About this time Jesus was told that Pilate had murdered some Galileans, as they were offering sacrifices at the Temple. “Do you think those Galileans were worse sinners than all the other people from Galilee?” Jesus asked. “Is that why they suffered? Not at all! And you will perish, too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. And what about the eighteen people who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them? Were they the worst sinners in Jerusalem? No, and I tell you again that unless you repent, you will perish, too.” Then Jesus told this story: “A man planted a fig tree in his garden and came again and again to see if there was any fruit on it, but he was always disappointed. Finally, he said to his gardener, ‘I’ve waited three years, and there hasn’t been a single fig! Cut it down. It’s just taking up space in the garden.’ “The gardener answered, ‘Sir, give it one more chance. Leave it another year, and I’ll give it special attention and plenty of fertilizer. If we get figs next year, fine. If not, then you can cut it down.’”
What do we know about fig trees? Not much, probably because we don’t see them a lot. Fig trees are quite common in areas of the world with a Mediterranean climate, which includes the southern US, California and Texas. They can be picked twice, and even three times in a year. Figs have been an important food crop for thousands of years, and are one of the very first plants cultivated by humans. In Gilgal, in the Jordan Valley just north of Jericho, no fewer than nine subfossil figs dating to about 9400–9200 BC - the Neolithic age - were found. This find predates the domestication of wheat, barley, and legumes.
So when Jesus talks about fig trees, as he does in various places in the Gospels, he is using a symbol which has been around as long as the Israelite people remember. He isn’t using some rare esoteric plant that hardly anyone would relate to, he is using literally the most common food source around.
But there’s another little piece in this scripture which needs to be noted. The translation I just read uses the word fertiliser, but the Greek word is kopria, which means literally “manure”. So the gardener says to the owner “Leave it with me for a year or so. I will prune it and give it lots of manure.”
So here we have a scripture in two parts - first, Jesus saying something totally contrary to the accepted religious belief. Remember, it was common cultural belief that people suffered because of sin. Some of the Galileans were murdered by Pilate, and the people who come to Jesus intimate that somehow they were responsible for their own deaths at the hands of Pilate. Jesus says that those people were no worse than any other Galileans. Neither were the eighteen who were crushed by the tower of Siloam. ...and, says Jesus, everyone sins. Everyone is less than perfect, and no one is any better than anyone else. You can almost see the eyebrows of the religious leaders going straight up into their hairlines.
Then he goes on to tell one of his stories about the realm of God, and what it is like. The second part of the scripture. ...then there are two parts to the story of the tree - the roots which need feeding, before the fruit can come.
Yesterday, at the coffee and conversation get together, we got slightly off into plants that don’t bloom. I have two orchids which have sat proudly putting out lots of nice green and healthy robust leaves; they were very muscular plants, but not a sign of a bloom. I got mad. I stuck them in the front window, fertilised, and told them if they didn’t bloom they were going out into the trash. Miraculously those two orchids are now putting forth spikes and preparing to bloom.
So here is a tree - something which has been around longer than anything else - something which represents everything the children of Israel are, and it puts out leaves and branches year after year - but no fruit. Jesus was a master at using ordinary commonplace everyday things as a vehicle for teaching something really important and profound.
So he has dismissed out of hand the idea that tragedy and sin are related. These things were not (and are not) God's doing. They are terrible tragedies, and God weeps at the senselessness of the acts. Were the people who died in the bombing of the trains in Spain worse than others? Were those who died in the world trade centre worse than others? No!! They died because of random acts of violence. None of these calamities was God's doing, none of them was a punishment. Jesus wants people to understand that suffering is random. But Jesus also is saying that we all have a need to return, to repent, and to do something with our lives before we too are gone.
To repent is to get ourselves back on track, to be in right relationship with God. Sin is being out of right relations with God. To repent is to reconnect with God, to stop doing the things that hurt us and others. God calls us to repent because if we don't, our souls perish. Just as the fig tree is offered a second chance to produce fruit, God offers us a chance to begin again, to live a life of abundance.
The owner of the fig tree wants to cut it down. It's taking up precious land, soil, and time. The gardener says "Give it one more year. I'll dig around it, put manure around it. Now, this makes sense, doesn’t it? Tree roots, like everything else, need oxygen in the soil, they need to breathe. I don't know about you, but I can identify with the fig tree. Every time I turn around, there is a second chance. But there’s the critical part, too. The roots have to be dug around, the soil loosened so the air can get in, good old stinky manure spread around to give nourishment. So it is with people. We have to dig down to our roots, let some air in, fertilise with study and reflection, taking out what we’ve always believed and giving it a good second look. Is this who we are? We have to remember, we aren’t in it alone. God helps us to grow, helping us garden our lives and bearing fruit.
Anna Murdock, who continues to offer plenty of food for thought to scripture discussions, tells a story about an elderly man in her church. His back yard was filled with fig trees. He and his wife spent the fruitful season making jams and cobblers, and bagging up fresh figs. They would go throughout the town, knocking on doors and giving little gifts of their overabundance. He not only understood about looking after trees, he understood about the soul, the roots, and how essential healthy roots are in the gardens of our souls.
Sources:
1. Anna Murdock, story on “Midrash”, Woodlake Books.
2. From the sermon “One More Year”, by Rev. Cynthia Huling Hummel
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_fig
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