Exodus 32:21-28

New American Standard Bible 1995

²¹ Then Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you, that you have brought such great sin upon them?” ²² Aaron said, “Do not let the anger of my lord burn; you know the people yourself, ^(A)that they are ^[a]prone to evil. ²³ For ^(B)they said to me, ‘Make ^[b]a god for us who will go before us; for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ ²⁴ I said to them, ‘Whoever has any gold, let them tear it off.’ So they gave it to me, and ^(C)I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.”

²⁵ Now when Moses saw that the people were ^[c]out of control—for Aaron had ^(D)let them ^[d]get out of control to be a derision among ^[e]their enemies— ²⁶ then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, “Whoever is for the Lord, come to me!” And all the sons of Levi gathered together to him. ²⁷ He said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Every man of you put his sword upon his thigh, and go back and forth from gate to gate in the camp, and kill every man his brother, and every man his friend, and every man his ^[f]neighbor.’” ²⁸ So ^(E)the sons of Levi did ^[g]as Moses instructed, and about three thousand men of the people fell that day.