AND AS HE WENT OUT OF THE TEMPLE,.... The Ethiopic version reads, "as they went out"; Christ and his disciples: for when Christ went out of the temple, the disciples went out with him; or at least very quickly followed him, and came to him, as appears from what follows; though the true reading is, ... [ Continue Reading ]
AND JESUS ANSWERING SAID UNTO HIM,.... The Persic version reads, "unto them"; and so Beza's most ancient copy but as that question is put by one, the reply is made to him: SEEST THOU THESE GREAT BUILDINGS? how beautiful and strong they are. The Vulgate Latin and Ethiopic versions, add the word all;... [ Continue Reading ]
AND AS HE SAT UPON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES,.... On the east of Jerusalem: OVER AGAINST THE TEMPLE: where he could have a full view of it; the eastern wall of the temple being lower than the rest; Matthew 24:3. PETER, AND JOHN, AND JAMES, AND ANDREW, ASKED HIM PRIVATELY; apart from the rest of the dis... [ Continue Reading ]
TELL US WHEN SHALL THESE THINGS BE?.... When the temple will be destroyed, and these fine buildings shall be demolished, and not one of these large stones shall be left upon another: AND WHAT SHALL BE THE SIGN WHEN ALL THESE THINGS [SHALL BE] FULFILLED? And what is the sign of his coming, and of th... [ Continue Reading ]
AND JESUS ANSWERING THEM,.... His four disciples, Peter, John, James, and Andrew: "began to say"; or "said", a way of speaking frequent with this evangelist: TAKE HEED LEST ANY MAN DECEIVE YOU; Matthew 24:4.... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR MANY SHALL COME IN MY NAME,.... Taking upon them the name of the Messiah: saying, I AM [CHRIST]; the word "Christ", is rightly supplied from Matthew 24:5; otherwise in the original it is only, "I am"; which the Persic version doubles, reading it, "I am indeed, I am": he that was promised and e... [ Continue Reading ]
AND WHEN YE SHALL HEAR OF WARS, AND RUMOURS OF WARS,.... Among the Jews themselves, and with the Romans: BE NOT TROUBLED; keep your place, abide by your work, go on preaching the Gospel, without distressing yourselves about the event of things: FOR [SUCH THINGS] MUST NEEDS BE: being decreed by God... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR NATION SHALL RISE AGAINST NATION,.... The nations of the world one against another, and the Romans against the Jews, and the Jews against them: AND KINGDOM AGAINST KINGDOM; which is a synonymous phrase with the former, and what the Jews call, מלות שונות, "different words", expressing the same t... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT TAKE HEED TO YOURSELVES,.... This does not so much regard their doctrine and conversation, they were to take heed to; in which sense this phrase is sometimes used; but the security of their persons and lives; and the advice is, to take care of them selves, as much as in them lay, how they came i... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THE GOSPEL MUST FIRST BE PUBLISHED AMONG ALL NATIONS. The Syriac version reads, "my Gospel"; the Gospel which Christ was the author, subject, and preacher of; this "must be published". There was a necessity of the promulgation of it by the will of God, the command and commission of Christ; and f... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT WHEN THEY SHALL LEAD YOU, AND DELIVER YOU UP,.... Lead to councils and courts of judicature, and deliver up to kings and rulers, to the civil magistrate, to be punished by the secular arm: TAKE NO THOUGHT BEFORE HAND; be not previously anxious, and carefully solicitous, in a distressing way: W... [ Continue Reading ]
NOW THE BROTHER SHALL BETRAY THE BROTHER TO DEATH,.... Signifying, that such should be the rage of men, particularly the Jews, against Christ and his Gospel, that those that were in the nearest relation, were of the same flesh and blood, children of the same parents, should betray and deliver up eac... [ Continue Reading ]
AND YE SHALL BE HATED OF ALL MEN,.... Not only of your friends and relations of your countrymen the Jews; but of all men, the generality of men, in, all nations of the world, wherever they came: FOR MY NAME'S SAKE; for the sake of Christ and his Gospel, they professed and preached: BUT HE THAT SHA... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT WHEN YE SHALL SEE THE ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION,.... The Roman army encompassing Jerusalem, which was an abomination to the Jews, and an "impure sign" of their destruction, as the Syriac and Persic versions render it; and a desolating one to their nation, city, and temple: SPOKEN OF BY DANIEL T... [ Continue Reading ]
AND LET HIM THAT IS ON THE HOUSE TOP,.... On the battlements of the house, either for diversion or devotion: NOT GO DOWN INTO THE HOUSE; in the inner way by the stairs, or ladder within doors: NEITHER ENTER THEREIN; being come down from the top of the house, by stairs, or a ladder without, which w... [ Continue Reading ]
AND LET HIM THAT IS IN THE FIELD,.... At work, in any sort of business there, NOT TURN BACK AGAIN: either to his own house, or rather to that part of the field where he laid down his clothes: FOR TO TAKE UP HIS GARMENT; but let him flee without it, or otherwise he would be in great danger; Matthew... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT WOE TO THEM THAT ARE WITH CHILD,.... Who because of their burdens, would be very unfit for, and very incapable of fleeing with any haste; and therefore very liable to fall into the hands of the enemy, and become their prey: AND TO THEM THAT GIVE SUCK IN THOSE DAYS; who could not bear to leave t... [ Continue Reading ]
AND PRAY YE THAT YOUR FLIGHT BE NOT IN WINTER. When days are short, roads bad, the weather inclement; and when to lodge in mountains, is very incommodious, and uncomfortable. The Persic version adds, "neither on the sabbath day"; Matthew 24:20.... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR IN THOSE DAYS SHALL BE AFFLICTION,.... What with the close siege of the Romans; the fury of the zealots, and seditious; the rage of different parties among the Jews themselves; the ravage of the sword, both within and without, together with dreadful plagues and famines: SUCH AS WAS NOT FROM THE... [ Continue Reading ]
AND EXCEPT THAT THE LORD HAD SHORTENED THOSE DAYS,.... Had determined that those days of affliction should be but few, and not last long; that the siege should not be longer continued, and the devastations within and without be prolonged: NO FLESH SHOULD BE SAVED; there would not have been a Jew le... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THEN IF ANY MAN SHALL SAY TO YOU,.... During those days of tribulation and affliction, or when shortened and at an end: LO! [HERE IS] CHRIST, OR LO! [HE IS] THERE; the Messiah has appeared in such or in such a place, to deliver you from your national distresses and calamities, and from the Roma... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR FALSE CHRISTS AND FALSE PROPHETS SHALL RISE,.... As there did, both before and after the destruction of Jerusalem: AND SHALL SHOW SIGNS AND WONDERS; as they pretended to do, and did, at least to the appearance of people: TO SEDUCE, IF IT WERE POSSIBLE, EVEN THE ELECT; who were chosen in Christ... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT TAKE YE HEED,.... The Persic version adds, "of them"; of the false Christs, and false prophets: for though the purposes of God, concerning the salvation of his elect, are infrustrable; his promises are yea and amen; his grace is efficacious and irresistible, and his power uncontrollable; and the... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT IN THOSE DAYS, AFTER THAT TRIBULATION,.... That is, after the destruction of the city and temple of Jerusalem, and the miseries and calamities attending it, in the times immediately following it; see Matthew 24:29; THE SUN SHALL BE DARKENED: so the Shekinah, or glory of the divine majesty was w... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THE STARS OF HEAVEN SHALL FALL,.... The Jewish Rabbins and doctors, who fell off from the written word, and compiled their "Misna", or oral law, their book of traditions, and set it up above the Bible, the foundation of which was laid immediately upon their dispersion. AND THE POWERS THAT ARE I... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THEN SHALL THEY SEE THE SON OF MAN,.... Not in person, but in the power of his wrath and vengeance; of which the Jews then had a convincing evidence, and full proof; and even of his being come in the flesh, as if they had seen him in person: this shows, that the sign of the son of man, in Matthe... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THEN HE SHALL SEND HIS ANGELS,.... The ministers of the Gospel to preach it, and plant more churches among the Gentiles, since that at Jerusalem was entirely broken up: AND SHALL GATHER TOGETHER HIS ELECT; that is, he the son of man, or Christ, shall gather them by the ministry of his servants;... [ Continue Reading ]
NOW LEARN A PARABLE OF THE FIG TREE,.... Our Lord was now upon the Mount of Olives, in one part of which fig trees grew in great plenty, and one, or more, might be near, and in view; and it was the time of year, the passover being at hand, for its putting forth: WHEN HER BRANCH IS YET TENDER; and s... [ Continue Reading ]
SO YE, IN LIKE MANNER,.... This is an accommodation of the parable to the present case: WHEN YE SHALL SEE THESE THINGS COME TO PASS; the signs preceding the destruction of Jerusalem, and especially the abomination of desolation, or the Roman army surrounding it: KNOW THAT IT, OR HE is nigh, even a... [ Continue Reading ]
VERILY I SAY UNTO YOU, THAT THIS GENERATION SHALL NOT PASS,.... Not the generation of men, in general, or Jews in particular, nor of Christians; but that present generation of men, they should not all go off the stage of life, TILL ALL THESE THINGS BE DONE; which were now predicted by Christ, conce... [ Continue Reading ]
HEAVEN AND EARTH SHALL PASS AWAY,.... Which may be understood either affirmatively, as what will be at the second coming of Christ; or comparatively, rather than any thing said by Christ should; and so shows the certainty and irreversibleness of his predictions, as it follows: BUT MY WORDS SHALL NO... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT OF THAT DAY, AND OF THAT HOUR,.... Of Jerusalem's destruction; for of nothing else had Christ been speaking; and, it is plain, the words are anaphorical, and relate to what goes before: KNOWETH NO MAN; nay, they that lived to see it, and have spoken of it, are not agreed about the particular da... [ Continue Reading ]
TAKE YE HEED, WATCH AND PRAY,.... This seems to be the principal reason why the day and hour of Jerusalem's destruction, though known by the Father, were not made known to any man, neither to the angels, nor by them; nor to the son of man in the days of his flesh, nor by him when on earth; that his... [ Continue Reading ]
[FOR THE SON OF MAN IS] AS A MAN TAKING A FAR JOURNEY,.... Or this case of the son of man's coming to take vengeance on the Jewish nation, is like a man that takes a journey into a far country. This puts me in mind of a question asked m by the Jews: "what דרך רחוקה, "a far journey" from Modiim, and... [ Continue Reading ]
WATCH YE THEREFORE,.... Against false Christs, and false prophets; over yourselves, and the whole church; for the words are particularly addressed to the disciples of Christ: FOR YE KNOW NOT WHEN THE MASTER OF THE HOUSE COMETH; when Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven, and in earth, is named... [ Continue Reading ]
LEST COMING SUDDENLY,.... Unthought of, and unexpected, at an unawares: HE FIND YOU SLEEPING; inactive in the exercise of grace, and negligent in the performance of duty; unprepared for his coming, and unfit for service.... [ Continue Reading ]
AND WHAT I SAY UNTO YOU,.... The four disciples, Peter, James, John, and Andrew; who came privately to him, and put to him the questions, which occasioned this long discourse; see Mark 13:3. I SAY UNTO ALL. The Syriac and Persic versions read, "you all"; meaning all the rest of his apostles, and a... [ Continue Reading ]