Commento su Genesi 50:3

וימלאו לו [AND FORTY DAYS] WERE FULFILLED — They (the physicians) completed the days of embalming until forty days were completed for him.

ויבכו אותו מצרים, not only out of respect for Joseph and because of his decree of public mourning, but also because he was revered for his name Yisrael and what this name stood for. He deserved the same respect as royalty.

שבעים יום . Forty days were spent embalming his body and thirty days of weeping for the absence of this man henceforth. We find that both Moses and Aaron were mourned for 30 days (Numbers 20,29 and Deuteronomy 34 8) The difference was that Moses and Aaron were mourned after they had been buried, whereas Yaakov was mourned prior to his interment. This was permissible as the embalming procedure was equated with a kind of burial. During all these days the Egyptians wept out of respect for the feelings of Joseph. According to a view quoted by Rashi, the Egyptians also mourned him, being aware that this man had been able to arrest the famine five years before it had run its predetermined course. This concludes the manuscripts available of the Redak’s commentary on the Torah. We are all impoverished when reflecting on much has been lost of his commentary.

שבעים יום, “for seventy days.” Forty days embalming followed by thirty days of mourning.

They completed the days of his embalming until forty days. Rashi is answering the question: [Why does it say וימלאו?] The term מלוי (completion) applies only to a predetermined number, such as: “I will fill (אמלא) the number of your days” (Shemos 23:26), meaning the number of days apportioned to you. Similarly (25:24): “When her days of pregnancy were completed (וימלאו),” meaning the number of days apportioned for her pregnancy. There are many [other examples of this] in Scripture. But here, there was no predetermined number, so Rashi needed to add: “They completed the days of his embalming.” Their period for embalming was for a predetermined number of forty days, as Rashi goes on to say. Rashi says השלימו instead of וימלאו, to teach that this מילוי denotes “completion,” rather than denoting “full” which is the opposite of empty. (Re’m)

Im jüdischen Kreise beginnt die Trauer erst nach סתימת הגולל, nachdem die vorliegende Gottespflicht an der Leiche vollzogen ist. Allein da, wo das Begräbnis eigentlich gar nichts zu bedeuten hat, da für einbalsamirte Leichen es völlig gleichgilt, ob sie über der Erde oder in der Erde verharren, mochte auch schon die Trauer vor dem Begräbnis beginnen. Bemerken aber dürfen wir, dass Jakob von dem ägyptischen Volke beweint wurde.

ויבכו אותו מצרים, We find numerous words in the Torah where the prefix ב is missing. This is one of these words, and the phrase means: “Yaakov’s death was mourned with weeping in Egypt.”

ויבכו אתו מצרים שבעים יום AND THE EGYPTIANS WEPT FOR HIM THREESCORE AND TEN DAYS — viz., forty days during the period of embalming and thirty more days for mourning. They wept for him during so long a period because a blessing had come to them on his arrival in Egypt for the famine then ceased and the waters of the Nile again increased (Midrash Tanchuma, Nasso 26).

Forty days of the embalming period and thirty for mourning... [Rashi explains] that the seventy days of mourning are not in addition to the forty days mentioned here.

שבעים יום “for seventy days.” 40 of these days were spent embalming him, and the remaining thirty were official mourning. We also find that both Moses and Aaron were mourned for thirty days. Compare Numbers 20,20 and Deuteronomy, 34,8. A different interpretation of the “seventy days;” each of the direct descendants of Yaakov who had come to Egypt with him mourned him for one day each.

Because a blessing had come to them on account of him... [Rashi knows this] because otherwise, why did they weep? It could not have been to honor Yoseif, because a person cannot weep at will.