Matthew 24:14-28

B. Specific, True Information About Jerusalem's Destruction (24:14-28)

TEXT: 24:14-28

(Parallels: Mark 13:14-20; Luke 21:20-24)

14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a testimony unto all the nations and then shall the end come. 15 When therefore ye see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let him that readeth understand), 16 then let them that are in Judaea flee unto the mountains: 17 let him that is on the housetop not go down to take out the things that are in his house: 18 and let him that is in the field not return back to take his cloak. 19 But woe unto them that are with child and to them that give suck in those days! 20 And pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on a sabbath: 21 for then shall be great tribulation, such as hath not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, nor ever shall be. 22 And except those days had been shortened, no flesh would have been saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. 23 Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is the Christ, or, Here; believe it not. 24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. 25 Behold, I have told you beforehand. 26 If therefore they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the wilderness; go not forth: Behold, he is in the inner chambers; believe it not. 27 For as the lightning cometh forth from the east, and is seen even unto the west; so shall be the coming of the Son of man. 28 Wheresoever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered together.

THOUGHT QUESTIONS

a.

On what basis can a great Teacher, who is about to be brutalized and crucified by His religious competitors, assert so confidently that this gospel that I teach you shall be preached in the whole world? Wishful thinking and ungrounded optimism?

b.

Did Jesus assert that the entire earth would have been evangelized, i.e. every single human being would have heard the gospel before the end should come? Further, shall all be converted?

c.

How could the proclamation of the Kingdom Gospel to every nation become a signal of the near approach of the end of the period in question? Could every Christian in first-century Palestine, without the benefit of mass communications, have known about the world-wide outreach of the Gospel, and recognized therein the proof that the end was nearing? What evidences does the New Testament give to prove that Christians everywhere indeed COULD have known this?

d.

Why do you think Matthew (or Jesus) resorted to a form of code to render the specific, true signal that Jerusalem was about to fall, warning believers to flee from it? What would this Jewish double-talk tell us about the date of the final form of Matthew's manuscript? After all, Luke (Luke 21:20) decodifies the desolating sacrilege phrase to mean, when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies. If Matthew wrote long after the fall of Jerusalem, would he have needed to point out to the reader (let the reader understand) that there is something about the desolating sacrilege spoken of by the prophet Daniel that is not to be understood literally, but to be taken symbolically?

e.

What is so important about the detailed escape instructions Jesus gave? What would the people concerned have been tempted to do, had He not given precisely this information?

f.

How does the detailed escape information help us to determine the historic period to which Jesus refers? That is, when Jesus shall come again to take His own with Him, would it be essential, for example, for those who are in Judea to flee to the mountains? Why not just go with Jesus in heaven instead? And what about pregnant women or nursing mothers: do they need flight certification to be caught up in the air? (1 Thessalonians 4:17). Or is He even talking about the Second Coming?

g.

Why does Jesus direct His disciples to flee to the mountains? Would not escape to the desert accomplish the same thing? If not, why not?

h.

Why do you think Jesus delayed the judgment of Israel until the Kingdom Gospel could be proclaimed everywhere? Who would benefit from this delay?

i.

What must have been the-' force of the evidence, which this chapter furnishes of Jesus-' divine foreknowledge, upon the minds of those who stood in the midst of the earth-shaking events themselves with Matthew's Gospel open before them?

PARAPHRASE AND HARMONY

Further, this good news about God's Kingdom will be proclaimed all over the entire inhabited earth as a witness to all nations. THEN shall the end come. So, when you see -the desolating sacrilege-' (spoken of by the prophet Daniel) standing -in the holy place-' where it does not belong,let the reader understand that this means -when you see Jerusalem surrounded by camps of enemy armies-'then recognize that its devastation is about to take place.
At that time those who live in Judea must take refuge in the mountains. Those who are inside the city of Jerusalem must get out. Anyone who is up on the rooftop terrace must not take time to go down into his house to get things out of it. Those who are in the country districts or out in the fields must not enter the city or return back to pick up even an overcoat! Those will be -days of vengeance-' that make all that the Scriptures said come true. How dreadful for expectant mothers and for those nursing a baby during that time! Pray that you do not have to escape in the wintertime or on a Sabbath, because there will be such great -tribulation-' and such severe misery in the land and such fury unleashed on this people -that it has been unequalled since God created the world until now,-' and is never to be repeated again. Further, if the Lord had not abbreviated those days, nobody could survive. However, for the sake of God's special people, He will put a limit on those days. People will either be killed outright with the sword or deported as prisoners of war into other countries. -Jerusalem will be trampled on by the pagans-' until -the times of the pagans-' be completed.
At that time, if someone says to you, -Look, here is the Messiah!-' or -Look, there he is!-' you must not believe it. This is because false christs and false prophets will make their appearance, performing great confirmatory signs and wonderful deeds so that, wherever possible, even God's special people could be deceived by them. So, be on your guard, because I am warning you about everything in advance. So, if anyone tells you, -Look, he is out in the wilds,-' do not go out there. Or, if they say, -Look, he is hiding in some secret place,-' you dare not believe it. The Second Coming of the Messiah will be as obvious as lightning when it lights up the whole sky from east to west! Wherever the carcass is, there the vultures will flock!

SUMMARY

The true signal of Jerusalem's impending doom is the appearance of an enemy army at its gates. The only safety is in undelayed escape because of the greatness of the disaster that is to occur shortly thereafter. False hopes of the Messiah's personal coming during the siege must be unswervingly ignored, because Jerusalem must be destroyed. On the other hand, when Christ really returns, He will need no prophets to herald His coming, because it will be so evident to everyone that none could ever miss it.

NOTES
1. The true signals of the nearness of Jerusalem's fall (24:14ff.)
a. Worldwide Gospel proclamation signals the approximate approach of the end (24:14)

Matthew 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a testimony unto all the nations; and then shall the end come. Shall be preached: this simple future quietly but confidently predicts the triumph of the Crucified in that His message would enjoy a world-wide hearing. Note how deliberately our Lord turns His disciples-' attention away from the soul-crippling dangers to occur during what would appear to them to be the climax of a great eschatological event. In the midst of a world coming apart, the Christians-' main concern was to be their dedication to proclaiming Christ's Gospel throughout the whole world. Persecution could not defeat the Gospel. Irrepressibly vocal witnesses of Christ would flee from one city or country to another, reaching otherwise inaccessible audiences. Victory is assured: nothing can stop the program of God. In fact, the end shall not come until His testimony is given to all nations! It is entirely appropriate that Jerusalem and its Temple, the heart and home of the Mosaic era, not be eliminated until the Church, the new Israel of God, had been well established throughout the Roman Empire. When the Gospel shall have triumphed, the curtain can fall: what soul-stirring encouragement!

This highly significant verse interprets truly the mission of the early disciples. Rather than sit around idly waiting for Jerusalem to fall, as if their life could be lived in a vacuum, they were to accept the meaningful challenge to evangelize the world. Out of this we too may understand that our participation in Christian eschatology is not a question of merely gazing at heaven and waiting for Jesus to return. This moment is the hour to commit ourselves wholly, not to an obsession with prophecies of the end, but to the world mission of the Church and to our present opportunities to preach the Gospel to every creature!

The end in question is still the end of the age concerning which the Apostles had asked on the basis of Jesus-' prediction of the Temple's destruction (Matthew 24:2 f.). Further indication of the specific period in which the end in question shall come is derived from the Marcan parallel which more precisely delimits the era in which this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached. As noted at Matthew 10:17-22 which contains material identical to Mark and Luke's parallel paragraphs (Mark 13:9-13 = Luke 21:12-19), the period in question is to be characterized by the special, divine guidance and miraculous power of the Holy Spirit (Mark 13:11). This is not the usual indwelling of the Spirit promised every Christian, but that special inspiration to speak infallibly for God, granted to those on whom the Spirit's power was poured out. Hence, this occurred within the lifetime of the Apostles to whom Jesus was talking, i.e. during the period between Pentecost and the death of the last of those on whom they laid their hands. (Cf. Acts 8:17 ff.) Jesus is not discussing some future end to occur some 2000 years or more after the first century. Further, the immediate context discusses escape from Jerusalem, hence is related to that event.

Logically, however, this verse belongs to the paragraph which follows it, as it furnishes the sign of the approximate approach of the end of the time in question. While some pronounce it impossible to know when this worldwide Gospel testimony would be complete, the New Testament writers speak otherwise:

1.

The first Gospel proclamation ever given was sounded forth to Godfearing Jews from every nation under heaven (Acts 2:5). This laid appropriate groundwork for the potential fulfilment of Jesus-' prediction.

2.

The very existence of our New Testament Epistles, addressed to widely separated congregations, attest the presence of important Christian centers around the Mediterranean world. Further, there lived a generation of non-Apostolic men, who lived in widely scattered parts of the Roman Empire shortly after, if not contemporary with, the Apostles, who also testify to the existence and wide-acceptance of our Apostolic Epistles.

3.

Romans 10:18. Although the words cited from Psalms 19:4 referred originally to God's revelations in nature, Paul legitimately borrowed the poetic expression to picture the wide diffusion of the Gospel among the Diaspora. In fact, he had already affirmed that the faith believed by the Roman Christians is proclaimed in all the world (Romans 1:8).

4.

In a letter dated between 59 and 63 A.D. Paul announced that the Gospel had already been proclaimed to every creature under heaven and that all over the world this gospel is producing fruit and growing (Colossians 1:6; Colossians 1:23). Paul does not say it IS BEING proclaimed (toû kçrùssoménou),but it HAS BEEN preached (toû kçruchthéntos en pàsç ktìsei hupò tòn ouranòn). His wording is too clear for misconception: Jesus-' goal has been reached in Paul's day. (Cf. Preach the Gospel to every creature kçrùxate tò euangélion pàsç tê ktìsei, Mark 16:15, with Paul's above-cited language in Colossians. The obedience matches the order!)

Care must be exercised in defining the extent of Jesus-' meaning here. While, to us, in the whole world and unto all the nations, as phrases, have a ring of absolute universality about them, this would not necessarily have been so for Jesus nor for His first century hearers. The whole world (hòlç tê oikouménç) need not include much more than all the nations involved in the Roman empire. (Cf. oikouménç in Luke 2:1.) Josephus (Ant. XV, 11, 1; XIX, 2, 4; 3, 1), quoting Romans and Herod the Great, asserts that all the inhabitable world is subject to Rome.

Just as God had not left Himself without a providential witness of all His goodness and care for all the nations (cf. Acts 14:15-17), a witness which many misinterpreted or rejected (cf. Romans 1:18-32; Romans 2:4), so now the Gospel witness is to be offered to all the nations on the same take-it-or-leave-it basis. Nothing is here affirmed of the mass conversion of any nation, much less, of all. Just as the healed leper's presenting himself to the priests must serve for a testimony to them, whether they were ever convinced of Jesus-' authority or not (Matthew 8:4), just so would the persecuted Christians stand before governors and kings for a testimony to them and to the nations (Matthew 10:18) with no guarantee that these would be converted. The Greek phrase (eis martùrion autoîs) is the same in both texts as here (Matthew 24:14). This witness aims to furnish everyone a solid basis for believing the Gospel and acting on it with confidence. However, where its well-grounded evidence is scorned, the Gospel becomes a witness before God and man against anyone who turns it down. Sooner or later, everyone must deal with it. When they resist it, deny it, doubt it and finally refuse it as false or insignificant, they sentence themselves and stand self-judged.

Nevertheless, laden with far-reaching implications, Paul's victorious shout (Colossians 1:6; Colossians 1:23) rippled the grim silence of the persecuted Christian world of A.D. 60-62. Although his own ministry had been harassed by perils and endless anxieties, Paul could affirm that Jesus-' Great Commission was being accomplished. What Paul mentioned in passing to one congregation at Colossae, the whole Judean Christian community could also sense, as reports of the Church's worldwide progress filtered back to Jerusalem on the lips of worshipers from the Diaspora who filed into the Holy City for the yearly festivals. Peter, too, urged the brethren to stedfast resistance in the confidence that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings (1 Peter 5:9). So, the time is almost right. Whereas, before, all had seemed to be a jumble of unrelated pieces, the puzzle is beginning to fit together. Christians could begin to steel themselves for the final crisis. While the worldwide proclamation of the Gospel, as a clue to the death-day of Jerusalem, is not very precise, nevertheless, before Jesus concluded His message, He would clearly limit the extent of the period in question to His own contemporary generation. (See on Matthew 24:34; cf. Matthew 23:36-39.)

Then shall the end come for what? Certainly, it was not the end of the Jewish race nor even of their national existence per sè, because, though they lost the latter for 1900 years, they are today beginning to re-establish this in the modern state of Israel. What they really lost and, to date, have not regained, is their sole possession of the Kingdom of God, their unique hope of the Messiah, the most significant and real symbols of God's reconciliation of man with Himself in the Levitical priesthood, the sacrificial system, the wonderful typology of the Tabernacle and Temple plan. These were all brought to final completion once for all in our Lord Jesus Christ. These were theologically lost to Israel at the cross. (Cf. Romans, Galatians and Hebrews.) What followed until 70 A.D. was merely the foredoomed struggle between the Judaism of Jesus-' day and death.

If only then shall the end come after the completion of all the aforementioned events, if Jewish history must grind on until that date, before which the tragic end could not occur, then certainty the Second Coming must wait no less time. So, how can it be so confidently affirmed that well-informed first-century Christians held to the unsupported belief that Jesus must soon return? If so, they deduced this on some basis other than Jesus-' eschatological discourse, because in it He leaves every clue to indicate the groundlessness of such a hope (Matthew 24:48; Matthew 25:5; Matthew 25:19).

b. The precise, decisive signal of the end (24:15)

Matthew 24:15 When therefore ye see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let him that readeth understand). . Here is the crucial signal, but its formulation is most remarkable. For, if Matthew intended to prepare first century readers for an event so critical as this, an event which would require attentiveness and instant flight at the appearance of the first signal, he could scarcely have expressed himself more ambiguously, unless, in the very nature of this vital clue is a truth of tremendous significance that would require its expression in precisely these words. What does the codification of the decisive key have to say about the date of Matthew's quotation of Jesus-' words? In fact, Luke, presumably writing for a non-Jewish readership, simply deciphers the coded part into literal language: When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near (Luke 21:20). What factors could have induced Matthew not to decodify Jesus-' expression, leaving it unintelligible for readers unfamiliar with Daniel's prophecy?

1.

Presumably only Jewish readers would know the meaning of abomination of desolation, since the fulfilment of Daniel's prophecy was a sad chapter in their own history (Daniel 11:31; Daniel 12:11; cf. 1Ma. 1:10-64; 1Ma. 6:7). This gave the expression its particular usefulness for describing a future event similar in import to the past one.

2.

Presumably only Jesus-' disciples, among all Hebrew readers of this text, would trust Him to know that this cryptic reference to Daniel has anything to do with life and freedom in the later national emergency. But even if unbelievers learned this password, making the code-word an open secret among Hebrews generally, it is less likely that Jewish unbelievers would reveal to Romans a secret so potentially useful to themselves. (Study Josephus-' intriguing note: Wars, II, 20, 1: were those fugitives only Christians, only unbelievers, or both?)

3.

Presumably, then, this code-word for Jerusalem's H-hour would remain unintelligible for heathen readers. But why should Jesus, or Matthew, wish to hide vital truth from Gentiles, if this could mean their physical safety? Simply because these instructions are not needed by non-Christian Gentiles living anywhere in the world, but by those Christian Jews yet dwelling in Jerusalem during the critical period in question. Any pagans antagonistic to Jews generally or who would sympathize with Roman policy, if aware of a fantastic plan whereby many eminent Jews (Christians) could escape the Roman grip on Jerusalem, could have hindered Christians-' flight and thwarted Jesus-' warning, by simply reporting His plan to Roman authorities. These, in turn, could have taken countermeasures to expose and capture even Christian Jews along with their unbelieving brethren. Unquestionably, any Gentile Christians resident in Judea would receive explanations from their Jewish Christian brethren.

If these considerations have worth, then not only Jesus-' original statement, but also Matthew's record thereof antedate the fall of Jerusalem. Matthew penned his document at a time when the critical code-word still had practical usefulness in its undecodified form, i.e. before 70 A.D. Composition after this date would more likely have eliminated this vagueness and not called attention to critical signs which, because documented after the fact, would be outrageous hypocrisy and more highly suspect as a forgery. As it stands, however, the cryptic word is evidence of an early date.

(Let him that readeth understand.) This parenthetical remark is either Jesus-' words or Matthew's urgent note:

1.

If Jesus said it, He meant, When you read Daniel, grasp what he meant by this cryptic phrase, abomination of desolation. Even Daniel was told to know and understand, since the revelation was not easy to understand. One needs a mind experienced in dealing with God's past revelations. However, Mark does not even mention Daniel, so the primary emphasis is on the critical clue itself, more than on its literary origin. Even without reference to Daniel, any patriotic Jew who ever attended the Dedication Feast knows what Daniel meant by desolating sacrilege (1Ma. 4:36-59; 2Ma. 10:1-8; Josephus-' Ant. XII, 7, 7; John 10:22 ff.).

2.

Rather, this parenthetical exhortation is addressed by the Evangelists to their readers: Dear reader, fix this unique, final signal firmly in mind, so that you will remember it and escape at the time indicated. This warning argues that the Gospel was written prior to the first march of the Romans on Jerusalem under Cestius Gallus, A.D. 66.

So, why affirm that the abomination of desolation was spoken of by the prophet Daniel? Does Jesus intend to identify the fulfilment of Daniel's famous prophecy of the Seventy Weeks (Daniel 9:20-27)? Opinion is greatly varied on this point, simply because it is difficult to give a conclusive beginning or ending date satisfactory to all, without ignoring some important data. Unfortunately, Daniel 9:24-27 is not the only possible source of the expression quoted by Jesus, since abomination of desolation appears also in Daniel 11:31; Daniel 12:11 in undoubted reference to Antiochus Epiphanes. Because this pagan brute had taken Jerusalem and in 168 B.C. outraged Jewish religious feeling by erecting an altar to Zeus in the Temple thus profaning it, the Jews since that time feared that an analogous sacrilege could be repeated. What happens once can happen again. This realization loaded the expression with the tremendous emotional force it possessed as a sign of an approaching disaster for Jerusalem and its Temple. Clearly understood by the Jews of the Greek period, this stereotyped phrase was already applied by the author of 1Ma. 1:54 to the outrage perpetrated by Antiochus IV. (Cf. also 1Ma. 6:7.) Thus, without intending to indicate the fulfilment of a specific prophecy, Jesus could still have utilized this historico-literary allusion, since this unforgettable point of reference evoked a horrifying image and created an emotional impact something like Remember Pearl Harbor! to the Americans after December 7, 1941.

It is unquestionably tempting to believe, with Kik (Matthew XXIV, 26) that our Lord quotes from the prophecy of Daniel 9:24-27. But while it may be sure that the prophecy of Daniel 9:24-27 finds its fulfillment in the atoning sacrifice of Christ and the destruction of Jerusalem (ibid., 51), is it likely that Jesus would have risked the clarity of the all-important signal whereby Christians could escape the impending wrath upon Jerusalem, by basing it on a prophecy which itself depends upon critical calculations for the clarity of its undoubted fulfillment? Consider these questions:

1.

Are the seventy sevens to be considered 490 literal years or symbolic periods?

2.

Are these solar or lunar years?

3.

Is the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem from which calculations are to begin:

a.

The decree of CYRUS (B.C. 536; Ezra 1:1 ff.)? If so, 483 (=7 + 62 heptads) years end in 53 B.C. in no apparent connection with Christ.

b.

The decree of DARIUS I (B.C. 519; Ezra 4:24; Ezra 6:1)? If so, 483 years end in 36 B.C.

c.

The decree of ARTAXERXES I (B.C. 457; Ezra 7:7-28)? If so, 483 years end in 26 A.D. and the 490 years (70 heptads) end in 33 A.D.

4.

Thus, while it is conceivable that Jesus could point to Daniel 9:24 ff. which would be completely fulfilled in His generation, the above-mentioned uncertainties render it less likely that He would pinpoint the critical signal by linking it with the interpretation of a prophecy like that of Daniel's Seventy Weeks, because it was too complicated for the common people.

5.

If we presuppose that Jesus is thinking in terms of the LXX and no other version, the expression, desolating sacrilege (tò bdélugma tês erçmòseôs), appears as such only at Daniel 12:11 in the LXX, a reference to Daniel 11:31, but not to Daniel 9:26 where a plural form is used. This distinction is important beyond simple linguistics. Daniel makes three uses of expression, abomination of desolation or its equivalent, but they do not refer to the same object. In fact, in Daniel 9:26 he speaks of events leading up to and contemporaneous with the Messiah, but in Daniel 11:31 and Daniel 12:1 he forepictures events during the Maccabean era. This makes the abomination of desolation in Daniel 9:26 ROMAN, and that referred to in Daniel 11:31 and Daniel 12:11 GREEK. Taken together, these literary allusions furnish a grisly foreshadowing of the final desolating sacrilege accomplished by the Zealots, Idumeans, Assassins and other terrorists and finally by the Roman army in 66-70 A.D. But, to establish the literal fulfillment on Daniel 9:24-27, one must begin from the correct starting point in order correctly to calculate the events down to the coming of Christ and the establishing of the Church. However, because the definite date for the conclusion of the Seventy Weeks of Daniel is not specified in the prophecy itself, readers from 33 A.D. onward would still need to trust Jesus to know when the abomination of desolation predicted in Daniel 9:24-27 must occur. Thus, the Christians-' comprehension of the complete fulfillment of Daniel 9:24-27 would have to await the events themselves. For this, Jesus provided a signal based on a historico-literary allusion too painfully clear for misconception, based not on Daniel 9:27, but on Daniel 11:31; Daniel 12:1.

So, because Jesus-' warning would be perfectly valid without it, it is unnecessary to affirm that He intended hereby to interpret Daniel's prophecy as an ancient prediction of the Roman invasion of His own times. Rather, for His own purpose He apparently borrows Daniel's expression because of its vivid historical connotations. He intimates that what Antiochus Epiphanes did against Jerusalem would find tragic repetition in what the Romans would do, even though not literally predicted by Daniel in Daniel 11:31 or Matthew 12:11. He means, then, When you see the slightest suggestion that the agonizing history of Jerusalem's pollution and desolation by Antiochus Epiphanes is about to be repeated, escape before you are trapped in the doomed city. One of the incredible sidelights of the final siege was the presence of a Greek general who, with Titus-' ungrudging permission, led his Macedonian troops in an unspectacular assault on Jerusalem's wall. His name? Antiochus Epiphanes! (Wars, V, 11, 3).

Another important conclusion may be drawn from Jesus-' wording: our Lord considers the author of the wording in question to be Daniel the prophet himself, not some unknown understudy or later disciple who supposedly edited Daniel's work. Nor is he some unknown Jew of Maccabean times who foisted off his own reading of history down to his own times, as if it were actually a prophecy by the ancient Jewish hero of Babylonian and Persian times. (Cf. critical introductions to the book of Daniel.)

REQUIREMENTS FOR THE FULFILLMENT OF DANIEL'S WORDS

If the abomination of desolation is to be a precise, decisive signal to warn believers of Jerusalem's imminent downfall, the following conditions must be met:

1.

The signal must involve an abomination, i.e. an outrage of Jewish religious sentiments. The sacrilege can be accomplished by anything God has taught His people to regard as idolatrous. (Cf. the bronze serpent, 2 Kings 18:4; Jeremiah 4:1; Jeremiah 7:30; Ezekiel 5:9; Ezekiel 5:11, esp. Ezekiel 5:14; also Molech the abomination of Moab, Chemosh the abomination of Ammon 1 Kings 11:5 ff.; 2 Kings 23:13.) Josephus terms the Roman ensigns images because of Caesar's image thereon and because of the worship offered them (Ant. XVIII, 3, 1; War, VI, 6, 1). Various near-sacrileges occurred before 70 A.D. When Pilate stubbornly insisted on introducing Roman standards bearing Caesar's effigy into Jerusalem, he faced so resolute a resistance he was compelled to concede and remove them (Ant. XVIII, 3, 1). Vitellius, Pilate's contemporary and president of Syria, was persuaded by Jewish leaders not to march his armies across Jewish territory, because of the idolatrous insignias on Roman banners (Ant. XVIII, 5, 3). While these abominations brought no desolation, because each respective crisis was averted, yet they reveal the depth and intensity of Jewish aversion to the Roman banners, due to the abomination involved.

2.

The sacrilege must also threaten desolation, i.e. it must be a religious outrage that brings desolation in its wake. This code word is no merely stereotyped phrase, since the event portended was life-menacing. When in 168 B.C. Antiochus Epiphanes took Jerusalem by treachery and committed sacrilege by building an idol altar dedicated to Olympian Zeus upon God's altar, slew swine upon it and compelled Hebrews upon pain of death to forsake God's worship, he desolated the religious basis of Israel's national existence (Ant. XII, 5, 4; 1Ma. 1:41 ff; 1Ma. 6:7; 2Ma. 6:1-5). So, the original abomination of desolation was instigated by a foreign conqueror, the result of a disastrous war in which the City and Sanctuary were desecrated, ending sacrifice and offering. (Cf. Daniel 11:31; Daniel 12:11.) This suggests that pagan armies would perpetuate the sacrilege. (Cf. Luke 21:20.)

3.

The signal must be standing in the holy place where it ought not to be set up (Mark 13:14). Where, however, or what is this holy place?The Temple? Jerusalem? the Holy Land itself? To be an effective signal, it must be visible, obvious to all, unmistakable: when you see. Hence, it cannot be half-hidden in the interior of the Temple house where presumably no eyes, but those of a few priests or the desecrators of the holy place, could penetrate. So, the holy place need not mean even the Temple's grounds, consecrated to God but desecrated in some way by pagan armies. Rather, because He had made it His dwelling place, the entire Holy City belonged to God, and even to threaten its holiness by idolatrous banners is to desecrate it. (Cf. Matthew 5:35.) So reasoned the Jews (Ant. XVIII, 3, 1).

4.

The signal must occur at a time when Christians would be in a condition of real liberty to flee from Jerusalem despite the City's encirclement by foreign troops (Matthew 24:16; Luke 21:21). This could occur under the following conditions:

a.

Roman armies could flood across Palestine, taking city after city, moving ever closer to the capital. However, their troop movements and the establishment of Roman garrisons of occupation do not close up all escape routes whereby Christians could escape, although Jerusalem is virtually surrounded, even if not totally besieged. (Cf. Wars, IV, 9, 1.)

b.

Jerusalem itself is totally surrounded by Roman troops in siege positions, rendering escape virtually impossible, but, for some incredible and unexplained reason, the siege is suddenly lifted and the Roman legions unexpectedly retreat, granting a moment for Christians to evacuate the City. Thus, the sign cannot occur during or after the final Roman siege has begun.

c.

But it must also occur before Jerusalem's sectarian defenders render all escape impossible by considering it a desertion of their cause to abandon the City and tantamount to joining the Romans. Hence, it cannot have occurred after the Zealots locked Jerusalem's gates against the possibility of escape or desertion by its inhabitants.

Any reference to events that do not meet these requirements must be judged mistaken, because Jesus intended this critical signal to function successfully and be of practical help to His people. If, for example, the abomination of desolation must be thought of as (1) the desecration of the Temple by the outrages committed in the Temple by Jewish terrorists themselves (Wars, IV, 6, 3) of (2) the erection of the Roman standards within the Temple (Wars, VI, 6, 1), then, where is the Christians-' freedom to escape the City?

One thing this sign cannot mean, knowledgeable sources might confidently assert, is an army besieging Jerusalem, since escape from the city would be impossible once the siege began! Who but Jesus could be trusted to know that, even though Jerusalem were surrounded by a formidable military power, escape would still be incredibly possible by a totally improbable lifting of that siege? Who but a true Prophet could foresee with unerring certainty that a well-armed, well-disciplined army would inexplicably lift a successful siege from a desperate city and simply march away without any reason in the world (Wars, II, 19, 4-7). Who could predict this with such confidence as to make this obviously improbable event the very sign which would permit His followers to discern the critical moment to escape? And yet, this is the interpretation given by Luke (Luke 21:20). The abomination of desolation, then, is to be a pagan army planting its idolatrous banners on soil that belongs to God's people within His Holy City.

The fact that vile abominations were imported by the Roman conquerors AFTER the city's desolation is no argument against this interpretation. Rather, the appearance of these outrages against God occurred too late to save any lives. The common sense of Jesus implies that the critical signal be given in time for Christians to escape BEFORE the final siege began, whereas both in the case of Antiochus Epiphanes (Wars, I, 1, 1-2; Ant. XII, 5, 3f.) and in that of Titus-' conquest, the abomination connected with its permanent desecration occurred AFTER the city was taken,

THE FULFILLMENT OF JESUS-' PROPHECY

Although the Jews were not by any means united in their attitude toward Rome, they still longed for a political Messiah as a solution to their national situation increasingly infected with the disease of creeping revolt. Many vindictive blood baths and retaliatory measures took place in which hundreds of Romans, Samaritans and Jews were slain or severely wounded. The most significant took place in November of 66 A.D., convincing a vast group of eminent Jews to flee the City. Other Jews, when they saw the war approaching to their metropolis [i.e. Jerusalem], left the feast, and betook themselves to their arms. (Wars, II, 19, 2). In concept, this closely parallels Jesus-' warning: When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, know that its desolation has come near. The unbelieving Jews saw it and armed themselves to fight Cestius Gallus and the Romans; the Christians saw it and abandoned the city. Josephus describes the daring escape mechanism thus (§§4-7):

Cestius, observing that the disturbances that were begun among the Jews afforded him a proper opportunity to attack them, took his whole army along with him, and put the Jews to flight, and pursued them to Jerusalem. He then pitched his camp upon the elevation called Scopus.. But when Cestius was come into the city, he set the part called Bezetha. on fire; as he did also to the timber-market; after which he came into the upper city, and pitched his camp over against the royal palace; and had he but at this very time attempted to get within the walls by force, he had won the city presently, and the war had been put an end to at once; but Tyrannius Priscus, the muster-master of the army, and a great number of the officers of the horse had been corrupted by Florus, and diverted him from that his attempt; and that was the occasion that this war lasted so very long.. Thus did the Romans make their attack against the wall for five days but to no purpose. And now it was that a horrid fear seized upon the seditious, insomuch that many of them ran out of the city, as though it were to be taken immediately; but the people upon this took courage, and where the wicked part of the city gave ground, thither did they come, in order to set open the gates, and to admit Cestius as their benefactor, who had he but continued the siege a little longer, had certainly taken the city; but it was, I suppose, owing to the aversion God had already at the city and the sanctuary, that he was hindered from putting an end to the war that very day. It then happened that Cestius was not conscious either how the besieged despaired of success, nor how courageous the people were for him; and so he recalled his soldiers from the place, and by despairing of any expectation of taking it, without having received any disgrace, he retired from the city, without any reason in the world.

Cestius-' mode of retreating practically invited the Jewish insurrectionists in Jerusalem to follow him away from the City in hope of galling him at every opportunity. Rather than take decisive action by marching to Antipatris directly, he kept stalling his departure at each encampment until so many Jews surrounded him that the Roman troops were outnumbered (Wars, II, 19, 9).

So the Jews went on pursuing the Romans as far as Antipatris; after which, seeing they could not overtake them, they came back and took the engines [of war, i.e., catapults, etc.], and spoiled the dead bodies; and gathered the prey together which the Romans had left behind them, and came back running and singing to their metropolis; when they had themselves lost a few only, but had slain of the Romans five thousand and three hundred footmen and three hundred and eighty horsemen.

It was at this critical moment, while the terrorists pursued the retreating Romans, Josephus (Wars, II, 20, 1) remembers, After this calamity had befallen Cestius, many of the most eminent Jews swam away from the city, as from a ship when it was going to sink. Who were these people? While the Jewish historian names a few, were there no Christians in that mass exodus?

Further, that the time factor was critically limited is evident in a further note by Josephus (Wars, II, 20, 3): But as to those who had pursued after Cestius, when they were returned back to Jerusalem, they overbore some of those that favoured the Romans by violence, and some they pursuaded by entreaties to join with them. Later, even the slightest intimation that someone was making plans to leave Jerusalem was justification for the insurrectionists to slit his throat (Wars, V, 10, 1)! How important it was to believe Jesus and abandon the City on time! The opportunity for escape was fearfully limited. The door was left open when the terrorists and others rushed out of Jerusalem in pursuit of the Romans, but the door slammed shut as they returned. The time to go had comeand GONE. Those who saw that Cestius Gallus had entered an important suburb of Jerusalem, Bezetha, and visibly pitched his camp opposite the royal palace just outside the inner wall, proudly displaying his idolatrous Roman standards in his camp, recognized the sign of which Jesus had spoken years before. So while the pagan army retreated, the Christians fled. Unquestionably Cestius Gallus had planted Roman insignias within the city of Jerusalem in 66 A.D. Although his camp was situated outside an older wall, the site on which he chose to erect his camp was the New Town, or Bezetha suburb. This addition to Jerusalem was surrounded by a wall that linked it to the capital proper. So, a desolating sacrilege had appeared at Jerusalem and gone, leaving an escape route open for God's people. (See Wars, V, 7, 2.)

It should be noticed that Cestius-' retreat was not the only opportunity for Christians to flee the City. It was merely the best one. There was temporary respite from the Roman advance on Jerusalem, when Vespasian suspended operations against it due to the death of Nero in A.D. 68-70 (Wars, IV, 9, 2). During the short reigns of Galba, Otho and Vitellius (A.D. 68, 69), Vespasian and Titus simply waited due to the tension mounting in the Roman Empire. This afforded little opportunity for many to escape from Jerusalem, however, since the Zealots in Jerusalem and the Romans encompassing the city on all sides practically deprived them of this liberty (ibid., §1). Some even managed to escape the City's fate after the Zealot-Idumean pollution of the Temple (ibid.,7, 1; see also on Matthew 24:24).

2. Urgent, practical instructions for rapid escape (24:16-20)

Matthew 24:16 Then let them that are in Judea flee unto the mountains. Up to this point the Lord was advising disciples not to panic in the presence of misleading signs by acting hastily on the basis of superficial judgments about the times. Now He must protect them against the ill-advised fanaticism of the rebels who would hope that God would miraculously deliver Jerusalem from its assigned destiny. (Cf. Wars, V, 11, 2.) This error compounded their confusion and funneled them all right into the Roman meat grinder. Here, too, the ancient observation would find another appropriate application: Many will be purified, made spotless and refined, but the wicked will continue to be wicked. None of the wicked will understand, but those who are wise will (Daniel 12:10).

Those that are in Judaea are those who believe Jesus enough to act on the signal He gives. Judea may or may not include all of Jewish-controlled Palestine. Luke often uses this geographic term in this sense, but Matthew seems to use it here in the more limited, provincial sense, i.e. only the area south of Samaria, not all of Jewish territory. Certainly, Judea involves Jerusalem directly, as Luke adds: Let those who are inside the city depart and let not those who are out in the country enter it (Luke 21:21). Christians who would actually be dwelling in the target area at the moment by the warning, who would see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, would otherwise think to take refuge in the City as a place of perfect security. There would have been no reason whatever to urge believers to attempt a physical escape, if Jesus had in mind His own Second Coming when we will no longer need to escape, but shall finally rise to meet Him in the air. The keyword is flee from the would-be disaster zone, Judea.

Flee unto the mountains. Is it not most singular that anyone should advise leaving a city as well-fortified as Jerusalem which could withstand a long siege and enjoyed a superior military advantage over its attackers? To the common-sense observer of the day, the question was, Why should these otherwise sensible people become fools for sake of their Christ? But the true wisdom of the Christians was amply justified by its results. In fact, if God Almighty is planning to rain down judgment on a city and warns His people to abandon that locality, it is the height of folly NOT to leave! (Cf. Jeremiah 51:45 f.; Genesis 19:14-22.)

Part of the cause of the magnitude of the tragedy surrounding Jerusalem's death lay in the fact that, shortly before the final siege-works closed the city, on the feast of unleavened bread, which was not come. Eleazar and his party opened the gates of this. temple, and admitted such of the people as were desirous to worship God into it (Wars, V, 3, 1). Vast multitudes of Jews and proselytes poured into Jerusalem despite the war-time conditions, to worship at the Passover (Wars, VI, 9, 3). Confident of God's protection, they crowded into what, ironically, would prove to be their grave, sealed in by their own people (Wars, V, 1, 5). Jesus ordered His people, Flee! (See also Eusebius, Ecclestical History, III, 5.)

To the mountains. Because Jerusalem itself is located on a ridge in the hill country of Judah, hills surround it both on the north and south. Even though these hills themselves are not high, still, in contrast to the Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea far below them, they would seem mountains by contrast. So, where are the mountains to which Christians must flee? Eusebius (Eccl. Hist., III, 5) reports:

The whole body, however, of the church at Jerusalem, having been commanded by a divine revelation, given to men of approved piety there before the war, removed from the city, and dwelt at a certain town beyond the Jordan, called Pella.

Pella is located east of the Jordan River in the edge of the hill country of Perea between the Jabbok and Jarmuk Rivers, south of Gadara, southeast of Scythopolis (Bethshean) northwest of Gerasa. This city of the Decapolis lies about 4 km (2.5 mi.) from the Jordan. This location so near the river is not yet well into the higher hills of Perea farther east. So, in what sense would an escape to Pella be tantamount to flight to the mountains?Josephus (Wars, IV, 8, 2) contrasts the hill country of Cisjordan with that of Transjordan thus:

[Jericho] is situated in a plain; but a naked and barren mountain of a great length, hangs over it, which extends itself to the land about Scythopolis [Bethshean] northward, but as far as the country of Sodom and the utmost limits of the lake Asphaltitis [Dead Sea] southward.. There is an opposite mountain that is situated over against it, on the other side of the Jordan; this last begins at Julias [Bethsaida Julias, see Luke 9:10; Mark 8:22; John 6:1] and the northern quarters, and extends itself southward as far as Somorrhon, which is the bounds of Petra in Arabia.

So, Jesus could speak of the mountains and be understood by others as referring to what we might call hills in contrast to the Alps or the Rockies. In fact, at some point in their eastward rush, Christian refugees must cross the Jordan River. Were they to cross opposite Pella from the valley of Bethshean, they must descend to the river's level at - 259 m (- 850 ft.) below sea level. Coming out on the other side, they must climb out of the inner Jordan Valley (Zôr) onto the wider Jordan plateau only - 137 m (- 450 ft.) below sea level. Then they would begin the real climb to the 874 m (2868 ft.) above sea level in the first 10 km (6.2 mi.). This represents a total gain of over 1134 m (300 ft.). Although such tall hills, of course, do not compare with Mount Hermon to the north, anyone walking that particular stretch of country would be ready to call those hills mountains. Regardless of which route Christians took to arrive at Pella, they would be moving from the level of the Jordan River at whatever crossing they chose, toward the Gilead mountain range that arises to an average height of 1220 m (4000 ft.) above the Jordan Valley, or to about 915 m (3000 ft.) above sea level.

Hendriksen (Matthew, 858) offers four arguments for rejecting the fourth century assertion that the Christians went to Pella: Scholars who have made a special study of the early history of the Jerusalem church doubt this fourth century A.D. report. They tell us that a. in order at this time to get to Pella, believers would have had to break their way through lines of Roman soldiers; b. the people left in Pella were filled with bitter hatred against all Jews, including Christian Jews; c. Pella could not have provided housing for all the refugees; and d. if the escape had been attempted at a slightly earlier date, the Christians would have fallen into the hostile hands of the fanatical Jewish freedom-fighters.

Unhappily, these arguments ignore several important points and contain several false assumptions involving both the geography of Palestine and the chronology of the Roman occupation of Palestine.

1.

Certainly, if the fleeing Christians took the Jericho road and either of the two roads flanking the Jordan River for easier travel north to Pella, they might have encountered Romans. The same could be affirmed of travel straight north to Bethel, Shechem, Scythopolis and Pella. However, if they entered the hilly country northeast of Jerusalem, bypassing any towns garrisoned by the Romans or occupied by Zealot sympathizers, it is far less likely that they would have encountered enemy troops. Engines of war could not be hauled over those hills with ease, and the infantry would be worn out by the constant climbing and descents. The same is also true for the refugees themselves, but they have at least gained the advantage of staying away from the main-travelled routes leading to Jerusalem.

2.

What inhabitants of Pella would not receive the fleeing Jewish Christians? Pella was one of the cities whose population has been DESTROYED by Jews in retaliation for the anti-Jewish massacres in Caesarea (Wars, II, 18, 1). Thus, along with other abandoned cities of the Decapolis, Pella could well have been settled by Jewish Christians fleeing from Jerusalem. Josephus specifically states: some cities they destroyed there and some they set on fire. some they burned to the ground entirely demolished. But he is silent about the fate of Pella and other Decapolis cities, limiting himself to say they laid waste the villages of the Syrians and their neighboring cities, which perhaps refers only to their inhabitants. It was shortly after the above-mentioned massacres that Cestius Gallus encircled Jerusalem (Wars, II, 19, 1, 8). Then he retreated, leaving the way for Christians to flee from the capital to these abandoned cities of Decapolis.

3.

Although we may presume that, despite persecutions, the Jerusalem Church remained of significant size even to the times of Paul's great, final visit (cf. Acts 21:17-22), for how many refugees must lodging be found in Pella? Because of the earlier massacre of its inhabitants, the Christians would become the majority, if not the exclusive population, to take possession of the property of the former inhabitants of the now practically empty city.

4.

While it is true that after Vespasian swarmed into Palestine, there were Roman garrisons in Bethel and Ephraim, blocking that route (Wars, IV, 9, 9), earlier, however, immediately after the disastrous retreat of Cestius Gallus (Wars II, 19, 1-8; 20, 1), that route would have been relatively open. In fact, both Jewish insurgents and Roman troops together were moving northwest away from Jerusalem toward Antipatris. The fanatics, thus, were led AWAY from the Christians-' escape route by the retreating Romans, leaving even the critical well-travelled highways to the northeast quite free.

EASE OF ESCAPE DEPENDS ON TIMING. If the signal came before Vespasian arrived in Palestine after the debacle of Cestius Gallus at Jerusalem, then Christians would have been quite free to desert the capital and travel to Pella and other cities.

The Hindrances of Possessions (24:17f.)

Matthew 24:17 Let him that is on the housetop not go down to take out the things that are in his house. On the housetop pictures the flat-roofed constructions so common around the Mediterranean. The limited, and in some areas almost non-existent, snowfall permits builders to create a roof terrace to gain further living space and storage. In Scripture, the paved, flat roof was a place for drying flax (Joshua 2:6), for privacy and rest (1 Samuel 9:25 f.), for prayer (Acts 10:9), as an observation post (Isaiah 22:1) or a place from which to make public announcements (Matthew 10:27). Jesus does not order His followers to escape by jumping from rooftop to rooftop until they could reach the city wall and let themselves down nor does He order them not to descend from their own rooftop in an orderly manner. Rather, they are not to go down to take out the things that are in the house. Life preserved is more than possessions conserved. Anyone who has ever moved his possessions from one town to another and must decide which items were absolutely essential and which things might be abandoned without loss, understands the time-consuming, decision-making process that would hinder the instant flight of the householder. Further, transporting cumbersome household goods would require further precious time to secure the necessary transport. Speedy removal of a house full of goods collected over a lifetime was out of the question, but the temptation would arise to try it anyway. Therefore, Jesus enjoins instant, unencumbered escape while there was still time.

Matthew 24:18 And let him that is in the field not return back to take his cloak. Here is a Christian farmer working his ground near Jerusalem, lightly dressed only for sweaty field work. The warning signal to flee catches him at work, without his long robe that serves as an overcoat and, in the case of the poor, also doubles as a blanket at night (Deuteronomy 24:12 f.; Exodus 22:26 f.). But even this vital item of clothing is to be abandoned in favor of departure without delay. Jesus is emphasizing an exodus so hasty that people would be evacuated with just the shirt on their back!

Unavoidable Personal Hindrances (24:19)

Matthew 24:19 But woe unto them that are with child and to them that give suck in those days! This woe depicts the plight of both believing and unbelieving mothers alike in those fateful days (Luke 23:28 f.). Any mother would suffer. Due to excruciating hunger during the famine of the siege of Jerusalem, Jewish mothers devoured their own children, just as God said they would (Deuteronomy 28:49-57; cf. Wars V, 10, 3; VI, 3, 4f.). Contextually, however, Jesus-' reference is to the Christian mothers who, because pregnant, or because nursing children, would not be able to travel rapidly for long, forced marches plunging through rough country without provisions or adequate shelter,

Hindrances Beyond Christians-' Control (24:20)

Matthew 24:20 And pray ye that your flight be not in winter, neither on a sabbath. Pray means that God is not unaware of your plight nor unconcerned about you in those terrible uncertainties nor are those trials an evidence He had abandoned His people. Rather, even though your escape cannot be avoided, your suffering may be alleviated. You should continue to beseech Him for what might seem to be trivial blessings, but which could make all the difference between succumbing and survival.

Your flight: what is contemplated is the believers-' escape, hopefully not during certain periods. Obviously, none of these directions concern Christ's Second Coming, because under what conditions may the believer's rising to meet the Lord in the air be considered an escape from dangers of earth, a flight not to be conditioned by winters or sabbaths?Must God be besought to send Jesus back to earth on the off-season, but not on the weekend?

Travel in civil-war conditions would not be safe in the best of weather. (Cf. 2 Chronicles 15:5 f.) But in the winter, cold, rainy weather, shorter daylight hours, bad or non-existent roads and unfordable, swollen rivers would all contribute to limit freedom of travel. Worse, camping out in such weather would be prohibitive, except for the most desperate fugitives. Winter might even bring snowfall (1Ma. 13:22). Further, the fields through which the Christians must pass would not furnish any but the crudest emergency food.

The total rout of Cestius Gallus occurred on the eighth day of the month of Dius, or Marchesvan, in the twelfth year of Nero (A.D. 54-68). This would be late October or early November of A.D. 66. So, these prayers were essential, because, although their flight occurred about three weeks after the Feast of Tabernacles in which people had been camping out in and around Jerusalem (Wars, II, 19, 1ff.), the early rains would normally begin in that period (Deuteronomy 11:14). Their prayers should be addressed therefore to Him who controls the rain.

Neither on a sabbath. Never would this warning have any worldwide significance, except in that country where strict, superstitious reverence for the Sabbath would have prohibited long-distance travel on Saturday, i.e. in Palestine. (Cf. Ant. XVIII, 8, 4; XIV, 4, 2f.) That Mark does not mention the sabbath is not so much out of regard for his Gentile readers, as that this detail would not affect them outside of Palestine, whereas Matthew's inclusion of this detail would be extremely pertinent in Israel. There a centuries-old tradition, coupled with proud patriotism, had taken root, which refused to take offensive action against one's national enemies on the Sabbath. Even if Christians themselves might with justification describe their fleeing from the Roman horror as defensive action, zealous bigots might quarrel with their interpretation and impede their escape. Further, if city gates were locked (cf. Nehemiah 13:19 ff.) or Sabbath closing of stores made the purchase of food for the journey or the hiring of lodging impossible among the orthodox (cf. Nehemiah 13:15 ff.), dangerous delays would mount up.

And what of those Jewish Christians whose ingrained habit continued to hold one day above another (Romans 14:5 f.)? Their cultural orientation might still cause them to think of the Sabbath as a day on which no work might be done. (Study Acts 21:20-26.) Because Jewish believers still observed many cultural mores, perhaps many in Jerusalem still acted on Saturday as they always had, even though they knew it had been surpassed by Christ. Nevertheless, even though Jesus-' sabbath doctrine (cf. Matthew 12:8-11) was elastic enough to permit life-saving escape, yet those who would not travel more than a sabbath-day's journey would travel no more than a kilometer away from the danger zone.

3. Motivation: great, unprecedented tribulation (24:21)

Matthew 24:21 for then shall be great tribulation. For connects this great tribulation with the hasty escape just mentioned to avoid the punishment of Jerusalem (Matthew 24:20). That this cannot be the great tribulation of Revelation 7 is evident because the sufferings of Matthew 24 are punitive justice poured out by God on an unbelieving Israel and from which the Christians could escape alive on earth by following Jesus-' instructions. They would actually avoid this great tribulation meant here, whereas those who must suffer it and die in it were the wicked of Israel who had crucified their Messiah, persecuted His Church and filled up the measure of their fathers (Matthew 23:23 ff.). Contrarily, those who come out of great tribulation in Revelation 7 are the victorious from every nation, tribe, people and tongue who have been purified by the blood of Christ (Revelation 7:14 ff.). There are simply TWO great tribulations, one through which the unbelieving in Israel passed, and the other which Christians must endure. The fact that they were sometimes contemporaneous must not confuse us regarding their perpetrators, their intentions nor their victims. The Jewish great tribulation of 66-70 A.D. must not be confused for the trials suffered by Christians during the present age down to Christ's coming (Revelation 7:14).

Great tribulation such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no and never will be. This language appears to depict an event so horrible that Jerusalem's demolishment must be sought by relating the prophecy to some later, even future temple. But three motives induce us to conclude otherwise:

1.

God had already used this kind of language before: How awful that day will be! None will be like it. It will be a time of trouble for Jacob, but he will be saved out of it (Jeremiah 30:7). Uniquely grand and terrible would be that later day intended, but Jeremiah proceeds to explain that its occurrence would be completely earthly as the events in world politics would permit God's people to return to their homeland. (See Jeremiah's context.) Further, Daniel too wrote: There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then (Daniel 12:1). And yet, despite the horrors of that distress, the deliverance of God's people was guaranteed, because at that time your peopleeveryone whose name is found written in the bookwill be delivered.

2.

This same thought form was considered appropriate by Jesus-' contemporary, the Pharisean(?) author of Assumption of Moses Matthew 8:1, to describe the persecutions of Antiochus Epiphanes:

And there shall come upon them a second visitation and wrath, such as has not befallen them from the beginning until that time, in which He will stir up against them the king of the kings of the earth and one that ruleth with great power who shall crucify those who confess to their circumcision..

3.

Josephus (Wars, Preface, 4) lamented:

Accordingly it appears to me, that the misfortunes of all men, from the beginning of the world, if they be compared to these of the Jews, are not so considerable as they were.

Josephus (Wars, V, 10, 5) further noted:

Neither did any other city ever suffer such miseries, nor did any age ever breed a generation more fruitful in wickedness than this was, from the beginning of the world.

After tallying the number of captives of 97,000 and those who perished during the entire siege at 1,100,000, whether by pestilence, famine or murder, Josephus then concludes in highly wrought, emotional language: The multitude of those that therein perished exceeded all the destructions that either men or God ever brought upon the world. While it is fashionable to dismiss Josephus for exaggeration, one must consider his lament in the light of its theological and spiritual significance, evident even to this Jewish observer.

Now, if it be thought that Jews are given to hyperbole when describing monstrously horrible facts, should not Jesus prepare His disciples to face this particular disaster by using language appropriate to the terrible grandeur and spiritual significance of the events portrayed? If it be argued that the fall of Jerusalem, however indescribable its horrors, is nevertheless beggared by comparison with the Nazi holocaust that wiped out a greater number of Hebrews, let it be recalled that the magnitude of what Jesus predicts is not to be evaluated merely in terms of the number of lives or the value of the property lost. Rather, its meaning lies in the kind or quality of the catastrophe.

This great tribulation must be adjudged such in light of the sentence Jesus had just pronounced upon Israel (Matthew 23:29-36, esp. Matthew 23:35). If the punishment of that nation was to be the proper judicial climax to a process of rejecting God's witnesses from the beginning of the world until now, from the blood of the righteous Abel to the death of Zachariah, consummating in the crucifixion of Israel's Messiah, then it should not be surprising that unparalleled privations, torture and slaughter should accompany this terrible visitation of God's wrath so horrible as to defy description. (Cf. Luke 21:23 and similar language used by the author of 1Ma. 1:64 to describe the original abomination of desolation. See also 1Ma. 9:27.)

One of the significant differences between the great tribulation suffered by the Christians (Revelation 7:14) and that endured by the Jews (Matthew 24:21) is that to a significant degree the latter was self-inflicted. Without diminishing the seriousness of the heartless slaughters of Jewish people by Syrians and others (Wars, II, 18), the most damage to Hebrew people during the final hours of their Holy City came from their own countrymen, not so much from the Romans (Wars, IV, 5, 3-5). In fact, Vespasian astutely refused to seek military advantage in the civil war raging inside the city, lest he thereby instantly unite the Jews against the Romans. So he determined to let his enemies destroy each other with their own hands (Wars, IV, 6, 2). The degree of barbarity rose to such heights that Jews considered the dead most happy (ibid,, 6, 3). Josephus (Wars, V, 6, 1) chronicled:

For they never suffered anything that was worse from the Romans than they made each other suffer; nor was there any misery endured by the city after these men's actions that could be esteemed new. But it was most of all unhappy before it was overthrown, while those that took it did it a greater kindness; for I venture to affirm, that the sedition destroyed the city, and the Romans destroyed the sedition, which was a much harder thing to do than to destroy the walls; so that we may justly ascribe our misfortunes to our own people and the just vengeance taken on them by the Romans.

Not least among the miseries was the entire absence of any mercy shown fellow Jews who happened by the evil destiny of war to be on the wrong side, or in possession of food or valuables sought by Jewish plunderers who went from house to house, assaulting, robbing and killing. No moral law, no honor, no mercy! Where was that superior righteousness that Israel had flaunted before the benighted pagans?

Not least among the agonies was the soul-wrenching anguish of doubt, Why does not God save us, His people, racked and wretched as we are? To be abandoned by God must be the most heart-rending tragedy imaginable for anyone, and it was theirs in that dark hour. This was literally the end of an era (suntélia toû aiônos, Matthew 24:3).

So, this great tribulation is, for us, now past, because the destruction of Jerusalem was the gruesome climax of that period. This is not to say, unfortunately, that all, or even any, tribulation is over for the Christians, since, in fact, Jesus was not even discussing this latter issue. After 70 A.D. John still considered himself a sharer in the Christian tribulation (thlìpsis, Revelation 1:9). Temptations and crises of every kind will plague us down ,to the last minute before our Lord's return, simply because evil shall be left in the world until that time. (See notes on Matthew 13:24-30; Matthew 13:36-43; cf. Acts 14:22; 1 Thessalonians 3:3 f.; 2 Thessalonians 1:4 f.; Revelation 7:14.) However, the horror-filled death-throes of Jerusalem and its Temple are past.

But what is there to fear, then, if this all be over? What encouragement to righteousness is there, if modern man must contemplate this event as all but forgotten in the dust of history? Much every way! Jesus has been proved true as an authentic spokesman for God. All that He foretold about OUR future may be studied with far more serious reflection, and all that He commands must be obeyed with greater promptness and eagerness. We may trust Him for leadership during our trials.

4. Duration: short but terrible (24:22)

Matthew 24:22 And except those days had been shortened, no flesh would have been saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. Those days are the ruthless bloodbath just described (Matthew 24:21), identified as those days in which Christians must flee from Judea (Matthew 24:19) at the time of the desolating sacrilege standing in the holy place (Matthew 24:15). See also Mark 13:17; Mark 13:19 and Luke 21:23 which use in those days to identify this period. No flesh: Jesus is discussing only Hebrew flesh, i.e. the entire Jewish people, not all of humanity. Everyone in Israel would have been wiped out in the Roman malestrom that would take the nation and all its people with it. Jesus uses saved here, not of spiritual salvation, but in the sense of avoidance of death. (Cf. Matthew 8:25; Matthew 27:40; Matthew 27:42; Matthew 27:49.)

A remarkable series of events contributed to the abbreviation of the sufferings:

1.

The earlier emperor Claudius had forbidden Agrippa to complete significant fortifications that would have rendered Jerusalem's northern flank virtually unimpregnable (Ant. XIX, 7, 2), Consequently, both Cestius Gallus (Wars, II, 19, 4) and Titus (Wars, V, 6, 2; Matthew 7:3) found the wall around the New City (Bezetha) easier to demolish. This tightened his vice-like grip on the capital sooner.

2.

Shortly before Titus arrived at Jerusalem, the three-way civil war within the city shortened those days in a surprising manner (Wars, V, 1, 4). One of the terrorists

... set on fire those houses that were full of corn, and of all other provisions. as if they had, on purpose, done it to serve the Romans, by destroying what the city had laid up against the siege, and by thus cutting off the nerves of their own power. almost all of the corn was burnt, which would have been sufficient for a siege of many years. So they were taken by the means of famine, which it was impossible they should have been, unless they had thus prepared the way for it by this procedure.

3.

Internal dissension divided and seriously undermined Israel's defenders.

4.

Due to battle fatigue and fear compounded by emotional stress caused by desertions and their own physical distress, the Jewish terrorists-' nerve was broken to the point they even abandoned unassailable bulwarks. Josephus (Wars, VI, 8, 4f.) reflects,

Here one may chiefly reflect on the power of God exercised upon those wicked wretches, and on the good fortune of the Romans; for these tyrants did now wholly deprive themselves of the security they had in their own power, and came down from those very towers of their own accord, wherein they could have never been taken by force, nor indeed by any other way than by famine. And thus did the Romans, when they had taken such great pains about weaker walls, get by good fortune what they could never have gotten by their engines; for three of these towers were too strong for all mechanical engines whatsoever.. So they now left these towers of themselves, or rather they were ejected out of them by God himself, and fled.. So the Romans being now become masters of the walls, they both placed their ensigns upon the towers, and made joyful acclamations for the victory they had gained, as having found the end of the war much lighter than its beginning; for when they had gotten upon the last wall without any bloodshed, they could hardly believe what they found to be true..

After inspecting this fortification, the Roman general himself could not but confess, We have certainly had God for our assistant in this war, and it was no other than God that ejected the Jews out of those fortifications; for what could the hands of men, or any machines, do towards overthrowing those towers (ibid., 9, 1)!

5.

Crowded conditions were created by the Paschal crowds that had poured into the Holy City just prior to its encirclement by the Romans. Because of the scanty provisions, the pestilence created by festering corpses and the hideous brutality, survival of anyone became a debatable question.

These factors, taken together, facilitated the Roman victory, took off the pressure against Rome and essentially shortened those days. The Roman siege of Jerusalem lasted from shortly before the Passover on the fourteenth of Nisan until the eighth of Elul in Vespasian's second year (Wars, V, 3, 1; 13, 7; VI, 10, 1). Thus, from April to September, Jerusalem's capture was completed in the relatively brief span of five months. By contrast, it had taken Nebuchadnezzar over a year and five months to bring the city to its knees (Jeremiah 52:4-7; Jeremiah 52:12).

But for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. Even the abbreviation of the time allotted for the troubling of God's people was a concept in vogue in Jewish apocalyptic literature. (Cf. 2 Baruch 20:1f.; 83:1.) There, however, the elect are the righteous in Israel and the days of judgment would punish the Gentiles, the apostates and glorify the proselytes to Judaism. But here, according to Jesus, who are the elect?

The elect, in Scripture, is a term always to be understood from God's point of view, ideally referring to those whom He chooses to be His people. But His election is not unconditional, for His choice presupposes their free choice to be His by loving, obedient faith. Hence, here, the elect are those Jewish Christians who as the remnant of visible, national Israel, formed the nucleus of the new Israel of God (Romans 11:5-7; Galatians 3:7-9; Galatians 3:26-29; Galatians 6:16; Ephesians 1:4; Philippians 3:3) as well as converted Gentiles (Romans 11:11-32). To affirm that the elect must refer exclusively to God's former people, national Israel, is to forget that Matthew, though himself a Jew, has already taught that true participation in God's program is not a question of parentage (Matthew 3:8-10) personal power (Matthew 7:22 f.), pampering and past privileges (Matthew 8:10 ff.; Matthew 11:20-24; Matthew 21:33 to Matthew 22:14), or perspiration (Matthew 20:1-16), but a question of proper priorities and appropriate openness with God. No unbelieving Hebrew could be described as elect in this definitive sense.

So, because it is exegetically impossible that Jesus could have spoken so ambiguously as to embrace both the converted and the unconvertible of Israel under the term, the elect, He refers here, as also in Matthew 24:31, to the people of the Messiah, the free citizens of the Kingdom (Matthew 17:26), who lived to see and hear the very things for which the fathers had long waited (Matthew 13:17) and enjoyed the personal knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom (Matthew 13:11). In short, the elect are those fortunate (from the Jewish standpoint: Luke 14:15) people who lived in the days of the Messiah and served Him, the Christians. For them the critical days shall be shortened, for although they fled from Jerusalem in time and were relatively safe from immediate danger, they could not avoid other privations elsewhere in Palestine spawned by the war: famine, pestilences, shortages and other break-downs in every area of civil life wrecked by the war,

To know that those days shall be shortened brings comforting assurance and hope. This affirmation fairly sings its confidence, infusing its certainty into believing hearts:

1.

God's true Prophet, Jesus of Nazareth, knows that the terrible days just described will not go on forever. They will end. This fact convinces believers that it is worth it to hold on patiently till the end.

2.

Neither Satan, nor Rome nor the evil men in the land are either final or omnipotent. The duration of the suffering has already been established by the determinate planning of Almighty God who is in full control, notwithstanding the soul-crushing terror stalking the land.

3.

This shortening is even a decree of mercy for Jerusalem, for if it blesses Christians, it also gives respite to the tormented survivors of Jerusalem's siege because the terrors would be over for them too, since even Roman treatment of captives would be merciful by comparison to the barbarities suffered from their own people.

This hope confirms another conclusion by evidencing how misguided is any rapture theory that imagines God's people to be caught up out of this world before the great terrible tribulation. If our text is thought to be evidence of the final great tribulation (Revelation 7:14), and not merely of the Jewish sufferings at Jerusalem in 70 A.D., then what are the elect doing present in the tribulation? If they were all previously caught up to heaven, according to the rapture theory, then why must the days of the tribulation be shortened for the elect's sake?

Ulterior confirmation of the correctness of the view that the great tribulation here pictured by Matthew refers to the shocking debacle of 70 A.D. comes from Luke 21:23 f. where this same period is thus summarized: For great distress shall be upon the earth (land?) and wrath upon this people. 24 They will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led captive among the nations; and Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. Avoiding all the Jewish rhetoric of Matthew and Mark to describe these dramatic events, Luke furnishes important interpretative details:

1.

Great distress upon the earth (anàgkç megàlç epì tês gês). Gê, here rendered earth, can also refer to a land, a district, a region or country. (Cf. Arndt-Gingrich, 156.) So, Jesus may be discussing merely the land par excellence highest in the Hebrew mind, Palestine. His parallel phrase, wrath upon this people, confirms this view, because this people, contextually, refers to Jerusalem and the dwellers of Judea (Luke 21:20 f.; cf. Matthew 24:24).

2.

What would happen to Israel could only be termed wrath, probably of both God and men. Although Titus himself was mild and conciliatory to the end (Wars, VI, 2, 1-4; 4:3-7; esp. 6:2; 8, 2), the Roman legions were the appropriate rod of God's wrath. (Cf. Wars, V, 1, 3; 8, 2; 9, 3f.; 13, 5; VI, 1, 5; 9, 1.) Roman vengeance simply punished Israel's violations of the Old Covenant (Deuteronomy 32:35; Deuteronomy 28:15-68; cf. Hosea 9:7; Jeremiah 5:29), not to mention their refusal of God's Son and His messengers (Matthew 23:34-39). Jerusalem well deserved both the Roman and the Divine wrath.

3.

Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles. (Cf. Matthew 24:2; Wars, VII, 1, 1.) This city has literally gone under the heel of Gentiles from A.D. 70 onward, as Romans and a host of other Gentiles dominated it down to the time of the Arabs. Rather than promise the fondly hoped-for restoration of God's kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6), the Lord revealed that Israel's fate would be dispersion and disintegration and the City's destiny is desolation.

4

The effect of this disaster would be lasting, but not necessarily eternal; simply until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

a.

The simplest interpretation of this key time-limitation is that the desolation would last until the Gentiles, as instruments of God's government of the world, had completed this punitive judgment on the City and its people, the Jewish nation itself.

b.

However, because the expression, the times of the Gentiles (kairoi ethnôn), may correctly speak of the opportunity which God grants the Gentiles, not merely to punish Israel, but primarily to enjoy His grace, Jesus means that the aforementioned disaster would continue during the period when the gracious offer of salvation is granted the Gentiles through the Gospel. (Cf. Mark 13:10; Romans 11:25; Matthew 21:43.) Bruce (Training, 327) sees this special period of Gentile opportunity as corresponding to the time of gracious visitation enjoyed by the Jews, referred to by Jesus in His lament over Jerusalem. Then he concludes:

It is incredible that Jesus should speak of a time of the Gentiles analogous to the time of merciful visitation enjoyed by the Jews, and imagine that the time of the Gentiles was to last only some thirty years. The Jewish kairòs lasted thousands of years: it would be only mocking the poor Gentiles to dignify the period of a single generation with the name of a season of gracious visitation.

Alford (I, 637) is probably correct to notice that the times (kairoi) is plural because the gentiles is plural: each Gentile people having in turn its kairòs.

c.

NOTE, however, that nothing is affirmed here about what will occur once the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. Jesus does not affirm that the Jews will return to Jerusalem under the same terms they always enjoyed prior to their loss of the Holy City. That Jews have returned to the City is a fact of modern history, but their conversion either to the complete message of the Old Testament or to the Christ of the New Testament is not. Rather, the period in question may end when the Gentile world per sè rejects Christ, just as the Jewish dispensation ended when the Hebrews as a people turned Him down. In fact, after the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled, God could bring world history to a complete halt, judge everyone and start eternity rolling for us, without so much as one backward glance at Jerusalem, Palestine or Jews.

d.

Another important observation: contrary to many views of Matthew 24:29-31 based on the expression, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled, it may be correctly inferred that an indefinite period of time would follow Jerusalem's fall, so that Christ's return to earth could not be expected shortly after the Judean crisis. As will be seen, immediately after the tribulation of those days (Matthew 24:29) may be interpreted in its natural sense, because it is not the Second Coming of Christ that is being announced for the period directly following Jerusalem's destruction. (See on Matthew 24:29.)

5. Warning: no hope of Christ's personal coming during the siege (24:23-28)
a. Despite apparently miraculous signs, all false hopes of deliverance raised by false prophets must unswervingly be disregarded (24:23-26)

Matthew 24:23 Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is the Christ, or, Here; believe it or not. Then (tòte), i.e. during the same general period referred to before (in those days, then, Matthew 24:19-22), thus, in the last, distress-filled days prior to the overthrow of Jerusalem. Although the appearance of false hope can plague Christians of any era, the peculiar uncertainties of a war-torn, first-century Palestine could stimulate unwarranted trust in rumors that Christ had returned to earth. This would tempt Jewish believers living in the Diaspora to flock to Palestine because of their love for Jesus and for their religious homeland. But it would also draw them right into the Roman trap just before it would spring shut. Jesus would not have His people lay down their lives unnecessarily for a wrong-headed nationalistic movement with which they should have no true, spiritual affinity or association.

If any man shall say unto you.. Contrary to false rumors, Jesus-' true appearance will be so obvious and convincing (Matthew 24:27) that there will be no need for false intelligence reports by charlatans! Believe it not: this command is repeated in v. 26 to make its force emphatically clear. Here is a severe test of one's discipleship: whom shall I believe when my world is falling apart? Jesus would guard His followers from losing Christ while believing themselves about to find Him!

The fact that Jesus reiterates this warning (Matthew 24:4) is thought by some to be a change of subject from the perils surrounding the Jewish War to the Second Coming, for, say they, He could not have desired merely to repeat information already given, unless it related to another subject as, in this case, the Second Coming. On the contrary, the breakdown in communications between Christian groups that could occur in the chaos of the crumbling nation might well entice those congregations to rally behind anyone who held out a glimmer of hope for the doomed nation. This explains why our Lord must make His point emphatically clear by repeating it, especially in connection with the great tribulation of A.D. 66-70.

Matthew 24:24 For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. For: this verse and those following reinforce Matthew 24:23 by way of parenthetical explanation. Jesus will not leave this point until Matthew 24:27. The excited cry, Here is the Christ! or There! (Matthew 24:23) is not to be believed because it involves false claims put forward by imposters, backed by deceptive credentials. Here the Lord returns to an earlier theme (Matthew 24:5) to clarify a particular point. But the fact that He is doing this helps to determine to what time period the information most specifically refers. The contention that history knows little if anything of such false Christs prior to the Destruction of Jerusalem has no validity, because it does not ask the right question. We must ask WHAT KIND of messianic concept moved the masses, and even Jesus-' disciples, in the first century. Only thus will become clear WHAT KIND of great signs and wonders would have been so appealing as to tempt God's precious nucleus, the remnant that believed Jesus, into abandoning the true Christ for false christs. (Examine texts like the allurements and challenges Jesus was offered to become a Jewish Messiah: Matthew 4:9; Matthew 11:2; Matthew 16:21 f; Matthew 27:39-43; Luke 22:49; John 6:14 f; John 7:3-4; Acts 1:6.) These texts reveal the basely materialistic, nationalistic messianism of Jesus-' contemporaries and explain the power of the temptation to all who held such notions. (See notes on Matthew 18:1; Matthew 20:20-28.)

So, a false Christ was not an Antichrist in the Johannine sense (1 John 2:18 ff.; 2 John 1:7) or even one who would necessarily perform lying wonders by Satanic power, in the Pauline sense (2 Thessalonians 2:9), but a demagogue in Israel who pretended to be everything Jesus was not, but who would give Israel the kind of Christ Israel longed for but which Jesus refused even to offer. False prophets, in the Old Testament sense, are men who offered false hopes to a doomed, unrepentant Israel. (Cf. Jeremiah 8:10 f; Jeremiah 14:14-16; Jeremiah 20:1-6; chap. 23; Jeremiah 27:9-21; chaps. 28, 29; Jeremiah 37:19; Ezekiel 13; Ezekiel 14:9-11; Ezekiel 22:28; chap. 34.)

Josephus-' history documents the appearance of a number of politico-military messiahs who cruelly deceived themselves and the people with unfounded schemes for re-establishing the ancient independence of the theocracy as they conceived it (Wars, II, 13, 4; VI, 5, 2f.). Although the Lord had predicted the appearance of false prophets before the end (Matthew 24:5), there would also be impostors during the Roman siege of Jerusalem too. Josephus (Wars, VI, 5, 2f.) recounts:-'

A false prophet was the occasion of these people's destruction, who had made a public proclamation in the city that very day, that God commanded them to get up upon the temple, and there they should receive miraculous signs of their deliverance. Now there was then a great number of false prophets suborned by the tyrants to impose upon the people, who denounced this to them, that they should wait for deliverance from God; and this was in order to keep them from deserting, and that they might be buoyed up above fear and care by such hopes. Now, a man that is in adversity does easily comply with such promises; for when such a seducer makes him believe that he shall be delivered from those miseries which oppress him, then it is that the patient is full of hopes of such deliverance.. Thus were the miserable people persuaded by these deceivers, and such as belied God himself; while they did not attend, nor give credit, to the signs that were so evident, and did so plainly foretell their future desolation; but, like men infatuated, without either eyes to see the minds to consider, did not regard the denunciations that God made to them.

Surprisingly, despite guards set to prevent their escape (Wars, V, 1, 5), many succeeded in leaving Jerusalem by one means or another, even after its encirclement by the Romans (Wars, IV, 6, 3; 7, 1; V, 10, 1; 13, 7; VI, 2, 3). Even after that horrible carnage had begun within the city, people could yet be duped by false claims to speak for God and promise Israel's deliverance, and not even think of abandoning the doomed city. Because eventually 40,000 people were saved, whom Caesar let go whither everyone of them pleased (Wars, VI, 8, 2), even during the worst fighting and with the greatest menace from fiercely suspicious Zealots inside the City, the temptation would still be high to remain in the fortress protected by God. So, Jesus-' warning is also His attempt to save even beyond the last minute anyone who would believe Him in those horrifying circumstances and flee the City.

McGarvey (Fourfold Gospel, 621) caught the spirit of the times:

Nothing is more natural, however, than that the excitement attendant upon the ministry of Jesus should encourage many to attempt to become such a Christ as the people wanted. The Gospels show so widespread a desire for a political Christ that the law of demand and supply would be sure to make many such.

These all, the false deliverers and those taken in by them, fell for the temptation which Jesus resisted firmly to the end. His polestar was the program of God. Troubled times tempt men to embrace anything that promises relief, and, without anchors, they welcome deceptions, instead of clinging to the help promised by God through the Scripture.

So as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. That ominous condition, if possible, must stir each believer to the core, What kind of Christ-concept do I have, that would expose me to being led astray? What signs would function so effectively as finally to deceive me? The possibility of fatal deception by imposters, in fact, is in direct proportion to the degree each believer uncritically and perhaps unwittingly already accepts the basic presuppositions on which the imposter's claims are based: desire for national independence from Rome, greed for gold, lust for power, blind commitment to the proposition that God is inextricably bound to bless the nation's political and economic future. Here is the choice: do we follow the popular theories, or do we trust Jesus instead?

Matthew 24:25 Behold, I have told you beforehand. Why foretell these events? (Cf. John 16:1-4.) Three reasons suggest themselves:

1.

Despite the frightening prospects that are enough to paralyze decisive action, remember: you are thoroughly prepared to face this future with information and courage. You are not among the unbelievers who must wring their hands in despair over the dark unknown that looms over them. Rather, you know both the extent and the God-ordained limitations of that period (Matthew 24:34). Further, you now possess directives for your conduct and for Gospel proclamation during the intervening years, and specific instructions about what to do when the final crisis of Jerusalem arrives at last. It is a stabilizing force and comfort to know that I have already clearly foreseen and foretold it forty years before the storm finally breaks, and have given you sound advice.

2.

So, forewarned is forearmed. The very appearance of impostors, since I, the true Christ, have warned you, will actually save you from being deceived. Their coming will prove I was right, justify your faith in me and save you. With these advance warnings that every rumor that Jesus had returned are false, Christians could calmly and without hesitation refute them as they arose. Because signs and wonders could be produced by false prophets (Deuteronomy 13:1 ff.; Acts 8:9 ff.; 2 Thessalonians 2:9 f.; Revelation 13:13 f.), such wonders alone were not a final, definitive test of one's divine authority. The context of God's well-authenticated revelations were to serve as a check. (Cf. Isaiah 8:20.) In this case, Jesus offers His own word as that framework with which to test others-' claims.

3.

Although He does not use the emphatic pronoun, I (egò), in which case His point would be more emphatic, nevertheless, by calling attention to the prediction, He obtains the same result: Notice, I have made you a prediction (idoù proeìrçka humîn). Jesus has just placed His own prophetic ministry to the supreme test. If things do not take place as He predicted, HE TOO IS A FALSE PROPHET. This challenge is but one more way for Him to present His prophetic credentials. (See my notes on prophetic credentials, Vol. III, 377f.) By so doing, He puts everyone's discipleship to the test: does each believe He knows what He is talking about? Do I trust Jesus that much?

Matthew 24:26 If, therefore, they shall say unto you. (See notes on Matthew 24:23.) After furnishing the background for His order not to be duped by anyone who pretends to announce Christ's return, He amplifies it by listing other situations wherein the deceptive announcement could come.

Behold, he is in the wilderness. Not only would the deserted wastes of Palestine furnish an excellent base camp and mustering area for revolutionaries, but also a tempting quiet solitude for monastic contemplation under the leadership of imposters masquerading as ascetics of the old school. For those who rejected John the Baptist (cf. Matthew 11:2-19), a text like Isaiah 40:3-5 could be distorted and pressed into service for sectarian ends. The Qumran sect, for example, chose the wilderness to await the Messiah. Consider the case of Theudas. (See on Matthew 24:5.) Jesus-' warning against going out into the wilderness is intensely practical, for it happened again under Felix (Ant. XX, 8, 6; cf. Acts 21:38) and again under Festus (ibid., §10).

Behold, he is in the inner chambers. The presumably secret return of Christ linked with the claim He was in hiding until the moment of public revelation would entice the ignorant who claimed not to know where Christ should come from. (Cf. John 7:27.) Such secrecy, enforced by the charlatans and accepted by the gullible, would furnish maneuvering room for the pretenders to foment revolt and develop in their followers the psychological dependence essential to create a cohesive movement.

Go no farther. believing it not. So saying, Jesus pushes the disciples-' confidence in His prophetic announcement to its logical conclusion: whose word will you follow? that of these false christs, however attractive, or this order given by me, your Master and Lord? What you do about either will decide your true loyalty. Believe it not means, BELIEVE ME!

b. Christ's true coming will be too obvious to require prophetic announcement (24:27)

Matthew 24:27 For: what follows explains why none of the above-mentioned false announcements of Christ's return are to be believed. As the lightning cometh forth from the east, and is seen even unto the west; so shall be the coming of the Son of man. (Cf. Luke 17:23 f.) In contrast to a localized coming marked by gradualism and the concealment and secrecy of the false christs who promise a revelation to a select few, the Second Coming will be so obviously visible as to need absolutely no advance publicity. By calling it the coming (he parousìa), Jesus implies that there would be only one such appearance and no prior secret raptures about which any prophets on earth could make the aforementioned predictions.

There cannot be a supposed double reference in this verse (1) to His coming in providence to destroy Jerusalem, and (2) to His return on the Final Day. His coming in judgment on Jerusalem would be attended by clear signs indicating the approach of the critical hour, permitting Christians to escape the worst. But His final return will give no forewarning, but will strike like lightning, unexpectedly; not locally, but obvious to the entire world; not hidden temporarily only to be revealed by degrees, but everywhere, instantaneously and unmistakably visible; not in shoddy secrecy, but in brilliant, heavenly glory beyond all possibility of imitation.
Although the disciples first asked about the coming of the Son of man (Matthew 24:3), this is the first time in this discourse Jesus mentioned His coming (parousìa toû huioû toû anthròpou). By using the word which became one of the usual technical terms for the Second Coming (parousìa), He meant no other than His personal return at the end of the present world age. (Cf. 1 Corinthians 15:23; 1 Thessalonians 2:19; 1 Thessalonians 3:13; 1 Thessalonians 4:15; 2 Thessalonians 2:1; James 5:7 f.; 2 Peter 1:16.) How, then, is it possible for Him to insert information about His final return into a context that unquestionably involves problems connected with the final years of the Jewish state and the fall of Jerusalem? It is because the disciples had wrongly connected Jesus-' Second Coming with the fall of Jerusalem. Hence, they too would be easily deceived by false announcements in that fateful era (Matthew 24:3). So, He must inform them that the Second Coming shall not require private prophetic preannouncements.

However, just because He has now mentioned His Second Coming does not mean He will continue to elaborate on it at this point. Many have assumed that this is His procedure in Matthew 24:29-31. Instead, it was sufficient for His purpose to assure the disciples that His coming, WHEN IT EVENTUALLY TOOK PLACE, would not be concealed, as preached by imposters, but perfectly evident to everyone. This first glance at His glorious return is inserted here only to illustrate how completely it contrasts with the views thereof preached by the ignorant. Hence, there is no need at this point to ask where Jesus changed over from discussing Jerusalem's fall to begin answering the disciples-' question about the Second Coming. This is rather an insertion to clear up a misconception, not evidence of a complete change of subject.

c. Israel's hopeless deadness cannot but attract scavengers (24:28)

Matthew 24:28 Wheresoever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered together. Eagles (aetoì) would be better translated vultures, because the birds pictured here are carrion-eaters, whereas eagles, for the most part, kill their own food. (Cf. Arndt-Gingrich, 19; I.S.B.E., 885f.; however, see Job 39:30 b.) Further, the figure Jesus uses is not so much that of a swift flight of eagles that plummet on their yet-living prey (cf. Deuteronomy 28:49; Jeremiah 4:13; Jeremiah 48:40; Jeremiah 49:22; Lamentations 4:19; Hosea 8:1; Habakkuk 1:8), as that of the congregation (ekéi sunachthésontai) of vultures around the carcass. While for us, eagles and vultures are two distinct birds, the ancients classified the vulture among the eagles. (Aristotle, Annimal History 9, 32; Pliny, Natural History 10, 3; Hebrew uses nesher indiscriminately for eagle [see the above passages], or vulture, Micah 1:16; Proverbs 30:17.)

Earlier (Luke 17:37), when questioned about WHERE these events would occur, He responded with this proverbial expression. To determine the sense and application of this striking aphorism we must recognize it for what it is, a proverb. Not to be taken literally, it stands symbolically for some other, literal reality. Expanded, Jesus-' observation, would be, See, you can recognize that the decaying remains of a corpse is lying on the ground, because of the vultures hovering over it. These make it evident to the observer that there is little or no life in what was once alive, only death and corruption. But what, in Jesus-' allusion, is the carcass and what the vultures?

1.

Because He had just spoken of His Second Coming, some apply His proverb to this event, believing that wheresoever cannot limit His reference exclusively to one place like Jerusalem. Rather, wherever the condition of spiritual deadness is found, the sudden, punitive vengeance of the coming Christ will plummet, like the eagle to seize its prey. Granted, Jesus-' words have the generalized ring of a proverb with multiple applications. However, to what specific case did He refer it this time? Further, the aforementioned objections to eagle are applicable here.

2.

Contextually, Jesus is returning to His warning about false christs and false prophets whose excited pronouncements about a returned Christ could attract and destroy God's elect. In this case, the carcass would be the general moral corruption that invested the Jewish nation, while the vultures picture the imposters who profit from this spiritual confusion to serve their own interests.

3.

However, since Jesus-' larger context includes the destruction of Jerusalem, the carcass could be Jerusalem while the vultures would be the Roman army. Precisely because of the deteriorated political situation in Palestine, Rome had to intervene to bring order out of chaos. (Study Josephus-' diagnosis of Palestinian politics from 60-70 A.D., Ant. XX, 8, 5; cf. chaps. 5-11, also his Wars, Preface, 2.) There is no necessity to notice the use of eagle symbols on Roman banners, for two reasons: (1) Jesus-' meaning would be the same without any direct reference to them, and (2) to take eagles literally of the Roman standards but interpret the carcass symbolically is illegitimate hermeneutics. Further, this interpretation is less direct and obvious, since, in this paragraph, Jesus was not discussing Jerusalem's being surrounded by armies with their eagle banners, His immediate concern being the appearance of imposters raucously gathering around Israel like vultures to fatten themselves on Israel's moral putrefaction.

Either way, whether He means false prophets or Roman soldiers, Jesus argues that no hope of deliverance from God could be expected, just destruction and elimination of Jerusalem's glory. There would be no angels to liberate Israel, just vultures to devour the carcass.

FACT QUESTIONS

1.

Cite the New Testament texts that indicate that the Gospel could have been universally proclaimed throughout the entire world in the first century.

2.

What did Jesus mean by the abomination of desolation? Prove your answer by indicating from what source He quoted that phrase or where the reader must go to get an explanation for it.

3.

The words let the reader understand, are inserted in parentheses. Who said them and why?

4.

Explain how believers were to react to the one, clear, final signal that the desolation of Jerusalem was about to occur. What evidence is there that they reacted correctly?

5.

Explain why people in Judea, an already hilly country, are told to flee to the mountains. What mountains are meant? How did the early Christians carry out Jesus-' directions?

6.

Explain why Jesus thought there would be so many people on the housetop.

7.

Explain why someone out in the country would want to enter Jerusalem to take his mantle. What is this article and why is it important?

8.

Explain why people should not take anything that is in (their) house.

9.

Explain why pregnant women and nursing mothers are singled out for special notice in the escape instructions.

10.

What hindrances to escape are peculiar to winter or to the sabbath in Palestine?

11.

If the great tribulation was to be totally unprecedented since the beginning of the creation of the world (Mark 13:19), how can Luke with propriety summarize Jesus-' words that identify the particular sufferers as this people will fall by the edge of the sword and be led captive among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles? In what sense is the fall of Jerusalem and the end of the Jewish state rightly described as great tribulation?

12.

Who are the elect for whose sake the Lord would shorten the days of tribulation: the Jewish people per se, or Jewish Christians alone? Defend your answer.

13.

What are some of the historical factors in the crack of the Jewish commonwealth that not only precipitated its fall but also shortened the length of its tribulation?

14.

How could false christs and false prophets show signs and wonders? Reveal the source(s) of their persuasive power.

15.

Explain the allusion to the carcass and the eagles in context.