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
1 tn Heb “and the anger of Moses burned hot.”
2 sn See N. M. Waldham, “The Breaking of the Tablets,” Judaism 27 (1978): 442-47.
3 tn Here “it” has been supplied.
4 tn Here “it” has been supplied.
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).