Mark 13:14 Commentary and Bible Study

This now is the first peak of prophecy, the first event. ‘But when ye shall see the abomination of desolation.’ This is terminology from the Book of Daniel, and was the language used to predict how an Assyrian king, in 167 BC, would invade and take over the temple, and would offer swine on the altar, and turn it into a pagan shrine. This will happen again, says the Lord. It will take a different form. It will be the Roman armies destroying the place utterly, and treating it shamefully. In the Gospel of Luke there are some more words of the Lord recorded, where it becomes even more plain, because he says, ‘When ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies’ (Luke 21:20), so we know when the event is that this refers to. It is an amazing prophecy in Daniel, it is mentioned in several verses (Daniel 9:27; 11:31; 12:11), when the temple is dreadfully desecrated and great troubles come. In the 2^nd century before Christ Antiochus Epiphanes, a Syrian king, had unleashed a terrible assault upon Jerusalem and desecrated the temple. That was a partial fulfilment of this same prophecy. It happened once then, but Christ now says that same prophecy is going to be fulfilled again and there is going to be another abomination: Roman soldiers desecrating the temple, and utterly destroying and it would come in their lifetime, because they are warned what to do to escape.‘Then let them that be in Judaea flee to the mountains.’ This is a message to Christian people who are living in Jerusalem and around in Judaea at the time of the Roman invasion in A.D. 70. When you see these things, flee. Flee where? To what mountains? We don't know, but the best guess is, flee south, south-east through the region of the Dead Sea and down to as far as the mountains where there are many, many caves, and places where you can be safe. At any rate, there is testimony that that is where they went in A.D. 70, and by doing so they avoided being trapped in Jerusalem by the Romans.