Warning from A.D. 70     
    
   Eager as we are to "cancel" our fellow Americans, there is a lesson for us from A.D. 70, courtesy of Marvin Olasky, WORLD magazine, himself born Jewish. 

   The risen Christ had removed his physical self about 40 years earlier. Roman soldiers had been subduing ancient Judah. They crucified thousands and enslaved others, meeting a ferocious response from Judeans and Galileans.  

   Jewish general turned historian Josephus described the violence in seven books, Wars of the Jews, now available online. Romans eventually captured the towns and turned toward Jerusalem. 

   Roman historian Tacitus wrote of "three (Jewish) generals and three armies, and among these there was constant fighting, treachery and arson." Some high priests, like predecessor Caiaphas, were often Roman collaborators. 

   "Seeing each other rather than the Romans as their prime enemy, the dueling Jewish forces acted insanely," Olasky writes. They burned each other's supplies and destroyed precious food. 

   A small number of Jewish Christians fled Jerusalem. They knew that Jesus had predicted destruction (Mark 13, Luke 21). The prophecies in Leviticus - "You shall eat the flesh of your sons" - and Deuteronomy came true. The cannibalistic history in 2 Kings repeated itself.

   Zealots on all sides thought anyone who disagreed with them deserved death, Olasky says. 

   Now, Romans were crucifying some 500 each day, and broke through the walls, massacring tens of thousands. They burned the Temple, as Jesus had forecast.

   We also are tempted to be our own messiahs, Olasky notes. Rather, we might remember futile infighting in Jerusalem, and Christ's blood shed for the whole world, irrespective of human conventions. 


       Jimmy