Ezek 16:12

“After clothing, she shows what she has of food, so that Jerusalem may eat fine flour and honey and oil. This can be either individually or in a mixture of the three, which is a sweeter bread, the bread that comes down from heaven. The three names, as several think, indicate the mystery of the Trinity, not each within a separate substance but diversely, like fine flour and honey and oil, so that the single sweetness of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit can be made manifest.”

“(Verse 12.) And I placed a jewel above the mouth or nostrils. The Hebrew word 'Nezem' (except for Symmachus, who interpreted it as 'ἐπιῤῥίνιον') is translated by all as 'jewel'. Not that the jewels are placed in the nostrils that are called earrings because they hang from the ears, but so that the circles made in the likeness of earrings are called by the same name, and even today among other ornaments of women, golden circles are accustomed to hang from the front of the mouth and hang over the nostrils. We then understand them according to mystical understanding, when we can say with the Apostle: We are the good odor of Christ to those who are saved and to those who perish. To some, we are the odor of death leading to death; to others, we are the odor of life leading to life (II Cor. II, 15). When we live and it can be said of us, the dead shall not praise you, O Lord, but we who live (Psal. CXIII, 17), then God smells the fragrance of our good sacrifice, and we have a golden circle of senses and divine doctrines in our nostrils. When we are truly dead and are turned into mud and in the filth of vices, we have that ring in our nostrils, of which Solomon wrote: Like a gold ring in a pig's snout, so is the beauty of a woman who is ill-tempered. And circles in your ears. LXX: And wheels upon your ears. Who shuts his ears, so as not to hear the judgment of blood, and encloses them with thorns, so as not to become a partner to the envious and detractors, of whom it is written: Do not associate with detractors, for suddenly their destruction will come, and who knows the ruin of both (Prov. XXIV, 21, 22)? Both the one who detracts and the one who willingly listens to them have these circles and wheels in their ears, not the wheels that follow the Cherubim (for those are of angelic strength), but diminutive wheels that correspond to human frailty. Therefore it is said also to God: The voice of your thunder is in the wheel (Psalm 76:19). For in those who pass through earthly things and barely touch the earth with their small footsteps, of whom it is written: Holy stones are rolled upon the earth (Zachariah 9:16), the voice of the Lord's thunder resounds, and the sound of lofty teachings is heard. But those who are led astray by human errors and do not have solid footsteps, but are carried about by every wind of doctrine (Ephesians 2), and are expelled from the paradise of stability, dwell in the region of Naid, which means fluctuation, and deserve to bear the judgment of the deceitful tongue, which inflames the wheel of our birth (Genesis 4). And a crown of beauty on your head. LXX: And a crown of glory upon your head. We have interpreted 'decor' as 'elegance' according to Symmachus for the sake of the senses. Otherwise, in Hebrew it is called 'Thopherth', and in other translations 'καύχησις' or 'gloriation'. The other ornamentations belong to each individual member. The ornamentation of the head is the dignity of the whole body. But the crown is called a diadem for women, with which the hair is bound and ambition is adorned. We want to know what is the crown of beauty on the head of Jerusalem, let us turn to Exodus, in which it is written: And he made a golden plate, and wrote on it the letters deformed with the seal of the sanctification of the Lord, and put it on the head of Aaron (Exod. XXXIX, 29). The sign of the Lord's sanctification, the name of the almighty God, is written with four Hebrew letters (), and among them it is called ineffable, because his name cannot be spoken. Whose majesty even the pagans do not ignore, and the altar of the Athenians testifies to the unknown God. Hence the Apostle says: Him whom you worship as unknown, Him we proclaim to you (Acts 17:23). I believe this crown is the one of which the psalmist speaks: You have put a shine on us in the light of your face, O Lord (Psalm 4:7). And the Apostle said: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. From now on, there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the righteous judge will give to me (2 Timothy 4:7, 8). And in another place to the Believers: My joy and my crown (Phil. 4:1). For the glory of the fathers is the children. And in Solomon it is written: The crown of glory is old age (Prov. 12:6); namely, those who have destroyed those things that belong to children, and after reaching maturity, have come to old age and the names of the fathers, of whom John writes after the children (1 John 2), and the young men who can say: When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I understood like a child, I thought like a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things (1 Cor. 13:11).”