John 1:48

‘Nathaniel says to him, “From where do you know me?” Jesus answered and said to him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree I saw you”.

Nathaniel is puzzled by Jesus' first statement and so he asks, ‘From where (or how) do you know me?' Jesus is claiming knowledge about him. He wonders what the source is.

Jesus replies, ‘Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you'. It is clear from Nathaniel's reply that this must have had some significance for Nathaniel for he is even more impressed. Perhaps he had just been meditating on Psalms 32 himself, or thinking of Jacob and Esau (see Genesis 27:35 and note John 1:50 below), or perhaps what he had been thinking to himself while under the fig tree was of great religious importance and related to thoughts about the coming king and the days of deliverance (compare Simeon in Luke 2:25). Whatever it was, he wonders how Jesus could have known it. Indeed he considers that there can be only one explanation, this man has extraordinary powers.