Komentarz do Wyjścia 16:11

וידבר ה׳ אל משה לאמור. G'd told Moses to say: It is difficult to understand why the Torah writes לאמור in verse 11 when G'd had not yet completed the instructions He gave to Moses. The word לאמור in verse 12 would have been perfectly adequate.

V. 11. Alles, was Mosche und Aaron bis jetzt zum Volke geredet hatten, war nur Vorbereitung auf dieses Gotteswort, damit sie es in dem rechten Sinne auffassen und daraus die beabsichtigte Belehrung schöpfen mögen.

וידבר ה' אל משה, “Hashem spoke to Moses; actually we have been told this already in verse 4. [This may have been repeated as Moses and Aaron had not immediately included what G-d had said concerning the manna on Friday being a double portion. Therefore here we have a stronger command, Hashem being quoted as וידבר instead of the softer ויאמר, Ed.]

We may have to explain this by remembering what we learned in Yuma 4 according to which one must not reveal anything one has been told by anyone unless given specific permission to do so. Accordingly, when G'd said: "I have heard, etc." these were G'd's words to Moses, and as such Moses would not have had permission to reveal them to anyone unless he was given permission to do so. The word לאמור in verse 11 was that permission. Permitting someone to reveal something does not mean a directive to do so. When G'd wanted to ensure that Moses used this permission to reveal his conversation with Him, G'd had to instruct him to do so. Hence we find in verse 12: דבר אליהם, "speak to them," that Moses was to relate those parts of the conversation between himself and G'd which had a direct bearing on the Israelites' activities. The first לאמור indicated merely permission to say something, whereas the לאמור in verse 12 introduces things Moses was obligated to communicate to the Israelites. This is also the reason there is a subtle change in the manner G'd speaks of the Israelites. Whereas prior to the instructions דבר אליהם, G'd spoke about the Israelites, from that moment on He addresses them (תאכלו not יאכלו) even while speaking through Moses. Moses was to first address the Israelites, i.e. דבר אליהם telling them what G'd had said to him, namely that He had heard the complaints of the Israelites. He was not to tell them the part about his being G'd's messenger. The second message Moses was to relate, the one introduced by the word לאמור, concerned the fact that the Israelites would eat meat on the evening of that day. The word לאמור was necessary although it followed דבר אליהם to ensure that Moses would tell the Israelites this in the name of G'd. The whole sequence then means: "tell the Israelites that I am telling them 'you will eat meat by evening.'" In this instance the word לאמור replaces the normal expression כה אמר השם. The concluding words of the verse: כי אני השם אלוקיכם, are justified then. Had it not been not for the word לאמור one could have assumed that Moses promised the meat on his own authority.