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Author	: Bill Kochman
Publish	: Jun. 14, 2025
Update	: Jun. 14, 2025
Parts	: 25

Synopsis:




Continuing our discussion from part seventeen, as the battle for the temple continued, Josephus says that the place where the battle was occurring was so narrow, that the fighters on both sides were pushed up against each other, and forced to engage in direct hand-to-hand combat using only their swords, because using arrows and spears was useless. After fighting through the night, and realizing that they couldn't take the temple with the forces they had, the Romans had to content themselves with just taking possession of the tower of Antonia.

As we enter Book 6 Chapter 2, Titus has ordered his troops to dig up the foundations of the tower of Antonia in order to bring it down. Receiving word that the daily sacrifice had not been offered that day in the temple, Titus then had Josephus brought to him, in order that he might deliver yet another message to the Jerusalemites, and particularly to John of Giscala and his men. Josephus then extended another offer of peace to John, and told him that not only was it his fault that the daily sacrifice had been missed, but that if the city were destroyed, and the temple burned down, the blame would fall squarely on him and his band of thugs, due to their obstinance in refusing to surrender to the Romans.

Josephus also reminded John of how centuries earlier, Jewish king Jehoiachin -- along with his family, other royalty and servants -- had preferred to be taken as captives to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar, rather than see Jerusalem and the temple destroyed by the Babylonians. Josephus implored John to make a similar gesture. Consider the following verses:

"Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. And his mother's name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father had done. At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against Jerusalem, and the city was besieged. And Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came against the city, and his servants did besiege it. And Jehoiachin the king of Judah went out to the king of Babylon, he, and his mother, and his servants, and his princes, and his officers: and the king of Babylon took him in the eighth year of his reign. And he carried out thence all the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king's house, and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold which Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of the LORD, as the LORD had said. And he carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valour, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and smiths: none remained, save the poorest sort of the people of the land. And he carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, and the king's mother, and the king's wives, and his officers, and the mighty of the land, those carried he into captivity from Jerusalem to Babylon. And all the men of might, even seven thousand, and craftsmen and smiths a thousand, all that were strong and apt for war, even them the king of Babylon brought captive to Babylon."


Tragically, and as was to be expected, even though Josephus delivered his words with great passion, sobs and tears, yet did not John and his men yield. Seeing that John would not yield, Josephus then reminded John of the prophecies which foretold of the city's destruction, and told him again that it was God himself who was bringing this judgment upon the city, in order to purge it, as we see by this excerpt:

----- Begin Quote -----

"Thou hast an instance before thee in Jechoniah, the king of the Jews, if thou hast a mind to save the city, who, when the king of Babylon made war against him. did of his own accord, go out of the city before it was taken, and did undergo a voluntary captivity with his family, that the sanctuary might not be delivered up to the enemy, and that he might not see the house of God set on fire; on which account he is celebrated among all the Jews, in their sacred memorials, and his memory is become immortal, and will be conveyed fresh down to our posterity through all ages. This, John, is an excellent example in such a time of danger; and I dare venture to promise that the Romans shall still forgive thee.

And who is there that does not know what the writings of the ancient prophets contain in them; and particularly that oracle which is just now going to be fulfilled upon this miserable city? For they foretold that this city should be then taken when somebody shall begin the slaughter of his own countrymen. And are not both the city and the entire temple now full of the dead bodies of your countrymen? It is God therefore, it is God himself who is bringing on this fire to purge that city and temple by means of the Romans, and is going to pluck up this city, which is full of your pollutions."

----- End Quote -----

If we go back to Book 4 Chapter 6 Section 3 of "The Wars of the Jews", we discover that Josephus spoke of this very same prophecy, and described these wicked men in this very same fashion. In fact, I shared part of the following excerpts in part nine of this same series. However, what I did not share with you is the second excerpt below. Consider the following:

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"But these Zealots came at last to that degree of barbarity, as not to bestow a burial either on those slain in the city, or on those that lay along the roads; but as if they had made an agreement to cancel both the laws of their country and the laws of nature, and at the same time that they defiled men with their wicked actions, they would pollute the Divinity itself also, they left the dead bodies to putrefy under the sun: and the same punishment was allotted to such as buried any, as to those that deserted, which was no other than death; while he that granted the favour of a grave to another, would presently stand in need of a grave himself.

These men, therefore, trampled upon all the laws of men, and laughed at the laws of God: and for the oracles of the prophets, they ridiculed them as the tricks of jugglers; yet did these prophets foretell many things concerning [the rewards of] virtue, and [punishments of] vice, which when these Zealots violated, they occasioned the fulfilling of those very prophecies belonging to their own country: for there was a certain ancient oracle of those men, That "the city should then be taken and the sanctuary burnt, by right of war, when a sedition should invade the Jews, and their own hand should pollute the temple of God."

----- End Quote -----

As you can see once again, these seditionists were totally ungodly men. They mocked the laws of men. They also mocked the Laws of God. They even mocked the very prophecies of old which foretold of their coming doom. As Josephus notes, they were the vilest of creatures, and these wicked men had taken over the temple. You may recall that earlier in this series, I mentioned how the Zealots, Sicarii, the robbers and other thugs had in fact totally defiled the temple and polluted it due to their constant violence and bloodshed. You may also recall that I shared the following set of verses with you:

"And arms shall stand on his part, AND THEY SHALL POLLUTE THE SANCTUARY OF STRENGTH [meaning the temple], AND SHALL TAKE AWAY THE DAILY SACRIFICE, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate. And SUCH AS DO WICKEDLY AGAINST THE COVENANT SHALL HE CORRUPT BY FLATTERIES: but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits. And they that understand among the people shall instruct many: yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil, many days. Now when they shall fall, they shall be holpen with a little help: but many shall cleave to them with flatteries. And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed."


In Daniel chapter nine, we also find the following rather intriguing verses. As tragic as it may all be, what I find particularly amazing is how accurately the Prophet Daniel describes these events which befell Jerusalem during the First Century. Of course, this should not really come as a surprise to us, because the words which are being spoken are not those of Daniel himself, but rather those of the Angel Gabriel, who also delivered an important message to Mary, the mother of Jesus. These verses are commonly referred to as the "Seventy Weeks" prophecy. I have added some words in brackets for the sake of clarification . . . at least as I currently understand them:

"And after threescore and two weeks [or 434 years] shall Messiah be cut off, [meaning Jesus is crucified] but not for himself [because He died for our sins]: and the people of the prince that shall come [meaning General Titus and the Roman legions] shall destroy the city and the sanctuary [meaning Jerusalem and the temple]; and the end thereof shall be with a flood [not of water, but an army of men], and unto the end of the war [meaning the First Jewish-Roman War] desolations [destruction] are determined. And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations [possibly refers to Roman standards which bore the image of an eagle, which is unclean and an abomination to the Jews], he shall make it desolate [destroy Jerusalem], even until the consummation [until the war is completed], and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate [the people who were destroyed, meaning the Jews]."


On an interesting side note, please notice how Gabriel very specifically refers to Titus as "the prince that shall come". While you may not have noticed, when earlier I quoted from Book 5 Chapter 1 of Tacitus' "The Histories", it included the following section where Tacitus also specifically refers to Titus as "the Prince":

----- Begin Quote -----

". . . and, lastly, by many persons brought from the capital and from Italy by private hopes of securing the yet unengaged affections of the Prince. With this force Titus entered the enemy's territory, preserving strict order on his march, reconnoitering every spot, and always ready to give battle. At last he encamped near Jerusalem."

----- End Quote -----

For many years now, I have struggled to understand the deep prophecies that we find in the Book of Daniel and elsewhere in the Bible. Little by little as I have applied myself and continued to diligently study both the Scriptures, and also ancient history, the Lord has graciously revealed more and more to me and opened my personal understanding.

As you may recall, in part fifteen, I discussed with you Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes, and how he took over Jerusalem for more than three years, until he and the Greeks were finally ousted by the Maccabees. During the time that he was in Jerusalem, not only did he build the fortress at Acra, but he also suppressed the Jewish religion, and polluted the temple by sacrificing swine on the altar. Now some Christians hold the view that Antiochus' actions were the fulfillment of Daniel's above words where he writes "they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate."

In other words, said Christians believe that the swine which were being sacrificed were the abomination. After all, pigs are ritually unclean animals and prohibited according to the Mosaic Law. However, there is an obvious problem with that particular interpretation; and that is that in the Gospels, Jesus clearly framed Daniel's prophecy as a FUTURE event -- that is to say, from the perspective of 30 AD -- and NOT as a past event -- meaning about two hundred years earlier during the period of the Maccabees -- when He stated the following:

"When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)"


"But when ye shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it ought not, (let him that readeth understand,) then let them that be in Judaea flee to the mountains:"


You will likewise notice that in the previous verses from the ninth chapter of Daniel, we are similarly told "and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease." Being as, in my view, Daniel's prophecy seems to be describing General Titus and his Roman legions, I have long assumed that these words in both Daniel 9 and Daniel 11 were describing Titus as taking away the daily sacrifice and causing the oblation -- offering -- to cease. In my mind, this has seemed like quite a logical conclusion to make. After all, when the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, this did in fact put a complete end to the sacrifices.

However, as I have dug deeper into the writings of Josephus, and come to better understand the attitude and mentality of the Romans, I have begun to question my understanding. The first thing I would like to point out is that Josephus has made it clear on multiple occasions in his works that Titus -- and the Romans in general -- actually admired the Jewish temple for its magnificence, and did NOT want to destroy it. Titus in fact made multiple endeavors to preserve both the city and the temple, as did Josephus himself. This we have seen throughout this series.

Furthermore, Titus also respected the right of the Jews to practice their religion as they saw fit. As I noted earlier in this series, while the Romans conquered a huge swath of territory, they did respect local religions and laws. The only thing they were interested in was that the conquered nations submitted to Rome, and paid tribute. But that isn't all, not only did the Romans admire the Jewish temple, and respect the right of each subdued nation to worship as they pleased, but to my own surprise, Josephus even stated that the Romans offered gifts for the temple in Jerusalem. This even included the emperor himself. While you may not have noticed it, in part seventeen when I discussed how John of Giscala began to melt down the holy vessels in the temple, I included the following words in that excerpt:

----- Begin Quote -----

". . . nay, he [John of Giscala] did not abstain from those pouring vessels that were sent them by Augustus and his wife; for the Roman emperors did ever both honour and adorn this temple;

----- End Quote -----

So the idea of General Titus intentionally polluting the temple, and stopping the daily sacrifice, doesn't make much sense. Furthermore, you may recall how earlier in the series when I was discussing how General Pompey first took over the city of Jerusalem in 63 BC, while it is true that he did in fact enter the temple as a foreigner -- thus polluting it -- he too did NOT take anything from it. In fact, the next day, he ordered that the temple be ritually cleansed, and that the sacrifices be resumed. So you see, this was a pattern with the Romans. As ruthless as they were, they did respect foreign religions.

On the other hand, as we have already quite clearly seen, there is in fact someone who not only defiled and polluted the temple, but who also prevented the daily sacrifice from occurring. If you have been paying attention, then you will already know that the guilty parties are John of Giscala, Simon bar Giora, and the Zealots, Sicarii and other violent riffraff who followed them, and who took control of both the city and the temple. Josephus repeatedly emphasize this point.

Those ungodly, blasphemous men totally defiled and polluted the temple with their violence and murders. As we discovered earlier, John's thugs in particular mocked the Laws of God, mocked the writings of God's Prophets, removed the real high priests from the temple and placed their own in their place, abused the sacred vessels in the temple, and prevented the daily sacrifice from occurring. Do you see my point? If not, it is this: Even BEFORE General Titus captured the temple, the daily sacrifice had ALREADY ceased from being performed, due to the actions of the seditionists themselves. That being the case, how could Titus stop what had ALREADY been stopped?

So the question is this: When Daniel writes "he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease" and "and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice", is Daniel actually talking about Titus, or is he perhaps really talking about John of Giscala and his band of disgusting thugs?

Please notice also that Daniel says "And such as do wickedly against the covenant shall he corrupt by flatteries" and also "And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week." Daniel 11:28 and Daniel 11:30 also speak several times of a "holy covenant". Let me point out two things here. First of all, if there is one thing we have seen, it is that Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala -- the two leaders of the factions -- both relied heavily on flatteries to convince people to do their bidding. They were both blatant liars and deceivers, as Josephus repeatedly pointed out. They constantly twisted the truth, particularly when it came to actions by the Romans.

Second of all, the fact that it's described as being a "holy covenant", strongly suggests that this covenant is directly related to God's people at the time. That is to say, to the Jews. Previously, I had considered the possibility that the Prophet Daniel may have been referring to a type of military or political agreement with the Romans. However, this idea now has less merit in my mind. As I was re-examining these issues, I came across the following interesting verses in Psalm 74. As you may know, there are a number of prophecies in the Book of Psalms which pertain to future events from the perspective of the time in which the Psalms were first written. Could this Psalm possibly contain some of them?:

"Lift up thy feet unto the perpetual desolations; even all that the enemy hath done wickedly in the sanctuary. Thine enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations; they set up their ensigns for signs. A man was famous according as he had lifted up axes upon the thick trees. But now they break down the carved work thereof at once with axes and hammers. They have cast fire into thy sanctuary, they have defiled by casting down the dwelling place of thy name to the ground. They said in their hearts, Let us destroy them together: they have burned up all the synagogues of God in the land. We see not our signs: there is no more any prophet: neither is there among us any that knoweth how long. O God, how long shall the adversary reproach? shall the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?"


Notice how the Psalm specifically says "the enemy hath done wickedly in the sanctuary." This sentence can certainly be applied to what John of Giscala and Simon bar Giora did in the temple with all of their violence and killing and every thing else they did there. And then the Psalm says "Thine enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations." Both Simon and John did this as well. Once they each got into the city, they and their men began to mix with the regular people and they began to pollute their minds, particularly the minds of their own followers. They wanted to turn as many people as possible against the Romans. This we have clearly seen.

The Psalm also says "They have cast fire into thy sanctuary." This sentence certainly holds true for John and Simon. As we learned earlier, all of their infighting resulted in multiple fires occurring within the temple, so that the supply of corn and other food staples were seriously diminished. This served to increase the severity of the famine within the city. Psalm 74 also says "they have defiled by casting down the dwelling place of thy name to the ground." Please note that the words "by casting down" are in italics in the KJV Bible, meaning that they were added by the translators to clarify the verse.

If we omit those words, the sentence says "they have defiled the dwelling place of thy name." Again, this certainly holds true for both Simon and John. Or, if we leave the sentence as it is, it could also be a prophecy regarding the Romans who burned and tore down the temple to the ground. Lastly, we see that the Psalm concludes with "shall the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?". There should be no doubt that the thugs who took over the temple were indeed blasphemers. No matter how you look at it, it is a very interesting Psalm which seems to have some prophetic significance.

So I hope that with the above explanations, I have give you a few new thoughts and possibilities to consider. As for me, I will continue to ponder these things, and pray that the Lord will give me further understanding and revelation concerning these matters. He knows that for many decades now, my earnest heart's desire has been to better understand these prophecies, so that I can correctly share the truth concerning them with my online friends who also hunger to know and understand what they all mean.

Returning to Book 6 Chapter 2 of "The Wars of the Jews", as we have seen, despite Josephus' sincere pleading with those rebellious insurrectionists led by John of Giscala and Simon bar Giora, and despite rebuking them strongly and informing them that it was the very hand of God which was working against them, those wicked men refused to bow the knee to the Romans. Rather than save the people, save the city, and save the very temple itself, those deceived, haughty fools preferred to go down with the ship, even if it meant taking everything and everybody with them.

If there is one thing I have learned -- among many things -- from reading Josephus' work, it is the depth of wickedness of the Jewish heart. It just boggles my mind. Of course, as Bible-believing, this should not really come as a surprise to us. After all, the Scriptures are very clear regarding the state of the unregenerate human heart, as we see by the following group of verses:

"And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually."


"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"


"But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man."


"And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man."


So as I said, rather than be moved by Josephus' words, those wicked men not only became even more exasperated against the Romans, but they were also more desirous to get control of Josephus himself. However, on the other hand, many of the high priests and nobility escaped to the Romans, while others had no choice but to resign themselves to their fate, which meant destruction at the hands of the Romans, or at the hands of the seditionists themselves. Thus, Josephus writes as follows:

----- Begin Quote -----

"But for John, and those that were with him, they were but the more exasperate against the Romans, on this account, and were desirous to get Josephus also into their power: yet did that discourse influence a great many of the better sort, and truly some of them were so afraid of the guards set by THE SEDITIOUS, that they tarried where they were, but still were satisfied that both they and the city were doomed to destruction. Some also there were, who, watching a proper opportunity, when they might quietly get away, fled to the Romans, of whom were the high priests Joseph and Jesus, and of the sons of high priests three, whose father was Ishmael, who was beheaded in Cyrene, and four sons of Matthias, as also one son of the other Matthias, who ran away after his father's death, and whose father was slain by Simon the son of Gioras, with three of his sons, as I have already related; many also of the other nobility went over to the Romans, together with the high priests. Now Caesar not only received these men very kindly in other respects, but, knowing they would not willingly live after the customs of other nations, he sent them to Gophna, and desired them to remain there for the present, and told them, that when he was gotten clear of this war, he would restore each of them to their possessions again: so they cheerfully retired to that small city which was allotted them, without fear of any danger."

----- End Quote -----

Not surprisingly, when the seditionists realized that those people were no longer in the city, they did as they had done before, and they lied about it, by saying that those people were deserters, and had been killed by the Romans. However, while the Jerusalemites at first believed this deception, the lie of the seditionists was fully exposed when Titus got wind of their deception, and brought those very same people before the wall, so that the Jerusalemites could see that they were still very much alive. Not only that, but those same people who Titus had spared, then likewise began to plea with the seditionists to surrender themselves, if for no other reason than to prevent the destruction of the temple. The obvious result was that even more of the Jerusalemites took a chance by fleeing to the Romans. Thus, Josephus writes as follows:

----- Begin Quote -----

"But as they [the people who had escaped] did not appear, THE SEDITIOUS gave out again, that those deserters were slain by the Romans, which was done in order to deter the rest from running away, by fear of the like treatment. This trick of theirs succeeded now for a while, as did the like trick before; for the rest were hereby deterred from deserting, by fear of the like treatment.

However, when Titus had recalled those men from Gophna, he gave orders that they should go round the wall, together with Josephus, and show themselves to the people, upon which a great many fled to the Romans. These also got in a great number together, and stood before the Romans, and besought THE SEDITIOUS, with groans and tears in their eyes, in the first place to receive the Romans entirely into the city, and save that their own place of residence again; but that, if they would not agree to such a proposal, they would at least depart out of the temple, and save the holy house for their own use; for that the Romans would not venture to set the sanctuary on fire, but under the most pressing necessity."

----- End Quote -----

Please go to part nineteen for the continuation of this series.

⇒ Go To The Next Part . . .

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