Mark 13:14

“But when you see the Desolating Abomination standing where he ought not.”

The original Desolating Abomination (Abomination is the Jewish view of idolatry and the phrase in Hebrew can mean ‘the desecration that appals') was when Antiochus Epiphanes (168 BC) raised an altar to Zeus in the Temple and slew a pig on it deliberately in order to offend the Jews, and thus caused the cessation of true sacrifices (Daniel 11:31). This was looked on as the sacrilege that it was, and as a ‘Desolating Abomination', a desolation that appalled. But it became a phrase which could be applied to any such action and was expected to occur again in the then far future (Daniel 9:27). Thus the Desolating Abomination, the Temple and the cessation of sacrifice were closely connected in Jewish minds (see also Daniel 12:11), and if you were to say to a Jew of Jesus' time ‘Desolating Abomination' he would immediately think of sacrilege, the profaning of the holy city and the Temple and of cessation of sacrifice, with general desolation also included (Daniel 9:27).

Furthermore if he thought of it happening at that time he would have thought of Rome. Under its procurators Rome had already made attempts at such sacrilege. Pilate had introduced his troops' Roman standards into Jerusalem by stealth at night. These were looked on as idolatrous because they often bore a representation of Caesar on them and soldiers offered sacrifices to them. But the sense of horror that this aroused comes out in that a huge crowds of Jews besieged Pilate day and night in his palace at Caesarea demanding their removal, and when he sent his soldiers with bared swords to threaten them they bared their necks and said they would rather die than allow what he had done. The people's fierce resistance, and their fortitude to the point of offering to lay down their lives in passive resistance, was so great that Pilate at last withdrew. This brings out vividly their sense of the holiness of the whole city, not just of the Temple.

So the people were constantly on their guard against such attempts by Rome, and viewed them with great horror. Note also that it was not only the Temple's sanctity that the people sought to preserve, it was also the sanctity of the city they saw as ‘the holy city' (Nehemiah 11:1; Nehemiah 11:18; Isaiah 48:2; Isaiah 52:1; Daniel 9:24). (Later the mad Emperor Caligula would order the erection of his statue in the Temple at Jerusalem, and demand accompanying worship, and this was only forestalled by his death, something Mark's readers would also have been very much aware of).

So the ‘Desolating Abomination standing where it ought not' would indicate the actual preparation for the introduction into the holy city of idolatrous emblems and actions. Luke confirms this quite clearly. Instead of mention of the Desolating Abomination he wrote, ‘When you see Jerusalem compassed with armies then know that her desolation is at hand (Luke 21:20)'. This is found in exactly the same place in the discourse (note in both cases the previous and following verses - Mark 13:13 = Luke 21:17; Mark 13:14 b = Luke 21:21). The entry of these troops with their standards and idolatrous worship would be the Desolating Abomination. The holy city would be profaned. And once they approached the holy city they would be standing where they ought not. Furthermore Titus would enter the Holy Place itself, quite probably with his standardbearer who would follow close behind, thus profaning it also. Josephus claims that rather than see the Temple profaned it was the Jews themselves who set fire to it. But that may simply have been propaganda.

Some commentators are dissatisfied because Jesus did not actually mention the destruction of the Temple at this point. But we know that Jesus constantly said things and left the rest for the mind to think over. Those whose hearts were receptive would understand. The same is the case here. He was never prosaic. He was answering a question about the destruction of the Temple, and about not one stone being left on another, and therefore these words and their consequences would mean exactly that in the minds of those who considered His words. The coming of the Desolating Abomination (with its close connection with destruction of city and sanctuary in Daniel 9) and the resulting idea of great tribulation would be seen as including the destruction of the Temple. To have actually said it in so many words would have been to take away the mystery, and have been contrary to His habit of teaching in parables. It might also have opened the words to the charge of being accusatory against Rome, for although they were private words to the four disciples they were words which were intended to be passed on.