Golden calf up the Israelites' golden earrings and ornaments, constructed a "molten calf" and they declared: "These "[be]" thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." (Exodus 32:4) Aaron built an altar before the calf and proclaimed the next day to be a feast to the . So they rose up early the next day and "offered burnt-offerings, and brought peace-offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play." (Exodus 32:6) God told Moses what the Israelites were up to back in camp, that they had turned aside quickly
Biblical Mount Sinai Jebel Musa as Mount Sinai and this identification was later adopted by the Christian pilgrims. R. K. Harrison states that, “Jebel Musa . . . seems to have enjoyed special sanctity long before Christian times, culminating in its identification with Mt. Sinai." In the second and third centuries BCE Nabataeans were making pilgrimages there, which is indicated in part by inscriptions discovered in the area. Josephus wrote that "Moses went up to a mountain that lay between Egypt and Arabia, which was called Sinai." Josephus says that Sinai is "the highest of all the mountains thereabout," and is "the highest