What did Jesus mean when He said, "Whoever says to this mountain . . ." (Mark 11:23)?

Again spending the night outside the city, they return in the morning to find the fig tree the Lord had cursed dried up from the roots. Peter drew the Lord's attention to this strikingly rapid result of His words. The Lord answers, "Have faith in God," and assures them absolutely that one could say to a specific mountain, "Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea," and if he had no doubts about the matter, if would definitely take place. Of course the Lord is not speaking of a literal mountain, but "this mountain" is clearly the obstacle of Israel's condition at the time, lust as the fig tree spoke of her condition. The obstacle was Israel's opposition to the Lord Jesus. Its being removed and cast into the sea actually took place not long after the death of Christ, when the nation was driven from her land and absorbed by the sea of the Gentile nations.

(Vv. 20-26). The Lord instructs His disciples in the great principle that enables the feeblest saint to overcome the greatest difficulty and the most subtle opponent. Outwardly all the power and authority of the established order was in the hands of those who were opposing the Lord and His teaching. How then were a few poor fishermen to stand against the wisdom and power of men in high places? The Lord's answer is, "Have faith in God." All the power of those who were represented by the barren fig tree would vanish before the power of God used by faith. The Jewish nation which represented the whole system of the law, loomed large in the eyes of the disciples, even as a mountain that had stood for ages. Nevertheless, though to sight the nation looked so stable and enduring, faith could discern that it was about to be cast into the sea of nations. But though the mountain would be removed, God would remain, the unfailing resource for faith.

As in the above scriptures, so also in these there is doubtless a connection. The prophet says, "Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain." The "great mountain" is clearly a figure to express the totality of all the obstacles and hindrances that lay in the way of building the temple. The difficulties were so many and so great that it seemed impossible that the builders could ever accomplish their design. But all things are possible with God, and all things are possible to him that believeth; and Jehovah, in this message through the prophet, encourages the faith of His people with the assurance that the "great mountain" should become a plain, and that the hands of Zerubbabel, having laid the foundation, should also finish the house. In our Lord's words to His disciples also the mountain is without doubt a symbol of some great hindrance to their work. He had just pronounced the sentence on the fig-tree — "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever." Then we are told, "And presently the fig-tree withered away. And when the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, How soon is the fig-tree withered away! Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig-tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done." Now it is in the context that the key to the meaning of the "mountain" is found. The fig-tree is admittedly the Jewish nation. The Lord had been for three years seeking fruit from it, and had found none. (Luke 13:6-9.) The time of its probation was now ended, and the irreversible sentence was uttered, that it should bear no fruit henceforward for ever; for indeed man in the flesh, although possessing every advantage and under divine culture, could not produce fruit for God. But it was precisely this truth that the Jewish nation would not accept; and in their violent opposition to it, and to the proclamation of grace, as connected with it through the death of Christ, they became the chief adversaries of the gospel. (See 1 Thess. 2:14-16.) Everywhere, and on all occasions, they sought to destroy the first preachers of Christianity. The Lord foresaw this "mountain" in the way of His disciples, and, as in Zechariah, He ministers encouragement to their hearts by telling them that it would utterly disappear before faith in God. They had marvelled at His display of power upon the fig-tree; but if they had faith in the prosecution of the mission on which they should be sent, and doubted not, they should do a greater work than this (see John 14:12), for before the irresistible command of faith this Jewish nation, seemingly a huge mountain of difficulty, should disappear in the sea of the nations; and this, whatever the failure of the apostles, was accomplished. The Lord then added, showing that this pathway of power in service is open to all believers in all ages, "And all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." Happy are they who have in any measure learnt the lesson.

In answer to the disciples' marveling at how quickly the fig tree withered away, the Lord tells them that if they have unquestioning faith, they themselves could not only do what was done to the fig tree, but could, by speaking to a certain mountain, cause it to remove and be cast into the sea. It is certainly not that faith decides what it wants to do. Faith rather depends on the will of God had decided that the fig tree (Israel) would wither: faith therefore could act upon God's will in the matter. Just so, the specific mountain, the obstacle of Israel's opposition to the truth, would very soon be set aside by God, in fact cast into the sea of the Gentile nations. The faith of dependent confidence in God could discern this, and therefore speak prophetically about the matter. For faith makes no independent decisions: it confides simply in the word and will of God; and His will in this matter could have been found in His word (the Old Testament). Consider for instance Deut.28:15-68, specially verses 64 and 65.

The disciples are in amazement when they see the fig-tree withered; but the Lord uses the miracle to assure them of the power which was ready to manifest itself for them in response to faith. Not only should they do what was done to the fig-tree, but if they had faith and doubted not, even a mountain standing in their way should be removed and cast into the sea, and whatsoever they asked in prayer, believing, would be done. We may well see in this a veiled assurance of how Israel, now nothing but an obstacle in the path of faith would disappear politically in the sea of the nations. But the promise here is of course, of very various application, and it would be entirely wrong in any way to limit it, save as the Lord Himself does; who distinctly makes His last assurance as full as possible. To faith nothing shall be denied; but it is not limitation to insist that faith must be faith.

"And when the disciples saw it, they wondered, saying, How immediately is the fig tree dried up! And Jesus answering said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith and do not doubt not only shall ye do what is done to the fig tree, but even, if ye should say to this mountain, Be thou taken away and be cast into the sea, it shall come to pass. And all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive" (verses 20-22).

They wondered at the power which made the fig tree wither, and He calls their attention that the power of God is ready to answer their faith. The connection is obvious. Israel had no faith in God, hence their bareness. If they have faith, it shall be far different; the power of God is then at their disposal. The mountain is the type of an obstacle. Every obstacle can be and will be removed out of the way in answer to prayer. That there is a reference to Israel in these words is no doubt true. The nation was a mountain and by its disobedience and rejection of the Lord, the nation was an obstacle in the path of the Gospel. But on account of faith this mountain was indeed cast into the sea, the type of the nations. Precious to faith has ever been and ever will be the Word, the author and finisher of the faith speaks here. "And all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." Let us not limit them, nor say as some have said, it is not for us. They are for the children of God and there is no limit to them. All things -- whatsoever; surely there is no limit here; and then the three steps -- asking in prayer, believing and receiving. He, the King, who has all power spake these words; and what a meaning they should have for us! May we cast ourselves upon them in childlike faith.

As they passed next morning, the sight of the fig-tree dried up from the roots118 recalled the curse of yesterday to Peter. The Master's answer was, "Have faith in God" — a more pointed form of speech119 than that in the Gospel of Matthew, and of the gravest moment for the servants of God in presence of the guilt and ruin of that which seems fairest, or, at least, is most esteemed among men. As the fig-tree symbolized the people in their religious pretensions, now manifestly vain, and so judged of Him whose right it was and is, "this mountain" appears to denote rather their "place and nation," which in their unbelief they strove hard to keep under Roman patronage. ("We have no king but Caesar.") Strong as it stood in Jewish eyes, before the faith of the disciples it was doomed, and soon about to be violently rooted up and lost in the sea of Gentiles. Such is the declared efficacy of faith; but another requisite is (which faith indeed would effect) the spirit of gracious forgiveness toward any who might have wronged or otherwise offended us. In Matthew this has its place in the Sermon on the Mount, and especially in the prayer,120 as the retributive converse appears in the parable of the merciless servant. In Luke the principle comes out in another shape. The Received Text is far from correct. The Sinai and other manuscripts [D, 33corr, with 69, etc., Syrsin Arm.] give "If ye have faith in God, verily," etc. But apart from this, the close of verse 23, I think, should be, "but believe that what he speaks comes to pass, he shall have it" [as ℵB, etc.]. "For" at the beginning of the verse appears in ACL and later uncials, most cursives, syrpesch hcl Memph. Goth.]. So in verse 24 [ℵBCL Memph.], "For this reason I say unto you, All things, whatsoever ye shall pray and beg, believe that ye have received, and ye shall have them" (B.T.).

1910 43 The promises to prayer, of which the following are some of the more prominent, are, in general, dependent on specified conditions: — (1) "All things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive" (Matt. 21:22). (2) "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you" (John 15:7). (3) "Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God. And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight" (1 John 3:21-22). (4) "If we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us; and if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him" (1 John 5:14-15). (5) "If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them" (Matt. 18:19-20). (6) "Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him" (James 5:14-15). (7) "Verily, verily, I say unto you, whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you" (John 14:13-14; John 15:16; John 16:23).

The condition attached to the first of the foregoing is believing. It will be said that believing, or faith, is necessary to all prayer. Though this is true, Scripture recognises specific faith about a specific thing. Thus one of the subjects of the miracles had faith to be healed (Acts 14:9); and it is expressly taught in 1 Cor. 12:9 that there is a distinct spiritual gift of faith which some have, and some have not — a gift alluded to in chap. 13 where Paul corrects the tendency to glory in gifts. "Though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing" (1 Cor. 13:2). It is perhaps to this special character of faith that the Lord refers when He says, "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark 11:24). Genuine, divinely-given faith, not mystical or fancied faith, is what is here meant. Probably many have experimented upon this promise, only to be disappointed. Mahomet, it is said, audaciously commanded a mountain to come to him, and when his folly was manifest to all, tried to evade humiliation by saying, "If the mountain will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet will go to the mountain." But the promises of God, and the power of His Spirit, are not bestowed to be the subject of curious experiment, or the means of subserving private ends.

Further, the application of some of the promises in the Gospels was primarily to the apostles, however much the principle of them may extend to the humblest disciple. Take, for example, the promise we are considering. This, as well as the parallel passage in Mark 11, stands in relation to the incident of the barren fig-tree. The fig-tree was a type of Israel, to whom the Lord had come seeking fruit but finding none. He pronounced it fruitless for ever. That is a picture of Israel after the flesh, producing only the leaves of profession. Any fruit-bearing must be from the living One — "From me is thy fruit found." In connection with this the Lord says, "Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this to the fig-tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive" (Matt. 21:21-22). Now as the fig-tree symbolized Israel in the character of fruit-bearer, so "mountain" here represents Israel as a political system, and accordingly as an answer to the faith of the apostles, Israel has been cast into the sea of the nations, and politically lost.

In the first place then Zerubbabel is to be directed to the only source of power — to the Spirit of God; in the next he is sustained by the promise of the successful issue of his work. The great mountain should "become a plain: and he should bring forth the headstone [of the temple] with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it." (v. 7.) By the mountain, we apprehend, is symbolized all the obstacles that lay, in the way of the completion of the work. It is a figure gathering up the whole of the difficulties, as well as the opposition encountered, the details of which are given in the book of Ezra. But all these — whatever the activity, power, or influence of the adversaries — are nothing to God; and they are likewise nothing to the man of faith when resting alone upon the power of the Spirit, and when walking in the path of God's will. It is thus that the question is triumphantly, not to say defiantly, put, "Who art thou, O great mountain?" It is indeed an exultant challenge, bringing out the confident assurance that before Zerubbabel it should become a plain. (Compare Isaiah 40:35.) The Lord Jesus, it is more than probable, referred to this scripture when He said to His disciples, "Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig-tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done." (Matthew 21:21.) For what is the mountain in this case? It was doubtless the Jewish nation in its unbelief and opposition to grace, that enmity of the Jews which was ever the obstacle to the proclamation of the gospel to the Gentiles, and which, overcome by the faith of the disciples, finally disappeared as the Jews were merged in the sea of the nations. But whether this or that, it affords abundant encouragement in the Lord's service, as it will enable His servants to regard the most insurmountable difficulties as occasions only for the display of almighty and victorious power through the working of the Holy Spirit.

The second blow supposes a great change; it falls on the sea, and so refers not to that sphere which is under special and settled government, but to what is or will then be in a state of confusion and anarchy. The nations which are in this condition do not remain scatheless. "And the second angel sounded: and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea; and the third of the sea became blood; and the third of the creatures which were in the sea, that had life, died; and the third of the ships were destroyed." If Jeremiah be consulted, it will be seen that these things are not explained arbitrarily or out of mere imagination. As this is not so common a judgment, it would seem that God deigns to furnish us with another example; for just where we should be likely to make mistakes, there God comes in with light and instruction. The "mountain burning with fire" represents a system of power, itself under the judgment of God and the occasion of judgment to others. In Jer. 51:25 it is said, "Behold, I am against thee, O destroying mountain, saith the Lord, which destroyest all the earth; and I will stretch out mine hand upon thee, and roll thee down from the rocks, and will make thee a burnt mountain." There we have what answers, in some measure, to what we have here. Babylon, in Jeremiah, was to be "a burnt mountain," hurled down from its place of eminence. Here the mountain is said to be "burning." Babylon was itself to be as a consumed or destroyed mountain. Here the mountain is the means of destroying others, as in the Jewish prophet: "O destroying mountain, saith the Lord, which destroyest all the earth."

A mountain is regularly the symbol of settled and exalted power; but here it is cast into the sea, because it is made the means of judgment to others, and not merely the object of judgment itself. The Lord Jesus Himself uses a part of the figure with regard to Israel. Seeing a fig-tree with nothing but leaves, He pronounced that no fruit should grow, nor man eat of it henceforward for ever. He had come and found no fruit upon it, only abundance of leaves. And presently the fig-tree withered away. Now almost every person who has read the word of God with care has viewed that fig-tree as the symbol of Israel, responsible to bear fruit unto God, but completely failing to do so. The fig-tree was figurative of "that generation," and in connection with this the Lord says to His disciples, "ye shall not only do this … but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done." And so it was done; for no sooner had the apostles' testimony gone out to Israel, and Israel had utterly rejected what the Holy Ghost preached to them therein, than judgment came upon them. It was not merely that they bore no fruit, but there was a positive judgment and an uprooting from where they were. The mountain was cast into the sea; the place and nation of Israel completely disappeared in the mass of the Gentiles. This was much more than their merely ceasing to produce fruit. Their polity was broken up and completely vanished, just as much as a mountain would be that was torn up from its base and cast into the sea.