Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit

 

 "Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit.  Brood of vipers!  How can you, being evil, speak good things?  For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.  A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things.  But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.  For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, "Teacher, we want to see a sign from You."  But He answered and said to them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.  For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.  The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here.  The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here."

 

- Matthew 12:33-42 

 

Yesterday we read that one was brought to Jesus who was demon-possessed, blind and mute; and He healed him, so that the blind and mute man both spoke and saw.  And all the multitudes were amazed and said, "Could this be the Son of David?"  Now when the Pharisees heard it they said, "This fellow does not cast out demons except by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons."  But Jesus knew their thoughts, and said to them:  "Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.  If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself.  How then will his kingdom stand?  And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out?  Therefore they shall be your judges.  But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you.  Or how can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man?  And then he will plunder his house.  He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters abroad.  Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven men.  Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come." 

 

  "Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit.  Brood of vipers!  How can you, being evil, speak good things?  For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.  A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things.  But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.  For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."  Here is a call for discernment, and attention to the inner spiritual state of a person.  What we have read so far (over the course of the past two readings) is a growing depth of intransigence on the part of these Pharisees, religious leaders.  Their hard-heartedness and self-righteousness blinds them to repentance, to the words of Christ, and even to see the powerful healing He has done for what it is, the sign of holy power at work.  Jesus has just criticized them for blaspheming against the Holy Spirit in accusing Him of working by the power of demons.  Here He addresses the state of their interior lives, using the analogy of a tree and its fruit.  Brood of vipers is a term used by John the Baptist to address the religious leaders who came to him in the wilderness, also indicating a lack of capacity for repentance, for opening minds and hearts to the Lord's work.  (See Matthew 3:7.)  "Brood" means offspring.   My study Bible explains that the heart in Scripture is a reference to the center of consciousness.  It notes that the heart is the seat of the intellect and the will, and the place from which spiritual life proceeds.  Here Jesus speaks of the good treasure of the heart:  my study Bible says that when God's grace permeates the heart, it masters the body and guides all actions and thoughts.  But on the contrary, when the heart is captured by malice and evil, a person becomes full of darkness and spiritual confusion (see Matthew 6:23). 

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, "Teacher, we want to see a sign from You."  Imagine that!  After so many signs, here these scribes and Pharisees demand yet another.  My study Bible says that they show their wickedness by so doing.  It points out for us that Christ will not cater to those who demand a sign out of wicked intent. 

 

 But He answered and said to them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.  For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."  The term adulterous generation is an echo of the illustration for Israel used by the prophets, in the times when Israel was unfaithful to God (Jeremiah 3; Hosea 2:2-13).   The sign of the prophet Jonah is Christ's Passion and Resurrection; it is the only sign these who duplicitously demand signs from Him will receive.  In the heart of the earth refers to Christ's entombment. 

 

"The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here.  The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here."   Here again Jesus affirms that the response to Him is the pivot point for judgment, and makes more full the analogy to the prophet Jonah (see Jonah 1 - 4).  Jonah was sent by God to Nineveh, and did not want to go to these strangers who worshiped foreign gods.  But they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and Christ, a greater than Jonah, is here before them.  The queen of the South is the Queen of Sheba, whose origins trace to the Red Sea region bordered by Ethiopia and Yemen, thereby controlling one of the earliest ancient trade routes, source of great wealth.  But together with her wealth, her understanding gave her the reverence for the greater value of holy wisdom, which is also understood to be the provenance of our Lord.  And a greater than Solomon, Christ Incarnate, is here before them.

In today's reading, Jesus teaches, "For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.  A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things.  But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.  For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."  In this sense, Jesus continues from His analogy of human beings to trees; in these words, He is comparing the words we speak to the fruit that a tree bears.  If a tree is diseased or blighted, it will not bear good fruit.  One must carefully cultivate and prune and pay attention to trees with the proper medicine, otherwise they can bear many afflictions, and the fruit will not be good or edible.  So it is with human beings, only we cannot be corrected successfully from the outside.  Whatever medicine is offered, whatever words Christ teaches, if we don't take them to heart and apply them, then how will we be corrected, how will the things that afflict us be healed so that we may bear good fruit?  If we are bitter with envy, this can blight our capacity for bearing good fruit, and afflict our souls, just as it does the Pharisees and scribes in today's reading.  In yesterday's reading, the Pharisees labeled the work of the Holy Spirit (Christ's signs or healing miracles) the work of demons, thus blaspheming the Spirit.  If we are so spiritually blind that we would do the same, then how is the grace of the Holy Spirit to be at work in us, healing us of what ails, and giving us spiritual medicine to repair our hearts?   In his letter to the Galatians, St. Paul writes, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law."  If we put together St. Paul's "fruit of the Spirit" with Christ's demand that we make the tree good in order to bear good fruit, then it stands to reason that opening ourselves to the Holy Spirit and the ways that the Spirit can be at work in us and in our lives is a key to the "good treasures" of the heart that may be brought forth as "good things."  So important is this for understanding that Jesus underscores the point by teaching us that we will give an accounting in the judgment for even every idle word.  Those fruits of the heart, our words, will be the basis for that judgment.  In this context let us again recall the words spoken by these men Jesus is confronting:  they have just pronounced the work of the Holy Spirit to be the work of demons, thereby committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.  In this light, we have yet another lesson on personal blindness:  blasphemy is the very thing for which they will accuse Jesus and bring Him before Pilate to be crucified.  Let us consider how important the notion of repentance is, the willingness to reconsider what we think we know, opening our hearts to God to be led.  Otherwise we run the risk of projecting our own blindness onto others, our faults we don't wish to see.  Fortunately we have prayer and worship always working for us so that Christ's light can show us the way, revealing to us the things we need to see, and ways we need to change.  For this is real healing; and so important is it that this message is repeated many times:  see Matthew 13:15; John 12:40; Acts 28:27 -- all referencing Isaiah 6:10.  Let us seek the light of grace, the holy wisdom that heals us.