A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
All Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 3:2 Go To Ecclesiastes 3
Gregory of Nyssa
AD 394
It is right that at the start he makes this tight bond linking death to birth; for death inevitably follows birth, and everything born dissolves in decay. He intends, through the demonstration that death and birth are connected, by using the reference to death as a goad, to wake from sleep those who are sunk deep in fleshly existence and love this present life, and to rouse them in awareness of the future. This insight Moses, the friend of God, used secretly in the first books of Scripture, writing Exodus immediately after Genesis, so that those who read what has been written may learn what affects them even through the very arrangement of the books; for it is impossible to hear of a birth (“genesis”) without also envisaging a departure (“exodus”). Here also the great Ecclesiast, having noticed this, points it out, classing death with birth.
