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No.10. Behold the fig tree, and all the trees.
The reader may at times have wondered why the whole issue of life and death should have ‘hung upon a tree’ in the garden of Eden, and as the choice of this emblem manifests something of the wisdom and knowledge of the Lord, it may not be amiss if we turn our attention to the place that ‘trees’ occupy in the working out of the purpose of the ages.
It is only within our own times that the extensive importance of trees to the well being of the world has been recognized as the following extracts will show:
“Every moment that he draws breath here below man is dependent on the grass of the field for his very being. Sir Thomas Browne knew this and pointed it out in Religio Medici. ‘All flesh is grass, is not only metaphorically, but literally true; for all those creatures that we behold are but the herbs of the field digested into flesh in them, or more remotely in ourselves’. In the fourth chapter of this present book, Mr. Baker puts the same thought into a few words ‘Thus the tree, with the help of plant life, controls the food supply and life of man and of the animal kingdom’.
A great deal of Mr. Baker’s writing in all his books has been concerned with the disasters that follow when man forgets that he is not the world’s master, but one of many tenants. The tenants are animate and inanimate—or so we chose to call them, though the animation of a tree is an inescapable thing, and some trees take on the proportions of majestic personality. But, call them what we may, the further we go into the matter the more deeply we apprehend that men and trees, grass and birds, the beasts of the field and all living things are held in a balance that may not lightly be disturbed . . . . . We find in this book some truly terrifying pictures of man flying in the face of Nature, ruthlessly uprooting and burning the very stuff that holds the world together: and no less terrible pictures of Nature making her implacable reply. Man strips the forests of China: Nature swirls away in the Yellow River every year 2,500,000 tons of the soil on which man might live. Man strips the western prairies to the bone; Nature hands him a dust bowl . . . . . When improvidence goes so far that one edition of an American newspaper consumes twenty-four acres of forest, it is not difficult to imagine a too-near time when the plight of those Negroes (a tragedy on the Gold Coast) shall be the plight of millions of mankind. Only knowledge, implementing a rational co-operation with Nature, can avert such a disaster; and I am not aware of any writer today who spreads that knowledge more fruitfully than Mr. St. Barbe Baker” (Howard Spring).
A distinguished engineer some twelve years ago, warned America that unless something drastic and immediate was done to prevent the squandering of the soil, that America had not another 100 years before it of virile national existence. Another authority as late as 1946 pointed out that one-eighth of the crop land of the U.S.A. had been ruined by erosion, another eighth almost ruined, on a further quarter erosion is at work, and that in 100 years from now the United States will not be able to sustain a living man.
Mr. St. Barbe Baker says:
“The red lights are against us in our reckless career. To continue to rape the earth and fight for dwindling supplies of food and timber, spells destruction . . . . . Let us remember that the empires of Babylon, Syria, Persia and Carthage were destroyed by the advance of floods and deserts caused by the increasing clearing of forests for farmland.”
Much more to the same effect could be quoted, but what has been given is sufficient, not only to emphasize the extreme importance that must be attached to trees in their influence upon climate, soil and fertility, but to reveal once more to our wondering eyes, how completely abreast of the times is the Word of the living God. He knew what man is but now learning through centuries of folly for food or ill man’s destiny was intimately associated with trees.
When the great day of the Lord shall come and judgment is about to fall on the earth we read:
“Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads” (Rev. vii. 3).
When the storm breaks, we read:
“The first angel sounded . . . . . and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up” (Rev. viii. 7).
Again when the bottomless pit is opened and the scourge of supernatural locusts is let loose on the earth, we read:
“And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads” (Rev. ix. 4).
From whence came this knowledge of the superlative value of trees but from the Lord Himself?
The wisdom of Solomon is proverbial, and it is written that his wisdom excelled that of all the children of the east country and of Egypt, and of what did Solomon speak?
“And he spake three thousand proverbs, and his sons were a thousand and five, and he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall” (I Kings iv. 29-34).
The book of Psalms opens with the blessedness of the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, and says “He shall be like a tree planted by rivers of water” (Psa. i. 3). Jeremiah uses the same figure to describe the man whose hope is in the Lord (Jer. xvii. 8).
Much has been said by adverse critics of the Bible concerning the barbarity of the wars that are described in its pages, but moderns could learn with profit the humanitarian law of Deut. xx. 19:
“When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof . . . . . thou shalt not cut them down to employ them in the siege (for the tree of the field is man’s life)” (Deut. xx. 19).
Here again the recognition of the extreme value of trees in the law of Moses anticipates modern science by centuries. The purpose of the ages may be said to hang upon three trees:
The Tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The Tree upon which Christ was crucified.
The Tree of Life.
The curse came in with reference to the first, and it is written ‘no more curse’ when the last is made accessible. The middle one, the cross, is where Saviour was made a curse for us, as it is written “Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree” (Gal. iii. 13).
The book of Proverbs uses the figure of the “Tree of life” four times, and indeed speaks of a tree in no other way. There are two other occurrences of the Hebrews ets but these are translated ‘wood’ in relation to a fire.
Wisdom. “Happy is the man that findeth wisdom . . . . . she is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her” (Prov. iii. 13-18).
Righteousness. “The righteous shall flourish as a branch (for ‘leaf’). The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life” (Prov. xi. 28-30).
Desire. “When the desire cometh, it is a tree of life” (Prov. xiii. 12).
Heading. “A wholesome tongue is a tree of life” (margin: The healing of the tongue)
(Prov. xv. 4). “The tongue, as a healing thing” (Miller’s translation).
These, together with Gen. ii. 9 and iii. 22, are all the passages of the O.T. that speak of the Tree of Life. To these we may add the three references that are found in the Revelation.
“To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God” (Rev. ii. 7).
“In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river was there the tree of life . . . . . the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations” (Rev. xxii. 2).
“Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life” (Rev. xxii. 14). The texts read ‘Wash their robes’ instead of ‘do His commandments’ stole ‘robe’ instead of entole.
It will be seen that the tree of life does not stand for life in the abstract but in its outgoings. Wisdom that is held fast, righteousness that bears fruit, a healing tongue, and a fulfilled desire.
Let us now turn to the record of Gen. ii. and iii.:
“The tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Gen. ii. 9).
“Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it” (Gen. ii. 17).
It will be observed that the tree of life is said to have been ‘in the midst of the garden’. Now when the woman refers to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, she says “Of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden” which means either that the two trees stood together, side by side, or that the two trees must be considered as representing one thing from two aspects.
How was it that neither Adam nor his wife partook of the tree of life? There was no prohibition, but two things seem clear from Gen. iii. 22:
(1) Man had partaken of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
(2) He might then have gone further and have taken of the tree of life, but was prevented. A flaming sword was placed at the east of the garden to keep the way of the tree of life.
Let us summarize what we have elsewhere discovered regarding the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. An undue emphasis upon evil is untrue, there should be as much stress laid upon the word ‘good’, and if every ‘good’ is balanced by an ‘evil’ and this is known, no thought of temptation, a bait or a snare is tolerable. Angels evidently know ‘good and evil’ and a comparison of II Sam. xiv. 17 and 20, will show ‘good and evil’ is synonymous with ‘all things’, and it is obvious that if one knew all that is good and all that is evil, he would have all knowledge.
That there were two trees in the midst of the garden, Gen. ii. 9, iii. 3 and iii. 22 make clear, but if we confine ourselves simply to ‘trees’ and pay no regard to meaning or typical teaching, of what interest can two trees planted centuries ago, be to us? It is what those two trees stand for, and the consequences of Adam’s attitude to the Divine prohibition that bears upon us all. How can we explain why it was that man in his innocency, did not put forth his hand and eat of the tree of life, and live for ever? What was to stop him?
In our endeavour to find a reasonable explanation of this somewhat strange fact, our mind returns to the group of references to the tree of life in Proverbs. We observe that the coming of ‘desire’ is likened to a tree of life (Prov. xiii. 12) and that this word ‘desire’ is a translation of the same Hebrew word that comes in Gen. iii. 6 “pleasant (margin ‘a desire’) to the eyes”. We also note that ‘the desire accomplished is sweet to the soul’ (Prov. xiii. 19). We learn that ‘the desire of the righteous shall be granted’ (Prov. x. 24) and that ‘the desire of the righteous is only good’ (Prov. xi. 23).
All desires, however, are not good, nor can their attainment be likened unto a tree of life. Some desires are but ‘coveting’, as Prov. xxi. 26 (margin) will show. Wisdom also is associated with the tree of life in Proverbs (iii. 13-18), and it will be remembered that when the woman saw that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she succumbed to the temptation. The word translated ‘wisdom’ in Prov. iii. 13 is defined by Wilson as among other things, ‘the discrimination of good and evil’. In following the ‘desire’ and seeking to be ‘wise’ our first parents did not fulfil one other condition indicated in Proverbs. They were not ‘righteous’ (Prov. xi. 30) for in taking of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil they transgressed. It would appear that so far as the typical teaching is concerned, what needed two separate trees to set forth the truth, can be represented in the spirit by two aspects of the same action.
Had our first parents obeyed God, desire would have been righteous and the tree of life would have been taken; but inasmuch as they disobeyed, desire was unrighteous and death came in its train. There is much more that lies behind the references to these two trees; but we shall be unable to include one or two equally important references if we stay longer.
A tree is associated with the bearing of a curse (Deut. xxi. 23) and so points on to the ‘tree’ upon which the Saviour died the just for the unjust (Gal. iii. 13). In three passages in the Acts the cross of Christ is spoken of as a ‘tree’ (Acts v. 30; x. 39; xiii. 29), and is so called by Peter in his epistle (I Pet. ii. 24), who never mentions the word ‘cross’ once. Paul in Galatians speaks both of the ‘tree’, as it touched the Jew under the law, and the ‘cross’ as it touched Gentiles by nature.
The ‘healing’ that is associated with the tree of life (Rev. xxii. 2) and the ‘healing’ brought about by the ‘tree’ shown to Moses (Exod. xv. 25) alike point to that salvation which was accomplished by the cross, for the word ‘salvation’ soteria is derived from sozo which is often used to speak of “healing” or making “whole” (Matt. ix. 21; Acts iv. 9, 12).
When the prophet would describe the blessed change that will take place when the day of glory dawns, he finds the imagery of the trees at his hand.
“For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace . . . . . all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree” (Isa. lv. 12, 13).
“The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree and the box together . . . . . and I will make the place of My feet glorious” (Isa. lx. 13).
“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose” (Isa. xxxv. 1).
“Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest” (Isa. xxxii. 15).
“He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root: Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit” (Isa. xxvii. 6).
Here then is another pleroma, a story of grace and glory caused by the trees of Scripture. Like the Apostle in another context, we are obliged to write ‘time would fail me’ to speak of the symbolism of “The Fig, the Vine and the Olive”, of the ‘uncorruptible’ or aseptic (LXX) trees from which the Ark was made (Exod. xxv. 10), or what is implied by the promise “as the days of a tree are the days of My people” (Isa. lxv. 22), or the ‘two olive trees’ of Zech. iv., or the parable of Jotham of Judg. ix. Neither can we ponder the question of resurrection with Job (xiv. 7), the pictures of antichristian pride assembled by Ezekiel (xxxi.), nor the vision of the great tree granted to Nebuchadnezzar (Dan. iv.), but if the reader will but explore these sylvan stretches of inspired imagery, a wealth of refreshing truths will be gathered as from a veritable “tree of life”.
------------------
(From The Berean Expositor, vol. 42, page 227).
------------------
When the storm breaks, we read:
“The first angel sounded . . . . . and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up” (Rev. viii. 7).
Again when the bottomless pit is opened and the scourge of supernatural locusts is let loose on the earth, we read:
“And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads” (Rev. ix. 4).
From whence came this knowledge of the superlative value of trees but from the Lord Himself?
The wisdom of Solomon is proverbial, and it is written that his wisdom excelled that of all the children of the east country and of Egypt, and of what did Solomon speak?
“And he spake three thousand proverbs, and his sons were a thousand and five, and he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall” (I Kings iv. 29-34).
The book of Psalms opens with the blessedness of the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, and says “He shall be like a tree planted by rivers of water” (Psa. i. 3). Jeremiah uses the same figure to describe the man whose hope is in the Lord (Jer. xvii. 8).
Much has been said by adverse critics of the Bible concerning the barbarity of the wars that are described in its pages, but moderns could learn with profit the humanitarian law of Deut. xx. 19:
“When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof . . . . . thou shalt not cut them down to employ them in the siege (for the tree of the field is man’s life)” (Deut. xx. 19).
Here again the recognition of the extreme value of trees in the law of Moses anticipates modern science by centuries. The purpose of the ages may be said to hang upon three trees:
The Tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The Tree upon which Christ was crucified.
The Tree of Life.
The curse came in with reference to the first, and it is written ‘no more curse’ when the last is made accessible. The middle one, the cross, is where Saviour was made a curse for us, as it is written “Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree” (Gal. iii. 13).
The book of Proverbs uses the figure of the “Tree of life” four times, and indeed speaks of a tree in no other way. There are two other occurrences of the Hebrews ets but these are translated ‘wood’ in relation to a fire.
Wisdom. “Happy is the man that findeth wisdom . . . . . she is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her” (Prov. iii. 13-18).
Righteousness. “The righteous shall flourish as a branch (for ‘leaf’). The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life” (Prov. xi. 28-30).
Desire. “When the desire cometh, it is a tree of life” (Prov. xiii. 12).
Heading. “A wholesome tongue is a tree of life” (margin: The healing of the tongue)
(Prov. xv. 4). “The tongue, as a healing thing” (Miller’s translation).
These, together with Gen. ii. 9 and iii. 22, are all the passages of the O.T. that speak of the Tree of Life. To these we may add the three references that are found in the Revelation.
“To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God” (Rev. ii. 7).
“In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river was there the tree of life . . . . . the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations” (Rev. xxii. 2).
“Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life” (Rev. xxii. 14). The texts read ‘Wash their robes’ instead of ‘do His commandments’ stole ‘robe’ instead of entole.
It will be seen that the tree of life does not stand for life in the abstract but in its outgoings. Wisdom that is held fast, righteousness that bears fruit, a healing tongue, and a fulfilled desire.
Let us now turn to the record of Gen. ii. and iii.:
“The tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Gen. ii. 9).
“Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it” (Gen. ii. 17).
How was it that neither Adam nor his wife partook of the tree of life? There was no prohibition, but two things seem clear from Gen. iii. 22:
(1) Man had partaken of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
(2) He might then have gone further and have taken of the tree of life, but was prevented. A flaming sword was placed at the east of the garden to keep the way of the tree of life.
Let us summarize what we have elsewhere discovered regarding the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. An undue emphasis upon evil is untrue, there should be as much stress laid upon the word ‘good’, and if every ‘good’ is balanced by an ‘evil’ and this is known, no thought of temptation, a bait or a snare is tolerable. Angels evidently know ‘good and evil’ and a comparison of II Sam. xiv. 17 and 20, will show ‘good and evil’ is synonymous with ‘all things’, and it is obvious that if one knew all that is good and all that is evil, he would have all knowledge.
That there were two trees in the midst of the garden, Gen. ii. 9, iii. 3 and iii. 22 make clear, but if we confine ourselves simply to ‘trees’ and pay no regard to meaning or typical teaching, of what interest can two trees planted centuries ago, be to us? It is what those two trees stand for, and the consequences of Adam’s attitude to the Divine prohibition that bears upon us all. How can we explain why it was that man in his innocency, did not put forth his hand and eat of the tree of life, and live for ever? What was to stop him?
In our endeavour to find a reasonable explanation of this somewhat strange fact, our mind returns to the group of references to the tree of life in Proverbs. We observe that the coming of ‘desire’ is likened to a tree of life (Prov. xiii. 12) and that this word ‘desire’ is a translation of the same Hebrew word that comes in Gen. iii. 6 “pleasant (margin ‘a desire’) to the eyes”. We also note that ‘the desire accomplished is sweet to the soul’ (Prov. xiii. 19). We learn that ‘the desire of the righteous shall be granted’ (Prov. x. 24) and that ‘the desire of the righteous is only good’ (Prov. xi. 23).
All desires, however, are not good, nor can their attainment be likened unto a tree of life. Some desires are but ‘coveting’, as Prov. xxi. 26 (margin) will show. Wisdom also is associated with the tree of life in Proverbs (iii. 13-18), and it will be remembered that when the woman saw that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she succumbed to the temptation. The word translated ‘wisdom’ in Prov. iii. 13 is defined by Wilson as among other things, ‘the discrimination of good and evil’. In following the ‘desire’ and seeking to be ‘wise’ our first parents did not fulfil one other condition indicated in Proverbs. They were not ‘righteous’ (Prov. xi. 30) for in taking of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil they transgressed. It would appear that so far as the typical teaching is concerned, what needed two separate trees to set forth the truth, can be represented in the spirit by two aspects of the same action.
Had our first parents obeyed God, desire would have been righteous and the tree of life would have been taken; but inasmuch as they disobeyed, desire was unrighteous and death came in its train. There is much more that lies behind the references to these two trees; but we shall be unable to include one or two equally important references if we stay longer.
A tree is associated with the bearing of a curse (Deut. xxi. 23) and so points on to the ‘tree’ upon which the Saviour died the just for the unjust (Gal. iii. 13). In three passages in the Acts the cross of Christ is spoken of as a ‘tree’ (Acts v. 30; x. 39; xiii. 29), and is so called by Peter in his epistle (I Pet. ii. 24), who never mentions the word ‘cross’ once. Paul in Galatians speaks both of the ‘tree’, as it touched the Jew under the law, and the ‘cross’ as it touched Gentiles by nature.
The ‘healing’ that is associated with the tree of life (Rev. xxii. 2) and the ‘healing’ brought about by the ‘tree’ shown to Moses (Exod. xv. 25) alike point to that salvation which was accomplished by the cross, for the word ‘salvation’ soteria is derived from sozo which is often used to speak of “healing” or making “whole” (Matt. ix. 21; Acts iv. 9, 12).
When the prophet would describe the blessed change that will take place when the day of glory dawns, he finds the imagery of the trees at his hand.
“For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace . . . . . all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree” (Isa. lv. 12, 13).
“The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree and the box together . . . . . and I will make the place of My feet glorious” (Isa. lx. 13).
“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose” (Isa. xxxv. 1).
“Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest” (Isa. xxxii. 15).
“He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root: Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit” (Isa. xxvii. 6).
Here then is another pleroma, a story of grace and glory caused by the trees of Scripture. Like the Apostle in another context, we are obliged to write ‘time would fail me’ to speak of the symbolism of “The Fig, the Vine and the Olive”, of the ‘uncorruptible’ or aseptic (LXX) trees from which the Ark was made (Exod. xxv. 10), or what is implied by the promise “as the days of a tree are the days of My people” (Isa. lxv. 22), or the ‘two olive trees’ of Zech. iv., or the parable of Jotham of Judg. ix. Neither can we ponder the question of resurrection with Job (xiv. 7), the pictures of antichristian pride assembled by Ezekiel (xxxi.), nor the vision of the great tree granted to Nebuchadnezzar (Dan. iv.), but if the reader will but explore these sylvan stretches of inspired imagery, a wealth of refreshing truths will be gathered as from a veritable “tree of life”.
------------------
(From The Berean Expositor, vol. 42, page 227).
------------------
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