In the shape of a calf may be rendered as “it looked just like a calf.”

Offered sacrifice is equivalent in many languages to “killed animals in honor of” or “killed animals in order to worship.”

As the context of the story in Exodus 32.4-6 makes clear, the idea is not merely that the people “rejoiced” (King James Version), “had a festive celebration” (New American Bible), or “were perfectly happy” (Jerusalem Bible), with what they had done, but rather that they held a religious feast in honor of what they had made (see An American Translation* “held a celebration over” and New English Bible “had a feast in honor of”). What they themselves had made translates the Hebraic expression “the work of their hands,” and here refers, as it often does in the Old Testament, to idols.

In some languages there is a problem caused by the different agents implied in verse 40 make us some gods and the phrase what they themselves had made (v. 41). In the first instance it is obviously Aaron who undertakes to make the gods or is commissioned to see that they are made, and in verse 41 the people as a whole are regarded as the ones who make the gods. In some languages a seeming discrepancy of agents constitutes a problem which may be resolved by an expression such as “they asked to have made for themselves” or “they asked Aaron to make for them.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .