Judges 9:11

But the fig tree replied, ‘Should I stop giving my sweetness and my good fruit, to hold sway over the trees?’

BSB

Parallel translations

4 additional translations

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KJV

But the fig tree said unto them, Should I forsake my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to be promoted over the trees?

ASV

But the fig-tree said unto them, Should I leave my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to wave to and fro over the trees?

YLT

And the fig saith to them, Have I ceased from my sweetness, and my good increase, that I have gone to stagger over the trees?

DBT

But the fig-tree said to them, Should I leave my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to wave over the trees?

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On this verse

And the fig tree said unto them,.... Rejecting the offer made: should I forsake my sweetness and my good fruit; for such the fruit of the fig tree is, sweet and good: so Julian (d) the emperor shows from various authors, Aristophanes, Herodotus, and Homer, that nothing is sweeter than figs, excepting honey, and that no kind of fruit is better, and, where they are, no good is wanting: and go to be promoted over the trees? the same is designed by this as the former. (d) Opera, par. 2. ep. 24. Sarapioni, p. 142.

John Gill· Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763)reformed

Related commentary

But lest I should appear to some to be sophistical, and to conjecture these things from mere probabilities, and to babble, I will bring forward to you, O virgins, from the Old Testament, written prophecy from the book of Judges, to show that I speak the truth, where the future reign of chastity was already clearly foretold.…Now it is clear that these things are not said of trees growing out of the earth. Inanimate trees cannot be assembled in council to choose a king since they are firmly fixed to the earth by deep roots.

Methodius of Olympus· BANQUET OF THE TEN VIRGINS 10.2, 311patristic

But the fig tree said - Should I forsake my sweetness - The fruit of the fig tree is the sweetest or most luscious of all fruits. A full-ripe fig, in its own climate, has an indescribable sweetness; so much so that it is almost impossible to eat it, till a considerable time after it is gathered from the trees, and has gone through an artificial preparation. This I have often noticed.

Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832evangelical

It is intimated, [1.] That government involves a man in a great deal both of toil and care; he that is promoted over the trees must go up and down for them, and make himself a perfect drudge to business. [2.] That those who are preferred to places of public trust and power must resolve to forego all their private interests and advantages, and sacrifice them to the good of the community.

Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710puritan

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The verses this one reaches1

Luke 13:6–7
Then Jesus told this parable: “A man had a fig tree that was planted in his vineyard. He went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any.

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Around this verse

Word doors

Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread — the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.

About this book

The Death of Gideon's Sons — Gustave Doré, Doré's English Bible (1866) — public domain

Judges — The post-conquest slide into cyclical apostasy. Twelve judges delivering Israel from successive oppressors, a pattern repeating seven times, and an appendix whose violence diagnoses a nation with no king.

Canon: Old Testament
Author: Anonymous; rabbinic tradition attributes to Samuel (Bava Batra 14b)
Date: Events c. 1375–1050 BC; compilation during the early monarchy

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