The Perils of Premature Judgment: Reading Matthew 21.18–22.14 with the Fig Tree
Because fig trees were agriculturally important, residents of Palestine during Jesus’s and Matthew’s times would be much more familiar with figs than are most academic biblical interpreters. This article engages the cultural, economic, and ecological significance of fig trees in first-century Syrio-...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2023
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| In: |
Journal for the study of the New Testament
Year: 2023, Volume: 45, Issue: 3, Pages: 264-283 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Court
/ Fig tree
/ Ecology
/ Hermeneutics
/ Matthew
|
| IxTheo Classification: | HC New Testament KAB Church history 30-500; early Christianity |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Because fig trees were agriculturally important, residents of Palestine during Jesus’s and Matthew’s times would be much more familiar with figs than are most academic biblical interpreters. This article engages the cultural, economic, and ecological significance of fig trees in first-century Syrio-Palestine in conversation with the cursing of the fig tree in Mt 21.18–22. This engagement reveals parallels between this passage and the parable of the wedding banquet (Mt 22.1–14), rendering all of Mt 21.12–22:14 as one literary unit centered on the theme of judgment and its timing. Specifically, these two pericopae portray those who render swift judgment as both unreasonable and self-defeating. In contrast, the parables of the two sons (Mt 21.28–31) and the wicked tenants (Mt 21.33–41) show that deferring judgment creates room for repentance, making the literary unit a nuanced explanation of the deferral of divine judgment and an invitation to repentance. |
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| ISSN: | 1745-5294 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal for the study of the New Testament
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1177/0142064X221146219 |