Yet at the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth branches like a plant.
All Commentaries on Job 14:9 Go To Job 14
Gregory The Dialogist
AD 604
6. It shews its greenness in the executing of practice, such as it had before in the foreknowledge of the Creator.
7. The ‘root of the righteous’ may also be taken for the very nature itself of a human being, by virtue whereof he subsists, which same root waxes old in the earth, when the natural frame of flesh comes to nought being reduced to dust, whose ‘stock dies in the dust,’ in that the body dismantled of its own form and fashion crumbles to nought; but at the ‘scent of water it buds,’ in that through the coming of the Holy Spirit it rises again; and it will bring forth boughs as when it was first planted, in that it returns to that form, which it was created to receive, if, when he was set in Paradise, he had refused to sin.
8. Which perhaps may also be taken of the Lord Himself, Who is the Head of all the good; for according to that which we have said before, whereas He saith of Himself, For if they have done these things in a green tree, what shall be done in a dry? [Luke 23, 31] He said that Himself was the green tree, and we the dry tree, forasmuch as He contained in His own Person the power of the Divine Nature, but we that are mere men are called a dry tree. And so ‘there is hope of a tree if it be cut down, that it will sprout again,’ in that even if He was able to be put to death by His Passion, yet by the glory of His Resurrection, He came to the greenness of life again; ‘His branches shoot,’ in that the faithful being multiplied by His Resurrection grew out far and wide; His root as it were waxed old in the earth, in that the preaching of Him was to the unbelief of the Jews a despicable thing; ‘and His stock dried in the dust,’ in that in the heart of those that persecuted Him, which was uplifted by the wind of their unbelief, He was held as an object of scorn and contempt, in that He was capable of being put to death in the flesh; but ‘at the scent of water He budded,’ in that through the power of God His Flesh after demise returned to life, according to that which is written, Whom God hath raised from the dead. [Acts 3, 15] For in that God is a Trinity, the Holy Trinity, i.e. the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, raised up to life the extinct Flesh of the Only-Begotten Son. And ‘It brought forth foliage as when It was first planted,’ in that the feebleness of the Apostles, which in the season of His death was afraid and denied, and by denying turned dry, by the glory of His Resurrection was again quickened in faith. In comparison with which Tree what is every man but dust?
