He
left them, and went out of the city to Bethany, and camped there. Now in the morning, as he returned to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig tree by the road, he came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves. He said to it, “Let there be no fruit from you forever!” Immediately the fig tree withered away. When the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree immediately wither away?” Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, if you have faith, and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it would be done. All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”
Matthew 21:17-22
Matthew 21 [14.] The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children who were crying in the temple and saying, “Hosanna to the son of David!” they were indignant, and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?”
Jesus said to them, “Yes. Did you never read, ‘Out of the mouth of babes and nursing babies you have perfected praise?’”
Matthew 21 [17.] He left them, and went out of the city to Bethany, and camped there. Now in the morning, as he returned to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig tree by the road, he came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves. He said to it, “Let there be no fruit from you forever!”
Immediately the fig tree withered away. When the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree immediately wither away?”
Matthew 21 [21.] Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, if you have faith, and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it would be done. All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”
Matthew 21 [23.] When he had come into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, “By what authority do you do these things? Who gave you this authority?”
Meaning:
Jesus had cleansed the temple and healed the blind and the lame there, while the chief priests and scribes were indignant at the children’s praise (Matthew 21:15-16). That evening he left the city, and the next morning, on his way back, he cursed a fig tree. It is the only miracle of judgement in the Gospels, and it is an acted parable about the temple and the nation.
- “He left them, and went out of the city to Bethany”
Bethany was a village on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, about two miles from Jerusalem. During the crowded Passover week Jesus spent his nights outside the city, perhaps to rest among friends and away from the leaders who sought to arrest him.
- “Found nothing on it but leaves”
In spring fig trees put out small early figs with or before their leaves. A tree in full leaf seemed to promise fruit. Mark adds that “it was not the season for figs” (Mark 11:13), which shows that the point was not Jesus’ hunger or the tree’s fault. The tree was a picture. Like the temple, busy with sacrifices and trade but empty of prayer and justice, it had a fine show of leaves and no fruit.
The prophets had used the same image. Through Jeremiah God said, “no grapes shall be on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade” (Jeremiah 8:13). In Luke, Jesus told of an owner who said of a barren fig tree, “these three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and found none. Cut it down” (Luke 13:6-9).
- “Let there be no fruit from you forever!”
Jesus’ word was a sign of judgement on fruitless religion. The leaders had rejected God’s messengers and would soon reject his Son. In the parables that follow, Jesus says plainly that the Kingdom will be taken from them and “given to a nation producing its fruit” (Matthew 21:43). About forty years later the temple was destroyed.
- “How did the fig tree immediately wither away?”
In Matthew the withering happens at once and the disciples marvel. Mark tells the story over two days (Mark 11:20-21). Matthew’s shorter account focuses on the power of Jesus’ word and the lesson he drew from it.
- “If you have faith, and don’t doubt”
Jesus turned the disciples’ amazement into teaching about faith. “This mountain” may have been the Mount of Olives, or the temple mount itself. Moving a mountain was a Jewish saying for doing what seems impossible. Mark records Jesus’ words, “Have faith in God” (Mark 11:22-24). Faith is not confidence in our own power but trust in God, for whom nothing is impossible.
- “All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive”
This promise is given to disciples who live in fellowship with Jesus. Elsewhere he said, “If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, you will ask whatever you desire, and it will be done for you” (John 15:7). James warns that the one who doubts “is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed” (James 1:6).
The Significance of Matthew 21:17-22
- Leaves are not enough
God looks for the fruit of faith, love and obedience, not only an outward show of religion.
- Pray with confidence
Jesus invites his followers to pray boldly, trusting God’s power and seeking his will.
Cross-References:
Jeremiah 8:13: "no grapes shall be on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade;" The prophetic picture of a fruitless people.
Mark 11:22: "Have faith in God." Mark’s account of the same teaching.
James 1:6: "But let him ask in faith, without any doubting," Prayer without doubt.
Conclusion: Returning to Jerusalem from Bethany, Jesus found a fig tree with leaves but no fruit and said, “Let there be no fruit from you forever!” It withered at once. The tree was an acted parable of judgement on fruitless religion, like the busy but prayerless temple. When the disciples marveled, Jesus taught them that faith without doubt can do what seems impossible, and that whatever they ask in prayer, believing, they will receive.
PIB Scriptures are derived from the World English Bible