Comentario citado sobre Isaías 5:12

and...a drum Heb. תפת, like תּוֹף, a drum.

ושמרתם ועשיתם כי היא חכמתכם ובינתכם לעיני העמים, “You shall safeguard it and perform it, for it (the Torah’s laws) are what the nations perceive as your wisdom and discernment.” The verse teaches first and foremost that all the commandments only come into their own when being performed. Their integrity has to be safeguarded (against reformers) and their substance has to be carried out (when they are positive commandments) or performed by not violating them (in the case of negative commandments). All the worthwhile activities in the world are automatically part of one or more of the Torah’s commandments. The discipline of healing is part of a commandment seeing the Torah tells us that if we listen carefully to its commandments and perform all its statutes and refrain from violating them we will not experience disease, etc., (compare Exodus 15,26) “seeing the Lord is your Healer.” The message is clear: Torah observance=preventive medicine. The same applies to all other scientific disciplines.
Our sages in Shabbat 75 understand the words לעיני העמים in our verse as a reference to the people (astronomers, mathema-titians) who can calculate the movements and timing of the stars in their respective orbits. They go so far as to say that if someone possesses this knowledge and neglects to use it (for the benefit of mankind) he becomes the target of the verse in Isaiah 5,12: “they refuse to acknowledge the work of the Lord and refuse to see His accomplishments.”

ויאכלו, “they ate.” The plain meaning of the text is that the subject of the word are those who were in the habit of eating, i.e. Ishmael and the other members of Avraham’s household. We encounter something similar in Isaiah 5,12 והיה כנור ונבל תף וחליל ויין משתיהם “and their banquets consisted of lyre and lute, timbrel and flute and wine;” it is obvious that people do not drink musical instruments such as the ones mentioned in that verse, but that these instruments provide only background music to the banquet whereas the wine is fit to drink.
A Midrashic approach: The word ויאכלו is not to be understood literally (Bereshit Rabbah 48,14); the angels appeared to eat seeing that the meat was the first thing to disappear. This was not unlike Judges 6,21 in an incident involving Gideon. We are told there: וישלח מלאך ה' את קצה המשענת אשר בידו ויגע בבשר ובמצות, ותעל האש מן הצור ותאכל את הבשר ואת המצות, “The angel of the Lord held out the staff that was in his hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened bread with its tip. A fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread.” The term אכילה, “eating, consuming,” is applied to matters which disappear. A classic example of such use of the word is found in Deut. 32,42 וחרבי תאכל בשר, “my sword will consume flesh.” Another such example is also found in Deut. 7,16 ואכלת את כל העמים, “you will consume all the nations, etc..”