Clothing and Symbols of the Soul

The father has given to the son. What woman will find a brave one? Bravery is an excellent state of the rational soul, by which it has mastered the opposing forces of enemies. Such a thing will not be despoiled by dogs: having conquered the opposing power, we plunder it, learning the discourses concerning it.

Wool and linen being dyed: the soul is dyed like wool and linen, exercising itself in the discourses concerning the living and the non-living, or examining the discourses concerning the practical and the natural. And someone said that the soul is dyed like wool and linen, pulling the contemplation of bodies and incorporeal things toward it through the practical life.

And rising from the nights, she gave food to the household: the one who practices righteousness finds the soul rising from the night, being watchful; and certainly, also praying so that she might not fall into temptation; for she herself hastens to say, 'I awoke and became like a sparrow perching on a roof' (Ps 84:3). And her lamp is not extinguished through the whole night: a pure mind is a lamp, filled with spiritual contemplation. Her wicks are set in a lampstand: a pure mind is a lampstand, weaving virtue with virtue and doctrine with doctrine; or an articulated word, drawing spiritual contemplation from the mind.

Her husband does not care for those in the house when he lingers: the mind would not go forth, nor would it come to be in the contemplation of the incorporeal, without first correcting what is within; for the disturbance of the domestic affairs is accustomed to turn it back toward those from which it had departed; having acquired impassibility, it will linger in contemplation, and will not care for those in the house; for the passion is indeed clothed in practical and humble...

Wisdom, but desire requires temperance and self-control. Clothing itself of deep color and purple: The words of earth and sea are garments of the rational soul from the depths and the purple.

Another will say that the contemplation of events and the contemplation of the Holy Trinity are the clothing of a pure mind from the depths and the purple. He made linen cloths and gave them, but belts to the Canaanites (Mark 2:22): The linen cloth revealed on the roof (Mark 2:9) was a symbol of this sensible world; for the various animals contained therein showed the diverse characters of men, having been purified by the cross of Christ. If one linen cloth signified this world, perhaps many linen cloths contain the contemplation of various worlds, which the pure soul having contemplated, shared with others. If the Canaanites are interpreted as the lowly, it was not rightly that he gave the linen cloths to the lowly in mind, but rather the linen cloths to the pure, and to the Canaanites belts, which are symbols of practice, binding the passionate part of the soul.

Secure dwellings of its house: If the devil is king of all those in the waters and finds no rest through dry places, it is rightly said that the dwellings of the pure soul are secure. And he did not eat lazy grain: They say lazy grain is the grain of wickedness. For a prudent woman is blessed (Proverbs 31:30), but let this one praise the fear of the Lord (Psalm 111:10): If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, the soul which happens to possess wisdom rightly praises the fear of the Lord, which has become to her a precursor of such knowledge.

They were collected from which we found them spread out. And again, these were corrected by the hands of Pamphilus and Eusebius.