Yeshayah 58:6

6 Is not this the tzom that I have chosen? To loose the chartzubbot resha (chains of wickedness, injustice), to undo the aguddot motah (bindings of the yoke bar), and to let the retzutzim (oppressed ones) go as chafeshim (free ones), and that ye break kol motah (every yoke of oppression)?

Yeshayah 58:6 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 58:6

Is not this the fast that I have chosen?
&c.] Which God has appointed, he approves of, and is well pleasing in his sight; these are works and services more agreeable to him, which follow, without which the rest will be rejected: to loose the bands of wickedness;
which some understand of combinations in courts of judicature to oppress and distress the poor; others of bonds and contracts unjustly made, or rigorously demanded and insisted on, when they cannot be answered; rather of those things with which the consciences of men are bound in religious matters; impositions upon conscience; binding to the use of stinted forms, and to habits in divine worship, which the word of God has not made necessary: to undo the heavy burdens.
The Septuagint render it, "dissolve the obligations of violent contracts"; such as are obtained by violence; so the Arabic version; or by fraud, as the Syriac version, which translates it, bonds of fraud. The Targum is,

``loose the bonds of writings of a depraved judgment;''

all referring it to unjust bonds and contracts in a civil sense: but rather it regards the loosing or freeing men from all obligation to all human prescriptions and precepts; whatever is after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ; so the traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees are called "heavy burdens, grievous to be borne", ( Matthew 23:4 ) these should not be laid and bound on men's shoulders, but should be done and taken off of them, as well as all penal laws with which they have been enforced: and to let the oppressed go free;
such as have been broken by oppression, not only in their spirits, but in their purses, by mulcts and fines, and confiscation of goods; and who have been cast into prisons, and detained a long time in filthy dungeons; and where many have perished for the sake of religion, even in Protestant countries: and that ye break every yoke;
of church power and tyranny; everything that is not enjoined and authorized by the word of God; every yoke but the yoke of Christ; all human precepts, and obedience to them; all but the commands of Christ, and obedience to them; no other yoke should be put upon the neck of his disciples but his own.

Yeshayah 58:6 In-Context

4 See, ye undergo a tzom for grievance and strife, and to strike with the fist of resha; ye shall not do a tzom as ye do today, to make your voice to be heard on marom.

5 Is such as this a tzom that I have chosen? Merely for adam to afflict his nefesh? To bow down his rosh like a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and efer (ashes) under him? Wilt thou call this a tzom, and a yom ratzon (a day of acceptance, an acceptable day) unto Hashem?

6 Is not this the tzom that I have chosen? To loose the chartzubbot resha (chains of wickedness, injustice), to undo the aguddot motah (bindings of the yoke bar), and to let the retzutzim (oppressed ones) go as chafeshim (free ones), and that ye break kol motah (every yoke of oppression)?

7 Is it not paras lechem (breaking bread of thine, i.e., serving food) to the hungry, and that thou bring the homeless aniyyim (poor) to thy bais? When thou seest the arom (naked), that thou cover him with clothing; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own basar (flesh and blood, kinspeople)?

8 Then shall thy light break forth like the shachar (dawn), and thine healing titzmach (shall spring forth; Tzemach) speedily; and thy tzedek shall go before thee; the kavod Hashem shall be thy rearguard.