Ibn Ezra (on 32:11) explains that really Moshe only prayed (once) on the day after he came down from Mount Sinai. This appears to accord with Moshe's account of the sin of the golden calf in the book of Devarim, that there he said that he first went down from the mountain, broke the tablets and only afterwards began to pray for the people, Devarim 9:15-18. Ibn Ezra argues that Moshe could not have prayed before he destroyed the golden calf. With this approach, Ibn Ezra is forced to argue that the verses 32:11-14, which indicate that Moshe prayed on the mountain immediately upon hearing of the people's sin, are recorded out of their chronological order and really follow 32:30. Yet, still there remains the problem that 32:14 (even recorded out of order) indicates a complete pardon for the people, and 32:33-35 indicate that there was only a partial pardon for the people.
Ramban (on 32:11) asks that if Moshe really only prayed once, why would the Torah split the prayers by recording half the prayer sixteen verses before the other half of the prayer? Furthermore, Ibn Ezra's proof from Moshe's account in Devarim is not so convincing. Devarim 9:19 records that G-d listened to Moshe for a second time, which implies that there were two prayers. Also, in Devarim, Moshe was not giving a complete recording of the events, and hence maybe he skipped mentioning his first prayer since he did not want the people to know that they had been forgiven so quickly for their sins.
Ramban argues that Moshe had to pray immediately for the people's welfare when he heard of their sins since he believed that there was a possibility that the people would have been destroyed at that moment. Thus, he claims that Moshe prayed twice, once as recorded in 32:11-14, when he heard about the sin on Mount Sinai, and then again as recorded in 32:30-34, after he had come down from Mount Sinai. Why was there a need for two prayers?
The Ramban (also see Hoffmann on Devarim 9:18,19) suggests that when 32:14 records that G-d agreed to Moshe's prayer on the mountain this just meant that the people would not be wiped out at that moment, but the people had not been truly pardoned and they could be punished later for the sin with the golden calf. Hence, Moshe had to pray again on the day after he came down from Mount Sinai. This approach is difficult since 32:14 seems to mean that G-d renounced punishing the people, and not that G-d might punish the people a few days later.
Abravanel accepts the Ramban's answer (1997, p. 542) and then he suggests (p. 546, also see N. Leibowitz, 1976a, p. 579) that the second prayer was for those people who did not participate in the sin but who did not attempt to stop the people from sinning. I doubt this since 32:14 seems to mean that everybody had been forgiven.
In his comments on Devarim, Abravanel (1999, p. 162) suggests two additional reasons why Moshe prayed twice. One, while the Torah records that G-d renounced punishing the people in 32:14, he suggests that this information was not told to Moshe. And, then if Moshe did not know that the punishment was rescinded, Moshe had to pray a second time. This approach is difficult since there is no reason to think that Moshe was not informed that G-d renounced punishing the people, and if Moshe did not know this fact then he would have kept on praying before descending from the mountain.
Abravanel's other answer in his comments on Devarim is a variation on the Ramban's approach. This suggestion is that when G-d renounced punishing the people, this meant that G-d would not directly kill the people, but G-d was still going to indirectly destroy the people by leaving them to fend for themselves in the desert. With this idea, one would understand that the threatened destruction recorded in Devarim 9:19 was indirect and not complete. Yet, the word in Devarim 9:19, le-hashmid, means to destroy and not simply to let the people fend for themselves, and again 32:14 seems to mean that the people would not be punished at all for their sin of the golden calf. Also 32:35 records that G-d would send a plague on the people, which is not just letting the people fend for themselves.
A different approach is that Moshe had to pray a second time due to the events that occurred after Moshe came down from Mount Sinai. When Moshe came down from Mount Sinai, he saw not only the golden calf but the dancing (around the idol?) and he broke the tablets, 32:19. N. Leibowitz (1976a, pp. 610,611) quotes Isaac Arama and the Netziv that Moshe broke the tablets to shock the people. This makes sense to me since there was pandemonium in the camp and he needed to do something to restore order in the camp. However, N. Leibowitz rejects this approach since she claims that with this approach Moshe's act was premeditated while 32:19 implies that it was a "spontaneous reaction sparked off by indignation." Yet, afterwards she writes (p. 612), "It is difficult to accept that Moshe deliberately planned to break the tablets. But the alternative – that it happened in a spontaneous fit of anger without any thought at all is equally implausible."
I would understand that after Moshe heard that G-d had forgiven the people, 32:14, he took the tablets with the idea that he would speak to the people and tell them that G-d had forgiven them. He did not intend to break the tablets when he was going down the mountain. However, when he came down, he was angry since he had not realized the mad frenzy scene that was occurring and he had to think of a way to get the people to stop. Moshe's solution was to break the tablets in front of the people, Devarim 9:17. However, this plan did not succeed.
32:25 records that even after Moshe broke the tablets and destroyed the golden calf, still the people were going wild. Accordingly, he went to plan B. He asked the people "Who is with G-d, come to me," 32:26. However, only the Levites responded. They compromised approximately 4% (22,000 males/603,000 men 20 years and up) of the population, which meant that 96% of the population was not with G-d. Moshe then sent out the Levites to kill the people who sinned, and as we discuss on 32:20-28, "Spiked water and the aftermath of the sin of the golden calf," they only killed people who had marks on their bodies which indicated that they had sinned. These people were not being killed for their actions with the golden calf, which no longer existed and for which they had been forgiven, but because they had not responded to Moshe when he asked who was with G-d. By not responding to Moshe’s call, this showed that they rejected G-d and were in essence continuing with the sin by golden calf even though the idol had been destroyed. Note, it could be that the Levites had also sinned by the golden calf, but once Moshe called to them, then they repented and answered Moshe’s call.
After this killing by the Levites, it seems that the pandemonium in the camp ended, and on the following day, Moshe told the people that they had sinned greatly and that he would pray for them, 32:30. What was the need for this prayer? One possibility is that G-d's forgiveness of the people in 32:14 was no longer relevant since the people continued to sin by not responding to Moshe when he asked who was with G-d, 32:26. A second possibility is that in 32:14, G-d forgave the people for their worship of the golden calf, a full scale idolatry, while in 32:30, Moshe needed to pray for the people for making the golden calf independent of their worship of the golden calf. Thus, in Moshe prayer’s he refers to the making of the golden calf, 32:31, and in G-d’s response that there would be a plague for the people’s sin, again the reference is to making the golden calf, 32:35. Moshe also refers to this sin as being a great or large sin, chataah gedolah, when he spoke to the people, 32:30, in his prayer, 32:31, and when he questioned Aharon about his actions, 32:21. The reason for this designation is that people might have thought that just making the golden calf was not such a terrible action since the goal might have been to use the idol to worship G-d, and hence to impress on Aharon, the people, and readers of the Torah, Moshe uses the phrase great sin to teach that even just making the golden calf was a terrible sin.
Bibliography:
Abravanel (1437-1508), 1997, Commentary on Shemot. 1999, Commentary on Devarim, Jerusalem: Horev.
Leibowitz, Nehama (1905-1997), 1976a, Studies in Shemot, translated by Aryeh Newman, Jerusalem: The World Zionist Organization.
Abravanel (1437-1508), 1997, Commentary on Shemot. 1999, Commentary on Devarim, Jerusalem: Horev.
Leibowitz, Nehama (1905-1997), 1976a, Studies in Shemot, translated by Aryeh Newman, Jerusalem: The World Zionist Organization.