Mark 13:1 Commentary and Bible Study

It is the Tuesday before the crucifixion, and Christ is in Jerusalem. He has been teaching in the temple, and now he leaves the temple for the last time, when the disciples comment on the beauty and wonderful structure of the temple, and certainly it was a very wonderful place – Herod's Temple. Some of the stones were huge. We read quite a bit about that in the archaeological books. The outer walls were built of stones of white marble up to forty feet in length, and very deep and wide, expertly fitted together. The whole of the eastern side of the temple appears to have been covered in gold plate, and when you left the temple and went up the Mount of Olives opposite the temple and sat on the Mount of Olives, as Christ did subsequently with his disciples – that's where most of this chapter is spoken – you looked across at the temple, and in the sun you saw the gold side. It must have been an astonishing sight.