Letter And Spirit

Et accedens unus scriba, ait illi: Magister, sequar te, quocumque ieris. Et dicit ei Jesus: Vulpes foveas habent, et volucres cæli nidos; Filius autem hominis non habet ubi caput reclinet.  Scriba iste legis, qui tantum litteram noverat occidentem, si dixisset: domine, sequar te quocumque ieris, non fuisset repulsus a domino; sed quia magistrum unum de pluribus aestimat, et litterator erat, quod significantius Graece dicitur γραματεύς, et non spiritalis auditor, ideo non habet locum in quo possit Iesus reclinare caput suum. Sanctus Hieronymus, In Evangelium Matthaei Commentarius, Lib I, Cap IX

And one of the scribes came to him, and said, 'Master, I will follow you wherever you are going.' But Jesus said to him, 'Foxes have holes and the birds of the air their resting places, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.' 1  This Scribe of the Law who knew only the perishing letter, if he had said, 'Lord, I will follow you wherever you are going,' would not have been repulsed. But because he judged Him as one of many masters, and was a 'man of the letter', which is better expressed by the Greek grammateus,  and not a spiritual hearer, therefore he had no place where Jesus was able to lay His head.    Saint Jerome, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Book 1, Chapter 9 1 Mt 8.19-20