Golden calf the words that were traditionally ascribed to Jeroboam and placed them in the mouths of the people." Friedman believes that the story was turned into a polemic, exaggerating the throne platform decoration into idolatry, by a family of priests sidelined by Jeroboam. The declarations of Aaron and Jeroboam are almost identical: After making the golden calf or golden calves both Aaron and Jeroboam celebrate festivals. Aaron builds an altar and Jeroboam ascends an altar (Exod 32:5–6; 1 Kings 12:32–33). In "Legends of the Jews", the Conservative rabbi and scholar Louis Ginzberg wrote that the worship of the golden calf was
Development of the Hebrew Bible canon Development of the Hebrew Bible canon Rabbinic Judaism recognizes the 24 books of the Masoretic Text, commonly called the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible, as authoritative. Modern scholarship suggests that the most recently written are the books of Jonah, Lamentations, and Daniel, all of which may have been composed as late as the second century BCE. The Book of Deuteronomy includes a prohibition against adding or subtracting, which might apply to the book itself (i.e. a "closed book", a prohibition against future scribal editing) or to the instruction received by Moses on Mt. Sinai. The book of 2 Maccabees, itself not