⁴ the terms I commanded your ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt,^(A) out of the iron-smelting furnace.^(B)’ I said, ‘Obey^(C) me and do everything I command you, and you will be my people,^(D) and I will be your God.

²⁰ But as for you, the Lord took you and brought you out of the iron-smelting furnace,^(A) out of Egypt,^(B) to be the people of his inheritance,^(C) as you now are.

²⁶ I prayed to the Lord and said, “Sovereign Lord, do not destroy your people,^(A) your own inheritance^(B) that you redeemed^(C) by your great power and brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.^{(D) 27} Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Overlook the stubbornness^(E) of this people, their wickedness and their sin. ²⁸ Otherwise, the country^(F) from which you brought us will say, ‘Because the Lord was not able to take them into the land he had promised them, and because he hated them,^(G) he brought them out to put them to death in the wilderness.’^{(H) 29} But they are your people,^(I) your inheritance^(J) that you brought out by your great power and your outstretched arm.^(K)”

¹³ Moses said to the Lord, “Then the Egyptians will hear about it! By your power you brought these people up from among them.^{(A) 14} And they will tell the inhabitants of this land about it. They have already heard^(B) that you, Lord, are with these people^(C) and that you, Lord, have been seen face to face,^(D) that your cloud stays over them,^(E) and that you go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.^{(F) 15} If you put all these people to death, leaving none alive, the nations who have heard this report about you will say, ¹⁶ ‘The Lord was not able to bring these people into the land he promised them on oath,^(G) so he slaughtered them in the wilderness.’^(H)

¹⁷ “Now may the Lord’s strength be displayed, just as you have declared: ¹⁸ ‘The Lord is slow to anger, abounding in love and forgiving sin and rebellion.^(I) Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.’^{(J) 19} In accordance with your great love, forgive^(K) the sin of these people,^(L) just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.”^(M)

¹¹ But Moses sought the favor^(A) of the Lord his God. “Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand?^{(B) 12} Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’?^(C) Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster^(D) on your people.