Thursday, June 18, 2020

Jacob 5:29-37


29 And it came to pass that a long time had passed away, and the Lord of the vineyard said unto his servant: Come, let us go down into the vineyard, that we may labor again in the vineyard.  For behold, the time draweth near, and the end soon cometh; wherefore, I must lay up fruit against the season, unto mine own self.
30 And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard and the servant went down into the vineyard; and they came to the tree whose natural branches had been broken off, and the wild branches had been grafted in; and behold all sorts of fruit did cumber the tree.
31 And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard did taste of the fruit, every sort according to its number.  And the Lord of the vineyard said: Behold, this long time have we nourished this tree, and I have laid up unto myself against the season much fruit.
32 But behold, this time it hath brought forth much fruit, and there is none of it which is good.  And behold, there are all kinds of bad fruit; and it profiteth me nothing, notwithstanding all our labor; and now it grieveth me that I should lose this tree.
33 And the Lord of the vineyard said unto the servant: What shall we do unto the tree, that I may preserve again good fruit thereof unto mine own self?
34 And the servant said unto his master: Behold, because thou didst graft in the branches of the wild olive-tree they have nourished the roots, that they are alive and they have not perished; wherefore thou beholdest that they are yet good.
35 And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard said unto his servant: The tree profiteth me nothing, and the roots thereof profit me nothing so long as it shall bring forth evil fruit.
36 Nevertheless, I know that the roots are good, and for mine own purpose I have preserved them; and because of their much strength they have hitherto brought forth, from the wild branches, good fruit.
37 But behold, the wild branches have grown and have overrun the roots thereof; and because that the wild branches have overcome the roots thereof it hath brought forth much evil fruit; and because that it hath brought forth so much evil fruit thou beholdest that it beginneth to perish; and it will soon become ripened, that it may be cast into the fire, except we should do something for it to preserve it.
Jacob 5:29-37

The Lord of the vineyard finished his work caring for his trees and went home.  After “a long time had passed away,” the Lord and his servant returned to work in his vineyard.  The time was coming, he told the servant, and that he must harvest his fruit.

Nephi wrote about this time.  “For the time speedily cometh that the Lord God shall cause a great division among the people, and the wicked will he destroy; and he will spare his people, yea, even if it so be that he must destroy the wicked by fire” (2 Nephi 30:10).  Commenting on this passage, Jacob would say, “And the day that he shall set his hand again the second time to recover his people, is the day, yea, even the last time, that the servants of the Lord shall go forth in his power, to nourish and prune his vineyard; and after that the end soon cometh” (Jacob 6:2).


Paul Hoskisson writes:

When the Lord arrived again after “a long time” (Jacob 5:29) to inspect his vineyard, he found that the mother tree had “brought forth much fruit, and there is none of it which is good. And behold there are all kinds of bad fruit” (Jacob 5:32). This is *precisely the situation of the (Christian) world as described by the Lord to the Prophet Joseph in the Sacred Grove (Joseph Smith-History 1:19). The mother tree in Israel that had borne much good fruit in the early Christian era had become entirely corrupt. As for the first transplanted branches, they also carried nothing but bad fruit. The good section of the last tree, the righteous Lehites, had been entirely destroyed by the evil branch, the apostate Lehites, so that nothing but wild fruit remained on it also. The apostasy had been complete and universal in all the trees representing Israel. Yet the roots remained good (Jacob 5:34).[1]

The Lord and the servant went to the vineyard.  They came to the tree with the grafts and found it full of fruit.  The Lord tasted of the fruits.  Even though he had spent much time nourishing and caring for it, it brought forth bad fruit.

“Grafting can be used to change the variety of fruit a plant produces. As an example, several kinds of apple stocks can be grafted onto the same rootstock so the same tree bears several kinds of apples. An important point is that grafting cannot be used to create new kinds of fruit or flowers, even when the scion and stock belong to different species. If a Bartlett pear scion is grafted onto a quince stock the tree will produce Bartlett pears. Bringing forth good, bad, and all sorts of fruit on one tree would require grafting; it would not happen naturally. Thus, it is not surprising that the tame tree with its wild grafts would produce all kinds of fruits (Jacob 5:30), but the branch planted in the nethermost part of the vineyard would not naturally bring forth good fruit on some branches and bad fruit on others, unless someone had come in and grafted wild material onto that scion. Perhaps this is why the Lord of the vineyard asks, ‘Who is it that has corrupted my vineyard’ (Jacob 5:47).”[2]

Describing this situation, Paul Hoskisson writes:

“When the Lord of the vineyard came to look at the earth near the end of the Apostasy, he found that none of the various trees of the house of Israel, with or without Gentiles grafted in, were bearing good fruit. Jacob 5:31-32 describes this condition of apostasy, ‘The Lord of the vineyard did taste of the fruit, every sort according to its number. And the Lord of the vineyard said: Behold, this long time have we nourished this tree, and I have laid up unto myself against the season much fruit. But behold, this time it hath brought forth much fruit, and there is none of it which is good. And behold, there are all kinds of bad fruit; and it profiteth me nothing.’ (What an apt description of the Apostasy.) This was the condition of the world in 1820.”[3]

Seeing the tree brought forth bad fruit, the Lord asked the servant, “What shall we do unto the tree, that I may preserve again good fruit thereof?”

The servant replied the branches grafted onto the tree nourished the roots.  Not only have they not perished, they are alive and good.

The Lord told the servant the tree was worthless.  The roots “profit me nothing so long as it shall bring forth evil fruit.”  Still, the roots are good, and he preserved them for his own purposes.

“At first, the Lord of the vineyard appears unsure of the cause of decay in his beloved olive tree. He grafts wild branches into the tame rootstock hoping to revitalize it, and he grafts tame shoots onto other trees in case the tame root dies (Jacob 5:7-8). After seeing how the wild grafts flourish, he knows that the roots of his beloved tree are good (Jacob 5:36) and thus resolves to keep trying, eventually deciding to clear out the wild branches that had been grafted in and to graft back in the original stock from the trees in the nethermost parts of the vineyard (Jacob 5:52).”[i]

The wild branches on the tree had overrun the roots.  This is why it was producing bad fruit.  It produces so much bad fruit, “it beginneth to perish.”  Unless a way is found to preserve it, it must be burned.

“As trees age it becomes more difficult for the roots to continue to grow and obtain nourishment for the tree, while the foliage is still very active. The equilibrium is broken when mineral substances from the roots become less available. When this happens rejuvenation pruning is necessary to reduce the aerial portions of the tree. Accordingly, when the older rootstock of the main tree in Jacob 5 is rejuvenated by extensive grafting, it cannot keep up with the vigorous new growth of the wild stock (Jacob 5:37), and pruning and grafting are necessary as a corrective measure.”[4]


[1] The Allegory of the Olive Tree in Jacob, Paul Y. Hoskisson, Maxwell Institute.
[2] Botanical Aspects of Olive Culture Relevant to Jacob 5, Wilford M. Hess, Daniel Fairbanks, John W. Welch, and Jonathan K. Driggs, Maxwell Institute.
[3] The Allegory of the Olive Tree in Jacob, Paul Y. Hoskisson, Maxwell Institute.
[4] ibid.

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