The Destruction of Jerusalem: The Last Days According to Jesus with R.C. Sproul

Fascinating chapters and the whole story are, of course, the events surrounding the

destruction

of Jerusalem and we do not have a biblical record of that very important moment that took place in 70 AD, but what we do have is a fascinating account of a eyewitness, step by step. of the siege of Jerusalem and all the things that happened at its

destruction

written for us by the famous Jewish historian Josephus now one of the things that surprises me is how few Christians have taken the time to read the history of these events that were compiled by Josephus and every person I have met who has taken the time to read his Jewish Wars has commented that they were absolutely captivated by reading this story because it was so fascinating, so what I want to do in our session today.

Let us briefly look at some of the main points of the report that comes to us from the history of the pen of Flavius ​​Josephus Josephus was born in the year 37 AD. during the reign of Emperor Caligula and we do not know the exact year of his death. but we know that it was after the year 100, we also know that Josephus was born into a priestly family of the Jews, but when he grew up he did not become a priest but a member of the party of the Pharisees and distinguished himself in his early years. As territorial governor of Galilee, he was also known as a military strategist and served as a general in the Jewish army.

We know, of course, that he was also a historian and functioned during the siege of Jerusalem as an intermediary between the Roman armies and the officials resisting in Jerusalem and how that happened we will see in a moment, but in the 19th century the historical reliability of Josephus was object of strong attacks by critical scholars of the traditionally liberal Josephus school. has been one of the most respected historians of antiquity, but 19th-century critics accused him of exaggerating details and engaging in a kind of self-aggrandizement in his own writings in which he was said to be tooting his own horn, for more than it was part of that.

This is related to the general spirit of criticism towards ancient writers and, although we are not sure of the detailed and precise accuracy of everything that Josephus informs us, we at least have the benefit of an eyewitness who was a very well-known writer. day and who was in a unique position to report on both sides of the conflict and so the writings he has provided us or of extreme importance in trying to understand the significance of what happened in the year 70 now Josephus was very familiar with the writings of the Old Testament prophets and he himself saw the destruction of Jerusalem in terms of the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy;

In fact, there are some aspects of Josephus's own writings in which one could say that he imagines himself to be a prophet, but if he were he is not even interested in the religious significance of what happened in Jerusalem in those

days

, Just to get an idea of ​​Roman military strength, weapons tactics and strategy, the writings of Josephus or a Treasury about it give these detailed descriptions, for example, of the battering ram. and how the catapult and other forms of weaponry that the Romans perfected in the ancient world and used to be quite successful in their military conquests were used.

Now, the destruction of Jerusalem did not happen overnight, it began earlier with the invasion of Palestine by the Romans in the late 60s under the leadership of one of their greatest generals whose name was vest bation now. The year 68 was the year that Emperor Nero died and after Nero's death there was a tremendous period of internal conflict, in fact, civil war. that happened in Rome and there was a quick succession of emperors who ascended the throne after Nero's death, immediately succeeding Nero was a man called Galba who only

last

ed a few months until he was murdered and then Galba was replaced by Otho and again Otho He

last

ed a short time in 69, he was assassinated and then he was succeeded by Vitellius and Vitellius was selected by the Senate of Rome to be in the line of succession but the military at that time rejected Vitellius and they called Ves Pattin, their favorite general. , so that he returned home after his invasion of Palestine to become Emperor and so he left the battlefield, returned and was hailed as Emperor of Rome and brought some stability now once again to the Roman Empire. and he reigned as Emperor from the year 69 to the year 79 after which he was succeeded by his son Titus when he abandoned the battlefield after the initial stages of the invasion of Palestine and was recalled to Rome.

The invasion passed into the hands of his son Titus, so it was Titus who presided over the conquest of Jerusalem, but what happened was that when the Romans invaded, they entered Palestine and systematically besieged and conquered city after city after city and village after village. as they headed towards the The main citadel of the Jewish force, which of course was in Jerusalem, now one of the key conflicts earlier in the invasion, while the batting of the vests was still in command, was the conquest of the city of Joe Dupatta, which was in the northern part of the country and was governed. by General Josephus and

according

to Josephus' records, over 40,000 of his countrymen were massacred in the destruction of Joe dupatta and part of this was due to the fierce resistance that his soldiers and people put up against the Roman invasion and this is a aspect of the story is extremely fascinating, it reads like a novel because obviously the Jews in this small town were no match for the invading Roman army, but they used all sorts of clever and creative tactics to repel the invaders and in the end there was only one . or two survivors of the whole city, one of whom was Josephus, who hid as in a pit or well and was betrayed to the enemies and was supposed to be summarily executed, but

according

to at least Josephus's own testimony, he was Vespasian saved him because Batian had such regard and respect for the courage that Josephus had shown in defending Joe dupatta, so what happened now was that Josephus, in a sense, was taken hostage, Vespasian took him captive and was more or less. under house arrest in the vest patient's own quarters now this raised all kinds of questions to future generations because now that Josephus was saved many considered him some kind of traitor or collaborator of the Romans because he was constantly interrogated by the investigation and his lieutenants but What emerges from the writings of Josephus is that Josephus had an unbridled passion, love and affection for Jerusalem, he was an accomplished Jew, he loved the holy city and the last thing he wanted to happen was its destruction and not to mention the destruction of Jerusalem. and from the temple and that is why it is the best station first until he was called back to Rome and then later the tightest used ship used Josephus as a negotiator as a mediator who under a flag of truce would send Josephus to the city to speak with the elders who were resisting when Jerusalem was under siege and this siege lasted a long time and Josephus tried everything he knew to persuade the leaders of the city to surrender because he was convinced that there was no way for the garrison there in Jerusalem to help. would be able to resist the current siege of the Romans and would prefer that the city surrender and at the same time he begs Titus to spare the temple and the city if the soldiers who were garrisoned there in Jerusalem surrendered so that Josephus dedicated himself to that task of trying to negotiate a surrender and that is why some of the Jews believed that he was being a traitor because he as a Jew was asking for the surrender of the holy city but his motivation was obviously to preserve the temple. and the city of destruction that of course now ensued also in his writings when describing the events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem, Josephus saw the hand of Providence in this whole catastrophe and was warning his own people that they were about to fall under the judgment of God now that's fascinating in light of the way we've been addressing these questions about the time frame references of the Mount of Olives discourse because I've argued the point that the end of the age of which Jesus speaks in the Mount of Olives speech does not refer to the end of the world but to the end of the Jewish era and he was warning the people of his generation of the imminent coming judgment of God against Jerusalem and against the temple and from From a Jewish perspective, Josephus was making the same kind of warning. his people by looking at passages from the Old Testament and the Old Testament prophets to warn the people that this was the promised judgment against the ungodliness of that generation and it is also significant as you read this and look at some of the details that when Jesus spoke of that particular generation of Israelites, he spoke of them as evil to an unprecedented degree and Josephus makes the same assessment against his contemporaries saying that they were the most evil of all.

Now I would like to take some time to look at some of the specific prophecies or statements and descriptions that emerged from the writings of Josephus and not only those of Josephus but also the Roman historian Tacitus and Tacitus in many cases confirm from the Roman perspective the accounts that Josephus preserves us, now one of the The range reports in this account are found in book 5 of the Jewish Wars of Josephus and have to do with the attack on the walls of Jerusalem that took place through the use of large, enormous stones , white stones that were pushed out of the catapult and engines. which were then thrown against the walls and the walls were so thick that they were able to withstand this assault of huge rocks thrown at them as well as the battering rams for a long, long time again as a footnote to this we remember that the walls of the temple were made of what historians now call the Herodian stone, this was the Herodian temple and the stones, the individual stones that made up that temple, were absolutely enormous, they were enormous in size if you look in your living room and look.

If you look at the entire wall in terms of width and height and imagine that there is a stone in a wall about four to six feet deep and thick, then you will have an idea of ​​these huge stones that were used for the construction of the walls of Jerusalem and the temple and so it is not surprising that these walls stood so firm against the attacks of the Romans. Now, of course, these stones that were thrown by the machines were not only thrown against the walls but they were also thrown over the walls and there they did inflict considerable damage to the structures within the city and even many victims of people who were injured. or killed by these stones now in the fascinating barrage of stones that came as Josephus' description as hail, they were white rocks, Josephus gives this record, he said that the At first, the Jews watched the arrival of the stones because they were white and therefore they could not only be perceived by the great noises they made, but could also be seen before landing by their brightness, so the sentinels who were sitting on the tire towers gave what they realized It was when the engine was released and a stone came out of it and he shouted loudly as a warning to those who were there, the stone is coming, it is a simple warning, the stone is coming, so those who were in his way stopped and threw themselves down on the ground through which and thus protecting themselves the stone fell and did not harm them now a scholar discovered that there is a variant in the translation of this record and that certain manuscripts read instead of the words the stoned one the stone comes that the The words that were used were the words the son does not come sun but son N and there were those who believed that this was related to a tradition that had developed from earlier times according to a historian that the apostle James, who was the brother of Christ, testified publicly in The quote of the temple says that the Son of Man was about to come in the clouds of heaven and sealed this testimony with his own blood.

It seems very likely that a historian would write that the Jews in their defiant and desperate blasphemy when they saw this white mass in the air. He shouted that the sun is coming in mockery of the Christians who had predicted the return of Jesus, so you can take that for what it's worth, there is certainly controversy about it, but in addition to these details, Josephus tells us of a severe famine. that affected the inhabitants. in which many people died in Jerusalem of hunger because of the prolonged siege if you have ever been to Palestine perhaps you visited the Mount of Olives and the Mount of Olives was called the Mount of Olives where the Garden of Gethsemane was, which is the Press garden of Olives where Jesus went for his agony of prayer the night he was betrayed that all that hillside across the valley from Jerusalem just on the other side of Bethany was a huge, dense forest of these huge, massive olive trees that would go be three or four hundred years old, if you go there today you will not see a single olive tree on the Mount of Olives and that is because during the siege that lasted so long the Romans systematically cut down every tree on that slope and used the wood as firewood to sustain themselves.hot and that's another one of the details that we learned from Josephus' account, but of course when the famine became so severe, the people actually resorted to cannibalism and Josephus tells the story of a woman who was taking care of them. baby and Z, at the point of great starvation, she roasted her own baby and ate it and it was that kind of thing that he recorded as part of the atrocities that took place, but again, perhaps the most difficult problem that We have already faced all of his speech and its application to the destruction of were Jesus' predictions regarding the astronomical signs in the sky.

Disturbances and one of the fascinating parts of the historical record of what happened are found in both the writings of Josephus as in the writings of Tacitus. Tacitus tells us for example that there were signs that occurred in the sky regarding a comet that had previously occurred around the year 60 during the reign of Nero a comet was observed for some period of time in the sky and for the public of that At the time they saw this as a harbinger of a radical change that would soon take place. place on the political scene Tacitus says quote as if Nero was already on the throne, men began to ask who could be his successor and Nero took the threats of the comets seriously, he did not take risks like the courtship.

Tonia also related to all the children, the condemned men were banished from Rome. and he died of starvation or poisoning under Nero and Nero survived the comet for several years and then Halley's Comet appeared in 66 AD. C., after which Nero committed suicide and many historians have linked that appearance of Halley's Comet with Nero's suicide, now perhaps the strangest record of everything that comes to us from the pen of Josephus is in a paragraph with which I will conclude this series where I read this section to you because it is so extraordinary that Joseph writes these words in addition to these things referring to comets and so on a few

days

after that festival, on the first and twentieth day of the month of Artemis, a certain phenomenon appeared prodigious and incredible.

I suppose the story would seem like a fable if it were not related by those who saw it and the events that followed were not of such a considerable nature as to merit such signs, for before sunset chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running among the clouds and surrounding the cities, furthermore, in that festival we call Pentecost as the priests did. Entering the inner court of the temple at night as was their custom to carry out their sacred ministries, they said that first they felt a tremor and heard a great noise and then they heard a roar from a large crowd saying quote: Let us eliminate from here now what Josephus reports that it follows an almost identical pattern of what the prophet Elijah experienced in both when his servants opened their eyes and saw all the myriads of angels and the Chariots of Fire around Elijah and the judgments in Ezekiel and so on.

On the departure of the holy spirit from the city of Jerusalem and God's words of judgment on Ichabod's departure, we leave and what I find fascinating about this brief report from Josephus is his own obvious reluctance to report it because he feels it is so extraordinary that People will think he's crazy for telling Dori this, but as he says, he was forced to tell it for two reasons, one because so many people witnessed it and two because it was consistent with the seriousness of this historical moment, so He sees in the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple a divine act of vengeance on his own people.