בחמשה עשר יום לחודש השני, this was the day when they ran out of the unleavened bread they had flung over their shoulders as dough when they left Egypt.

'ביד ה, a kind of death described in Job 5,26 as בכלח אלי קבר, “coming to the grave in ripe old age,” not from hunger.

על סיר הבשר, the word על here means “next to,” as it does in Numbers 2,20 ועליו מטה מנשה, “and next to him the tribe of Menashe.”

ויצא העם ולקטו דבר יום ביומו, even if it had been a man’s intention to collect what he perceived to be a large quantity (far more than the appropriate amount) it would turn out to be no more than was required for each day. This is what is described in verse 18, that when they measured it after returning to their respective tents they found that each person had returned to his tent with the daily ration of an omer multiplied by the number of people in his immediate family.

למען אנסנו, the trial consisted in the fact that the people had to look to G’d on a daily basis for their immediate food supplies. This experience would bring home to them that on the one hand they could rely on G’d, and on the other hand, as stated in Deuteronomy 8,3 such a lesson was only learned when, even briefly, for a day, they had been “starved” by G’d.

והכינו, they are to prepare (ahead of time, on the Friday) by baking, cooking, or whatever, their needs for the Sabbath as outlined in verse 23.

והיה משנה, it will prove to be double even though you have found and brought home a single omer per person in your tent. On the sixth day of the week they will find twice the amount.

כי ה' הוציא אתכם, not as you claimed or thought that Aaron and I took you out of Egypt.

'ובקר וראיתם את כבוד ה, when He will make bread rain down for you in the morning.

וידעתם כי אני ה' אלוקיכם, Who has taken you out of Egypt.

ותעל שכבת הטל, which covered the manna from above. It is in the nature of dew to rise toward the atmosphere as the air gets thinner after sunrise.

מחספס, a word appearing only here. It has to be understood in its context, “tiny crystals like hoary frost.”

ויאמרו איש אל אחיו מן הוא, seeing that they did not know what it was; this is also the interpretation offered by Dunash in a book called “answers of Dunash,’ aimed at the commentary of Menachem, arguing that the end of the verse proves that this must be the meaning.

I say that the meaning of the words מן הוא is simply: “whose is it?” Seeing that this is an Egyptian expression, and in that tongue the meaning of מן is the same as the meaning of מה “what,” in Hebrew, the reason why Moses used the Egyptian term is simply because there was no comparable Hebrew word for that phenomenon. It is not so out of character for the Torah when quoting people, to describe what they said in the language in which it was said. Examples are: Genesis 31,47 where the words יגר שהדותא for the monument erected by Lavan and called Galed by Yaakov, is repeated verbatim in the local language Lavan spoke. When, in the Book of Esther 3,7 we read about a פור, which means “lots” in English, but is the Persian equivalent, this reflects what was familiar to people in that region and at that time. Esther and Mordechai did not have to use this Persian term at all. All they had to write was what they did write in explaining the meaning of the word, i.e. הוא הגורל, “that is the lot.” After all, the entire Book of Esther with the exception of a couple of words is written in Hebrew. However, if the Book of Esther had not first mentioned the word פור we would not have understood why the festival was called פורים. The word מן therefore is quite understandable in light of the circumstances.

וילקטו, at random, without measuring any of it.

וימודו, after they had come home. The construction of the word וימודו from the root מדד is similar to the word ויסובו, they circled, from the root סבב.

ויגידו למשה, what they had found, i.e. that each of them had found double the usual ration. Moses had been told this by G’d already on the first day, but had withheld this information up until now.

'ויאמר אליהם הוא אשר דבר ה, already on the first day, but I did not tell you about it. Moses had deliberately waited until they would express their amazement at the phenomenon of a double portion on Friday in order to be able to explain to them that this was all in honour of the forthcoming Sabbath.

אפו, actually, the letter א in אפו should have been written with a chataf segol just as in אכל, echol, from the root אכל, or emor, from the root אמר. This would have been a normal imperative mode. However, seeing that the tone-sign does not link it to the word following, this resulted in the vowel tzeyre, a longer sounding vowel, instead of the chataf segol we would have expected. I have not really found any other parallel of this construction in the Bible other than the word heyvu in Hoseah 4,18 אהבו הבו קלון מגיניה , “they love beyond measure-disgrace is the gift.”[a reproof to the priests who demanded too much from the people. Ed.]

ולא הבאיש, even the worms which would normally become manifest in short order. לא היתה בו, did not materialise on it.

לא יהיה בו, on the manna.

וישבתו העם, from that day onwards the people made it a rule to observe rest ביום השביעי, every seventh day.

וטעמו כצפיחית. Later on in Numbers 11,8 the Torah describes the taste of the manna as like לשד השמן, some kind of cake made with a lot of oil. Our Rabbis (Yuma 75) explain that to children it tasted like wafers smeared with honey, whereas to the elderly it tasted like these oily cakes.

כצפיחית בדבש. Like walnuts before they have been ground when they taste sweet. In Numbers, when the Torah describes the manna as being ground in a mill or being treated in a variety of other ways, its oily taste would come to the fore. Nuts yield their oil as a result of grinding or pounding just as do olives. This is the reason why here the Torah describes וטעמו וגו', whereas in Numbers the Torah writes והיה טעמו, the word והיה alluding to the change in the taste after grinding it. That is when it began to taste more oily. כצפיחית, the letter כ at the beginning, meaning similar to, suggests that there is no other phenomenon in the universe which tasted exactly like the manna. The word צפחת מים in Samuel I 26,11 is a vessel, has nothing to do with the word צפיחית.

גד, a round globular shaped legume, similar to the seed of coriander

לבן, Coriander seed is not white, whereas the manna is described as such. This is why the Torah adds another description in Numbers 11,7, i.e. bdellium.

ויאמר משה אל אהרן, Moses said this to Aaron only after the Sanctuary had been built and inaugurated, i.e. at least about 11 months later. Until then there had not been a Holy Ark.

לפני העדות, in front of the Holy Ark.

אל קצה ארץ כנען, compare Joshua 5,12 where the cessation of the manna is described as occurring on the day following the Passover, three days after crossing of the river Jordan.