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"If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the
things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine
eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall
cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in
on every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy
children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone
upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation."
Luke 19:42-44.
From the crest of Olivet, Jesus looked upon Jerusalem. Fair and
peaceful was the scene spread out before Him. It was the season of the
Passover, and from all lands the children of Jacob had gathered there to
celebrate the great national festival. In the midst of gardens and
vineyards, and green slopes studded with pilgrims' tents, rose the
terraced hills, the stately palaces, and massive bulwarks of Israel's
capital. The daughter of Zion seemed in her pride to say, I sit a queen
and shall see no sorrow; as lovely then, and deeming herself as secure
in Heaven's favor, as when, ages before, the royal minstrel sang:
"Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, . .
. the city of the great King." Psalm 48:2. In full view were the
magnificent buildings of the temple. The rays of the setting sun lighted
up the snowy whiteness of its marble walls and gleamed from golden gate
and tower and pinnacle. "The perfection of
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beauty" it stood, the pride of the Jewish nation. What child of Israel
could gaze upon the scene without a thrill of joy and admiration! But
far other thoughts occupied the mind of Jesus. "When He was come near,
He beheld the city, and wept over it." Luke 19:41. Amid the universal
rejoicing of the triumphal entry, while palm branches waved, while glad
hosannas awoke the echoes of the hills, and thousands of voices declared
Him king, the world's Redeemer was overwhelmed with a sudden and
mysterious sorrow. He, the Son of God, the Promised One of Israel, whose
power had conquered death and called its captives from the grave, was in
tears, not of ordinary grief, but of intense, irrepressible agony.
His tears were not for Himself, though He well knew whither His feet
were tending. Before Him lay Gethsemane, the scene of His approaching
agony. The sheepgate also was in sight, through which for centuries the
victims for sacrifice had been led, and which was to open for Him when
He should be "brought as a lamb to the slaughter." Isaiah 53:7. Not far
distant was Calvary, the place of crucifixion. Upon the path which
Christ was soon to tread must fall the horror of great darkness as He
should make His soul an offering for sin. Yet it was not the
contemplation of these scenes that cast the shadow upon Him in this hour
of gladness. No foreboding of His own superhuman anguish clouded that
unselfish spirit. He wept for the doomed thousands of Jerusalem--because
of the blindness and impenitence of those whom He came to bless and to
save.
The history of more than a thousand years of God's special favor and
guardian care, manifested to the chosen people, was open to the eye of
Jesus. There was Mount Moriah, where the son of promise, an unresisting
victim, had been bound to the altar--emblem of the offering of the Son
of God. There the covenant of blessing, the glorious Messianic promise,
had been confirmed to the father of the faithful. Genesis 22:9, 16-18.
There the flames of the sacrifice ascending to heaven from the threshing
floor of Ornan had turned
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aside the sword of the destroying angel (1 Chronicles 21)-- fitting
symbol of the Saviour's sacrifice and mediation for guilty men.
Jerusalem had been honored of God above all the earth. The Lord had
"chosen Zion," He had "desired it for His habitation." Psalm 132:13.
There, for ages, holy prophets had uttered their messages of warning.
There priests had waved their censers, and the cloud of incense, with
the prayers of the worshipers, had ascended before God. There daily the
blood of slain lambs had been offered, pointing forward to the Lamb of
God. There Jehovah had revealed His presence in the cloud of glory above
the mercy seat. There rested the base of that mystic ladder connecting
earth with heaven (Genesis 28:12; John 1:51)--that ladder upon which
angels of God descended and ascended, and which opened to the world the
way into the holiest of all. Had Israel as a nation preserved her
allegiance to Heaven, Jerusalem would have stood forever, the elect of
God. Jeremiah 17:21-25. But the history of that favored people was a
record of backsliding and rebellion. They had resisted Heaven's grace,
abused their privileges, and slighted their opportunities.
Although Israel had "mocked the messengers of God, and despised His
words, and misused His prophets" (2 Chronicles 36:16), He had still
manifested Himself to them, as "the Lord God, merciful and gracious,
long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth" (Exodus 34:6);
notwithstanding repeated rejections, His mercy had continued its
pleadings. With more than a father's pitying love for the son of his
care, God had "sent to them by His messengers, rising up betimes, and
sending; because He had compassion on His people, and on His dwelling
place." 2 Chronicles 36:15. When remonstrance, entreaty, and rebuke had
failed, He sent to them the best gift of heaven; nay, He poured out all
heaven in that one Gift.
The Son of God Himself was sent to plead with the impenitent city. It
was Christ that had brought Israel as a goodly vine out of Egypt. Psalm
80:8. His own hand had cast
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out the heathen before it. He had planted it "in a very fruitful hill."
His guardian care had hedged it about. His servants had been sent to
nurture it. "What could have been done more to My vineyard," He
exclaims, "that I have not done in it?" Isaiah 5:1-4. Though when He
looked that it should bring forth grapes, it brought forth wild grapes,
yet with a still yearning hope of fruitfulness He came in person to His
vineyard, if haply it might be saved from destruction. He digged about
His vine; He pruned and cherished it. He was unwearied in His efforts to
save this vine of His own planting.
For three years the Lord of light and glory had gone in and out among
His people. He "went about doing good, and healing all that were
oppressed of the devil," binding up the brokenhearted, setting at
liberty them that were bound, restoring sight to the blind, causing the
lame to walk and the deaf to hear, cleansing the lepers, raising the
dead, and preaching the gospel to the poor. Acts 10:38; Luke 4:18;
Matthew 11:5. To all classes alike was addressed the gracious call:
"Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give
you rest." Matthew 11:28.
Though rewarded with evil for good, and hatred for His love (Psalm
109:5), He had steadfastly pursued His mission of mercy. Never were
those repelled that sought His grace. A homeless wanderer, reproach and
penury His daily lot, He lived to minister to the needs and lighten the
woes of men, to plead with them to accept the gift of life. The waves of
mercy, beaten back by those stubborn hearts, returned in a stronger tide
of pitying, inexpressible love. But Israel had turned from her best
Friend and only Helper. The pleadings of His love had been despised, His
counsels spurned, His warnings ridiculed.
The hour of hope and pardon was fast passing; the cup of God's
long-deferred wrath was almost full. The cloud that had been gathering
through ages of apostasy and rebellion, now black with woe, was about to
burst upon a guilty people;
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and He who alone could save them from their impending fate had been
slighted, abused, rejected, and was soon to be crucified. When Christ
should hang upon the cross of Calvary, Israel's day as a nation favored
and blessed of God would be ended. The loss of even one soul is a
calamity infinitely outweighing the gains and treasures of a world; but
as Christ looked upon Jerusalem, the doom of a whole city, a whole
nation, was before Him--that city, that nation, which had once been the
chosen of God, His peculiar treasure.
Prophets had wept over the apostasy of Israel and the terrible
desolations by which their sins were visited. Jeremiah wished that his
eyes were a fountain of tears, that he might weep day and night for the
slain of the daughter of his people, for the Lord's flock that was
carried away captive. Jeremiah 9:1; 13:17. What, then, was the grief of
Him whose prophetic glance took in, not years, but ages! He beheld the
destroying angel with sword uplifted against the city which had so long
been Jehovah's dwelling place. From the ridge of Olivet, the very spot
afterward occupied by Titus and his army, He looked across the valley
upon the sacred courts and porticoes, and with tear-dimmed eyes He saw,
in awful perspective, the walls surrounded by alien hosts. He heard the
tread of armies marshaling for war. He heard the voice of mothers and
children crying for bread in the besieged city. He saw her holy and
beautiful house, her palaces and towers, given to the flames, and where
once they stood, only a heap of smoldering ruins.
Looking down the ages, He saw the covenant people scattered in every
land, "like wrecks on a desert shore." In the temporal retribution about
to fall upon her children, He saw but the first draft from that cup of
wrath which at the final judgment she must drain to its dregs. Divine
pity, yearning love, found utterance in the mournful words: "O
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them
which are sent unto thee, how often would I
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have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her
chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" O that thou, a nation
favored above every other, hadst known the time of thy visitation, and
the things that belong unto thy peace! I have stayed the angel of
justice, I have called thee to repentance, but in vain. It is not merely
servants, delegates, and prophets, whom thou hast refused and rejected,
but the Holy One of Israel, thy Redeemer. If thou art destroyed, thou
alone art responsible. "Ye will not come to Me, that ye might have
life." Matthew 23:37; John 5:40.
Christ saw in Jerusalem a symbol of the world hardened in unbelief
and rebellion, and hastening on to meet the retributive judgments of
God. The woes of a fallen race, pressing upon His soul, forced from His
lips that exceeding bitter cry. He saw the record of sin traced in human
misery, tears, and blood; His heart was moved with infinite pity for the
afflicted and suffering ones of earth; He yearned to relieve them all.
But even His hand might not turn back the tide of human woe; few would
seek their only Source of help. He was willing to pour out His soul unto
death, to bring salvation within their reach; but few would come to Him
that they might have life.
The Majesty of heaven in tears! the Son of the infinite God troubled
in spirit, bowed down with anguish! The scene filled all heaven with
wonder. That scene reveals to us the exceeding sinfulness of sin; it
shows how hard a task it is, even for Infinite Power, to save the guilty
from the consequences of transgressing the law of God. Jesus, looking
down to the last generation, saw the world involved in a deception
similar to that which caused the destruction of Jerusalem. The great sin
of the Jews was their rejection of Christ; the great sin of the
Christian world would be their rejection of the law of God, the
foundation of His government in heaven and earth. The precepts of
Jehovah would be despised and set at nought. Millions in bondage to sin,
slaves of Satan, doomed to suffer the second death, would
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refuse to listen to the words of truth in their day of visitation.
Terrible blindness! strange infatuation!
Two days before the Passover, when Christ had for the last time
departed from the temple, after denouncing the hypocrisy of the Jewish
rulers, He again went out with His disciples to the Mount of Olives and
seated Himself with them upon the grassy slope overlooking the city.
Once more He gazed upon its walls, its towers, and its palaces. Once
more He beheld the temple in its dazzling splendor, a diadem of beauty
crowning the sacred mount.
A thousand years before, the psalmist had magnified God's favor to
Israel in making her holy house His dwelling place: "In Salem also is
His tabernacle, and His dwelling place in Zion." He "chose the tribe of
Judah, the Mount Zion which He loved. And He built His sanctuary like
high palaces." Psalms 76:2; 78:68, 69. The first temple had been erected
during the most prosperous period of Israel's history. Vast stores of
treasure for this purpose had been collected by King David, and the
plans for its construction were made by divine inspiration. 1 Chronicles
28:12, 19. Solomon, the wisest of Israel's monarchs, had completed the
work. This temple was the most magnificent building which the world ever
saw. Yet the Lord had declared by the prophet Haggai, concerning the
second temple: "The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of
the former." "I will shake all nations, and the Desire of all nations
shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of
hosts." Haggai 2:9, 7.
After the destruction of the temple by Nebuchadnezzar it was rebuilt
about five hundred years before the birth of Christ by a people who from
a lifelong captivity had returned to a wasted and almost deserted
country. There were then among them aged men who had seen the glory of
Solomon's temple, and who wept at the foundation of the new building,
that it must be so inferior to the former. The feeling that prevailed is
forcibly described by the prophet: "Who is
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left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see
it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?" Haggai
2:3; Ezra 3:12. Then was given the promise that the glory of this latter
house should be greater than that of the former.
But the second temple had not equaled the first in magnificence; nor
was it hallowed by those visible tokens of the divine presence which
pertained to the first temple. There was no manifestation of
supernatural power to mark its dedication. No cloud of glory was seen to
fill the newly erected sanctuary. No fire from heaven descended to
consume the sacrifice upon its altar. The Shekinah no longer abode
between the cherubim in the most holy place; the ark, the mercy seat,
and the tables of the testimony were not to be found therein. No voice
sounded from heaven to make known to the inquiring priest the will of
Jehovah.
For centuries the Jews had vainly endeavored to show wherein the
promise of God given by Haggai had been fulfilled; yet pride and
unbelief blinded their minds to the true meaning of the prophet's words.
The second temple was not honored with the cloud of Jehovah's glory, but
with the living presence of One in whom dwelt the fullness of the
Godhead bodily--who was God Himself manifest in the flesh. The "Desire
of all nations" had indeed come to His temple when the Man of Nazareth
taught and healed in the sacred courts. In the presence of Christ, and
in this only, did the second temple exceed the first in glory. But
Israel had put from her the proffered Gift of heaven. With the humble
Teacher who had that day passed out from its golden gate, the glory had
forever departed from the temple. Already were the Saviour's words
fulfilled: "Your house is left unto you desolate." Matthew 23:38.
The disciples had been filled with awe and wonder at Christ's
prediction of the overthrow of the temple, and they desired to
understand more fully the meaning of His words. Wealth, labor, and
architectural skill had for more than forty years been freely expended
to enhance its splendors. Herod
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the Great had lavished upon it both Roman wealth and Jewish treasure,
and even the emperor of the world had enriched it with his gifts.
Massive blocks of white marble, of almost fabulous size, forwarded from
Rome for this purpose, formed a part of its structure; and to these the
disciples had called the attention of their Master, saying: "See what
manner of stones and what buildings are here!" Mark 13:1.
To these words, Jesus made the solemn and startling reply: "Verily I
say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that
shall not be thrown down." Matthew 24:2.
With the overthrow of Jerusalem the disciples associated the events
of Christ's personal coming in temporal glory to take the throne of
universal empire, to punish the impenitent Jews, and to break from off
the nation the Roman yoke. The Lord had told them that He would come the
second time. Hence at the mention of judgments upon Jerusalem, their
minds reverted to that coming; and as they were gathered about the
Saviour upon the Mount of Olives, they asked: "When shall these things
be? and what shall be the sign of Thy coming, and of the end of the
world?" Verse 3.
The future was mercifully veiled from the disciples. Had they at that
time fully comprehend the two awful facts-- the Redeemer's sufferings
and death, and the destruction of their city and temple--they would have
been overwhelmed with horror. Christ presented before them an outline of
the prominent events to take place before the close of time. His words
were not then fully understood; but their meaning was to be unfolded as
His people should need the instruction therein given. The prophecy which
He uttered was twofold in its meaning; while foreshadowing the
destruction of Jerusalem, it prefigured also the terrors of the last
great day.
Jesus declared to the listening disciples the judgments that were to
fall upon apostate Israel, and especially the retributive vengeance that
would come upon them for their rejection and crucifixion of the Messiah.
Unmistakable signs would precede the awful climax. The dreaded hour
would come
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suddenly and swiftly. And the Saviour warned His followers: "When ye
therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel
the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him
understand:) then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains."
Matthew 24:15, 16; Luke 21:20, 21. When the idolatrous standards of the
Romans should be set up in the holy ground, which extended some furlongs
outside the city walls, then the followers of Christ were to find safety
in flight. When the warning sign should be seen, those who would escape
must make no delay. Throughout the land of Judea, as well as in
Jerusalem itself, the signal for flight must be immediately obeyed. He
who chanced to be upon the housetop must not go down into his house,
even to save his most valued treasures. Those who were working in the
fields or vineyards must not take time to return for the outer garment
laid aside while they should be toiling in the heat of the day. They
must not hesitate a moment, lest they be involved in the general
destruction.
In the reign of Herod, Jerusalem had not only been greatly
beautified, but by the erection of towers, walls, and fortresses, adding
to the natural strength of its situation, it had been rendered
apparently impregnable. He who would at this time have foretold publicly
its destruction, would, like Noah in his day, have been called a crazed
alarmist. But Christ had said: "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My
words shall not pass away." Matthew 24:35. Because of her sins, wrath
had been denounced against Jerusalem, and her stubborn unbelief rendered
her doom certain.
The Lord had declared by the prophet Micah: "Hear this, I pray you,
ye heads of the house of Jacob, and princes of the house of Israel, that
abhor judgment, and pervert all equity. They build up Zion with blood,
and Jerusalem with iniquity. The heads thereof judge for reward, and the
priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for
money: yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among
us? none evil can come upon us." Micah 3:9-11.
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These words faithfully described the corrupt and self-righteous
inhabitants of Jerusalem. While claiming to observe rigidly the precepts
of God's law, they were transgressing all its principles. They hated
Christ because His purity and holiness revealed their iniquity; and they
accused Him of being the cause of all the troubles which had come upon
them in consequence of their sins. Though they knew Him to be sinless,
they had declared that His death was necessary to their safety as a
nation. "If we let Him thus alone," said the Jewish leaders, "all men
will believe on Him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our
place and nation." John 11:48. If Christ were sacrificed, they might
once more become a strong, united people. Thus they reasoned, and they
concurred in the decision of their high priest, that it would be better
for one man to die than for the whole nation to perish.
Thus the Jewish leaders had built up "Zion with blood, and Jerusalem
with iniquity." Micah 3:10. And yet, while they slew their Saviour
because He reproved their sins, such was their self-righteousness that
they regarded themselves as God's favored people and expected the Lord
to deliver them from their enemies. "Therefore," continued the prophet,
"shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall
become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the
forest." Verse 12.
For nearly forty years after the doom of Jerusalem had been
pronounced by Christ Himself, the Lord delayed His judgments upon the
city and the nation. Wonderful was the long-suffering of God toward the
rejectors of His gospel and the murderers of His Son. The parable of the
unfruitful tree represented God's dealings with the Jewish nation. The
command had gone forth, "Cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?"
(Luke 13:7) but divine mercy had spared it yet a little longer. There
were still many among the Jews who were ignorant of the character and
the work of Christ. And the children had not enjoyed the opportunities
or
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received the light which their parents had spurned. Through the
preaching of the apostles and their associates, God would cause light to
shine upon them; they would be permitted to see how prophecy had been
fulfilled, not only in the birth and life of Christ, but in His death
and resurrection. The children were not condemned for the sins of the
parents; but when, with a knowledge of all the light given to their
parents, the children rejected the additional light granted to
themselves, they became partakers of the parents' sins, and filled up
the measure of their iniquity.
The long-suffering of God toward Jerusalem only confirmed the Jews in
their stubborn impenitence. In their hatred and cruelty toward the
disciples of Jesus they rejected the last offer of mercy. Then God
withdrew His protection from them and removed His restraining power from
Satan and his angels, and the nation was left to the control of the
leader she had chosen. Her children had spurned the grace of Christ,
which would have enabled them to subdue their evil impulses, and now
these became the conquerors. Satan aroused the fiercest and most debased
passions of the soul. Men did not reason; they were beyond
reason--controlled by impulse and blind rage. They became satanic in
their cruelty. In the family and in the nation, among the highest and
the lowest classes alike, there was suspicion, envy, hatred, strife,
rebellion, murder. There was no safety anywhere. Friends and kindred
betrayed one another. Parents slew their children, and children their
parents. The rulers of the people had no power to rule themselves.
Uncontrolled passions made them tyrants. The Jews had accepted false
testimony to condemn the innocent Son of God. Now false accusations made
their own lives uncertain. By their actions they had long been saying:
"Cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us." Isaiah 30:11.
Now their desire was granted. The fear of God no longer disturbed them.
Satan
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was at the head of the nation, and the highest civil and religious
authorities were under his sway.
The leaders of the opposing factions at times united to plunder and
torture their wretched victims, and again they fell upon each other's
forces and slaughtered without mercy. Even the sanctity of the temple
could not restrain their horrible ferocity. The worshipers were stricken
down before the altar, and the sanctuary was polluted with the bodies of
the slain. Yet in their blind and blasphemous presumption the
instigators of this hellish work publicly declared that they had no fear
that Jerusalem would be destroyed, for it was God's own city. To
establish their power more firmly, they bribed false prophets to
proclaim, even while Roman legions were besieging the temple, that the
people were to wait for deliverance from God. To the last, multitudes
held fast to the belief that the Most High would interpose for the
defeat of their adversaries. But Israel had spurned the divine
protection, and now she had no defense. Unhappy Jerusalem! rent by
internal dissensions, the blood of her children slain by one another's
hands crimsoning her streets, while alien armies beat down her
fortifications and slew her men of war!
All the predictions given by Christ concerning the destruction of
Jerusalem were fulfilled to the letter. The Jews experienced the truth
of His words of warning: "With what measure ye mete, it shall be
measured to you again." Matthew 7:2.
Signs and wonders appeared, foreboding disaster and doom. In the
midst of the night an unnatural light shone over the temple and the
altar. Upon the clouds at sunset were pictured chariots and men of war
gathering for battle. The priests ministering by night in the sanctuary
were terrified by mysterious sounds; the earth trembled, and a multitude
of voices were heard crying: "Let us depart hence." The great eastern
gate, which was so heavy that it could hardly be shut by a score of men,
and which was secured by
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immense bars of iron fastened deep in the pavement of solid stone,
opened at midnight, without visible agency.--Milman, The History of
the Jews, book 13.
For seven years a man continued to go up and down the streets of
Jerusalem, declaring the woes that were to come upon the city. By day
and by night he chanted the wild dirge: "A voice from the east! a voice
from the west! a voice from the four winds! a voice against Jerusalem
and against the temple! a voice against the bridegrooms and the brides!
a voice against the whole people!"-- Ibid . This strange being
was imprisoned and scourged, but no complaint escaped his lips. To
insult and abuse he answered only: "Woe, woe to Jerusalem!" "woe, woe to
the inhabitants thereof!" His warning cry ceased not until he was slain
in the siege he had foretold.
Not one Christian perished in the destruction of Jerusalem. Christ
had given His disciples warning, and all who believed His words watched
for the promised sign. "When ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with
armies," said Jesus, "then know that the desolation thereof is nigh.
Then let them which are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let them
which are in the midst of it depart out." Luke 21:20, 21. After the
Romans under Cestius had surrounded the city, they unexpectedly
abandoned the siege when everything seemed favorable for an immediate
attack. The besieged, despairing of successful resistance, were on the
point of surrender, when the Roman general withdrew his forces without
the least apparent reason. But God's merciful providence was directing
events for the good of His own people. The promised sign had been given
to the waiting Christians, and now an opportunity was offered for all
who would, to obey the Saviour's warning. Events were so overruled that
neither Jews nor Romans should hinder the flight of the Christians. Upon
the retreat of Cestius, the Jews, sallying from Jerusalem, pursued after
his retiring army; and while both forces were thus fully engaged, the
Christians had an opportunity to leave the city. At this time the
country also
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had been cleared of enemies who might have endeavored to intercept them.
At the time of the siege, the Jews were assembled at Jerusalem to keep
the Feast of Tabernacles, and thus the Christians throughout the land
were able to make their escape unmolested. Without delay they fled to a
place of safety--the city of Pella, in the land of Perea, beyond Jordan.
The Jewish forces, pursuing after Cestius and his army, fell upon
their rear with such fierceness as to threaten them with total
destruction. It was with great difficulty that the Romans succeeded in
making their retreat. The Jews escaped almost without loss, and with
their spoils returned in triumph to Jerusalem. Yet this apparent success
brought them only evil. It inspired them with that spirit of stubborn
resistance to the Romans which speedily brought unutterable woe upon the
doomed city.
Terrible were the calamities that fell upon Jerusalem when the siege
was resumed by Titus. The city was invested at the time of the Passover,
when millions of Jews were assembled within its walls. Their stores of
provision, which if carefully preserved would have supplied the
inhabitants for years, had previously been destroyed through the
jealousy and revenge of the contending factions, and now all the horrors
of starvation were experienced. A measure of wheat was sold for a
talent. So fierce were the pangs of hunger that men would gnaw the
leather of their belts and sandals and the covering of their shields.
Great numbers of the people would steal out at night to gather wild
plants growing outside the city walls, though many were seized and put
to death with cruel torture, and often those who returned in safety were
robbed of what they had gleaned at so great peril. The most inhuman
tortures were inflicted by those in power, to force from the
want-stricken people the last scanty supplies which they might have
concealed. And these cruelties were not infrequently practiced by men
who were themselves well fed, and who were merely desirous of laying up
a store of provision for the future.
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Thousands perished from famine and pestilence. Natural affection
seemed to have been destroyed. Husbands robbed their wives, and wives
their husbands. Children would be seen snatching the food from the
mouths of their aged parents. The question of the prophet, "Can a woman
forget her sucking child?" received the answer within the walls of that
doomed city: "The hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own
children: they were their meat in the destruction of the daughter of my
people." Isaiah 49:15; Lamentations 4:10. Again was fulfilled the
warning prophecy given fourteen centuries before: "The tender and
delicate woman among you, which would not adventure to set the sole of
her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall
be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward
her daughter, . . . and toward her children which she shall bear: for
she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and
straitness, wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates."
Deuteronomy 28:56, 57.
The Roman leaders endeavored to strike terror to the Jews and thus
cause them to surrender. Those prisoners who resisted when taken, were
scourged, tortured, and crucified before the wall of the city. Hundreds
were daily put to death in this manner, and the dreadful work continued
until, along the Valley of Jehoshaphat and at Calvary, crosses were
erected in so great numbers that there was scarcely room to move among
them. So terribly was visited that awful imprecation uttered before the
judgment seat of Pilate: "His blood be on us, and on our children."
Matthew 27:25.
Titus would willingly have put an end to the fearful scene, and thus
have spared Jerusalem the full measure of her doom. He was filled with
horror as he saw the bodies of the dead lying in heaps in the valleys.
Like one entranced, he looked from the crest of Olivet upon the
magnificent temple and gave command that not one stone of it be touched.
Before attempting to gain possession of this stronghold,
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he made an earnest appeal to the Jewish leaders not to force him to
defile the sacred place with blood. If they would come forth and fight
in any other place, no Roman should violate the sanctity of the temple.
Josephus himself, in a most eloquent appeal, entreated them to
surrender, to save themselves, their city, and their place of worship.
But his words were answered with bitter curses. Darts were hurled at
him, their last human mediator, as he stood pleading with them. The Jews
had rejected the entreaties of the Son of God, and now expostulation and
entreaty only made them more determined to resist to the last. In vain
were the efforts of Titus to save the temple; One greater than he had
declared that not one stone was to be left upon another.
The blind obstinacy of the Jewish leaders, and the detestable crimes
perpetrated within the besieged city, excited the horror and indignation
of the Romans, and Titus at last decided to take the temple by storm. He
determined, however, that if possible it should be saved from
destruction. But his commands were disregarded. After he had retired to
his tent at night, the Jews, sallying from the temple, attacked the
soldiers without. In the struggle, a firebrand was flung by a soldier
through an opening in the porch, and immediately the cedar-lined
chambers about the holy house were in a blaze. Titus rushed to the
place, followed by his generals and legionaries, and commanded the
soldiers to quench the flames. His words were unheeded. In their fury
the soldiers hurled blazing brands into the chambers adjoining the
temple, and then with their swords they slaughtered in great numbers
those who had found shelter there. Blood flowed down the temple steps
like water. Thousands upon thousands of Jews perished. Above the sound
of battle, voices were heard shouting: "Ichabod!"--the glory is
departed.
"Titus found it impossible to check the rage of the soldiery; he
entered with his officers, and surveyed the interior of the sacred
edifice. The splendor filled them with wonder; and as the flames had not
yet penetrated to the holy place,
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he made a last effort to save it, and springing forth, again exhorted
the soldiers to stay the progress of the conflagration. The centurion
Liberalis endeavored to force obedience with his staff of office; but
even respect for the emperor gave way to the furious animosity against
the Jews, to the fierce excitement of battle, and to the insatiable hope
of plunder. The soldiers saw everything around them radiant with gold,
which shone dazzlingly in the wild light of the flames; they supposed
that incalculable treasures were laid up in the sanctuary. A soldier,
unperceived, thrust a lighted torch between the hinges of the door: the
whole building was in flames in an instant. The blinding smoke and fire
forced the officers to retreat, and the noble edifice was left to its
fate.
"It was an appalling spectacle to the Roman--what was it to the Jew?
The whole summit of the hill which commanded the city, blazed like a
volcano. One after another the buildings fell in, with a tremendous
crash, and were swallowed up in the fiery abyss. The roofs of cedar were
like sheets of flame; the gilded pinnacles shone like spikes of red
light; the gate towers sent up tall columns of flame and smoke. The
neighboring hills were lighted up; and dark groups of people were seen
watching in horrible anxiety the progress of the destruction: the walls
and heights of the upper city were crowded with faces, some pale with
the agony of despair, others scowling unavailing vengeance. The shouts
of the Roman soldiery as they ran to and fro, and the howlings of the
insurgents who were perishing in the flames, mingled with the roaring of
the conflagration and the thundering sound of falling timbers. The
echoes of the mountains replied or brought back the shrieks of the
people on the heights; all along the walls resounded screams and
wailings; men who were expiring with famine rallied their remaining
strength to utter a cry of anguish and desolation.
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"The slaughter within was even more dreadful than the spectacle from
without. Men and women, old and young, insurgents and priests, those who
fought and those who entreated mercy, were hewn down in indiscriminate
carnage. The number of the slain exceeded that of the slayers. The
legionaries had to clamber over heaps of dead to carry on the work of
extermination."--Milman, The History of the Jews, book 16.
After the destruction of the temple, the whole city soon fell into
the hands of the Romans. The leaders of the Jews forsook their
impregnable towers, and Titus found them solitary. He gazed upon them
with amazement, and declared that God had given them into his hands; for
no engines, however powerful, could have prevailed against those
stupendous battlements. Both the city and the temple were razed to their
foundations, and the ground upon which the holy house had stood was
"plowed like a field." Jeremiah 26:18. In the siege and the slaughter
that followed, more than a million of the people perished; the survivors
were carried away as captives, sold as slaves, dragged to Rome to grace
the conqueror's triumph, thrown to wild beasts in the amphitheaters, or
scattered as homeless wanderers throughout the earth.
The Jews had forged their own fetters; they had filled for themselves
the cup of vengeance. In the utter destruction that befell them as a
nation, and in all the woes that followed them in their dispersion, they
were but reaping the harvest which their own hands had sown. Says the
prophet: "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself;" "for thou hast fallen
by thine iniquity." Hosea 13:9; 14:1. Their sufferings are often
represented as a punishment visited upon them by the direct decree of
God. It is thus that the great deceiver seeks to conceal his own work.
By stubborn rejection of divine love and mercy, the Jews had caused the
protection of God to be withdrawn from them, and Satan was permitted to
rule them according to his will. The horrible cruelties enacted in the
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destruction of Jerusalem are a demonstration of Satan's vindictive power
over those who yield to his control.
We cannot know how much we owe to Christ for the peace and protection
which we enjoy. It is the restraining power of God that prevents mankind
from passing fully under the control of Satan. The disobedient and
unthankful have great reason for gratitude for God's mercy and
long-suffering in holding in check the cruel, malignant power of the
evil one. But when men pass the limits of divine forbearance, that
restraint is removed. God does not stand toward the sinner as an
executioner of the sentence against transgression; but He leaves the
rejectors of His mercy to themselves, to reap that which they have sown.
Every ray of light rejected, every warning despised or unheeded, every
passion indulged, every transgression of the law of God, is a seed sown
which yields its unfailing harvest. The Spirit of God, persistently
resisted, is at last withdrawn from the sinner, and then there is left
no power to control the evil passions of the soul, and no protection
from the malice and enmity of Satan. The destruction of Jerusalem is a
fearful and solemn warning to all who are trifling with the offers of
divine grace and resisting the pleadings of divine mercy. Never was
there given a more decisive testimony to God's hatred of sin and to the
certain punishment that will fall upon the guilty.
The Saviour's prophecy concerning the visitation of judgments upon
Jerusalem is to have another fulfillment, of which that terrible
desolation was but a faint shadow. In the fate of the chosen city we may
behold the doom of a world that has rejected God's mercy and trampled
upon His law. Dark are the records of human misery that earth has
witnessed during its long centuries of crime. The heart sickens, and the
mind grows faint in contemplation. Terrible have been the results of
rejecting the authority of Heaven. But a scene yet darker is presented
in the revelations of the future. The records of the past,--the long
procession of tumults,
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conflicts, and revolutions, the "battle of the warrior . . . with
confused noise, and garments rolled in blood" (Isaiah 9:5),-- what are
these, in contrast with the terrors of that day when the restraining
Spirit of God shall be wholly withdrawn from the wicked, no longer to
hold in check the outburst of human passion and satanic wrath! The world
will then behold, as never before, the results of Satan's rule.
But in that day, as in the time of Jerusalem's destruction, God's
people will be delivered, everyone that shall be found written among the
living. Isaiah 4:3. Christ has declared that He will come the second
time to gather His faithful ones to Himself: "Then shall all the tribes
of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the
clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He shall send His
angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together
His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."
Matthew 24:30, 31. Then shall they that obey not the gospel be consumed
with the spirit of His mouth and be destroyed with the brightness of His
coming. 2 Thessalonians 2:8. Like Israel of old the wicked destroy
themselves; they fall by their iniquity. By a life of sin, they have
placed themselves so out of harmony with God, their natures have become
so debased with evil, that the manifestation of His glory is to them a
consuming fire.
Let men beware lest they neglect the lesson conveyed to them in the
words of Christ. As He warned His disciples of Jerusalem's destruction,
giving them a sign of the approaching ruin, that they might make their
escape; so He has warned the world of the day of final destruction and
has given them tokens of its approach, that all who will may flee from
the wrath to come. Jesus declares: "There shall be signs in the sun, and
in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations."
Luke 21:25; Matthew 24:29; Mark 13:24-26; Revelation 6:12-17. Those who
behold these harbingers of His coming are to "know that it is near, even
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at the doors." Matthew 24:33. "Watch ye therefore," are His words of
admonition. Mark 13:35. They that heed the warning shall not be left in
darkness, that that day should overtake them unawares. But to them that
will not watch, "the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night."
1 Thessalonians 5:2-5.
The world is no more ready to credit the message for this time than
were the Jews to receive the Saviour's warning concerning Jerusalem.
Come when it may, the day of God will come unawares to the ungodly. When
life is going on in its unvarying round; when men are absorbed in
pleasure, in business, in traffic, in money-making; when religious
leaders are magnifying the world's progress and enlightenment, and the
people are lulled in a false security--then, as the midnight thief
steals within the unguarded dwelling, so shall sudden destruction come
upon the careless and ungodly, "and they shall not escape." Verse 3.
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