Why did Jesus curse the fig tree?
The cursing of the fig tree is the one act of Jesus that looks purely destructive, and it happens in the days between His entry into Jerusalem and His arrest. Commentators read it as a acted-out sentence rather than a fit of frustration — a picture, in a single tree, of what God found when He came looking for fruit from His people.
The tree stood for the nation
The tree was chosen for what it pictured. Commentators consistently identify it with Israel, and see the words spoken over it as words spoken over the nation.
William KellyThe sentence on the fig tree was a symbolic curse on the people — Israel was the fig tree. The Lord found nothing but leaves, and the word is that from now on no fruit will grow on it forever. The nation had failed to bear fruit for God, when they had every means and opportunity for glorifying and serving Him; and now all their advantages are taken away, and the old stock is given up — a dead tree.
The timing was deliberate. This was the very week when each group in Jerusalem came to Him in turn.
J. N. DarbyThe fig tree was the symbol of the Jews as a nation, as the vine represented them figuratively as a religious system. Now the Lord had come seeking fruit, and at that very moment was really passing sentence on the nation. Each part of it — Herodians, Pharisees, Sadducees, lawyers, scribes, priests — comes up in turn to question Him in appearance, but really to receive their judgment from His mouth.
Leaves without fruit
The offence was not bareness but display. Leaves advertised a crop that was not there — profession without reality.
W. T. P. WolstonDespite all these privileges, they bore no fruit for God, though the leaves — all the outward forms of religion — were abundantly clear to see. But man in the flesh, man under the old covenant, responsible to bring forth fruit, never has yielded fruit and never can. The final proof of this was the rejection of Jesus, and in refusing Him, Israel signed their own death warrant.
"The time of figs was not yet"
Mark's note that it was not the season has made some readers feel the sentence was unfair. Writers answer this from the habit of the tree itself.
W. T. P. WolstonA peculiarity of the fig tree is that it bears two crops of ripe fruit during the year, and while one crop is ripening, another is just developing. So whatever time of year the eye rested on it, there should always have been some fruit; whether ripe or not is not the question. It had no fruit. "Nothing but leaves" was its state. This was the ground of its judgment.
After long patience
The curse came at the end of a long history of care, not at the start. Writers link it to the parable of the fig tree given a further year of digging and feeding.
J. N. DarbyThis is Israel under the old covenant, man according to the flesh; this is man in the place where God has spent all His care and used all His means — man for whom God could give up even His only-begotten Son, in order to get some good from his heart. All was in vain. He had spared the tree this year also, at the request of the vineyard keeper (Luke 13); He had dug around it and fed it, but it produced no fruit. Plenty of leaves, but no fruit; a pretence of piety — religious forms, but the true fruit that God's heart seeks in His own is not to be found in man.
The only miracle of judgment
Every other sign He gave healed or fed someone. This one killed a tree, and that contrast is itself part of the message.
A J PollockThe failure of Israel's response to all God's goodness is seen in our Lord cursing the barren fig tree. This was the only miracle our Lord performed that was not a work of kindness. It tells us that while grace and blessing are what God delights in, judgment must still find its place, for God is righteous and must uphold His name.
What followed immediately confirms it: having sentenced the tree, He walked into the temple and drove out those corrupting it — judgment beginning at the house of God (Hamilton Smith).
Withered, but not the end of the story
The curse closed one chapter without closing every chapter. Commentators point forward to a fig tree that buds again.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinIn Matthew 21 we see in the withered fig tree a type of Israel's spiritual and national death. But that withered tree is to be brought to life. The fig tree will bud again. However, the characteristic of the fig tree is that fruit and leaves are there together. As soon as the branch becomes tender the fruit is found.
Summary
- Fruit — God came looking for fruit, not foliage; the whole act turns on a tree that had none.
- Leaves — the fruit was missing while the display was full, which is why the sign is aimed at religion that is all show.
- Patience — the sentence followed years of digging and feeding, so it was the end of long care, not a sudden temper.
- Judgment — the only miracle He did that destroyed rather than blessed, showing that righteousness must have its place alongside grace.
- Hope — the tree withered, yet writers expect it to bud again, with fruit and leaves appearing together.