Chapter 78 is an extensive historical review: Asaf recounts Hashem's kindnesses to Israel from the Exodus from Egypt and the wilderness, set against the persistent chain of rebellion and ingratitude. In the passage before us, we stand at the turning point of the chapter: repentance that is not true repentance, and the attribute of mercy that nevertheless spreads its wings over a people whose heart is not whole.
Repentance of the Mouth and Not of the Heart
וַיְפַתּוּהוּ בְּפִיהֶם וּבִלְשׁוֹנָם יְכַזְּבוּ־לוֹ׃ וְלִבָּם לֹא־נָכוֹן עִמּוֹ וְלֹא נֶאֶמְנוּ בִּבְרִיתוֹ׃ - "Yet they flattered Him with their mouth, and lied to Him with their tongue. For their heart was not steadfast with Him, nor were they faithful to His covenant."
Rashi explains: They flattered Him with their mouths, but their hearts did not match their words. The heart and the mouth were not in harmony. Ibn Ezra derives a fundamental principle from this: Why is the central grievance that "their heart was not steadfast with Him"? Because the essence of prayer is the intention of the heart, and therefore a flaw in the heart is the primary deficiency.
This is like the story of a certain chassid whose Rebbe recognized that he was insincere, yet saw him beating forcefully upon his chest during prayers: "We have trespassed, we have dealt treacherously, we have robbed." The Rebbe said to him: Do not knock so hard - the master of the house is not home. He knocks and knocks, but the heart is not there; if you are not inside, on what are you knocking?
Why Hashem Still Forgives: For the Sake of the Onlookers
Radak explains that "their heart was not steadfast with Him" is the reason why, according to strict justice, Hashem should not have forgiven them at all, for everything depends on the intention of the heart. If so, why did He forgive them after all? For the sake of the onlookers. People see outward repentance and cannot discern what is in the heart; they do not know that this person's repentance is incomplete and not truly in his heart. If Hashem were not to forgive, people would say: Look, they repented and it did not help them, so why should it help me? Therefore, even though they were not faithful to His covenant, the Holy One, blessed be He, atones for iniquity and does not destroy, even though by the standard of truth they deserved destruction.
The Malbim's Explanation: They Thought He Did Not Know Thoughts
The Malbim explains why they reached a state where "their heart was not steadfast with Him": They believed that the Holy One, blessed be He, does not know their inner thoughts, and they therefore imagined that it was possible to deceive Him with speech. This is the meaning of the verse, "With its mouth and its lips it honors Me, but its heart is far from Me" - they sought to appease Him with words, thinking that what lies in the heart is not revealed before Him.
"And He Frequently Turned His Anger Away"
וְהוּא רַחוּם יְכַפֵּר עָוֺן וְלֹא־יַשְׁחִית וְהִרְבָּה לְהָשִׁיב אַפּוֹ וְלֹא־יָעִיר כָּל־חֲמָתוֹ׃ - "But He, being full of compassion, forgives iniquity and does not destroy; frequently He turns His anger away, and does not stir up all His wrath."
Rashi explains that "frequently" refers to the number of occurrences: many times Hashem turns His anger away, again and again. And what does it mean to "turn His anger away"? Even when the Holy One, blessed be He, exacts punishment from them, He does not punish with full fury, but rather turns His anger away and does not arouse all His wrath. Seemingly, once they were already deserving of retribution, it would have been fitting to stir up all His wrath; yet He only arouses it little by little.
The Malbim sharpens the distinction between af (anger) and cheimah (fury), as he has explained in several places: cheimah is the internal burning - "and his wrath burned within him"; whereas af is external, visible and apparent outward - "for a fire is kindled in My nostril." Therefore, even though the anger had already been put into action and the plague had already begun, the Holy One, blessed be He, extends abundant mercy to turn back the anger - that is, to recall it and halt the plague. But His fury He does not stir up at all, for if fury is aroused, it cannot be turned back, and it brings utter destruction. This is the meaning of "And Moses stood in the breach... to turn away His wrath from destroying," and this is why Chazal remarked, "Moses killed Cheimah" - there is, as it were, an angel of af and an angel of cheimah, and because the cheimah was not aroused, it was possible to turn back the af.
Radak offers another explanation of "and repeatedly / abundantly": it requires inner fortitude and an abundance of strength in the attribute of mercy to turn back divine anger. That is, it takes immense power and great intensity until Hashem turns back His anger. There are accusers and prosecuting angels, and against them Moshe Rabbeinu said, "Now, please, let the power of the Lord be great" - great power is needed to withstand the anger and the wrath, to stand against the accusers and prosecutors. Therefore, "and repeatedly": to multiply power and strength in order to halt the forces of destruction.
"And He remembered that they were but flesh"
וַיִּזְכֹּר כִּי־בָשָׂר הֵמָּה רוּחַ הוֹלֵךְ וְלֹא יָשׁוּב׃ - And He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes away and does not return.
Rashi explains that the Holy One, blessed be He, remembers the evil inclination embedded in their hearts, and that evil inclination is "a wind that passes away and does not return" - it will not return in the World to Come. When they rise again at the Resurrection of the Dead, the evil inclination will not return to rise with them: "He will swallow up death forever, and the Lord Hashem will wipe away tears from all faces," "They shall neither harm nor destroy on all My holy mountain" - there will no longer be any evil in the world. Hashem knows that all the evil within them now is temporary, stemming from the evil inclination, and when they are resurrected, that spirit will not return.
Why was Rashi compelled to adopt this interpretation? Because the plain meaning of the verse presents a serious difficulty: "They were but flesh, a spirit that passes away and does not return" - if understood literally, one would appear to deny the resurrection of the dead, for the soul is indeed destined to return to the flesh, as in the vision of the dry bones. Therefore, Rashi directs the verse to the evil inclination rather than to the human soul.
Radak also grapples with this difficulty. First, he explains: "And He remembered that they were but flesh" - and it is the nature of flesh to pursue bodily desires. As it were, Hashem says: I created them with this nature, and it is impossible for them not to sin; therefore, their iniquity must be atoned for. Furthermore, "a spirit that passes away and does not return" - their days are short, and they need atonement while they are still alive, as it is written, "And why do You not pardon my transgression and remove my iniquity? For now I shall lie down in the dust." Regarding the resurrection of the dead, Radak responds: in the natural order of things, the spirit does not return to the flesh once it has departed, and Scripture is speaking according to the laws of nature; the resurrection of the dead is not a natural occurrence, but one of the wonders that Hashem has performed and will perform by altering the order of nature.
The Malbim explains: Hashem remembered "that they were but flesh" - their very physical nature predisposes them to sin, for the flesh harbors physical desires, and it is the yeast in the dough that hinders spiritual growth. Furthermore, "a spirit that passes away and does not return" - this refers to the inner spirit, the faculty that conjures fantasies in the heart, the spirit of craving. For every desire begins in the imagination: a person imagines how delicious and enticing something will be, and only then does the sin occur. In truth, the sin itself is always far less satisfying than the fantasy - just as a pizza on the packaging and in restaurant photographs looks much better than it actually is. Why? Because the imagination is boundless and a person lets it run wild, whereas physical taste and reality are limited; thus, there is always disappointment when reality is measured against fantasy. And the Holy One, blessed be He, says: that imagining, lustful spirit departs with the death of the body and does not return - it will not return at the Resurrection of the Dead, for with the death of the body, that spirit of craving born of the flesh dies along with it.
"How often did they rebel against Him in the wilderness"
כַּמָּה יַמְרוּהוּ בַמִּדְבָּר יַעֲצִיבוּהוּ בִּישִׁימוֹן׃ - How often did they rebel against Him in the wilderness, and grieve Him in the wasteland!
"How often did they rebel against Him in the wilderness" - how many times they defied Hashem's word in the desert. The Malbim explains that beyond the sins mentioned earlier, this refers to outright defiance and rebellion: the episode of the Golden Calf, Korach, and Baal Peor.
"And grieve Him in the wasteland" is a distinct matter. A wasteland (yeshimon) is worse than a wilderness (midbar): a wilderness can sometimes be a sown land, as it says, "your following Me in the wilderness," followed by "in an unsown land" - implying that there is a wilderness that is sown and one that is unsown; but a yeshimon is an absolute desolation. The Malbim explains: "And grieve Him in the wasteland" - they grieved Hashem over the very circumstance of being in the wasteland. The lack of water, the lack of food, the lack of produce of the ground and fruit of the tree - all of these stemmed from being in a wasteland, and over these deprivations they complained, grieving Hashem for having brought them there.
"And they turned back and tested God"
וַיָּשׁוּבוּ וַיְנַסּוּ אֵל וּקְדוֹשׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל הִתְווּ׃ - And they turned back and tested God, and they set limits on the Holy One of Israel.
Radak explains: After they demanded meat and realized that they had sinned, seeing that Hashem's anger had flared against them, they turned around and tested the Holy One, blessed be He, again at Mei Merivah (the Waters of Strife) and in other matters not recorded in the Torah.
Why does Scripture specifically say "and tested God (Keil)," rather than "and tested Him" with a pronominal suffix like "defied Him" or "grieved Him"? Radak explains that Keil signifies power - the Holy One, blessed be He, is the Master of all powers. They were testing Him on this very point: Does He truly have the power in His hands; is He capable of doing this as well?
So too, "and the Holy One of Israel": Hashem's Name had already been magnified and sanctified in the past through signs and wonders, for through every sign and wonder the verse is fulfilled: "And I will magnify Myself and sanctify Myself in the eyes of many nations." They had already witnessed the Exodus from Egypt, the Ten Plagues, and the Splitting of the Sea of Reeds - the Holy One of Israel was already sanctified in their eyes, and yet "they set limits."
What does hitvu mean? Rashi interprets it as an expression of a mark or sign (tav), as in "and mark a sign upon the foreheads of the men." The sign here refers to a miracle: they demanded a sign and a token - "Is Hashem in our midst or not?" Give us a sign to know whether Hashem is with us.
Radak, however, explains hitvu as an expression of a boundary mark: they limited the Holy One, blessed be He, and drew a boundary for Him in their hearts - this He can do, but that already exceeds the boundary and lies beyond His capability. We find a similar usage in the verse, "You shall mark out your boundary to Mount Hor," meaning to make a boundary mark. They imposed limits on Hashem's capabilities: this He can do, but that He cannot. Malbim also follows Radak's explanation.
In summary: The verses before us present a repentance of the mouth without the heart - "they beguiled Him with their mouth," based on the mistaken notion that Hashem does not know human thoughts. By strict justice there was no room for forgiveness, since everything follows the intention of the heart; yet nevertheless Hashem atoned and did not destroy, so that onlookers would not say that repentance is of no avail. The attribute of mercy repeatedly turns back the external anger that has already begun to manifest, and does not stir up at all the inner wrath that cannot be turned back - and this is the secret of Moshe standing in the breach. All of this occurred because "He remembered that they were but flesh": the flesh and the desiring spirit of imagination within it are the root of sin, and this spirit goes and does not return. Yet despite all this kindness, Israel continued to defy Him in the wilderness, to grieve Him in the wasteland, and to test Hashem - demanding signs and setting limits on the Creator's capability. The lesson: do not knock on the heart when the master of the house is not inside, and do not set boundaries for the One Who is all-powerful.