Deuteronomy 9:8-21

8Even 1at Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, and the Lord was so angry with you that He would have destroyed you. 9When I went up to the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord had made with you, then I remained on the mountain forty days and nights; 2I neither ate bread nor drank water. 10The Lord gave me the two tablets of stone 3written by the finger of God; and on them were all the words which the Lord had spoken with you at the mountain from the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly. 11It came about 4at the end of forty days and nights that the Lord gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant. 125Then the Lord said to me, ‘Arise, go down from here quickly, for your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted corruptly. They have 6quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them; they have made a molten image for themselves.’ 13The 7Lord spoke further to me, saying, ‘I have seen this people, and indeed, it is a 89stubborn people. 1410Let Me alone, that I may destroy them and 11blot out their name from under heaven; and I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they.’

15“12So I turned and came down from the mountain while the mountain was burning with fire, and the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. 16And I saw that you had indeed sinned against the Lord your God. You had made for yourselves a molten calf; you had turned aside quickly from the way which the Lord had commanded you. 17I took hold of the two tablets and threw them from my hands and smashed them before your eyes. 1813I fell down before the Lord, 14as at the first, forty days and nights; 15I neither ate bread nor drank water, 16because of all your sin which you had committed in doing what was evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke Him to anger. 19For 17I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the Lord was wrathful against you in order to destroy you, 18but the Lord listened to me that time also. 20The Lord was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him; so I also prayed for Aaron at the same time. 2119I took your 20sinful thing, the calf which you had made, and burned it with fire and crushed it, grinding it very small until it was as fine as dust; and I threw its dust into the brook that came down from the mountain.