{"id":485,"date":"2014-12-01T12:00:41","date_gmt":"2014-12-01T12:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?p=485"},"modified":"2014-11-16T00:08:20","modified_gmt":"2014-11-16T00:08:20","slug":"matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In warning about false prophets in Matthew 7:15, Jesus compares those people to \u201cwolves\u201d disguised in sheep\u2019s clothing. The meaning here is clear: Christ\u2019s followers are vulnerable sheep, and false prophets are the hungry predators who will harm them.<\/p>\n<p>In biblical use, in both Old and New Testaments, the term \u201cwolf\u201d or \u201cwolves\u201d is almost always a symbolic image. Only rarely, such as in Isaiah (11:6, 65:25) and once in John\u2019s gospel (10:12) does the term refer to a literal, physical animal\u2014and even then the wolf is illustrative of a larger symbolic context (Isaiah) or a representative icon in a parable (John).<\/p>\n<p>In most other uses (including Matthew 7:15), the wolf represents only the worst, and most dangerous, aspects of people and life. As such, the wolf is a depiction of callous, insatiable hunger (Genesis 49:27), of destruction (Jeremiah 5:6), and of vicious, deadly abuse of the innocent (Ezekiel 22:27, Habakkuk 1:8, Zephaniah 3:3, Matthew 10:16, Luke 10:3, Acts 20:29).<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, one Bible historian notes that in ancient Palestine, \u201cOwing to the ease with which food is obtained, and the mildness of the winter, they [wolves] do not hunt in packs, as in the colder north, but prowl alone.\u201d In that context, Jesus\u2019 warning could apply to either a \u201clone wolf\u201d or a group of \u201cwolves\u201d hidden among his followers. And the results of either of those situations is\u00a0deadly.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u2126\u2126\u2126<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Bible Study Nerds\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-for-bible-study-nerds.html\">About: For Bible Study Nerds\u2122<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Mike Nappa\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-mike-nappa.html\">About: Mike Nappa<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2014 to present by\u00a0<a title=\"Nappaland Communications Inc. official website\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nappaland.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nappaland Communications Inc<\/a>. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In warning about false prophets in Matthew 7:15, Jesus compares those people to \u201cwolves\u201d disguised in sheep\u2019s clothing. The meaning here is clear: Christ\u2019s followers are vulnerable sheep, and false prophets are the hungry predators who will harm them. In biblical use, in both Old and New Testaments, the term \u201cwolf\u201d or \u201cwolves\u201d is almost&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":571,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,13],"tags":[208,207,209],"class_list":["post-485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-matthew","category-symbolism","tag-false-prophets","tag-fruit","tag-wolves"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism) - For Bible Study Nerds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism) - For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In warning about false prophets in Matthew 7:15, Jesus compares those people to \u201cwolves\u201d disguised in sheep\u2019s clothing. The meaning here is clear: Christ\u2019s followers are vulnerable sheep, and false prophets are the hungry predators who will harm them. In biblical use, in both Old and New Testaments, the term \u201cwolf\u201d or \u201cwolves\u201d is almost&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-12-01T12:00:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-11-16T00:08:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mike Nappa\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism) - For Bible Study Nerds","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism) - For Bible Study Nerds","og_description":"In warning about false prophets in Matthew 7:15, Jesus compares those people to \u201cwolves\u201d disguised in sheep\u2019s clothing. The meaning here is clear: Christ\u2019s followers are vulnerable sheep, and false prophets are the hungry predators who will harm them. In biblical use, in both Old and New Testaments, the term \u201cwolf\u201d or \u201cwolves\u201d is almost&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html","og_site_name":"For Bible Study Nerds","article_published_time":"2014-12-01T12:00:41+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-11-16T00:08:20+00:00","author":"Mike Nappa","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html","name":"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism) - For Bible Study Nerds","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website"},"datePublished":"2014-12-01T12:00:41+00:00","dateModified":"2014-11-16T00:08:20+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/12\/matthew-715-23-a-tree-and-its-fruit-symbolism.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Matthew 7:15-23; A Tree and Its Fruit (Symbolism)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/","name":"For Bible Study Nerds","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Mike Nappa","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575","name":"Mike Nappa","description":"Mike Nappa is an entertainment journalist at FamilyFans.com, a bestselling author\u2014and a notorious Bible Study Nerd. He's a former youth pastor who shepherded kids on staff at Chuck Swindoll's church in Southern California\u2014and he's a bestselling and award-winning author with more than a million copies of his books sold worldwide. Plus, he holds a degree in Christian Education with an emphasis in Bible Theology. So, you know, he\u2019s got that going for him. Mike is also a pop culture dork who watches too much TV, reads too many comic books, utters too many bad words, laughs at all the wrong jokes, and often gets in trouble because he says whatever he happens to be thinking at the moment\u2014like quoting an R-rated movie in the middle of a sermon. Yeah, he\u2019s a mess (just like you!), but he kind of likes it that way. Most of all, Mike Nappa loves Jesus, and he figures that covers over a multitude of sins. Learn more at nappaland.com\/mikenappa.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.biblestudynerds.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/author\/mnappa"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/571"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=485"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":492,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485\/revisions\/492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}