Comentário sobre Isaías 59:10

in dark places Heb. בָּאַשְׁמַנִּים. Menahem (Machbereth, p. 35) interpreted it as an expression of dark places, and most exegetes concur with him. Dunash, however, (Tesuhvoth Dunash, p. 93) interprets it as an expression of fat (שׁוּמָן), with the ‘alef’ prefixed to it like the ‘alef’ that is in (Job 13:17) אַחְוָתִי, “my narrative,” [derived from חוה]; and that is in (Jer. 15:18) אַכְזָב, “a failure,” (derived from כזב ; and (Num. 21:1) “the way of the spies (הָאֲתָרִים),” [derived from תור]. Here, too, among the שְׁמֵנִים, among the lusty living, we are like dead. And Jonathan rendered it as an expression of locking: It is locked before us as the graves are locked before the dead.

נגששה We grope. It is hap. leg. Some connect it with גוש a clod (Job 7:5).⁸Or rather the reverse, connect גוש with גשש. The fundamental meaning seems to be to touch, to feel; from this is derived גוש clod, that is, some substantial thing that is felt. Comp. Ges. Lex., sub voce גוש.

At noon day as in the night, that is, as if it were in the evening. It is a figurative expression.

באשמנים. Some say that it means in graves;^8aComp. Targ. Jonathan: מתיא אתאחד באפנא כמה דאחידין קבריא באפי The door closes before us, as the graves close to the dead.—R. Joseph Kimchi explains likewise באשמנים in graves; he derives the word from the root שמם═אשם to be desolate, with a paragogic נ. but it is equally admissible to explain it, at noon,⁹The opposite is said by some commentators, namely, that באשמנים means the same as במחשכים in darkness; this explanation is probably based on a comparison of this phrase with the verse He hath set me in dark places (במחשכים), as they that be dead of old (Lam. 3:6). צהרים in the Hebrew text is perhaps a corruption of חשכים. or, amongst the living.^9aבאשמנים being considered to be the opposite of כמתים as dead men, as in the preceding phrase בצהרים at noonday is the opposite of כנשף in the night. or, considering the א to be prosthetic, among the fat ones, that is, the heathen people.¹⁰The Israelites, while in exile, and deprived of liberty and independence, among successful and prospering people, compare themselves to dead persons among the living.