He has laid waste My vine, And ruined My fig tree; He has stripped it bare and thrown it away; Its branches are made white.
Parallel translations
- WEB He has laid my vine waste, and stripped my fig tree. He has stripped its bark, and thrown it away. Its branches are made white.
- KJV He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white.
- BSB It has laid waste My grapevine and splintered My fig tree. It has stripped off the bark and thrown it away; the branches have turned white.
- NASB It has made my vine a waste And my fig tree a stump. It has stripped them bare and hurled them away; Their branches have become white.
- NLT It has destroyed my grapevines and ruined my fig trees, stripping their bark and destroying it, leaving the branches white and bare.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The locusts have stripped the vines and fig trees bare, leaving them white and lifeless. The nation's symbols of blessing are reduced to ruin.
Overview
The vine and fig tree were emblems of Israel's prosperity and peace under God's blessing. Their stripping signifies the removal of that prosperity as judgment. By calling them 'my vine' and 'my fig tree,' God claims ownership of the land He is disciplining. The vine imagery anticipates Christ, the true vine (John 15:1), in whom fruitfulness is finally secured for God's people.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Isa 5:6I will lay it a wasteland. It won’t be pruned nor hoed, but it will grow briers and thorns. I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it.”
- Amos 4:9“I struck you with blight and mildew many times in your gardens and your vineyards; and your fig trees and your olive trees have the swarming locust devoured: yet you haven’t returned to me,” says Yahweh.
- Joel 1:12The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all of the trees of the field are withered; for joy has withered away from the sons of men.
- Isa 24:7The new wine mourns. The vine languishes. All the merry-hearted sigh.
- Exod 10:15For they covered the surface of the whole earth, so that the land was darkened, and they ate every herb of the land, and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left. There remained nothing green, either tree or herb of the field, through all the land of Egypt.
- Hos 2:12I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, about which she has said, ‘These are my wages that my lovers have given me; and I will make them a forest,’ and the animals of the field shall eat them.
- Ps 105:33He struck their vines and also their fig trees, and shattered the trees of their country.
- Hab 3:17For though the fig tree doesn’t flourish, nor fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive fails, the fields yield no food; the flocks are cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls:
- Jer 8:13“‘I will utterly consume them, says Yahweh: no grapes shall be on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade; and the things that I have given them shall pass away from them.’”
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Christ at the center
The promised outpouring of the Spirit on all flesh and the call to 'everyone who calls on the name of the LORD' are fulfilled at Pentecost in the name of Jesus.
How Joel 1:7 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.