Quomodo per mortem carpatur.
The Ripe Fruit of Death
Death is the plucking of ripe fruit, cutting believers from this life once they reach perfection to be transferred to the eternal King's feast.
It is through death that the fruit is plucked. When the fruit is ripe, then it is plucked, so that it may come to the table of the head of the household. And when we have been brought to the full measure of our perfection, we too are cut off from this life through death, so that we may be transferred to the feast of the eternal King.
The Bride's Garden Invitation
The bride invites her beloved into the garden to eat its fruit, echoing the soul's readiness for the wedding feast.
And this is what the bride says to her beloved in the song of love: May my beloved come into his garden and eat the fruit of his orchards; and she in turn replies to him in the same place: Come into my garden, my sister, my bride, I have gathered my myrrh with my spices, I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey, I have drunk my wine with my milk.
Plucked for the Wedding Feast
Through death believers are plucked as fragrant fruits to be presented before the eternal King.
Therefore through death we are plucked like well-fragrant fruits for the wedding. …so that we may be presented before the eternal King.
Mutual Feasting with God
In glory, believers become God's food as he delights in them, and God becomes their food as they behold his glory, fulfilling the prophet's word.
There we will be the food of God, because he will take delight in us, and he himself will be our food, because we will delight in him as we gaze on the face of his glory, so that the word of the prophet may be fulfilled in us: I will be satisfied when your glory appears. Therefore let us gather up the highest step of perfection, and let us say…
Read the original Latin
Per mortem carpitur. Quando fructus maturus est tunc discerpitur, ut ad patrisfamilias mensam veniat. Et nos, cum ad modulum nostrae perfectionis perducti fuerimus, ab hac vita per mortem praecidimur, ut ad convivium Regis aeterni transferamur. Et hoc est quod in cantico amoris, sponsa ad dilectum suum loquitur, dicens: Veniat dilectus meus in hortum suum, et comedat fructum pomorum suorum; et ipse versa vice ad ipsam ibidem respondet: Veni in hortum meum, soror mea sponsa, messui myrrham meam cum aromatibus meis, comedi favum meum cum melle meo, bibi vinum meum cum lacte mea. Per mortem ergo carpimur, ut quasi fructus bene redolentes ad nuptias. Regis aeterni praesentemur. Nos ibi cibus Dei erimus, quia ei complacebit in nobis, et ipse cibus noster erit, quia nos delectabimur in ipso faciem gloriam ejus contemplantes, ita ut illud prophetae compleatur in nobis: Satiabor cum apparuerit gloria ejus. Concludamus ergo summum perfectionis gradum, et dicamus.
De Arca Noe Morali et Mystica (On the Moral and Mystical Ark of Noah) companion
Keep the ark under construction
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