Israel the vine

The Old Testament and Jewish literature sometimes pictured Israel as a vineyard (Isaiah 5:7). Less often it was a vine (Psalm 80:8; Hosea 10:1), with God as the vinegrower. Isaiah has two songs of the vineyard (Isaiah 5:1-7; 27:2-6). Israel's failure to bear fruit brought judgment, and Ezekiel 15 says a barren vine is fit only for burning. Wright reads Psalm 80 as the background of the true vine: there God brings a vine out of Egypt and plants it in the land. Vines were grown across the Mediterranean and needed more attention than most crops. They were tied to posts and pruned through the year. At the severest annual pruning, the completely fruitless branches were cut out. They were useless for building, so they were burned. Keener writes, "A golden vine in the temple symbolized Israel's power." Josephus describes the gate of the temple: "it had also golden vines above it, from which clusters of grapes hung as tall as a man's height." In the Antiquities he says that under the crown-work of Herod's temple "was spread out a golden vine, with its branches hanging down from a great height."

Because the vine stood for Israel, Jesus calling himself the true vine in John 15:1 claims to be what Israel was meant to be, with his followers as its branches. The vineyard of the tenants parable in Matthew 21:33 is Isaiah's vineyard, so hearers knew at once whose story was being told.