Proper 21

Proper 22;  20th Sunday After Pentecost;  8th in Kingdomtide;  27th in Ordinary Time WORLD COMMUNION SUNDAY

Proper 23

Readings
 

Quotes

• 
  
   Luke 17:6

• John Wesley's Notes:
  And he said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed-If ye had the least measure of true faith, no instance of duty would be too hard for you.
  
  Ye would say to this sycamine tree-This seems to have been a kind of proverbial expression.
   

• Treasury of Scripture Knowledge:
  * If. Mt 17:20; 21:21; Mr 9:23; 11:22,23; 1Co 13:2
  * as. Lu 13:19; Mt 13:31,32
   
• Adam Clarke's Commentary:
  As a grain of mustard seed] A faith that increases and thrives as that is described to do, Mt 13:32, where see the note. See also Mt 17:20.
  
  This sycamine] The words seem to intimate that they were standing by such a tree. The sycamine is probably the same as the sycamore. Sycamore with us, says Mr. Evelyn, is falsely so called, being our acer majus, greater maple. The true sycamore is the ficus Pharaonis or AEgyptia, Pharaoh's, or Egyptian fig-tree; called also, from its similitude in leaves and fruit, morosyous, or mulberry fig-tree. The Arabians call it guimez: it grows in Cyprus, Caria, Rhodes, and in Judea and Galilee, where our Lord at this time was: see Lu 17:11. St. Jerome, who was well acquainted with these countries, translates the word mulberry-tree.
  
  Be thou plucked up by the root] See ACC for Mt 21:21, where it is shown that this mode of speech refers to the accomplishment of things very difficult, but not impossible.
   
• Family Bible Notes:
   Sycamine; the same as sycamore. Mt 17:20.
   
• 1599 Geneva Bible Notes:
  And the Lord said, If ye had faith as (a) a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.
  
  (a) If you had no more faith, but the quantity of the grain of mustard seed.
   
• People's New Testament Commentary:
   As a grain of mustard seed. See PNTC for Mt 13:32.
  
  Sycamine tree. A species of the fig.
  
  It should obey you. See notes on Mr 11:22-26.
   
• Robertson's Word Pictures:
   If ye have (ei echete). Condition of the first class, assumed to be true. Ye would say (elegete an). Imperfect active with an and so a conclusion (apodosis) of the second class, determined as unfulfilled, a mixed condition therefore. Sycamine tree (sukaminôi). At the present time both the black mulberry (sycamine) and the white mulberry (sycamore) exist in Palestine. Luke alone in the N.T. uses either word, the sycamine here, the sycamore in Lu 19:4. The distinction is not observed in the LXX, but it is observed in the late Greek medical writers for both trees have medicinal properties. Hence it may be assumed that Luke, as a physician, makes the distinction. Both trees differ from the English sycamore. In Mt 17:20 we have "mountain" in place of "sycamine tree." Be thou rooted up (ekrizôthêti). First aorist passive imperative as is phuteuthêti. Would have obeyed (hupêkousen an). First aorist active indicative with an, apodosis of a second-class condition (note aorist tense here, imperfect elegete).
   
• Albert Barnes' Commentary:
   See Barnes for Mt 17:20. Sycamine-tree. This name, as well as sycamore, is given, among us, to the large tree commonly called the buttonwood; but the tree here mentioned is different. The Latin Vulgate and the Syriac versions translate it mulberry-tree. It is said to have been a tree that commonly grew in Egypt, of the size and appearance of a mulberry-tree, but bearing a species of figs. This tree was common in Palestine. It is probable that our Lord was standing by one as he addressed these words to his disciples. Dr. Thomson (The Land and the Book, vol. i.p. 22-24) says of this tree :
  
  "It is generally planted by the wayside, in the open space where several paths meet." [Comp. Lu 19:4] This sycamore is a remarkable tree. It not only bears several crops of figs during the year, but these figs grow on short stems along the trunk and large branches, and not at the end of twigs, as in other fruit-bearing trees.
  
  The figs are small, and of a greenish-yellow colour. At Gaza and Askelon I saw them of a purple tinge, and much larger than they are in this part of the country. They were carried to market in large quantities, and appeared to be more valued there than with us. Still, they are, at best, very insipid, and none but the poorer classes eat them. It is easily propagated, merely by planting a stout branch in the ground, and watering it until it has struck its roots into the soil. This it does with great rapidity and to a vast depth. It was with reference to this latter fact that our Lord selected it to illustrate the power of faith. Now, look at this tree--its ample girth, its wide-spread arms branching off from the parent trunk only a few feet from the ground; then examine its enormous roots, as thick, as numerous, and as wide-spread into the deep soil below as the branches extend into the air above--the very best type of invincible steadfastness. What power on earth can pluck up such a tree ? Heaven's thunderbolt may strike it down, the wild tornado may tear it to fragments, but nothing short of miraculous power can fairly pluck it up by the roots."
  
  {e} "If ye had faith" Mt 17:20; 21:21; Mr 9:23; 11:23
   
• Jamieson-Faussett Brown:
  sycamine--mulberry. (See on JFB for Mr 11:22.)
   
• Spurgeon Devotional Commentary:
  To remove a tree from the earth and plant it in the unstable ocean would not be so great a marvel as to transplant the forgiving nature of the Lord Jesus and make it flourish in our hearts: yet faith can achieve the miracle. Lord, work this in each of us.
   
• William Burkitt's Notes:
  Here our Saviour tells his disciples, that if they have the smallest degree of true faith, lively, operative faith, it will enable them to perform this difficult duty of forgiving injuries, and all other duties, with as much facility and ease as a miraculous faith would enable them to remove mountains and transplant trees.
  
  Learn, that there is nothing which may tend to the glory of God, or to our own good and comfort, but may be obtained of God by a firm exercise of faith in him: All things are possible to him that believeth.
   
• Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary:
  (No comment on Genesis 2:7)
   
• Four-Fold Gospel:
  If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye would say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou rooted up, and be thou planted in the sea; and it would obey you. See TFG for Mt 17:20. "The only real power of the universe," says Godet, "is the divine will. The human will, which has discovered the secret of blending with this force of forces, is raised, in virtue of this union, to omnipotence." But our distance from omnipotence measures how far we are from attaining that desired union of will. The sycamine tree is the well-known black mulberry tree, which belongs to the same natural order as the fig-tree, and is a tree distinguished for being deeply rooted.
• 
   

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