¹⁰ Even now the ax is ready to strike the root of the trees! Therefore, every tree that doesn’t produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.^(A)

⁹ Even now the ax is ready to strike^[a] the root of the trees! Therefore, every tree that doesn’t produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”^(A)

⁷ He told the vineyard worker, ‘Listen, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down!^(A) Why should it even waste the soil?’^(B)

² Every branch in Me that does not produce fruit He removes,^(A) and He prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit.

The Apostates’ Doom

¹² These are the ones who are like dangerous reefs^[a] at your love feasts.^(A) They feast with you, nurturing only themselves without fear. They are waterless clouds carried along by winds;^(B) trees in late autumn—fruitless, twice dead, pulled out by the roots;