ציטירנדיקער פּירוש אויף תהילים 32:4

VV. 7 u. 8. והמן וגו׳. Dieser scheinbar berechtigten Klage gegenüber berichtet der Text Eigentümlichkeiten des Manna, die den Ungrund dieser Klage darzutun geeignet sein mögen. Er war כזרע גד וגו׳, dem Auge schön, כורע גד (siehe Schmot 16, 31) nach Joma 75a עגול כגידא ולבן כמרגלית, rund und perlweiß. Vergleichen wir die Stellen, in welchen sonst noch עין den Eindruck bezeichnet, den die Farbe eines Gegenstandes auf das Auge macht, so scheint dies durchweg bei glänzenden Gegenständen vorzukommen. כעין הקדח הנורא ,כעין תרשיש ,בעין נחשת קלל (Ezech. 1 u. 10), und wenn בדלה nach Raschi Krystall ist, so dürfte damit seine Durchsichtigkeit bezeichnet sein (siehe zu Schmot 16, 14). – שטו העם: nicht ganz mühelos, als Frucht einer Tätigkeit und zwar, wie das שטו, nach verschiedenen Richtungen hin streifend, andeutet, einer Abwechselung bietenden Tätigkeit, erlangten sie das Manna. Dies gehört zur geistigen Würze. וטחנו ברחים usw. fein zermahlen, grob gestoßen, gekocht oder gebacken, gewährte das Manna durch Verschiedenheit der Bereitung hinreichende Abwechselung. – לשד kommt nur noch Ps. 32, 4 נהפך לשדי vor, wo es die Feuchtigkeit, die Säfte des Körpers bedeutet. Demgemäss scheint es auch hier die Fettigkeit des Öls, die Ölschmelze zu bezeichnen. Schmot 16, 31 wird der Geschmack des Manna beschrieben: כצפיחית בדבש (siehe daselbst). Hier heißt es nicht: ,וטעמו וגו׳ sondern: והיה ,טעמו וגו׳ und wäre dies nach רשב׳׳ם Erläuterung daher der Geschmack, den es durch Kochen und Backen erlangte, während jenes seinen Geschmack in rohem Zustande vergegenwärtigt.

לשד, all of it the substance, no part of it refuse, waste. The expression occurs in Psalms 32,4 נהפך לשדי בחרבוני קיץ סלה, “my vigor waned as in a summer drought.” On this verse, Rashi describes this as “my moisture dried up as when figs become dry.”

Most foods lend themselves to one method of preparation for eating it. If a new method is tried this food will often not be tasty. Not so with the manna. This food was amenable to all known ways of preparing food and it would be equally tasty. It would be at least as tasty as baked goods made with dough kneaded with oil. The Torah quotes this example to contrast it with what some of the people had said, i.e. “our soul is dried out” (from eating manna, verse 6). The Torah provides objective rather than subjective yardsticks. According to the Torah’s description it would be impossible for a person to “dry out” from dough which contained both oil and honey. According to one opinion the word לשד is an acronym of the three words לישת שמן דבש, “something kneaded from oil and honey.” According to another opinion the letter ל in the words לשד השמן is part of the root of the word לשד. We find that word in Psalms 32,4 לשדי בחרבוני קיץ, “my vital juices in the summer drought.” Applied to our verse it would mean that far from dehydrating a person the manna would do the reverse as it tasted like something soaked in oil. The word השמן as opposed to merely שמן, suggests that this was the highest quality oil.
In this verse you will find an interesting allusion if you take one letter each from the words העם ולקטו וטחנו ברחים או and ending with the word השמן, yielding מטטרו-ן, the name of the angel running the universe on behalf of G’d and responsible for rainfall, i.e. ממטיר which is mentioned in connection with the מן. The word שטו is an allusion to the “employer” of Mattatron who sends him to “roam” (לשוט) over earth in his efforts to discharge his duties.

לשד השמן [AND ITS TASTE WAS AS THE TASTE OF] — לשד השמן i. e. moisture of oil. Thus did Dunash ibn Labrat explain it. Similar to it is, (Psalms 32:4) נהפך לשדי בחרבוני קיץ, where the ל in the word לשד is a root-letter, the meaning being: “my sap (לשדי) is turned by the drought of summer”. Our Rabbis (Sifrei Bamidbar 89) explained it as meaning “breasts’ (i. e. just as the suckling imbibes, so to speak, every possible flavor with the mother-milk. so the Israelites found all flavors in the manna; cf. Sifrei), but really the subject of “breasts” has nothing to do with oil. One cannot, however, in order to justify the explanation of our Rabbis say that השמן in לשד השמן has a meaning similar to (Deuteronomy 32:15) וישמן ישורון, “But Jeshurun waxed fat (וישמן)” (when the meaning would be: “And the taste of it was similar to that of a fat breast”), for then the מ ought to be punctuated with Kametz (our Tséré: הַשָּׁמֵן) and the accent ought to be on the last syllable, beneath the מ. Now, however, that the מ is punctuated with Patach Katon (our Segol) and the accent is on the ש, it can only have a sense connected with שמן “oil”. As to the ש which is punctuated with Kametz Gadol (שָׁמן) and not with Segol (since the noun “oil” is שֶׁמן,) this is so because the word is at the end of the verse (and in the pausal form שֶׁמֶן becomes שָׁמֶן). — Another explanation is that לשד is an acrostic of ליש, “kneading”, שמן “oil”, דבש “honey”, i. e. that the manna was like “dough kneaded with oil, and smeared with honey” (קטף literally means “to tear”, and when used of dough it means “to tear a lump of dough into pieces for which purpose the kneader moistens his hands with some liquid; here with honey) (Sifrei Bamidbar 89). The rendering of Onkelos who translates the phrase by דליש במשחא, “[as the taste] of dough with oil”, inclines to the meaning given by Dunash, because dough which is kneaded with oil has in it some moisture of oil.