No, I’m not referring to the very funny scene in “The History of the World – Part one” where Mel Brooks, dressed as Moses, drops one of three tablets he is holding as he proclaims, “The Lord has given unto you, these fifteen (breaks tablet) … Ten! Ten Commandments for all to obey.”
The commandments were initially given verbally to Moses but on yet another trip he made up and down Mount Sinai (I count eight!) the Lord says in Exodus 24 verse 12 “Come up to me on the mountain and stay here, and I will give you the tablets of stone with the law and commandments I have written for their instruction.”
Moses stays a full 40 days receiving detailed instructions for everything from garments to incense to the tabernacle. The people below grow tired of waiting and commission his brother Aaron to make a tangible god, a golden calf (idol) which angers the Lord. Moses successfully intervenes asking the Lord to not destroy them for their behavior, but instead confronts his brother for allowing them to sin. Moses smashes the original (two-sided – Ex 32:15) tablets, burns the calf, then mixes the ashes into water which he makes the sinners drink (blech!). After 3000 of his people are killed by their own people, a plague further ravages the Israelites for this heinous sin. So, were there two sets of tablets?
Conclusion; True! Later in Exodus 34 the Lord says to Moses “Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke”. Moses stays another 40 days with the Lord and later descends with his face literally glowing after his encounter. He wears a veil for fear of scaring the people.
Where did the tablets end up? Hebrews 9:4 records the disposition of the tablets as resting in the Ark of the Covenant stating “having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron’s staff that budded, and the tablets of the covenant.” Where is the Ark today? I believe it is in a warehouse in Washington, or so says the ending of a famous Indiana Jones documentary!