Lukechapter 13
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Speaks with:Matthew 7×5Luke 13×3John 15×3Matthew 25×3Matthew 21×3John 9×2
Summary
Chapter summary
Galileans slain by Pilate; the fig tree given one more year. Infirm woman loosed on the Sabbath. Mustard seed, leaven. Narrow gate. 'Go ye, and tell that fox' Herod; the lament over Jerusalem: 'how often would I have gathered thy children together.'
Context
Gospel · Luke — Luke overview
- A. 1–9 Repent or Perish; the Barren Fig Tree
- B. 10–17 The Bent Woman Loosed on the Sabbath
- C. 18–21 Mustard Seed and Hidden Leaven
- D. 22–35 The Narrow Door; O Jerusalem, Jerusalem
The outline
A.Repent or Perish; the Barren Fig Treevv. 1 to 9
Read vv. 1 to 9 →B.The Bent Woman Loosed on the Sabbathvv. 10 to 17
Read vv. 10 to 17 →C.Mustard Seed and Hidden Leavenvv. 18 to 21
Read vv. 18 to 21 →D.The Narrow Door; O Jerusalem, Jerusalemvv. 22 to 35
Read vv. 22 to 35 →
The world behind this chapter
Luke 13The history
The chapter opens with two current events, not parables. Pilate had killed some Galileans while they were offering sacrifices — the kind of brutality Josephus and the Jewish writer Philo both record of him, including his use of troops against protesters over temple funds spent on an aqueduct. And a tower at Siloam, in the south of the city near the pool, had collapsed and killed eighteen people. These were the disasters people were arguing about that season.
The assumption behind the argument was that suffering measures guilt. Jesus rejects the arithmetic in both cases and turns the question back on the questioners.
The fig tree parable reflects real orchard practice. A tree took years to come into bearing, and three fruitless years after that was a reasonable point to give up; digging around it and manuring it was the last intervention a gardener would try.
The Sabbath healing is defended with an argument from everyday chores. Everyone untied an ox or a donkey and led it to water on the Sabbath — that was permitted — so untying a daughter of Abraham bound for eighteen years could hardly be worse. Rules that freed livestock and bound people were the target.
The warning that Herod wanted to kill him fits the geography: much of this journey runs through Antipas's territory, and Antipas had killed a prophet before.
What it meant to them
The answer to the disaster question is not an explanation but a summons: unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Luke's readers, living in a world of sudden death from collapse, disease, and soldiers, were told to stop auditing other people's guilt.
And the lament that closes the chapter looks straight at what was coming: your house is left to you desolate. By the time many of Luke's readers heard it, Jerusalem had fallen, and that sentence read as something already fulfilled.
Sources cited
- Flavius Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews (Whiston translation)
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Luke 13. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.