In the third of three symbolic acts, Matthew’s Jesus curses a fig tree that has no figs (21:18–22), evoking Old Testament prophetic critique of Israel’s fruitlessness (Mic. 7:1; cf. Jer. 8:13). Matthew uses this account to emphasize Jesus’s critique of the current temple administration (in combination with 21:12–13, with the most immediate referent for mountain in 21:21 being the temple mount) and to call di…