The Daughters of Jerusalem Weep (Luke 23:27–31)

The texts below are quoted verbatim from public-domain English translations; nothing is paraphrased.

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St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376–444)

Commentary on the Gospel of Luke, Sermon 152 (on Luke 23:27–31), trans. R. Payne Smith, Oxford, 1859. Public domain. Full text: https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/cyril_on_luke_14_sermons_146_156.htm

On the women who followed weeping, and the tenderness of their sex:

there followed Him women weeping, as well as many others. For constantly, so to speak, the female sex is given to tears, and of a disposition ready to sink at the approach of aught that is sorrowful.

On "weep not for me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children":

But, O daughters of Jerusalem, He says, stay those tears on My account: cease your wailings: and weep rather for yourselves, and your children: for the days, He says, shall come, in which barrenness shall be preferable to women than to have borne children.

On why the coming ruin of the city outweighs His own passion:

Because when the war fell upon the country of the Jews, they all perished utterly, small and great: and infants with their mothers, and sons with their fathers, were destroyed without distinction. Then, He says, shall men count it above all price to be crushed under hills and mountains; for in extreme miseries those misfortunes which are less severely cruel become, so to speak, desirable.

On "If they do these things in a green tree", that He names Himself the fruitful tree:

He calls Himself the green tree, that namely which has leaves and fruit and flowers. But His fruits were doctrines and exhortations and the manifestation of a godlike power in His divine and ineffable miracles.

On "what shall be done in the dry?":

When therefore, He says, the Roman commanders have inflicted upon Me such things, though they see Me adorned with such great glory and praise, what will they do to Israel, perceiving him to be a dry and fruitless stock?

Theophylact of Ohrid (c. 1055–1107)

Explanation of the Gospel of Luke (on Luke 23:28–31), as preserved in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain. Full text: https://isidore.co/aquinas/CALuke.htm

On "weep not for me, but weep for yourselves":

He bids those who weep for him cast their eyes forward to the evils that were coming, and weep for themselves.

On "Blessed are the barren":

Seeing indeed that women shall cruelly roast their children, and the belly which had produced shall miserably again receive that which it bore.

On "If they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?":

As though He said to the Jews, If then the Romans have so raged against Me, a fruit-bearing and ever flourishing tree, what will they not attempt against you the people, who are a dry tree, destitute of every life-giving virtue, and bearing no fruit?

St. Gregory the Great (c. 540–604)

Moralia in Job (on Luke 23:31), as preserved in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain. Full text: https://isidore.co/aquinas/CALuke.htm

On the green tree and the dry:

He has called Himself the life and strength of the Divine nature; but we who are mere men are called the dry wood.

St. Bede the Venerable (c. 673–735)

Commentary on the Gospel of Luke (on Luke 23:27–30), as preserved in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain. Full text: https://isidore.co/aquinas/CALuke.htm

On the great company that followed, and why the women alone wept aloud:

A large multitude indeed followed the cross of Christ, but with very different feelings. For the people who had demanded his death were rejoicing that they should see Him dying, the women weeping that he was about to die. But He was followed by the weeping only of women. Not because that vast crowd of men was not also sorrowful at His Passion, but because the less esteemed female sex could more freely give utterance to what they thought.

On "Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us":

By these days He signifies the time of the siege and captivity which was coming upon them from the Romans, of which He had said before, Woe to them that are with child, and give suck in those days. ... And so it follows, Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us. For Josephus relates, that when the Romans pressed hard upon them, the Jews sought hastily the caverns of the mountains, and the lurking places in the hills.