What Does Mark 11:20 Mean?
And as they passed by early in the morning, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots.THE KEY
What looks like sudden collapse above ground is already present at the source below.
THE MEANING
A thing can seem to be failing only at the surface while its deeper source is already dry. Here the withering reaches the roots themselves, exposing the condition beneath what is seen. The visible collapse reveals what is already true underneath it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that visible failure begins at the surface: what appears now can reveal a condition already present at the root.
THE ROOT
ἐξηραμμένην
exērammenēn
GROWS FROM
ξηρ-
xēr-
Dry, arid; the basis of the Greek word family for drying and withering.
“dried up” in this verse is exērammenēn. The Greek form describes a completed drying whose result remains visible. Its word family holds “dry” and “wither” together, while “from the roots” locates that condition at the tree’s source.
ALSO GROWS
xēros: Dry, arid.
ξηρός
The adjective shares the same word family, joining the tree’s dried condition to the basic sense of dryness.
xērainō: To dry up, wither.
ξηραίνω
This verb is used for withering in Mark 4:6 and James 1:11, showing the same drying process across different images.
ῥιζῶν
rhizōn
GROWS FROM
ῥιζ-
rhiz-
Root; the anchoring base from which a plant grows.
The verse names the roots as the place where the tree’s condition is found, not merely the point beneath its visible branches. The Greek root also forms words for taking root and being uprooted, linking growth, anchorage, and removal.
ALSO GROWS
rhizoō: To root or take root.
ῥιζόω
This related verb describes becoming rooted, the opposite of a tree whose roots are dried.
ekrizoō: To uproot, pull out by the roots.
ἐκριζόω
The same root with the prefix meaning “out” makes the root the measure of a plant’s complete removal.
THE PATTERN
Withering reaches the visible form when the source that sustains it is absent, spent, or exposed.
The grass dries, the flower withers, because the breath of the LORD blows upon it; surely the people is grass.But when the sun rose, it was scorched, and because it held no root, it dried up.For the sun rises with its scorching heat, and dries the grass, and its flower falls, and the beauty of its shape perishes; so also the rich one withers in his goings.THE THREAD
But when the sun rose, it was scorched, and because it held no root, it dried up.Both verses use ξηραίνω (xērainō, “dry up; wither”): in Mark 4:6 the seed withers because it has no root, while here the tree is dried from its roots. The repeated verb makes the root the hidden condition behind the visible withering.
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