Комментарий о цитате к Рут 1:16

ולא אפגע אדם And I shall not accept the intercession of any man.⁶A. V., And I will not meet thee as a man. פגע means to entreat; comp. אל תפגעי בי entreat me not (Ruth 1:16); when פגע is constructed with the preposition ב, then the noun, to which the ב is prefixed, is the object to the verb.⁷I. E. thus distinguishes between פגע governing the accusative, and פגע being followed by the preposition ב; the former has the meaning to accept the prayer of or to be entreated by, the latter: to entreat. In the former case the noun governed by the verb פגע is in reality הפועל, the one that acts (that entreats), in the other case הפעול the object. Some render the meaning of this sentence in the following way: I shall not take vengeance on thee, and I shall not meet a man (comp. ויפגעו and they met, Ex. 5:20) sc. standing in my way, or telling me not to do it, or I shall not meet a man, whom 1 should not cause joy by this.⁸It can hardly be seen, how the reader could supply from the context, or from the signification of the verb פגע to meet, the relative sentence whom I should not cause joy by this, and it is very improbable that the prophet, if he had this sentence in his mind, should have dropped it, leaving it to the sagacity of the reader or hearer to supply it.

They also claim that the phrase when brothers dwell together denotes close relatives, but not actual brothers. They bring the case of Boaz [cf. Ruth 3: 9 ; Ruth 3: 13] as evidence. This is vacuous, however, because no mention is made there of the word yibbum [here translated as “acting as the husband’s brother” — Translator], only of “redemption” [cf. Leviticus 25: 25]. Besides, what, then, is the meaning of the word together ? That they live in the same country? In the same courtyard? That they are fond of each other? The Dissenters claim further that the Scriptural usage of the term act as her husband’s brother proves that she is his brother’s wife in name only, but not in fact, as in the phrase “your brother’s wife has returned” [Ruth 1: 16]. But they have stumbled into error. Note that regarding the sons of Y ǝ hudah, Scripture explicitly says, “act as her husband’s brother” [Genesis 38: 8], although there he clearly already was her husband’s brother. Even the abovementioned use of the word “your brother’s wife” can be understood on the grounds that the two women were married to two brothers. Every sensible person knows that, although the prohibitions that were told to Moshe were not forbidden beforehand, if someone before the time of Moshe refrained from engaging in such actions he would not have displeased God . Scripture even states, “for the men of the land who preceded you practiced all these abominations” [Leviticus 18: 27], and yet we have no evidence that any prophet had ever admonished them against such actions. With respect to Onan Scripture specifically says that he did not “provide progeny for his brother” [Genesis 38: 9] and consequently “it was evil in the sight of God ” [Genesis 38: 10]. For these reasons, we will rely on the tradition that actual brothers are meant here.

ופגעו לי — This phrase signifies entreaty, as (Ruth 1:16) “Do not entreat (תפגעי) me”.