With Vespasian taking over the government of the Roman Empire, his son Titus Flavius Vespasianus (AD 9-79; Joint Emperor AD 69-79 ; Sole Emperor 79-81) takes over as field marshal of the Roman forces opposing the Jewish revolt. Titus and Tiberius Alexander, Prefect of Egypt, march to Caesarea from Alexandria, bringing with them reinforcements from the 18th and 3rd Augusta Legions. The 12th Legion marched down from Syria, and three thousand legionaries of the 23rd and/or 24th Legions marched west from the Euphrates. In April, 70, Titus led the 12th and 15th Legions and the 3rd Augusta and 18th Legion cohorts out of Caesarea towards Jerusalem. Upon arriving, he encamped on Mount Scopus, north of the city.

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Shortly after the death and resurrection of Jesus, the mad Emperor Gaius Julius Caesar Germanicus - nicknamed Caligula ("little boots") - attempted to desecrate the Temple. Everywhere else in the Roman Empire subjugated peoples had been forced to conform to the cult of Rome and acknowledge not only Caesar as Lord but also fall into line by adopting the Roman pantheon of gods. The Jews had been left alone and it was time they began to conform. Caligula gave an order to set up his statue in the Holy of Holies in the Temple:

Now Caius Caesar did so grossly abuse the fortune he had arrived at, as to take himself to be a god, and to desire to be so called also, and to cut off those of the greatest nobility out of his country. He also extended his impiety as far as the Jews. Accordingly he sent Petronius with an army to Jerusalem to place his statues in the temple, and commanded him that, in case the Jews would not admit of them, he should slay those that opposed it, and carry all the rest into captivity.

The Roman writer Tacitus adds that Caius commanded the Jews to place his effigies in the Temple. Josephus records that the Jews pleaded with Petronius not to do this. The Jews in their stubborn monotheism were willing to sacrifice their whole nation before they would allow the Temple to be defiled. Petronius marveled at their courage and ceased with the process so confrontation was temporarily averted. An enraged Caligula commanded that Petronius be put to death. Josephus records that Caligula himself died soon thereafter and due to bad weather at sea, the letter ordering Petronius' death arrived three weeks after the news arrived of Caligula's death. Petronius was not executed and the Temple was spared this particular abomination.

To enforce their rule the Romans were forced to brutally repress the rebellions led by various "messiahs" - Theudas, James and Simon. One Jewish group, the Zealots, in existence since the turn of the century, gained enough strength by 50 A.D. that they were able to raid Jerusalem. The Roman procurator Gessius Florius whose headquarters were in Sebaste (Samaria), had taken advantage of the instability by taxing the Temple treasury for his own benefit. He was the cruelest of all Roman leaders to date. Florius met the Zealots in Jerusalem by killing 3600 Jews as he pillaged the upper market place. The Zealots in response destroyed the northern portico of the temple adjacent to the Antonia fortress thus preventing Florius from reaching the Temple where he wanted to seize the temple treasures.

Jesus left the temple and was going away, when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them, "You see all these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down." As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the close of the age?" (Matthew 24:1-3)

Both the Temple and the City of Jerusalem were indeed about to be destroyed. With four Legions, Titus the Roman General, later to become Caesar, began the siege of Jerusalem in April, A.D. 70. He posted his 10th legion on the Mount of Olives, directly east of and overlooking the Temple Mount. The 12th and 15th legions were stationed on Mount Scopus, further to the east and commanding all ways to Jerusalem from east to north. The 5th legion was held in reserve.

On the 10th of August, in A.D. 70 -- the 9th of Av -- in Jewish reckoning, the very day when the King of Babylon burned the Temple in 586 B.C., the Temple was burned again. Titus took the city and put it to the torch, burning the Temple.

Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus was present in Jerusalem when the city was captured and the Temple was burnt. He described the event in this manner:

The Romans, though it was a terrible struggle to collect the timber, raised their platforms in twenty-one days, having as described before stripped the whole area in a circle round the town to a distance of ten miles. The countryside like the City was a pitiful sight; for where once there had been a lovely vista of woods and parks there was nothing but desert and stumps of trees. No one - not even a foreigner - who had seen the Old Judea and the glorious suburbs of the City, and now set eyes on her present desolation, could have helped sighing and groaning at so terrible a change; for every trace of beauty had been blotted out by war, and nobody who had known it in the past and came upon it suddenly would have recognized the place: when he was already there he would still have been looking for the City.

In Luke 21:20 we have other details of this predicted overthrow of the city and the Temple. There Jesus adds, "But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near." Forty years later the Roman armies under Titus came in and fulfilled the prediction to the very letter. With Titus was a Jewish historian named Josephus who recorded the terrible story in minute detail. It was one of the most ghastly sieges in all history. When the Romans came the city was divided among three warring factions of Jews who were so at each other's' throats that they paid no heed to the approach of the Romans. Thus Titus came up and surrounded the city while it was distracted by its own internecine warfare. The Romans assaulted the walls again and again, and gave every opportunity to the Jews to surrender and save their capital from destruction.

The prediction of Jesus with regard to the city and the Temple were now fulfilled.

Bibliography. F M. Abel, Geographie de In Palestine, 1 (1933), 181-84; W. F Albright, CAH, 11/2 (3rd ed. 1975), 98-116; R, Antiran and A. Eitan, IEI, 20 (19170), 9-17; N. Avigad, Archaeological Discoveries in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem - Second Temple Period (19176); IEJ, 20 (1970), 1-8,129-140; 22 (1972)

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