Divine nectar and refreshment

Meaning

Divine nectar is a figurative refreshment given to Christ amid his suffering in Part IV: the spiritual comparison · unit 29. The passage compares his strengthening with the material body's repeated refreshment, then proceeds through death, revival, union and exaltation. Its 'as it were' qualifies the language of being imbued, moistened and given drink. Nectar is not named as an earthly drink to administer, nor does the analogy make Christ's renewed life dependent on a laboratory substance. The aligned English retains both the sweetness of the image and the ultimate agency of the eternal Godhead, whose power raises and glorifies him.