Charles Ellicott Commentary Luke 13

The Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.—The incident is not related by Josephus or any other historian, but it was quite in harmony with Pilate’s character. (See Note on Matthew 27:2.) We may fairly infer it to have originated in some outburst of zealous fanaticism, such as still characterised the followers of Judas of Galilee (Acts 5:37), while the pilgrims from that province were offering their sacrifices in the courts of the Temple, and to have been repressed with the same ruthless severity as he had shown in other tumults. It was probably one, at least, of the causes of the enmity between Herod and Pilate of which we read in Luke 23:12.

Do you suppose that these Galileans . . .?—The tale had probably been told with a conviction, expressed or implied, that the massacre had been a special judgment for some special and exceptional guilt. Our Lord at once, here as in John 9:7, sweeps away all their rash interpretations of the divine government and declares that all, unless they repented, were under the sentence of a like destruction.

The “likewise,” however, is hardly to be taken, as some have taken it, in a literal sense. Some, it may be, of those who heard the words, perished by the sword of Titus, as the Galileans had done by the sword of Pilate, but hardly all who were impenitent. Still less could this be said of the form of death referred to in the verse that follows.

Upon whom the tower in Siloam fell.—Here, again, we have a reference to an incident not recorded elsewhere. It was clearly one that had impressed the minds of people with horror, as a special judgment. At or near Siloam, the modern Birket-Silwan, is a swimming pool, or tank (John 9:7), where the valley of Tyropœon opens into that of the Kedron.

It was supplied through artificial conduits, and appears to have been one of a series of pools so fed. It is not unlikely, since Siloam was thus connected with the water-system of the city, that the tower in question was part of the works Pilate had planned and partly executed for the construction of an aqueduct. For this project, he appropriated part of the Corban, or sacred treasure of the Temple. If so, the popular excitement which this measure caused (see Note on Matthew 27:2) might well have led people to look on its fall as an instance of a divine judgment on what they regarded as an act of sacrilege.

A certain man had a fig tree.—The parable stands obviously in very close connection with the preceding teaching. The people had been warned of the danger of perishing, unless they repented. They are now taught that the forbearance and long-suffering of God are leading them to repentance. The sharp warning of the Baptist, Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down (Matthew 3:10), is expanded into a parable.

As regards the outward framework of the story, we have only to note that the joint cultivation of the fig tree and the vine was so common as to have passed into a proverb (2 Kings 18:31; Song of Solomon 2:13).

The interpretation of the parable as to its general drift is easy enough. The barren fig tree is the symbol of a fruitless profession of godliness; the delay represents the forbearance of God in allowing further time for repentance. When we come to details, however, serious difficulties present themselves. If we take the fig tree as representing Israel, what are we to make of the vineyard? If the owner of the vineyard is Christ, who is the vinedresser? Do the three years refer to the actual duration of our Lord’s ministry? Answers to these questions will be found in the following considerations:

1. The vineyard is uniformly in the parabolic language of Scripture the symbol of Israel. (See Note on Matthew 21:33.)
2. The owner of that vineyard is none other than the great King, the Lord of Hosts (Isaiah 5:7).
3. If this is so, then the fig tree must stand for something else than Israel as a nation, and the context points to its being the symbol of the individual soul, which, inheriting its place in a divine order, is as a tree planted in the garden of the Lord. (Jeremiah 18:8.)
4. The “three years” in which the owner comes seeking fruit can, on this view, correspond neither to the three stages of Revelation—Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Prophetic—nor to the three years of our Lord’s ministry, but represent, as the symbol of completeness, the full opportunities given to men: the calls to repentance and conversion that come to them in the several stages of their lives, such as youth, manhood, and old age.
5. The vinedresser, following the same line of thought, is the Lord Jesus Himself, who intercedes both for the nation as a whole and for each individual member of the nation. He pleads for delay. He will do what can be done by digging into the fallow ground of the soul and by imparting new sources of nourishment or fruitfulness. If these avail, well. If not, the fig tree—by implication, every fig tree in the vineyard that continued barren—would be cut down.

Why cumbereth it the ground?—The Greek verb means more than that the fig-tree was what we call a useless burden or encumbrance, and implies positive injury. It is commonly rendered by “bring to nought,” or some similar phrase. (In 1 Corinthians 13:8 it is rendered fail.) This would seem, indeed, to have been the old meaning of the English verb. Compare Julius Caesar, iii. 1:—

“Domestic fury, and fierce civil strife,
Shall cumber all the parts of Italy.”