Комментарий к Бамидбар 15:32

ויהיו ... במדבר וימצאו AND [WHEN THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL] WERE IN THE DESERT, THEY FOUND [A MAN THAT PICKED UP WOOD ON THE SABBATH DAY] — (This must mean when they first came into the wilderness, and) Scripture is speaking here to the disparagement of the Israelites viz., that they kept the first Sabbath only, for on the second this man came and desecrated it (Sifrei Bamidbar 113).

He placed next to this section the subject of the man who gathered sticks [on the Sabbath day] because it happened at this time, after the incident of the spies — this in accordance with the plain meaning of Scripture. And this is the meaning of [the phrase], and while the children of Israel were in the wilderness,²¹⁶Verse 32. for it was because the people tarried there on account of the above-mentioned decree, that this event happened. Afterwards He commanded the precept of Tzitzith (Fringes) in order that they would remember through it all the commandments, and not forget the Sabbath [as did the man who gathered the sticks], or any of the other Commandments.
Now the reason why Tzitzith have this [power of] reminding one of all the commandments is, as Rashi wrote,²¹⁷In Verse 39. because the total numerical value of the letters of the [Scriptural] word tzitzith is six hundred, and together with the eighth threads and five knots, you have six hundred and thirteen [corresponding to taryag, the six hundred and thirteen commandments]. But I have not understood this, for the word tzitzith in the Torah is written without a [second] yod,²¹⁸It is written with these letters: tzade = 90, yod = 10, tzade = 90, tav = 400. The sum total is thus 590 [and not 600 as Rashi wrote]. so the total numerical value is only five hundred and ninety! Moreover, the number of threads [to be used for each of the Fringes] in the opinion of the school of Hillel²¹⁹Menachoth 41b. is only three [which, when passed through the hole at the corner form six threads — not eight, as Rashi mentioned], and the knots by law of the Torah [need only] be two; as the Rabbis have said:²²⁰Ibid., 39a. See Vol. III, pp. 298-9, Notes 116-19, where this whole text of the Talmud is fully explained. “You must deduce from this that the upper knots in the Fringes are required by Scriptural law. For if you should think that they are not obligatory by Scriptural law, why then did the Torah have to state a [special] permission to use mingled stuff [of wool and linen] in Fringes! Do we not accept as the established law that if one joins two pieces together with only one stitch, it is not considered joined?”
Rather, the remembrance [of the commandments] is through the blue thread, which alludes to the all-inclusive attribute, which is bakol²²¹See Vol. I, pp. 290-291. and which is the aim of All. Therefore He said, that ye may look upon it, and remember ‘kol’ (all),²²²Verse 39 here. — And since Kol (All) is the all-inclusive attribute it therefore contains all the commandments of the Eternal, and hence the Rabbis have said that the commandment of Tzitzith is of equal importance to the total number of the commandments (Beiur Ha’lvush to Ricanti, quoting the text of Ramban). which is the commandments of the Eternal. This is why the Rabbis said:²²³Menachoth 43b. “[Why was blue chosen rather than any other color?] Because blue resembles the sea, the sea resembles heaven, and heaven resembles the Throne of Glory, etc.” The likeness is in the name,²²⁴Since the word t’cheileth contains in it the word kol (all) it alludes by its very name to that all-inclusive attribute of Kol. as also in the shade of the color which is the termination of all colors [and which leads one from the blue in the Fringes to the blue of the sea etc., and finally to think of Him Who is on high], for in the distance all colors appear to be that shade. That is why it is called t’cheileth [which is also suggestive of the word tachlith (termination) since this is the end of all colors].

ויהיו בני ישראל במדבר, While the children of Israel were in the desert, etc. Why did the Torah have to let us know that the children of Israel were in the desert? This may be understood in conjunction with what we learned in Shabbat 96. Rav Yehudah is quoted as saying that the sin of the person collecting the firewood consisted of his carrying it a distance of 4 cubits in the public domain. We have aslo learned in Shabbat 6 that a Seratya or a Platyah i.e. a camp or a busy highway, constitute a public domain. The Talmud asks there why the Baraitha which mentioned the examples of a camp or busy highway did not include a desert as a further example of a public domain? Abbaye answered that this was not really an appropriate question as the desert constituted a public domain only while the Israelites (600,000 plus) marched through the desert, whereas the Baraitha was concerned with conditions at the time. Rashi comments on this as follows: "In those days the desert was considered a public domain whereas in our time it is not considered an area traversed by many people. When a Baraitha did mention that a desert may also be a public domain this is based on the assumption that the desert once more became a route used by multitudes of people on a regular basis."