I was helping grind spices near the fire when the singing turned into shouting. At first, I thought they were celebrating—until I saw the gold calf.
My name is Caleb. I'm twelve, one of the boys who gathers wood for cooking near the elders’ tent. For weeks, we'd waited at our camp near the foot of the mountain where Moses had gone. People said he was talking to G-d Himself, bringing back laws to guide us. We were scared and excited. But mostly scared.
We hadn't seen Moses in over a month. The cloud still covered the top of the mountain, glowing like fire, but with every day, people grew restless. Some said G-d had forsaken us. Others whispered that Moses must have died up there. That’s when Aaron—Moses's own brother—told us to bring gold.
I watched as men ripped earrings from their wives and children. They handed it all to Aaron, who melted it down and shaped it into a calf.
“It’s the god who led us out of Egypt!” someone shouted.
That wasn’t true. I knew it wasn’t. G-d had split the sea for us. He brought water from rocks and food from the sky. We saw it. We lived it. But now the people wanted something they could touch—even if it meant turning their backs on the truth.
Drums pounded. People danced wildly—boys, girls, even elders. Some tore their clothes and shouted strange sayings. But I couldn’t move. Not when I realized what was happening. Not when I saw the golden calf glowing in the firelight, as if daring G-d to stop us.
Hours passed before I heard someone cry out, “He’s back!”
The dancing stopped. A hush fell over the crowd as Moses stepped down the mountain, holding two giant stone tablets. His eyes were locked on the calf. And then—
CRASH!
He hurled the tablets to the ground. They shattered like cracked ice, and for a moment, it was like the whole world stopped breathing.
How could we?
How could we do this—after everything G-d had done to rescue us?
I bowed my head and wept. Not from fear, but from shame. We weren’t slaves anymore, but we were still weak inside. We thought freedom meant doing whatever we wanted. But G-d had brought us here to make us His people, not to build golden lies.
Later, Moses went back up the mountain to plead for us. I prayed he would come back with a second set of tablets. But I knew those first ones were gone because we broke them—before he even had the chance to read them to us.
That night, I sat by the fire, looking at the last flickers of the gold calf melting into nothing.
The miracle wasn’t that Moses came down in time—it was that G-d still wanted to give us a second chance.
I never forgot the sound of those stones breaking. It was the sound of trust falling. But I also remember what came next: the whisper of mercy.
I was helping grind spices near the fire when the singing turned into shouting. At first, I thought they were celebrating—until I saw the gold calf.
My name is Caleb. I'm twelve, one of the boys who gathers wood for cooking near the elders’ tent. For weeks, we'd waited at our camp near the foot of the mountain where Moses had gone. People said he was talking to G-d Himself, bringing back laws to guide us. We were scared and excited. But mostly scared.
We hadn't seen Moses in over a month. The cloud still covered the top of the mountain, glowing like fire, but with every day, people grew restless. Some said G-d had forsaken us. Others whispered that Moses must have died up there. That’s when Aaron—Moses's own brother—told us to bring gold.
I watched as men ripped earrings from their wives and children. They handed it all to Aaron, who melted it down and shaped it into a calf.
“It’s the god who led us out of Egypt!” someone shouted.
That wasn’t true. I knew it wasn’t. G-d had split the sea for us. He brought water from rocks and food from the sky. We saw it. We lived it. But now the people wanted something they could touch—even if it meant turning their backs on the truth.
Drums pounded. People danced wildly—boys, girls, even elders. Some tore their clothes and shouted strange sayings. But I couldn’t move. Not when I realized what was happening. Not when I saw the golden calf glowing in the firelight, as if daring G-d to stop us.
Hours passed before I heard someone cry out, “He’s back!”
The dancing stopped. A hush fell over the crowd as Moses stepped down the mountain, holding two giant stone tablets. His eyes were locked on the calf. And then—
CRASH!
He hurled the tablets to the ground. They shattered like cracked ice, and for a moment, it was like the whole world stopped breathing.
How could we?
How could we do this—after everything G-d had done to rescue us?
I bowed my head and wept. Not from fear, but from shame. We weren’t slaves anymore, but we were still weak inside. We thought freedom meant doing whatever we wanted. But G-d had brought us here to make us His people, not to build golden lies.
Later, Moses went back up the mountain to plead for us. I prayed he would come back with a second set of tablets. But I knew those first ones were gone because we broke them—before he even had the chance to read them to us.
That night, I sat by the fire, looking at the last flickers of the gold calf melting into nothing.
The miracle wasn’t that Moses came down in time—it was that G-d still wanted to give us a second chance.
I never forgot the sound of those stones breaking. It was the sound of trust falling. But I also remember what came next: the whisper of mercy.
