Jacob 5

Jacob – Lesson 2: Jacob 5: The Allegory of the Tame and Wild Olive Trees (see additional study links in column to the right)
Day 1: Read Jacob 5 chapter heading, verses 1-3, 1 Nephi 19:10-16, Alma 33:3-15, Helaman 8:19
1. From 1 Nephi 19:10-16 and Helaman 8:19, what do we know about the prophet Zenos? Where might Nephi and Jacob have read Zenos’ prophecies? Why do you think these prophecies are not in our current Bible?



2. Alma quotes Zenos in Alma 33:4-11. In this quote, when does Zenos say he has felt the mercies of God?


3. From Jacob 5:3, to what is the house of Israel likened? Use footnote 3d to explain how the House of Israel could “decay.”


Day 2: Read Jacob 5:4-14 (First visit of the Master to His vineyard)
4. What did the master of the vineyard do first to save his vineyard?



5. When the “main top… began to perish” what did the Master and his servants do with the branches of the tame and wild olive trees?



6. Use footnotes 8a, 10a and 14a to help explain what the grafting of branches of the tame olive tree into the nethermost parts of the vineyard represents. What do the wild olive trees represent? Why was it necessary to scatter Israel?




Day 3: Read Jacob 5:15-28 (Second visit of the Master to His vineyard)
7. Why did the Lord and his servant revisit the vineyard? What was the state of the tame olive tree (Israel)? What brought strength to the wild branches?



8. What was the state of the tame branches grafted into trees in poor ground?


9. What part of the world have we been taught is “choice above all lands” (see 2 Nephi 1:5, Ether 2:7-10)? What was the problem with the branches grafted into good soil, and how was it addressed?



Day 4: Read Jacob 5:29-40 (Third visit of the Master to His vineyard)
10. What kind of fruit did the Lord find on the tame olive tree during his third visit? Use footnote 30a to explain what happened spiritually.



11. How were the roots kept vital? Why was the tree (the House of Israel) beginning to perish?



12. What had happened to the natural branches of Israel that had been scattered, or planted in the nethermost parts of the vineyard?



Day 5: Read Jacob 5:41-50 (Third visit continued)
13. Why did the Lord weep?


14. What does verse 47 tell you about how the Lord cares for the inhabitants of the earth?



15. From v. 48, what was the cause of the apostasy? How does the bad fruit of apostasy corrupt individuals and nations?



Day 6: Read Jacob 5:51-60 (Fourth visit of the Master to His vineyard)
16. According to footnote 52a, of what is the re-grafting of the natural branches back into the original tree symbolic?


17. What is the fate of any branch that continues to bear bad fruit after all the pruning, grafting and nourishing it needs to survive?


18. What are some things the Lord has done in your life to “prune” and “nourish” you?



Day 7: Read Jacob 5:61-77
19. Why do you think the Lord instructs his servants in the last days to prune the trees so that roots and tops are equal in strength?



20. Who do the servants in the vineyard represent? From vv. 71-72, who works with them? What is their reward?



21. What might the fruit of the tree represent?



BONUS: What were olives used for in ancient Israel? How are they used today?

Olive Culture
"Jacob's (or rather Zenos's) treatise on ancient olive culture (Jacob 5�6) is accurate in every detail: Olive trees do have to be pruned and cultivated diligently; the top branches are indeed the first to wither, and the new shoots do come right out of the trunk; . . . the ancient way of strengthening the old trees (especially in Greece) was to graft in the shoots of the oleaster or wild olive; also, shoots from valuable old trees were transplanted to keep the stock alive after the parent tree should perish; to a surprising degree the olive prefers poor and rocky ground, whereas rich soil produces inferior fruit; too much grafting produces a nondescript and cluttered yield of fruit; the top branches if allowed to grow as in Spain or France, while producing a good shade tree, will indeed sap the strength of the tree and give a poor crop; fertilizing with dung is very important, in spite of the preference for rocky ground, and has been practiced since ancient times; the thing to be most guarded against is bitterness in the fruit. All these points, taken from a treatise on ancient olive culture, are duly, though quite casually, noted in Zenos's Parable of the Olive Tree."39
39. Nibley, Since Cumorah, 238�39. See Nibley, Temple and Cosmos, 244�52.