פירוש על בראשית 47:13

ולחם אין בכל הארץ AND THERE WAS NO BREAD IN ALL THE LAND — Scripture reverts now to the original subject, viz, to the account of the beginning of the years of famine.

ותלה, similar to the word ותכה in Job 17,7 ותכה מכעס עיני, where it means: ”my eyes fail from vexation.” The letter ה is part of the root, this is why it has the mappik, similar to נגה אור in Job 22,28.in the word נגה. [indicates the letter is not a pronoun. Ed.]

ולחם אין…כי כבד הרעב מאד, there was no bread…because the famine was very severe, etc. The Torah informs us of the psychology of hunger. During a famine people have a tendency to eat inordinate amounts of food thus causing their reserves of food to be depleted prematurely. The author describes a personal experience of famine in the country he lived in where a person ate ten times the amount of food he would eat normally and still felt hungry.

ותלה, a word describing mental disturbance, Famine has that impact on people. The dagesh in the first root letter also indicates that meaning, compare Proverbs 26,18 כמתלהלה היורה זקים, “like a madman who throws firebrands.”

Returns to the beginning of the account... I.e., to the first year. [Rashi knows this] because the famine ceased when Yaakov came to Egypt, as Rashi soon explains [see v. 19]. Perforce, our verse goes back to before Yaakov came to Egypt.

ותלה, das Land verging, ermattete, rad. להה, verwandt mit לאה, kraftlos werden. לאה ist wohl die Wurzel von {לא, der logischen Negation, der Verneinung eines Seins, unterschieden von אל, der sittlichen Negation, der Verneinung eines Wollens und Sollens. לאה ist der Übergang aus dem Sein in das Nichtsein, das Schwinden der Kräfte.

ותלה AND FAINTED — This is the same as ותלאה, it means to be wearied, as the Targum renders it. Another example of the root is (Proverbs 26:18) “Like one fatigued who casteth fire-brands”.

ארץ מצרים וארץ כנען, however, people living further away than the people of Canaan did not come to Egypt to buy their food there. Either the journey was too long and tedious, or the famine was not as severe in their countries.

Similar to this is: כמתלהלה who shoots firebrands. I.e., the ה of כמתלהלה is in place of א, as the letters א–ה–ו–י are interchangeable.