Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grape gleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the first ripe fruit.
Read Chapter 7
Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
The unjust are winnowed away as lightweight chaff, while the just are saved as heavier wheat. Therefore heed the Lord as he says to Peter, “Behold, Satan has desired to winnow you as wheat, but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail.” Those who are winnowed as chaff fail, but that one does not fail who is like the seed that fell and sprang up, augmented and increased by very many fruits. And so the prophet says, “Woe is me! For I am become as one who gathers the stubble in the harvest.” Thus wickedness is compared with the stubble, which is quickly burned, and with the dust. And so, Job said subsequently, “They will be like chaff driven by the wind,” and at once he added a brief line and said, “or like dust that the wind has carried off.” Indeed, so that you may know that the wicked person swiftly crumbles and vanishes like dust, you find it said in the first psalm, “Not so the wicked, not so,” that is, not like the just, “but like the dust, which the wind drives from the ...
Figs, which are the worst. (St. Jerome; St. Ambrose in Luke vii. 3.) Yet they were eagerly sought after, before the other figs came to maturity. They had escaped the rigours of winter. Such Christ (Calmet) seemed to expect, Mark xi. 13.
