Or HaChaim on Numbers 11:18/אור החיים על במדבר י״א:י״ח

1 התקדשו למחר, "sanctify yourselves against to-morrow, etc." According to Sifri on our verse the reason why G'd did not provide the meat until the following day was that they saw in the word התקדשו a warning of approaching disaster. This is how the Sifri words this. G'd said: "prepare yourselves for disaster." G'd wanted to issue a warning that the very fact that He granted their request for meat was some kind of disaster. He gave them a period of time to desist from their urge to eat meat. If they would repent G'd would relent from His intention to bring disaster upon them.

2ואכלתם בשר, "and you will eat meat." The additional letter ו at the beginning of the word ואכלתם refers to the period of preparation which had preceded the Israelites' eating of the meat (Sifri.) The verse would then have two messages, 1) prepare yourselves for disaster, 2) you will eat (meat).

3כי בכיתם, "for you have wept." This reveals that G'd pays (angry) attention to weeping. We need to understand why G'd considers the very act of weeping as something ugly, detestable. Weeping may be perceived as a manifestation of someone having totally abandoned any hope of achieving a certain important objective. Were this not so they should have at least asked G'd, much as a son asks his father for his heart's desire. When one weeps instead of asking G'd to grant one's wish, this reflects one's belief in G'd's inability to grant one's wish. The very words מי יאכילנו בשר, "who could possibly give us meat to eat?" indicate the lack of faith of Israel at that time. Sifri on our verse says that Israel said: "G'd is unable to provide our request."

4באזני השם. "in the ears of G'd." The Torah emphasises that the Israelites spoke thus (verse 5) although they must have been aware that G'd heard everything they said to Moses seeing He dwelt amongst them. It is a special חוצפה, effrontery, to utter such words when one knows G'd hears them. What they said in verse 6 was even worse, especially since G'd quotes them in our verse as having said that they were better off in Egypt than at present.

5כי טוב לנו במצרים, "for we were better off in Egypt." We have to analyse why the Torah uses the word כי in כי בכיתם in our verse. Was the fact that they cried a reason to provide meat? It appears exaggerated to polarize one's craving for meat to the point where one prefers slavery under sub-human conditions in Egypt. Perhaps, at that moment, their desire to eat meat was really so great that they were willing to return to Egypt [not necessarily as slaves, Ed.] in order to indulge their craving. Alternatively, we may understand that G'd understood the deeper meaning of the weeping as only superficially connected with their craving for meat. The truth of the matter was that G'd understood that they craved to return to Egypt, and that the non-availability of meat was only an excuse to hide the people's real complaint. In essence the Israelites preferred a sojourn in Egypt to having G'd in their midst. This is why G'd told them to prepare themselves for disaster. The Torah expresses this explicitly in verse 20: "because you have despised the Lord Who is in your midst, etc." The use by the Torah of the word את underlines the odious comparison of the people choosing between dwelling את השם, "with G'd" or in Egypt.

6ונתן ה׳ לכם בשר ואכלתם, "and the Lord will give you meat and you will eat." Why did the Torah repeat this for a second time in the same verse? Besides, the word "you will eat" is basically superfluous; why would G'd give them the meat if not to eat? I believe that although G'd had told them to sanctify themselves only in anticipation of the following day, so as to give them time to do Teshuvah, the Torah says that the repentance had to occur before they actually received the meat. Once they received the meat, ואכלתם, "you have to eat it." The second expression ונתן ה׳ לכם בשר ואכלתם is an order then, whereas the first time it could be understood as a promise or as a threat. On a moral/ethical plane one may even understand that if their attitude would undergo a change then, although they would eat the meat given to them, it would not prove harmful. Of course, the people either did not understand this hint, or they understood it but did not take it to heart.