Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and terrors are in the way, and the almond tree shall blossom, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goes to his eternal home, and the mourners go about the streets:
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Didymus the Blind
AD 398
Those who have dealt with the world of plants say the following about the almond: Among all the plants it grows leaves in springtime and sheds them not before all the other trees have gotten bare; it is very durable. This is why it is said about the “priestly rod” that it was of almond wood. It did not last a short time; from Moses until the coming of the Savior it was a visible sign.… This is what we think: Even if there are plants from other teachings, they bloom later, that is, after the true teaching, and cease before it; they vanish when it appears. This rod, therefore, has extinguished the other rods, those of the false apostles, and of the false prophets.… The sentence “the almond blooms” can be understood in a moral sense. The almond has two layers around the edible kernel: something hard that has to be cracked and something bitter, that is, the outer shell. The outer shell can be seen as the body, since it is bitter, tending to the sensual. The hard part, however, is the soul,...
Way. They shall walk bent down, and afraid of rough ground.
Flourish. Their head shall become white, like the almond-flower, Jeremias i. 11.
Fat. Septuagint, "heavy. "
Destroyed. The hair shall fall off. (Calmet)
Concupiscence shall be extinct. (Vatable) (Tirinus)
Eternity. The body being consigned to the grave, and the soul to the region of spirits, to have no farther concern with the transactions of the world. (Haydock) (Job vii. 9.)
Street. This custom is often mentioned. (Herodotus ii. 85.) (Luke vii. 32.)
The women dance, having one (Calmet) or two old people disfigured in the midst of them, to recount the actions of the deceased. (Brun.)
Cities and their bloodstained leaders will wait for punishment from above. A most bitter and bloody time will arise like a blossoming almond tree, continuous punishments will be imposed like a swarm of flying locusts, and lawbreakers will be thrown out of the way like a black and contemptible caper plant. The good person will enter into his eternal home with rejoicing, but the bad people will fill all their homes with mourning.
