The Lesson of the Fig Tree #34

The Lesson of the Fig Tree is a short parable Jesus gave near the end of the Olivet Discourse, his teaching on the Mount of Olives about the destruction of the temple and the coming of the Son of Man. When a fig tree’s branches turn tender and put out leaves, people know summer is near, and in the same way, when his disciples see the signs he described, they can know that the promised event is close. All three Synoptic Gospels record it (Matthew 24:32-35; Mark 13:28-31; Luke 21:29-33).

The Parable

Jesus tells his disciples to learn the lesson from the fig tree. When its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near (Matthew 24:32). “So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.” (Matthew 24:33). He then says that this generation will not pass away until all these things take place, and that heaven and earth will pass away but his words will not pass away (Matthew 24:34-35).

Context

Jesus had been asked when the temple would fall and what sign would mark his coming and the end of the age (Matthew 24:3). He described wars, famines, false messiahs, persecution, and the desolation of Jerusalem before giving this parable. Immediately afterward he says that no one knows the day or hour, and he urges watchfulness (Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32-37).

Matthew and Mark are nearly identical. Luke says “the fig tree and all the trees” and states the conclusion as knowing that “And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.” (Luke 21:29-31). The fig tree loses its leaves in winter, unlike the evergreen trees common in Israel, so its new growth in spring is an obvious seasonal signal.

Meaning

The comparison itself is straightforward: signs precede the event, and observant people should recognize them. Its difficulty lies in the phrases “all these things” and “this generation.” Christians interpret them in several ways. Many understand the sayings to refer to the first-century generation and the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, with the coming of the Son of Man language taken as describing that judgment or as pointing beyond it. Others take “generation” to mean the people or the race of Israel, or the generation that will see the final signs at the end of history. The Greek word can be read in each way, and traditions differ.

The parable is also balanced by Jesus’s own statement that the exact time is unknown. The passage does not offer a timetable. Its purpose, as in the parables that follow it in Matthew, is readiness. Some readers connect the fig tree to Israel, given how the Old Testament often uses it as an image of the nation, but the text presents it as an ordinary seasonal example and does not identify it that way.

The parable should be kept distinct from Jesus’s cursing of the fig tree (Mark 11:12-14) and the parable of the barren fig tree (Luke 13:6-9), which share the imagery of a fig tree but have a different focus.