And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:
Ver. 1. And there shall come forth a rod,] i.e., Christ shall be born; whom our prophet having called "the anointing" or Messiah, Isa 10:27 maketh him and his kingdom henceforward the chief matter of his discourse, to the end of his book. Here he beginneth with his nativity, calling him a rod or twig, springing, not out of the stock of David, but out of the stump of Jesse, a mean man, and that then, when the royal family was sunk so low as from David the king to Joseph the carpenter. Well might Chrysostom say that the foundation of our philosophy was humility. And another, a that at Bethlehem brake forth that well of salvation which, in the type, once David so thirsted after. 2Sa 23:15
And a Branch.] Or, The Nazarene born at Nazareth, saith Junius, which signifieth "a branch"; for so it was generally deemed; and our Saviour styleth himself Jesus of Nazareth; Act 22:8 and on his cross they wrote Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, wherein that prodigy, saith A. Lapide, seemeth to have fallen out concerning which the poet inquireth -
“ Dic quibus in terris inscripti nomine Regis
Nascantur flores. ”
Tell who is noted in the earth by the name of a King, Let him in flowers. For Nazareth he interpreteth a flower, or something flowery; and for shall grow, others render shall bud, or bear fruit.
a Scultet.