13. "Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel. You made a promise. You took an oath in your name. You said, 'I will make your children after you as many as the stars in the sky. I will give them all of this land I promised them. It will belong to them forever.' "
14. Then the Lord took pity on his people. He didn't destroy them as he had said he would.
15. Moses turned and went down the mountain. He had the two tablets of the covenant in his hands. Words were written on both sides of the tablets, front and back.
16. The tablets were the work of God. The words had been written by God. They had been carved on the tablets.
17. Joshua heard the noise of the people shouting. So he said to Moses, "It sounds like war in the camp."
18. Moses replied, "It's not the sound of winning. It's not the sound of losing. It's the sound of singing that I hear."
19. As Moses approached the camp, he saw the calf. He also saw the people dancing. So he burned with anger. He threw the tablets out of his hands. They broke into pieces at the foot of the mountain.
20. He took the calf the people had made. He burned it in the fire. Then he ground it into powder. He scattered it on the water. And he made the people of Israel drink it.
21. He said to Aaron, "What did these people do to you? How did they make you lead them into such terrible sin?"
22. "Please don't be angry," Aaron answered. "You know how these people like to do what is evil.
23. They said to me, 'Make us a god that will lead us. This fellow Moses brought us up out of Egypt. But we don't know what has happened to him.'
24. "So I told them, 'Anyone who has any gold jewelry, take it off.' They gave me the gold. I threw it into the fire. And out came this calf!"