Tafsiran yang Mengutip untuk Yesaya 48:21

We should reflect on the fact that at the burning bush the miracles which occurred were performed by the attribute of Justice, to wit that Moses’ staff turned into a serpent (as a punishment for his making an inappropriate remark about the faith of the Jewish people). Moses’ hand turned white as a result of his suffering the skin affliction known as tzoraat surely also a miracle orchestrated by the attribute of Justice. Water turning into blood was certainly also a manifestation of the attribute of Justice at work. Our sages in the Midrash and the Talmud (Shemot Rabbah 3,19) are on record that originally “the sela dripped blood,” i.e. that when Moses hit the rock it first produced blood instead of water. This may also be the source of Psalms 78,20 speaking of ”here he struck the rock and water flowed.” The word ויזובו used by the psalmist to describe the flow is one that does not usually describe water flowing but blood flowing (compare Leviticus 15,25).
Although Moses himself did not even hint at such a thing in his various references to this episode, we do find allusions to it in the writings of the prophets a well as in the hagiographa. Assaph alluded to it in Psalms 78,20. Isaiah 48,21 hinted at it when he wrote both the word הזיל and the word ויזובו מים in the same verse referring to the same event. (“He made water flow for them from the rock, He cleaved the rock and water gushed forth”). Psalms 114,8 also suggests that the blood turned into water (the word אגם, “a pond,” has the same numerical value as דם, blood). Seeing that the sin of Moses and Aaron involved the צור, another term for the word הארץ in Genesis, their punishment was denial of entry into the ארץ. [Compare our translation to Genesis 6,6 about the kabbalistic approach to G’d being saddened at the need to bring on the deluge. Ed.].

ונתן מימיו, “it will yield its waters.” The Torah should have simply written ונתן מים, “it will yield water.” What is the meaning of the suffix “its?” Had the Torah not written the suffix we might have concluded that there was water beneath the rock which had been freed through Moses’ addressing it, moving it by giving it an order to move. This would not have been a special miracle. The Torah therefore reports that Moses was instructed to release water from the rock itself merely by giving such a command in the name of Hashem. Another way of looking at this suffix is that the potential of this rock producing water goes back to the six days of creation. Now G’d had seen fit to activate this potential. Our sages in Avot 5,6 already mentioned that the well of Miriam was one of the things created at dusk on the sixth day to be activated when the occasion would arise. Seeing that the word מימיו, “its waters,” allows people to think that perhaps the waters of this rock were natural, the Torah had to emphasize “you will produce waters for them out of the rock.” The Torah also chose the expression הוצאה because it is usually associated with supernatural events. When G’d told Avraham that He had taken him out of the fire of the Chaldeans (Genesis 15,7) saying אשר הוצאתיך מאור כשדים, He referred to the miracle of saving him from the furnace of Nimrod. When G’d referred to having taken Israel out of Egypt, He also used the expression הוצאתיך (Exodus 20,2). He referred to the miracles associated with the Exodus. Isaiah 48,21 is similar in nature where the prophet referred to צור to stress the miraculous nature of what occurred. The words והוצאת להם מים indicate that whole rivers of water flowed from the rock seeing that otherwise it would have been impossible for several million Israelites to drink water from that rock as well as to water their beasts. Psalms 78,16 makes this point clear when referring to the event in a second verse: “He brought forth streams from a rock and made them flow down like a river.”