain. ²  32:20 He took the calf they had made and burned it in the fire, ground it ³  to powder, poured it out on the water, and made the Israelites drink it. ⁴ 

32:21 Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you, that you have brought on them so great a sin?” 32:22 Aaron said, “Do not let your anger burn hot, my lord; ⁵  you know these people, that they tend to evil. ⁶  32:23 They said to me, ‘Make us gods that will go before us, for as for this fellow Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him.’ 32:24 So I said to them, ‘Whoever has gold, break it off.’ So they gave it ⁷  to me, and I threw it into the fire, and this calf came out.” ⁸ 

[32:19]  ¹ tn Heb “and the anger of Moses burned hot.”

[32:19]  ² sn See N. M. Waldham, “The Breaking of the Tablets,” Judaism 27 (1978): 442-47.

[32:20]  ³ tn Here “it” has been supplied.

[32:20]  ⁴ tn Here “it” has been supplied.

[32:20]  sn Pouring the ashes into the water running from the mountain in the brook (Deut 9:21) and making them drink it was a type of the bitter water test that tested the wife suspected of unfaithfulness. Here the reaction of the people who drank would indicate guilt or not (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 419).

[32:22]  ⁵ sn “My lord” refers to Moses.

[32:22]  ⁶ tn Heb “that on evil it is.”

[32:24]  ⁷ tn Here “it” has been supplied.

[32:24]  ⁸ sn Aaron first tried to blame the people, and then he tried to make it sound like a miracle – was it to sound like one of the plagues where out of the furnace came life? This text does not mention it, but Deut 9:20 tells how angry God was with Aaron. Only intercession saved his life.