{
 "id": "john-newton/the-blasted-fig-tree",
 "title": "The Blasted Fig-Tree",
 "ordinal": "97",
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "John Newton",
 "poet_slug": "john-newton",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Olney Hymns",
 "book_slug": "olney-hymns",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 97,
 "container": "Book I On Select Texts of Scripture",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1779,
  "venue": "Olney Hymns (1779)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_olney-hymns-in-three-bo_newton-john_1779",
   "https://cowperandnewtonmuseum.org.uk/bulletin/computerised-index-to-the-olney-hymns/",
   "https://archive.org/details/olneyhymnsinthre00cowpuoft"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/john-newton_william-cowper_olney-hymns",
  "file": "book-1.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Olney_Hymns_%281840%29",
   "https://archive.org/details/olneyhymnsinthre00cowpuoft"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-15"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 28,
  "n_stanzas": 7,
  "n_parts": 7,
  "longest_line_chars": 42,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [
  {
   "ordinal": "I",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    0,
    1
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "II",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    1,
    2
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "III",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    2,
    3
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "IV",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    3,
    4
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "V",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    4,
    5
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "VI",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    5,
    6
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "VII",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    6,
    7
   ]
  }
 ],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "One awful word which Jesus spoke",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against the tree which bore no fruit,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "More piercing than the lightning’s stroke,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blasted and dried it to the root.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But could a tree the Lord offend,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To make him show his anger thus!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He surely had, a further end⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To be a warning word to us.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The fig-tree by its leaves was known;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But having not a fig to show,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It brought a heavy sentence down⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Let none hereafter on thee grow.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Too many, who the gospel hear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whom Satan blinds and sin deceives",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We to this fig-tree may compare,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They yield no fruit, but only leaves",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Knowledge and zeal and gifts and talk.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unless combined with faith and love,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And witnessed by a gospel-walk,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will not a true profession prove.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Without the fruit the Lord expects,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Knowledge will make our state the worse;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The barren trees he still rejects,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And soon will blast them with his curse.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "O Lord, unite our hearts in prayer!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On each of us thy Spirit send,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That we the fruits of grace may bear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And find acceptance in the end.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}