Lukas 17:5-6

17:5 The ¹  apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” ²  17:6 So ³  the Lord replied, ⁴  “If ⁵  you had faith the size of ⁶  a mustard seed, you could say to this black mulberry ⁷  tree, ‘Be pulled out by the roots and planted in the sea,’ ⁸  and it would obey ⁹  you.

[17:5]  ¹ tn Grk “And the.” Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[17:5]  ² sn The request of the apostles, “Increase our faith,” is not a request for a gift of faith, but a request to increase the depth of their faith.

[17:6]  ³ tn Here δέ (de) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of previous action(s) in the narrative.

[17:6]  ⁴ tn Grk “said.”

[17:6]  ⁵ tn This is a mixed condition, with ἄν (an) in the apodosis.

[17:6]  ⁶ tn Grk “faith as,” “faith like.”

[17:6]  ⁷ sn A black mulberry tree is a deciduous fruit tree that grows about 20 ft (6 m) tall and has black juicy berries. This tree has an extensive root system, so to pull it up would be a major operation.

[17:6]  ⁸ tn The passives here (ἐκριζώθητι and φυτεύθητι, ekrizwqhti and futeuqhti) are probably a circumlocution for God performing the action (the so-called divine passive, see ExSyn 437-38). The issue is not the amount of faith (which in the example is only very tiny), but its presence, which can accomplish impossible things. To cause a tree to be uprooted and planted in the sea is impossible. The expression is a rhetorical idiom. It is like saying a camel can go through the eye of a needle (Luke 18:25).

[17:6]  ⁹ tn The verb is aorist, though it looks at a future event, another rhetorical touch to communicate certainty of the effect of faith.