“Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains: Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house: Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes. And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days! But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day: For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.” (Matt. 24:16-22)

Once more the language is to the generation Jesus spoke to for, He says, “And when you shall see these things…flee!”

Prior to the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 the disciples of Jesus did see the Holy City surrounded by Cestius Gallus, the Roman general initially put in charge of subduing the Jews. Cestius Gallus came to Jerusalem and laid siege to it. Then something mysterious happened.

“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” (Josephus, Wars, Book 2 Chapter 19:7).

The surprise withdrawal provided the window of opportunity for the Christian community to escape according to the guidelines Christ provided. Eusebius, the Christian historian, stated that,

“The whole body … 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” (Ecclesiastical History, 111, 5:3).

Jesus does not have in mind a worldwide tribulation in this verse for the context is Judea: “Then let them [elect Jewish believers living in Jerusalem] which be in Judaea flee.”

To escape this great tribulation period all one had to do was to flee to the mountains. The flight had to be made because the wrath of God was being poured out on the land. These were days of vengeance. The people of Israel had “killed the Lord of glory” (1 Cor. 2:8) and invited His blood to be upon the heads of them and their children (Luke 11:50-51). That invitation was accepted.

Beginning in the summer of AD 66 there were days of vengeance (Luke 21:22). The judgment of God was like no other judgment on the Jews since the beginning of the world, or ever shall be because God was divorcing the People of the Covenant. God was taking the gospel from them and giving it to another. There is no judgment more severe than that. The testimony of history confirms the fulfilment of this prophesy. The Church historian Eusebius recorded that,

“The members of the Jerusalem Church by means of an oracle, given by revelation to acceptable persons there, were ordered to leave the city before the war began and settle in a town in Peraea called Pella” (Book III, 5:4).

Epiphanius (375 AD) wrote, “All the disciples were living in Pella after they moved from Jerusalem, since Christ told them to leave Jerusalem and withdraw because it was about to be besieged. For this reason, they settled in Peraea and there, as I said, they lived” (Panarion 29:7:7-8).

 17 Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take anything out of his house:

The Jews had flat roofs they used as patios. The roof was a good place to relax, socialize, and enjoy the cool breeze of the evening. When the time came, those on the housetop were to flee and leave everything inside the house behind.

18 Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes [cloak].

No matter how dirty a person might be from working in the fields, they were not to return to retrieve clothes.

19 And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck [have babies] in those days!

Nursing mother and expecting mothers would find it difficult to flee in haste.

20 But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath day:

It is difficult to travel quickly in winter weather. For a scrupulous Jew, a flight to safety meant the Sabbath would be violated. Some Jews would rather die than break the Sabbath. Therefore, prayer was to be offered that these events not happen on the Sabbath. History records the Jews were slaughtered who did not flee more than the ¾ of a mile the Jewish law allowed for a Sabbath’s journey.

As the dark and terrible days of tribulation descended upon Israel Jesus said to His disciples, they would see the approaching desolation and so they should take cover in the hills. The appearance of the abomination of desolation, meaning the appearance of the armies of Rome, demanded instant, urgent flight.

21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.

Of this period Josephus, who was an eyewitness says that, “it appears to me that the misfortunes of all men from the beginning of the world, if they be compared to those of the Jews, are not so considerable as they were … It is therefore impossible to go distinctly over every instance of these men’s iniquity. I shall therefore speak my mind here at once briefly: That 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…” (Wars, Book 5, Chapter 10:5).

Because of the horrors against the Jews during World War II, it has been argued that the emphatic statement of Jesus in Matthew 24:21, a statement confirmed by Josephus and others, has not yet been realized.

Some Bible teachers point to the numbers slain, the amount of property destroyed, the duration of time in suffering, and the extent of the geographical coverage of persecuted Jews in the 20th century, and then declare that the words of Jesus have yet to be fulfilled. This commitment to simple numbers, how many bodies killed, how much money taken from the Jews in AD 70 compared to modem times misses the point of the words of Jesus to His generation.

It is the kind of vengeance that must be considered for in the period of the great tribulation (AD 40 to AD 70); this was nothing less than Almighty God divorcing His ancient wife who had proved unfaithful to Him. This was the time of Jacob’s Trouble (Jer. 30:7). This was the period of God concentrating His wrath upon His elect nation in particular (Luke 21:22-23; Daniel 12:1). Theologian Loraine Boettner comments on this fact.

“There have been, of course, other periods of tribulation of suffering in which greater numbers of people were involved, and which continued for longer periods of time.

But considering the physical, moral, and religious aspects, suffering never reached a greater degree of awfulness and intensity than the siege of Jerusalem.

Nor have so many people ever perished in the fall of any other city.

[Titus allowed Jewish pilgrims to enter Jerusalem for the Passover in April but then refused to let them leave thereby overpopulating the Holy City.]

We think of the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima as causing the greatest mass horror of anything in modern times. Yet, only about one tenth as many people were killed in Hiroshima as in the fall of Jerusalem.

Add to the slaughter of such a great number the bestiality of Jew to Jew and of Roman to Jew and the anguish of a people who knew they were forsaken of God, and we see the justification for Christ’s words,

“For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not from the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Loraine Boettner, The Millennium)

History testifies to the fact that there has never been a period of suffering IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL as the period between AD 66–135.

While the events of World War II were atrocious beyond belief, the suffering of the Jew did not take place IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL. The modern nation of Israel was created on May 15, 1948 as a refuge from the horrors of the Holocaust. Therefore, the Holocaust does not negate the prophesy of Jesus in Matthew 24 as being fulfilled. Jesus made this point clear. The generation to which He was speaking was not to pass away until everything He said was fulfilled (Matt. 24:34; Mark 13:30; Luke 21:32).

It is instructive that Josephus viewed the divine judgment on Jerusalem in AD 70 as a literal fulfillment of the prophecy of Daniel (Antiquities, Book 10, Chapter 11:7).

“In the very same manner Daniel also wrote concerning the Roman government, and that our country should be made desolate by them. All these things did this man leave in writing, as God had showed them to him, insomuch, that such as read his prophecies, and see how they have been fulfilled, would wonder at the wherewith God honored Daniel…”

As God honored Daniel so He honored His Son.Jesus too was a Prophet and what He told His disciples was true and terrifying.

22 And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.

Though Jerusalem was initially capable of withstanding a Roman siege for two, or even three years, the Holy City fell within five months. The siege began in April 70 AD and culminated in the conquest of the city in September of the same year. Once more the prophecy of Jesus was fulfilled.