אתה עובר היום, “you are crossing this day;” this is not to be understood literally, but means: “in the immediate future.”An alternate interpretation of these words: “you are being considered as if crossing the Jordan already on this day.”

אשר הקצפת במדבר, “how you made the Lord your G-d angry in the desert;” this occurred already immediately after the people had broken camp after over 11 months at Mount Sinai. (Ibn Ezra)

בעלותי ההרה, “while I ascended the Mountain.” This occurred on the first day of the week, the seventh day of the month of Sivan. [That is, Moses ascended Mount Sinai on the day following the Revelation which was on the Sabbath, the sixth of Sivan. Ed.]

ואשב בהר ארבעים וארבעים לילה, “I remained on the mountain for forty days and forty nights. This was from the day after the Sabbath of the revelation until dawn of the Friday on the 17th day of Sivan.

ויהי מקץ ארבעים יום וארבעים לילה, “it was at the end of forty days and forty nights;” these forty nights had expired at dawn on the Friday of the seventeenth day in Sivan.

ואפן וארד מן ההר, I turned around and descended from the Mountain,” on the same day, the seventeenth day in Tammuz.

ואשברם לעיניכם, “I smashed them in front of your eyes.” I did this in order not to make you guilty of transgressing the law written thereon. It was written on them that you are not to have other deities, and you had made a golden calf for yourselves.!”.

ואתנפל לפני ה' כראשונה ארבעים יום וארבעים לילה. I prostrated myself before the Lord, as previously, for forty days and forty nights. This verse does not refer to Rashi’s commentary here that G-d responded to Moses with the words: סלחתי כדברך, “I have forgiven, in accordance with your words.” This phrase occurs in Scriptures only once, after the Sin of the Spies and the subsequent rebellion of the people. But the verse here alludes to Moses’ second period of isolation to obtain forgiveness after the sin of the golden calf.(Exodus 32,30.) That quote is Rashi’s own words, for on the seventeenth of Tammus during the first year of the Exodus Moses returned up to the Mountain in order to obtain forgiveness for the sin of the golden calf. The spies had not been dispatched until the twenty ninth day of Sivan in the second year of their wanderings.

כראשונה, “as originally;” this word does not refer to the word: “I prostrated myself;” it could not have done, as he had not previously asked G-d to forgive the sin of the golden calf. It simply refers to a period of forty days and forty nights. Moses makes the point that he had had to stay on the Mountain without food or drink twice on two separate occasions. This had occurred the first time when he had ascended the Mountain of the seventh day of Sivan in order to obtain the first set of commandments. The second 40-day period to secure the forgiveness for the sin of the golden calf commenced on the eighteenth day of Tammus, and he returned at the beginning of the twenty ninth day of the month of Av. During those 40 days he did not ascend the mountain but prayed in his own tent, the one he had erected outside the camp, [as G-d had made Himself inaccessible to prayer inside the confines of the camp, as I have explained in my commentary on Exodus 32,11].

גם בפעם ההיא, “also on that occasion.” He had already prayed for them at the sea of reeds, (Exodus 14,15) at Marah (15,25) and at Massah.(Exodus 17,4)

ואת חטאתכם, “and your sin;” the golden calf (IbnEzra)

דק לעפר, fine as dust; the letter ל in this word has a semivowel, sh’va na.

ובתבערה and at Taveyrah; this is a reference to Taveyrah, also known as kivrat hataavah, the burial ground of the greedy ones, where thousands had died for eating too much meat for too long. (Numbers 11,3.) Seeing that this place had two names, Moses mentions both of them.

ואתנפל לפני ה, “I threw myself down before the Lord;” according to Rashi, these are the same forty days of which Moses had spoken already in verse 18. His proof is that he himself wrote: “the forty days and nights,” i.e. the ones referred to already.

ואמר ה, Moses uses G-d’s attribute spelled with the letters aleph dalet.

אל קשי העם הזה, ”to the stubbornness of this people.” The letter ק in the word קשי, has the semi vowel sh’va na.

ומשנאתו אותם, “or because of His hatred for them;” the letter ו at the beginning of the word ומשנאתו is to be understood as if the Torah had written: או, “or.” We have numerous occasions where the letter ו means “or,” for instance in Exodus 12,5: מן הכבשים, “or from amongst the sheep;” or in Exodus 21,17: ומכה אביו ואמו, “or if someone strikes his father or his mother,” to mention just a few.