S2 E12 (March 16-22) "The Lord Labors With Us"
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Put on your gardening gloves and get ready to play in the dirt! Just kidding, we're talking about allegorical dirt! This week, I discuss why I was hesitant to study Jacob 5, quote some sources that changed my mind, and decide that the allegory/parable/olivegory/WHATEVER of the Olive Tree is full of hope!
Jeffrey R. Holland:
"This allegory as recounted by Jacob is from the outset intended to be about Christ. …
“Even as the Lord of the vineyard and his workers strive to bolster, prune, purify, and otherwise make productive their trees in what amounts to a one-chapter historical sketch of the scattering and gathering of Israel, the deeper meaning of the Atonement undergirds and overarches their labors. In spite of cuttings and graftings and nourishings that mix and mingle trees in virtually all parts of the vineyard, it is bringing them back to their source that is the principal theme of this allegory. Returning, repenting, reuniting—at-one-ment—this is the message throughout.
“… At least fifteen times the Lord of the vineyard expresses a desire to bring the vineyard and its harvest to his ‘own self,’ and he laments no less than eight times, ‘It grieveth me that I should lose this tree.’ One student of the allegory says it should take its place beside the parable of the prodigal son, inasmuch as both stories ‘make the Lord’s mercy so movingly memorable.’
“Clearly this at-one-ment is hard, demanding, and, at times, deeply painful work, as the work of redemption always is. There is digging and dunging. There is watering and nourishing and pruning. And there is always the endless approaches to grafting—all to one saving end, that the trees of the vineyard would ‘thrive exceedingly’ and become ‘one body; … the fruits [being] equal,’ with the Lord of the vineyard having ‘preserved unto himself the … fruit.’ From all the distant places of sin and alienation in which the children of the Father find themselves, it has always been the work of Christ (and his disciples) in every dispensation to gather them, heal them, and unite them with their Master” (Christ and the New Covenant [1997], 165–66).
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Quote about Olive Trees as symbols (even though I found it in The Book of Mormon Made Easier, and they found it in the Book of Mormon Institute student manual, 1996 edition), I also found it at: https://latterdaysaintmag.com/article-1-1647/
"The use of the olive tree as a symbol for the house of Israel is an excellent example of how God uses symbolism to teach his children gospel laws and principles. For centuries the olive tree has been associated with peace. War and its grim attendants of destruction — rape of the land, siege, and death — were hardly conducive to the cultivation of olive orchards, that require many years of careful husbandry to bring into full production.
When the dove returned to the ark, it carried an olive leaf in its beak, as though to symbolize that God was again at peace with the earth (see Genesis 8:11) … There is further symbolic significance in the cultivation of an olive tree. If the green slip of an olive tree is merely planted and allowed to grow, it develops into the wild olive, a bush that grows without control into a tangle of limbs and branches producing only a small, worthless fruit (see Harold N. and Alma L. Moldenke, Plants of the Bible, p. 159).
To become the productive “tame” olive tree, the main stem of the wild tree must be cut back completely and a branch from a tame olive tree grafted into the stem of the wild one. With careful pruning and cultivating the tree will begin to produce its first fruit in about seven years, but it will not become fully productive for nearly fifteen years.
In other words, the olive tree cannot become productive by itself; it requires grafting by the husbandman to bring it into production.
Throughout its history Israel has demonstrated the remarkable aptness characterized by the symbol of the olive tree. When they gave themselves to their God for pruning and grafting the Israelites prospered and bore much fruit, but when they turned from Christ, the Master of the vineyard, and sought to become their own source of life and sustenance they became wild and unfruitful.
Two other characteristics of the olive tree further illustrate how it is an appropriate symbol for Israel. First, though requiring nearly fifteen years to come into full production, an olive tree may produce fruit for centuries. Some trees now growing in the Holy Land have been producing fruit abundantly for at least four hundred years.
The second amazing quality of the tree is that as it finally grows old and begins to die, the roots send up a number of new green shoots that, if grafted and pruned, will mature into full-grown olive trees. The root of the tree will also send up shoots after the tree is cut down. Thus, while the tree itself may produce fruit for centuries, the root of the tree may go on producing fruit and new trees for millennia.
It is believed that some of the ancient olive trees located in Israel today have come from trees that were ancient during Christ’s mortal ministry. How can Israel be compared to an olive tree, which time and again seems to have been cut down, and destroyed, yet, each time a new tree springs forth from the roots?
Zenos was not the only prophet to use the olive tree as a symbol for the chosen people of God. Jeremiah, foreseeing the coming destruction of the Jews by Babylonia, compared the covenant people to a green olive tree consumed by fire (see Jeremiah 11:16). The apostle Paul used a brief allegory almost identical to that of Zenos’s to warn the Roman Christians against pride as they compared their favored position to that of the Jews (see Romans 11:16-24). In modern revelation, the Lord uses the parable of a vineyard and olive trees to show his will concerning the redemption of Zion (see D&C 101:43-58)."
"The use of the olive tree as a symbol for the house of Israel is an excellent example of how God uses symbolism to teach his children gospel laws and principles. For centuries the olive tree has been associated with peace. War and its grim attendants of destruction — rape of the land, siege, and death — were hardly conducive to the cultivation of olive orchards, that require many years of careful husbandry to bring into full production.
When the dove returned to the ark, it carried an olive leaf in its beak, as though to symbolize that God was again at peace with the earth (see Genesis 8:11) … There is further symbolic significance in the cultivation of an olive tree. If the green slip of an olive tree is merely planted and allowed to grow, it develops into the wild olive, a bush that grows without control into a tangle of limbs and branches producing only a small, worthless fruit (see Harold N. and Alma L. Moldenke, Plants of the Bible, p. 159).
To become the productive “tame” olive tree, the main stem of the wild tree must be cut back completely and a branch from a tame olive tree grafted into the stem of the wild one. With careful pruning and cultivating the tree will begin to produce its first fruit in about seven years, but it will not become fully productive for nearly fifteen years.
In other words, the olive tree cannot become productive by itself; it requires grafting by the husbandman to bring it into production.
Throughout its history Israel has demonstrated the remarkable aptness characterized by the symbol of the olive tree. When they gave themselves to their God for pruning and grafting the Israelites prospered and bore much fruit, but when they turned from Christ, the Master of the vineyard, and sought to become their own source of life and sustenance they became wild and unfruitful.
Two other characteristics of the olive tree further illustrate how it is an appropriate symbol for Israel. First, though requiring nearly fifteen years to come into full production, an olive tree may produce fruit for centuries. Some trees now growing in the Holy Land have been producing fruit abundantly for at least four hundred years.
The second amazing quality of the tree is that as it finally grows old and begins to die, the roots send up a number of new green shoots that, if grafted and pruned, will mature into full-grown olive trees. The root of the tree will also send up shoots after the tree is cut down. Thus, while the tree itself may produce fruit for centuries, the root of the tree may go on producing fruit and new trees for millennia.
It is believed that some of the ancient olive trees located in Israel today have come from trees that were ancient during Christ’s mortal ministry. How can Israel be compared to an olive tree, which time and again seems to have been cut down, and destroyed, yet, each time a new tree springs forth from the roots?
Zenos was not the only prophet to use the olive tree as a symbol for the chosen people of God. Jeremiah, foreseeing the coming destruction of the Jews by Babylonia, compared the covenant people to a green olive tree consumed by fire (see Jeremiah 11:16). The apostle Paul used a brief allegory almost identical to that of Zenos’s to warn the Roman Christians against pride as they compared their favored position to that of the Jews (see Romans 11:16-24). In modern revelation, the Lord uses the parable of a vineyard and olive trees to show his will concerning the redemption of Zion (see D&C 101:43-58)."
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This is the Hugh Nibley video I mention: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BOJTtx_udw
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