Lesson – Luke xiii. 6 – 13
Pope St. Gregory the Great:
He spoke also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it, and found none. And he said to the dresser of the vineyard: Behold, for these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down therefore: why cumbereth it the ground? But he answering, said to him: Lord, let it alone this year also, until I dig about it, and dung it. And if happily it bear fruit: but if not, then after that you shall cut it down. And he was teaching in their synagogue on their sabbath. And behold there was a woman, who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years: and she was bowed together, neither could she look upwards at all. Whom when Jesus saw, He called her to him, and said to her: “Woman, you are delivered from your infirmity”. And He laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God.Praise be to you, O Christ.
Pope St. Gregory the Great:
Our Lord and Redeemer speakes to us sometimes by words, and sometimes by deeds, sometimes one thing by words, and another by deeds, and sometimes the same thing both by word and deed. In the portion of the Gospel which has this day been read, you have heard, my brethren, two things, the parable of the fig-tree and the history of the woman which was bowed together. In both is a manifestation of the Lord’s mercy, but in the one by a parable, in the other by an example. But the barren fig tree signifies the same thing as does the woman bowed together, and the patience shown to the fig tree the same thing as does the healing of the woman bowed together.
Of what is the fig tree a type, but of mankind? Of what is the woman bowed together by a spirit of infirmity a type, but of the same mankind? Man was originally placed in a garden like the fig tree, and created upright like the woman, but man fell away by his own wilful fault; like the fig tree he brought forth no fruit; like the woman he ceased to stand straight. When he wilfully went into sin, because he would not bring forth the fruit of obedience, he lost his uprightness. The nature which had been created in the image of God, continued not in honour, but cast aside the state in which it had been placed and made. The lord of the vineyard came thrice to the fig tree, for God has come in hope, and in warning, seeking fruit from mankind under three successive dispensations, that is to say, before the law, under the law, and under grace.
He came before the law, in that by natural understanding. He let all know by example of Himself, what and how they should do toward their neighbour. In the law He came teaching. After the law He came by grace, opening, manifesting His merciful Presence. But after all these three years He yet has to complain that He finds no fruit on the fig tree, for there are still some degraded minds which the inborn voice of the natural law does not control, which the commandments do not teach, and which the wonders of the Incarnation itself do not convert. Of what is the dresser of the vineyard a type, but of the Episcopacy? For these are they who have the government in the Church, and are therefore truly called the dressers of the Lord’s vineyard.
