334. As a fig tree drops its late figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind. This symbolically means, by reasonings of the natural self divorced from the spiritual self.

We say that this is its symbolic meaning even though the characterization is a metaphor, because all metaphors in the Word are at the same time correspondent expressions, and they cohere in the spiritual sense with the subject being addressed.

Such is the case here. For a fig tree by correspondence symbolizes a person's natural goodness conjoined with his spiritual goodness, and here, in an opposite sense, a person's natural goodness divorced from his spiritual goodness, which is not good. Moreover, because the natural self divorced from the spiritual self corrupts by its reasonings any concepts of goodness and truth, symbolized by the stars, it follows that this is what is symbolized by a fig tree shaken by a mighty wind.

That a wind or a storm symbolizes reasoning is apparent from many passages in the Word, but because we are dealing with a metaphor, it is not necessary for us to cite them here.

A fig tree symbolizes a person's natural goodness because every tree symbolizes some element of the church in a person, and so also the person himself in respect to it. By way of confirmation we cite the following:

All the host of heaven... shall fall down, as the leaf falls from the vine, and as it falls from a fig tree. (Isaiah 34:4)

I will surely consume them... No grapes shall be on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall float down. (Jeremiah 8:13)

All your strongholds are as fig trees with their first ripe figs, which, if they are shaken, fall into the mouth of the eater. (Nahum 3:12)

And so also elsewhere, as in Jeremiah 24:2-3, 5, 8; Mark 11:12-14, 20-26; Luke 6:44; 13:6-9. In these places a fig tree has exactly this meaning.