19. And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!
20. But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:
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.
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.
CHRYSOSTOM . As above He had obscurely intimated the end of Jerusalem; He now proceeds to a more plain announcement of it, citing a prophecy which should make them believe it.
JEROME . That, Let him that readeth understand, is said to call us to the mystic understanding of the place. What we read in Daniel is this; And in the midst of the week the sacrifice and the oblation shall be taken away, and in the temple shall be the abomination of desolations until the consummation of the time, and consummation shall be given upon the desolate. (Dan. 9:27. sec. LXX.)
AUGUSTINE . (Ep. 199. 31.) Luke, in order to shew that the abomination of desolation foretold by Daniel had reference to the time of the siege of Jerusalem, repeats these words of our Lord, When ye shall see Jerusalem encompassed by armies, then know ye that its desolation draweth nigh. (Luke 21:20.)
PSEUDO-CHRYSOSTOM . Whence I think that by the abomination of desolation, He means the army by which the city of the holy Jerusalem was desolated.
JEROME . Or it may be understood of the statue of Cæsar, which Pilate set up in the temple; or of the equestrian statue of Adrian, which stood to the present time in the very Holy of Holies. For, according to the Old Scripture, an idol is called ‘abomination;’ of desolation is added, because the idol was set up in the desolated and deserted temple.
CHRYSOSTOM . Or because he who desolated the city and the temple placed his statue there. He says, When ye shall see, because these things were to happen while some of them were yet alive. Wherein admire Christ’s power, and the courage of the disciples, who preached through those times in which all things Jewish were the object of attack. The Apostles, being Jews, introduced new laws in opposition to the Roman authority. The Romans conquered countless thousands of Jews, but could not overcome twelve unarmed unprotected men.
CHRYSOSTOM . (Hom. lxxvi.) But because it had often happened to the Jews to be recovered in very desperate circumstances, as in the times of Sennacherib and Antiochus, that no man might look for any such event now, He gave command to His disciples to fly, saying, Then let them which are in Judæa flee to the mountains.
REMIGIUS . And this we know was so done when the fall of Jerusalem drew near; for on the approach of the Roman army, all the Christians in the province, warned, as ecclesiastical history tells us (Euseb. H.E. iii. 5.), miraculously from heaven, withdrew, and passing the Jordan, took refuge in the city of Pella; and under the protection of that King Agrippa, of whom we read in the Acts of the Apostles, they continued some time; but Agrippa himself, with the Jews whom he governed, was subjected to the dominion of the Romans.
CHRYSOSTOM . Then to shew how inevitable the evils that should come upon the Jews, and how infinite their calamity, He adds, And let him which is on the housetop, not come down to take any thing out of his house, for it was better to be saved, and to lose his clothes, than to put on a garment and perish; and of him who is in the field He says the same. For if those who are in the city fly from it, little need is there for those who are abroad to return to the city. But it is easy to despise money, and not hard to provide other raiment; but how can one avoid natural circumstances? How can a woman with child be made active for flight, or how can she that gives suck desert the child she has brought forth? Woe, therefore, to them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days; to the one, because they are encumbered, and cannot easily fly, bearing about the burden of the womb; to the other, because they are held by compassion for their children, and cannot save with them those whom they are suckling.
ORIGEN . Or because that will not be a time of shewing pity, neither upon them who are with child, nor upon them who are suckling, nor upon their infants. And as speaking to Jews who thought they might travel no more upon the sabbath than a sabbath-day’s journey, He adds, But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath.
JEROME . Because in the one the severity of the cold prevents your flight to the deserts, and your lurking in mountains and wilds; in the other, you must either transgress the Law, if you will fly, or encounter instant death if you will stay.
CHRYSOSTOM . Note how this speech is directed against the Jews; for when these things were done by Vespasian, the Apostles could neither observe the Sabbath nor fly, seeing most of them were already dead, and those who survived were living in distant countries. And why they should pray for this He adds a reason, For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor shall be.
AUGUSTINE . (Ep. 199. 30.) In Luke it is thus read, There shall be great distress upon the earth, and wrath upon this people, and they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations. (Luke 21:23.) And so Josephus, who wrote the Jewish History, (B. J. vii.) relates evils so great happening to this people as to seem hardly credible. Whence it was not unreasonably said, that such tribulation had never been from the beginning of creation, nor should be; for though in the lime of Antichrist shall be such, or perhaps greater; yet to the Jews, of whom we must understand this, such shall never more befal. For if they shall be the first and the chief to receive Antichrist, they will then rather inflict than suffer tribulation.
CHRYSOSTOM . I ask the Jews, whence came upon them so grievous wrath from heaven more woful than all that had come upon them before? Plainly it was because of the desperate crime1 and the denial of the Cross. But He shews that they deserved still heavier punishment than they received, when He adds, And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh he saved; that is, If the siege by the Romans should be continued longer, all the Jews would perish; for by all flesh, He means all the Jewish nation, those within and those without; for the Romans were at war not only with those in Judæa, but with the whole race wherever dispersed.
AUGUSTINE . Indeed some persons seem to me not unfitly to understand by these days the evils themselves, as in other places of divine Scripture evil days are spoken of; not that the days themselves are evil, but the things that are done on them. And they are said to be shortened, because they are less felt, God giving us endurance; so that even though grievous, they are felt as short.
CHRYSOSTOM . But that the Jews should not say that these evils came because of the preaching and the disciples of Christ, He shews them that had it not been for His disciples, they would have totally perished, but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.
AUGUSTINE . For we ought not to doubt that when Jerusalem was overthrown, there were among that people elect of God who had believed out of the circumcision, or would have believed, elect before the foundation of the world, for whose sake those days should be shortened, and their evils made endurable. Some there are who suppose that the days will be shortened by a more rapid motion of the sun, as the day was made longer on the prayer of Jesus Naue.
JEROME . Not remembering that which is written. The day continues according to thy ordinances. (Ps. 119:91.) We must understand it of their being shortened not in measure, but in number, lest the faith of believers should be shaken by lengthened affliction.
AUGUSTINE . (ubi sup.) For let us not suppose that the computation of Daniel’s weeks was interfered with by this shortening of those days, or that they were not already at that time complete, but had to be completed afterwards in the end of all things, for Luke most plainly testifies that the prophecy of Daniel was accomplished at the time when Jerusalem was overthrown.
CHRYSOSTOM . Observe this economy of the Holy Spirit in this, that John wrote nothing of all this, that he might not seem to be writing a history after the event; for he survived sometime the taking of Jerusalem. But these who died before it, and saw nothing of it, these write it, that the power of prophecy may shine manifestly forth.
HILARY . Or otherwise; It is a sign of His future coming that the Lord gives, when He says, When ye shall see the abomination. For the Prophet spoke this of the times of Antichrist; and he calls abomination that which coming against God claims to itself the honour of God. It is the abomination of desolation, because it will desolate the earth with wars and slaughter; and it is admitted by the Jews, and set up in the holy place, that where God had been invoked by the prayers of the saints, into that same place admitted by the unbelievers it might be adored with the worship of God. And because this error will be peculiar to the Jews, that having rejected the truth they should adopt a lie, He warns them to leave Judæa, and flee to the mountains, that no pollution or infection might be gathered by admixture with a people who should believe on Antichrist. That He says, Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take ang thing out of his house, is thus understood. The roof is the highest part of the house, the summit and perfection of the whole building. He then who stands on the top of his house, i. e. in the perfection of his heart, aloft in the regeneration of a new spirit, ought not to come down to the lower desire of things of the world. Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his coat; i. e. He that has attained to obedience to the command, let him not return back to his former cares, to take on him again the coat of his former sins in which he once was clothed.