THE PARABLE OF THE FIG TREE

Jesus told every Christian that they must learn the Parable of the Fig Tree. It sets the parameters of the last generation of flesh on earth. 

Matthew 24:32-35: 

Now learn the parable from the fig tree; When its branch shall have become already tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye get to know that summer is nigh: 33 So ye also, when ye shall see all these things, know that He is near, even at the doors. 34 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall by no means pass, till all these things be fulfilled. 35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

Mark 13:28-31: 

Now learn the parable from the fig tree; When her branch shall have already become tender, and putteth forth its leaves, ye get to know that summer is near: 29 So ye also, when ye shall see these things taking place, get to know that it is nigh, even at the doors. 30 Amen I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things may have taken place. 31 The heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall by no means pass away.

Luke 21:29-33:

And he spake to them a parable; Look ye the fig tree, and all the trees; 30 When they already sprout, seeing ye get to know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand. 31 So likewise ye, when ye see these things coming to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand. 32 Amen I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all may possibly come to pass. 33 The heaven and earth shall pass away: but my utterances shall by no means pass away.

The fig is used symbolically to say more than what is written. Summer = harvest time, or the end of this age.  At the 6th trump, vial, and seal, the Antichrist returns. At the 7th, Christ Himself returns, and we will all be turned back into our spiritual bodies.   

This generation is characterized as: “evil” and “adulterous” in Matthew 12:39, 45, Matthew 16:4, Mark 8:38, and Luke 11:29.   “faithless and perverse” in Matthew 17:17, Mark 9:19, and Luke 9:41. “untoward” in Acts 2:40

A fig tree is not planted by a seed, you have to set out a shoot, which then sets forth leaves. The shoot is symbolic of the nation that would be planted of both the good and the bad fig that would consummate the end of the age. The fig tree shoot was set forth in 1948, when Israel became a nation.

Jeremiah 24 is the heart of the Parable of the Fig Tree.    

Jeremiah 24:1:

The LORD shewed me, and, behold, two baskets of figs were set before the temple of the LORD [Mt. Zion], after that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the carpenters and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon.   

The house of Israel had been taken captive 200 years before this incident, so we are focusing on Judah. Judah is part of the Parable of the Fig Tree. The location is Jerusalem. 

  
In 70 AD, all were dispersed from Jerusalem. They wandered and settled in the world. But in 1948, after WWII, they returned and set out the shoot, and it has grown now for many years. We are not to know the year or the day, but to know the generation.   

There are 3 generations mentioned in the Bible. One is the 40-year generation that the children wandered in the wilderness before they entered the Promised Land. Psalms cites a generation as 70 years. Genesis 6 cites another generation as 120 years.   

Pastor Arnold Murray explains the parable in-depth in the following videos. 

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Genesis 6:15: 

And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits.   
 
Genesis 7:2-3: 

2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female. 3 Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.
 
Genesis 7:9: 

There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.   
 
Genesis 7:10: 

And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.   
 
Genesis 8:4: 

And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.
 
Genesis 8:13 – 8:17: 

13 And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth: and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and, behold, the face of the ground was dry. 14 And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, was the earth dried.   15 And God spake unto Noah, saying, 16 Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee. 17 Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply upon the earth.

In 1957, during the Cold War, aerial photos taken of eastern Turkey revealed a boat-shaped formation in the mountains of Ararat, resting under volcanic lava at about 6,300 feet above sea level. The length of the formation was 515 feet. Most archaeologists searching for the Noah's Ark were looking for a 437 feet long ark, based on the Hebrew cubit. The Egyptian cubit was in service before the Hebrew cubit was. The Egyptian royal cubit was 20.62 inches. This would mean that Noah's Ark would be longer than 437 feet. 515 feet = exactly 300 royal Egyptian cubits.   
 
An ancient stele was found near the site which depicted the boat's shape, the mountain ridge, several birds, and 8 faces within the boat shape. Samples from the boat shape were sent for analysis. The results showed organic carbon, which indicated that the samples were consistent with decayed and fossilized wood. They also contained iron and aluminum. In using a metal detector, distinct lines were found down the entire length of the ark.
 
Subsurface radar equipment was used to determine the depth of the ark. The internal structure was consistent with bulkheads and rooms. To be sure they were interpreting the data correctly, the scan was brought to Geo Survey Systems, the maker of the subsurface radar equipment. They confirmed that it was a man-made structure in the ground.   
 
In the mountains of Ararat on June 20, 1987, Turkey officially recognized the discovery of Noah's Ark, on a mountainside about 15 miles south of Mt. Ararat. During a ceremony commemorating the site, archaeologist Ron Wyatt, who had been working the site for 10 years, gave a demonstration of the sub-surface machine. The Turkish governor instructed a soldier to start digging when they found what looked on the readout to be a timber. What was dug up was a fossilized, hand-wrought timber. It consisted of 5 layers of timber, glued together with pitch and then laminated. Subsequent, more complete radar scans revealed a ship with a ramp system at the door that led to each level.   

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Astronomer Dr. Jason Lisle: 

Science is a tool by which we try to understand the systematic way that God upholds His creation...in my own field of astronomy, I'm convinced that astronomy – the study of the heavens, the study of the stars – confirms Biblical creation, it confirms what the Bible teaches.   

Genesis 1: 14:

And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: 15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. 16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. 17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, 18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. 

Psalm 147:4: 

He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names.
 

Psalm 19:1: 

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.   

The hundreds of billions of galaxies in our universe show God's unlimited power. The Bible indicates that the earth is round in Isaiah 40:22 (720-698 BC) “the circle of the earth,” and in Job 26:10 (c. 2000 BC) “a circle on the face of the waters”. The Bible had it right before Pythagoros (570-500 BC) or Aristotle (384-322 BC) did. The earth is suspended in space in Job 26:7 “[God] hangs the earth upon nothing”. Dr. Lisle discusses this and more in the following video.

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Archaeological investigations have confirmed much of what the Bible has to say about Shechem - its location, its history, and many other details.   

About 30 miles north of Jerusalem is a 15-acre mound called Tell Balata. This ruin covers what was ancient Shechem. Shekem means “back” or “shoulder,” which probably refers to Shechem’s position between the two mountains. From the south, the major road from Beersheba, Hebron and Jerusalem splits in Shechem. Its modern counterpart is Nablus.
 
In 1903, a group of German scholars examined Tell Balata and concluded it was ancient Shechem.  In 1913 and 1914, Ernst Sellin led an excavation team to Tell Balata, but his work was interrupted by WWI. Work was done again from 1926-1936, and then again in 1956. The latest excavations at Tell Balata were in 1973.
 
The first mention of Shechem in the Bible is Genesis 12:6-7:   

6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. 7 And the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto the LORD, who appeared unto him.    

The next mention of Shechem is about 200 years later, when Jacob arrived, around 1890 BC. The Bible records that Jacob, Abram’s grandson, “camped within sight of the city [Shechem].” (Genesis 33:18). Excavations have revealed that the earliest urbanization at Tell Balata was about 1900–1750 BC.   
 

Archaeologists have found that Tell Balata had structures with mudbrick walls on stone foundations, and they have found artifacts typical of domestic living. The Bible records that Jacob bought land near Shechem. His son, Joseph, would later be entombed there (Joshua 24:32). God told Jacob to move to Bethel (Genesis 35:1), then to Hebron (Genesis 35:7).
 

The next mention of Shechem is the story of Jacob’s son Joseph, who was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers (Genesis 37). They conspired to sell Joseph into slavery, setting the stage for Joseph’s rise to power, Jacob's move to Egypt, and Israel’s oppression by the Egyptian Pharaohs.
 

The earliest known extra-Biblical written record of Shechem comes from the Middle Bronze era. The inscription on a stele of Egyptian Khu-Sebek, a nobleman in the court of Sesostris III (1880–1840 BC) was found in 1901.   

King Sesostris III became ruler when Jacob was in Shechem, and was probably the king when Jacob died in Egypt. Khu-Sebek’s stele tells how the king’s army campaigned in Shechem and how “Sekmem fell”. Archaeologist William Shea believes that the campaign on Khu-Sebek’s stele is the Egyptians’ account of the military encounters experienced by the entourage accompanying Joseph when Jacob’s embalmed body was brought to Canaan for entombment at Machpelah (Genesis 50:12–14). The stele tells that as early as the 19th century BC, Shechem was an important strategic location worthy of mention in a notable Egyptian’s biography.
 

Joshua at Shechem

Over 400 years later, God rescued the Israelites from Egyptian slavery and led them through the desert wilderness for 40 years. Near the end of the trek, Moses said that once they entered the land God had promised them at Shechem (Genesis 12:6-7), they were to erect an altar on Mt. Ebal (Deuteronomy 27:4) and read portions of the Law.

Assuming an early Exodus date  of 1446 BC, the Israelite entry into Canaan was approximately 1406 BC, the Late Bronze period. This period corresponds with Tell Balata’s. Shechem was destroyed around 1540 BC. The destruction resulted in debris covering the city up to a depth of over 5 feet. It is assumed that Ahmose I or Amenhotep I were the aggressors.
 

Shechem was rebuilt around 1450 BC. Level XIV goes along with this date and is noted for the reconstruction of the city’s defensive walls, homes, and a well built fortress-type temple. This Level XIV occupation was the city at which Joshua and the Israelites arrived to fulfill Moses’ orders to read the Law before Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerizim around 1406 BC. These mountains form a natural amphitheater where the telling of the Law could be easily heard. There are still many accounts of people speaking from the slopes of the mountains and being heard in the valley below.   

The discovery of an Egyptian library, as in the Amaru letters  - “Other rulers involved in the letters include...Lib'ayu of Shechem” - has provided additional insights. Other letters reveal Egypt’s relationship with Canaan’s rulers in the mid-14th century BC. Some of them tell that the kings of Shechem were independent of Egypt. Also, Shechem’s rulers were criticized by other Canaanite rulers for cooperating with an invading group of desert people called the Habiru. Many scholars believe the Habiru were the Israelites of the early Judges period.
   
Abimelech at Shechem

Abimelech colluded with some Shechemites to kill 70 of his brothers (Judges 8:30–31; 9), but his youngest brother Jotham survived. He climbed to the top of Mt. Gerizim and shouted the foretelling of the destruction of the men of Shechem by fire (Judges 9:7–21). Later in the chapter, the people of Shechem rose against Abimelech’s leadership. Abimelech razed the city. During the attack, leaders of Shechem tried to save themselves in “the stronghold of the temple of El-berith” (Judges 9:46). The story continues in Judges 9:48–49: 

He [Abimelech] took an ax and cut off some branches, which he lifted to his shoulders. He ordered the men with him, “Quick! Do what you have seen me do!” So all the men cut branches and followed Abimelech. They piled them against the stronghold and set it on fire over the people inside. So all the people in the tower of Shechem, about a thousand men and women, also died.

Archaeologists refer to the “tower of Shechem” as “the Tower (migdal) Temple” or “Fortress-Temple” of Shechem. In 1926, a large building was excavated that is believed to be this Fortress-Temple. Lawrence Stager’s conclusion is that it was the migdal referred to in Judges 9. It is the largest such Canaanite structure found so far in Israel. Stager thought that the courtyard of the temple could have been where Joshua “took a large stone and set it up there under the oak near the holy place of the LORD” (Joshua 24:26).
 

Stager places the destruction of the Fortress-Temple around 1100 BC. So does Seger, who correlates the destruction debris found at Level XI as being from the Iron period. Campbell states there was significant destruction around 1100 BC and says, “connecting Level XI with the story underlying Judges 9 is plausible”.

Dating Shechem’s destruction to 1100 BC helps confirm that 1406 BC was the beginning of the Conquest in Canaan.   
 

Shechem in the Time of the Divided Monarchy 

After the reigns of Saul, David and Solomon, Solomon’s son Rehoboam was next in line for the throne. All of the Israelites gathered at Shechem to anoint Rehoboam king. Rehoboam told the northern tribes that he would tax them heavily. The northern tribes retaliated by separating themselves from Rehoboam and the southern kingdom, making Jeroboam I king of their region. After this, the northern region and tribes led by Jeroboam I was known as Israel. The southern area and tribes, first led by Rehoboam, is referred to as Judah in the Bible.

Levels X and IX at Tell Balata represent the Jeroboam I period and are noted for carefully built houses of stone. The discovery of stone foundations for stairs suggests two-story, four-room houses, typical homes of that period. Campbell concludes that Level IX (920–810 BC) has “tangible evidence of Jeroboam I’s rebuilding (1 Kings 12:25) and a return to city status”.

The Assyrian invasion of Israel in 724 BC (2 Kings 17:5–6) brought more destruction to Shechem. Toombs notes that in Level VII, the city was “reduced to a heap of ruins, completely covered by debris of fallen brickwork, burned beams and tumbled building stones.” In addition to the destruction, the Assyrians placed exiled peoples from other nations into the region around Shechem (2 Kings 17:23–24).

These new peoples added Yahweh to their own beliefs (2 Kings 17:25–30). The new religion was the same as Judaism in many respects, and Mt. Gerizim was made the center of its worship. New Testament practitioners are called “Samaritans.” This also refers to the people who lived in the vicinity (Matthew 10:5; Luke 9:52, 10:53; 17:16; John 4:7, 9, 22, 39, 40; 8:48; Acts 8:25). A remnant of the ancient Samaritans still live on Mt. Gerizim and practice sacrifices there just as they did 2,700 years ago.
     
Shechem in the Intertestamental Period

Between the Old and New Testaments, Shechem had a modest recovery and there is much evidence that buildings were constructed (330–107 BC). During this time, the Samaritans built a large temple and sacrificial platform on Mt. Gerizim, which were still visible in Jesus’ day. John 4:20: Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.   
 

Physical decline again took place at Shechem. This decline culminated when Jewish leader John Hyrcanus took advantage of the temporary absence of outside armies and destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mt. Gerizim in 126 BC. He then leveled the city in 107 BC. Shechem never recovered from this destruction and lay in ruins until it was identified in 1901.
     
Shechem in the New Testament Period 

The discovery of human burials from the Roman period on the lower slopes of Mt. Ebal confirm that Samaritans continued to live in the area. They made several attempts to renew their worship on Mt. Gerizim. The Romans suppressed their efforts and built a new city called Flavia-Neapolis in 72 AD, about 1 mile west of Tell Balata. This is now Nablus, a modern Arab city of about 120,000 people whose name is similar to the Roman city Neapolis.
   
Jacob's Well

About 500 yards southeast of Tell Balata is an ancient well, regarded to be a well that Jacob the Patriarch dug when he lived there. A well like this is not mentioned in the Old Testament. There is a small Arab village, Askar, just north of the well. Most scholars associate Askar with Sychar, the village in John 4 near “Jacob’s well” (John 4:6). The authenticity of the well is based on its identification in John 4, and on “the fact that all traditions - Jewish, Samaritan, Christian and Muslim - support it” (Stefanovic 1992: 608). Several churches in Christian history have been built on the site of the well. Today, it is under a Greek Orthodox church. Access to the well is gained by going down steps from the apse of this church.
 

Jacob’s well is at the junction of the main road leading from Jerusalem. The road splits with the western branch leading to Nablus. It's a great setting for one of the most important passages in the Bible - Jesus’ announcement in John 4:25-26: 25 The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. 26 Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am He.
    
John 4  

Context in reading the Bible is important to full understanding of what the original writers wanted the original hearers to understand. In the case of Shechem, it is clear that John was appealing to the hearer’s understanding of Shechem’s unique historical and theological context.
 

John 4:5-6: 5:

Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with His journey, sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour. 

This established that the event took place at Sychar. By making reference to Jacob, he reminds us that this is where Jacob first settled when he returned to the Promised Land (Genesis 33:18). Here, Abram received God’s promise that “To your offspring I will give this land” (Genesis 12:7). In addition to God’s promise given to Abram, John wanted the listener to remember that many human agreements were made at Shechem in Bible history, but most were corrupted due to man’s sin.
   
Juxtaposed against human failings, lies and deceits, attention was brought to the fact that Shechem was where God reminded the people that He is faithful. Having given Abram the promise of the land, the Israelites were to remember that promise by going to Shechem and building an altar to worship and re-read God’s Law. This would refresh in the minds of the Israelites how God had led them out of bondage as He had promised, into a land He had promised. The rededication ceremony is described in Joshua 8:30-35. Joshua again assembled the people at Shechem where he reviewed God’s promises and Israel’s obligations, eliciting from the people an agreement. Joshua 24:24:

And the people said unto Joshua, The LORD our God will we serve, and his voice will we obey.    

This promise was another one that was repeatedly broken as revealed in the succeeding books of the Old Testament.
 

Earlier in Israel’s history, Joseph, as he lay dying in Egypt, reminded the people that God would lead them to the land He had promised to Abraham, Isaac and his father Jacob. He asked the people, when they did return, to “carry my bones up from this place” (Genesis 50:25). This was fulfilled in Joshua 24:32 when the body of Joseph was placed in a tomb in Shechem.
 
Shechem became the center for idolatrous worship practices that occurred following Israel’s capture by the Assyrians. After the importing of peoples from other lands, exporting of Jewish believers, and merging pagan beliefs with Jewish practices, a corrupted form of worship became centered at Shechem. The Samaritans chose to be worshippers of other gods despite their earlier promise in Joshua 24.
 

John wanted the reader and hearer to recognize and associate Shechem with God’s eternal unbroken promises, man’s corrupted state, the need for a Rescuer and how a Rescuer had been promised throughout history.   
 

The Samaritan woman’s response after John 4:25-26 was to immediately run into the village, leaving her water jar behind, and tell everyone that the Rescuer was there. The Samaritans rushed to the well, welcomed Him and exclaimed that Jesus was the Rescuer, “the Savior of the world” (John 4:42).
 

Shortly after Jesus’ declaration that He was Messiah, He would complete the promise and achieve the rescue through His death, burial and ascension. As He prepared His disciples for their duties, He told them that they would be His witnesses. Acts 1:8: 

But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.   

The story of Shechem and the Samaritan region had come full circle - from the promises to the Patriarchs to fulfillment of salvation as heard by the woman at the well and declared to the disciples.
 

It is apparent that the original hearer of John’s Gospel understood how Shechem was a focal point of God’s unbroken promises and man’s fallibility.   
 
 

This is a condensed version of a full article. For the full version, click here. 

bible evidence, faith and religion