The parable:
Now in the morning, as
He returned to the city, He was hungry. And seeing a fig tree by the road, He
came to it and found nothing on it but leaves, and said to it, “Let no fruit
grow on you ever again.” Immediately the fig tree withered away.
And when the disciples
saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither away so soon?” Matt 21: 18-20
Elder Theophylact
provides the interpretation of this parable passed on through the ages by our
Church fathers.
The fig tree means the
synagogue of the Jews, which has only leaves, that is, the visible letter of
the law, but not the fruit of the spirit.
But also every man who gives himself
over to the sweetness of the present life is likened to a fig tree, who has no
spiritual fruit to give to Jesus who is hungry for such fruit, but only leaves,
that is, temporal appearances which fall and are gone. This man then hears
himself cursed. For Christ says, Go, he accursed, into the fire. But he is also
dried up; for as he roasts in the flame, his tongue is parched and withered
like that of the rich man in the parable, who in his life had ignored Lazarus.
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