The Fallible Study Bible

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Matthew24:1–8

Temple Destruction and Other Signs

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Matthew 24:1–8 — Temple Destruction and Other Signs. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.

1

As Jesus left the temple and was walking away, His disciples came up to Him to point out its buildings.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Kai ho Iēsous exelthōn apo tou hierou eporeueto kai autou hoi mathētai prosēlthon epideixai autō tou hierou tas oikodomas

Word by word19 · parsed
ΚαὶKai[As]G2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ὁhoG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
ἸησοῦςIēsousJesusG2424
√ Ἰησοῦς — Jesus (iNounNominative Masculine Singular
ἐξελθὼνexelthōnleftG1831
√ ἐξέρχομαι — to issue (literally or figuratively)VerbAorist Participle ActiveNominative Masculine Singular
exerchomai: to issue, to go out The aorist participle fixes the exit as accomplished before anything else in the chapter happens. Gill and Pulpit agree on its weight: this is the final leaving, and Pulpit says the prophecy of the desolation of the house "was beginning to be fulfilled" in the act itself. The whole discourse that follows is spoken by someone already outside.
ἀπὸapo. . .G575
√ ἀπό — "off," iPreposition
τοῦtoutheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
ἱεροῦhieroutempleG2411
√ ἱερόν — a sacred place, iNounGenitive Neuter Singular
hieron: a sacred place, the temple precinct Not ναός (the sanctuary) but the enclosure: courts, porticoes, walls. That is why the disciples can gesture at masonry rather than at an altar, and why Pulpit renders it "the whole sacred enclosure."
ἐπορεύετοeporeueto[and] was walking awayG4198
√ πορεύομαι — to traverse, iVerbImperfect Indicative Middle or Passive3rd Person Singular
poreuomai: to traverse, to journey An imperfect of continuing motion. The grammar keeps Jesus walking while the disciples talk about stone, which is the visual argument of the verse: the glory is standing still and the Lord of the house is leaving it.
καὶkaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
αὐτοῦautouHisG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounGenitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular
οἱhoiG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Plural
μαθηταὶmathētaidisciplesG3101
√ μαθητής — a learner, iNounNominative Masculine Plural
προσῆλθονprosēlthoncame up to [Him]G4334
√ προσέρχομαι — to approach, iVerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
ἐπιδεῖξαιepideixaito point outG1925
√ ἐπιδείκνυμι — to exhibit (physically or mentally)VerbAorist Infinitive Active
epideiknumi: to exhibit, to display A rare verb (7 verses). The Verifier notes the same lexeme at Matthew 16:1, where the Pharisees demand that a sign be shown them, and at Matthew 22:19, where a coin is shown. Here the disciples do the showing, and what they show is precisely what will be taken away.
αὐτῷautōG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounDative Masculine 3rd Person Singular
τοῦtouG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
ἱεροῦhierou[its]G2411
√ ἱερόν — a sacred place, iNounGenitive Neuter Singular
τὰςtasG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Feminine Plural
οἰκοδομὰςoikodomasbuildingsG3619
√ οἰκοδομή — architecture, iNounAccusative Feminine Plural
oikodomē: architecture, a structure Benson and Barnes both retail Josephus on the stone sizes (their figures differ, because Josephus's own figures differ), and Cambridge quotes Milman that the Temple "looked literally like a mount of snow." The plural noun carries all of that mass, and v2 answers it with a single word: thrown down.
2

“Do you see all these things?” He replied. “Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Ou blepete panta tauta de ho apokritheis eipen autois amēn legō hymin ou mē lithos hōde aphethē epi lithon hos ou katalythēsetai

Word by word22 · parsed
ΟὐOuvvvG3756
√ οὐ — the absolute negative (compare G3361 (μή)) adverbAdverb
βλέπετεblepeteDo you seeG991
√ βλέπω — to look at (literally or figuratively)VerbPresent Indicative Active2nd Person Plural
blepō: to look at Present indicative inside a question framed with οὐ, which in Greek expects assent: you do see all this. Pulpit reads the question as deliberate, the Lord taking up their own exhibition "in order to give added emphasis to his weighty denunciation." The same verb returns two verses later as the imperative Βλέπετε (v4), and that is how the discourse moves the disciples' eyes: the looking is never stopped, only redirected off the stonework and onto the men who will come resting on his name.
πάνταpantaallG3956
√ πᾶς — all, any, every, the wholeAdjectiveAccusative Neuter Plural
ταῦταtautathese thingsG3778
√ οὗτος — the he (she or it), iDemonstrative PronounAccusative Neuter Plural
δὲdevvvG1161
√ δέ — but, and, etcConjunction
ὁhovvvG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
ἀποκριθεὶςapokritheisvvvG611
√ ἀποκρίνομαι — to conclude for oneself, iVerbAorist Participle PassiveNominative Masculine Singular
εἶπενeipenHe repliedG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
αὐτοῖςautois. . .G846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounDative Masculine 3rd Person Plural
ἀμὴνamēnTrulyG281
√ ἀμήν — properly, firm, iHebrew Word
amēn: firm, trustworthy The interlinear tags this as a Hebrew word carried untranslated into Greek. It is a formula of oath and guarantee, not of emphasis. Jesus stakes his own trustworthiness on a prediction that Barnes rightly calls, at the moment of speaking, the least probable thing in the world: the nation was at peace and the Temple was its pride.
λέγωlegōI tellG3004
√ λέγω — properly, to "lay" forth, iVerbPresent Indicative Active1st Person Singular
ὑμῖνhyminyouG4771
√ σύ — thouPersonal / Possessive PronounDative 2nd Person Plural
οὐouvvvG3756
√ οὐ — the absolute negative (compare G3361 (μή)) adverbAdverb
μὴmēnotG3361
√ μή — (adverb) not, (conjunction) lestAdverb
λίθοςlithosone stoneG3037
√ λίθος — a stone (literally or figuratively)NounNominative Masculine Singular
lithos: a stone Nominative, singular, indefinite: not "these stones" but stone as such, set against λίθον in the accusative after ἐπί. One stone upon one stone is the minimum unit of building, so the denial strikes not at the Temple's grandeur but at its being a built thing at all.
ὧδεhōdehereG5602
√ ὧδε — in this same spot, iAdverb
ἀφεθῇaphethēwill be leftG863
√ ἀφίημι — an intensive form of , to go)VerbAorist Subjunctive Passive3rd Person Singular
aphiēmi: to send away, to let go, to leave With οὐ μὴ this is the emphatic future denial. The passive voice matters theologically: no soldier is named. Poole draws the moral from the grammar, that God is able to destroy any place, "and sin is enough to blow up."
ἐπὶepionG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
λίθονlithon[another]G3037
√ λίθος — a stone (literally or figuratively)NounAccusative Masculine Singular
ὃςhos[every one]G3739
√ ὅς — the relatively (sometimes demonstrative) pronoun, who, which, what, thatPersonal / Relative PronounNominative Masculine Singular
οὐou. . .G3756
√ οὐ — the absolute negative (compare G3361 (μή)) adverbAdverb
καταλυθήσεταιkatalythēsetaiwill be thrown downG2647
√ καταλύω — to loosen down (disintegrate), iVerbFuture Indicative Passive3rd Person Singular
kataluō: to loosen down, to disintegrate The word is used of dissolving a building and, elsewhere in the Gospels, of dissolving the law. Its appearance as the last word of the sentence puts the verdict after the inventory: everything the disciples displayed, unknit. Ellicott and Pulpit both record that the fulfilment went as far as the substructures, so that nothing of Herod's work remains in place.
3

While Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately. “Tell us,” they said, “when will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming and of the end of the age?”

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

de autou Kathēmenou epi tou orous tōn Elaiōn hoi mathētai prosēlthon autō kat’ idian Eipe hēmin legontes pote tauta estai kai ti to sēmeion sēs tēs parousias kai synteleias tou aiōnos

Word by word31 · parsed
δὲde[While]G1161
√ δέ — but, and, etcConjunction
αὐτοῦautou[Jesus]G846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounGenitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular
ΚαθημένουKathēmenouwas sittingG2521
√ κάθημαι — and (to sitVerbPresent Participle Middle or PassiveGenitive Masculine Singular
kathēmai: to sit, to be seated A genitive absolute in the present tense: the sitting continues under the entire discourse. Pulpit records that the Roman siege later opened from this very ground. Barnes notes the mount commanded a full view of the city, so the prophecy is delivered looking at its object.
ἐπὶepionG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
τοῦtoutheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
ὄρουςorousMountG3735
√ ὄρος — perhaps akin to G142 (αἴρω)NounGenitive Neuter Singular
oros: a mountain The Mount of Olives is the vantage point, not a symbol the text names. It is worth resisting more than the text says here: the brief supplies the topography (Gill on the low eastern wall, Cambridge on the descent into Kedron) and nothing about a fixed prophetic meaning for the hill.
τῶνtōnG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Feminine Plural
ἘλαιῶνElaiōnof OlivesG1636
√ ἐλαία — an olive (the tree or the fruit)NounGenitive Feminine Plural
οἱhoitheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Plural
μαθηταὶmathētaidisciplesG3101
√ μαθητής — a learner, iNounNominative Masculine Plural
προσῆλθονprosēlthoncame toG4334
√ προσέρχομαι — to approach, iVerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
αὐτῷautōHimG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounDative Masculine 3rd Person Singular
κατ’kat’vvvG2596
√ κατά — (prepositionally) down (in place or time), in varied relations (according to the case (genitive, dative or accusative) with which it is joined)Preposition
ἰδίανidianprivatelyG2398
√ ἴδιος — pertaining to self, iAdjectiveAccusative Feminine Singular
idios: pertaining to self, one's own The idiom removes the crowd. Barnes and Poole note from Mark that only four came: Peter, James, John and Andrew. The great eschatological discourse is therefore given as private instruction, which is part of why, as Poole says, it gives no signs from which a date could be computed.
ΕἰπὲEipeTellG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Imperative Active2nd Person Singular
ἡμῖνhēminusG1473
√ ἐγώ — I, mePersonal / Possessive PronounDative 1st Person Plural
λέγοντεςlegontesthey saidG3004
√ λέγω — properly, to "lay" forth, iVerbPresent Participle ActiveNominative Masculine Plural
πότεpotewhen {will}G4219
√ πότε — interrogative adverb, at what timeConjunction
ταῦταtautathese thingsG3778
√ οὗτος — the he (she or it), iDemonstrative PronounNominative Neuter Plural
ἔσταιestaihappenG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbFuture Indicative Middle3rd Person Singular
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
τίtiwhat [will be]G5101
√ τίς — an interrogative pronoun, who, which or what (in direct or indirect questions)Interrogative / Indefinite PronounNominative Neuter Singular
τὸtotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Neuter Singular
σημεῖονsēmeionsignG4592
√ σημεῖον — an indication, especially ceremonially or supernaturallyNounNominative Neuter Singular
sēmeion: an indication, a sign The disciples ask for a σημεῖον, the same noun the Pharisees demanded at Matthew 16:1 and the Verifier flags in Luke 21:11. The request is for a readable marker in advance. The answer will be a list of things that are explicitly not the end (v6), which is a refusal disguised as an answer.
σῆςsēsof YourG4674
√ σός — thinePersonal / Possessive PronounGenitive Feminine 2nd Person Singular
τῆςtēsG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Feminine Singular
παρουσίαςparousiascomingG3952
√ παρουσία — a being near, iNounGenitive Feminine Singular
parousia: a being near, a presence The first occurrence of the word in the New Testament, as Ellicott points out, and the word the Epistles will carry (he cites 1 Thessalonians 2:19, James 5:7, 1 John 2:28). Its plain sense is arrival-and-presence rather than motion toward, so what the disciples ask after is when he will be here.
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
συντελείαςsynteleiasof the endG4930
√ συντέλεια — entire completion, iNounGenitive Feminine Singular
synteleia: entire completion Rare: six verses in the Greek NT. The Verifier finds all of them in a single family of sayings, four of them in Matthew (13:39, 13:40, 13:49, 28:20) plus Hebrews 9:26. Matthew's own usage defines the term: the συντέλεια is harvest and separation, and Matthew 28:20 puts Jesus present with his own until it.
τοῦtouof theG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Masculine Singular
αἰῶνοςaiōnosageG165
√ αἰών — properly, an ageNounGenitive Masculine Singular
aiōn: properly, an age Not κόσμος. The disciples' question is about the close of a period, and Ellicott shows the two-age scheme ("this age" and "the age to come") was current speech. Translating it "world" is what generates the later confusion between the fall of a city and the end of the created order.
4

Jesus answered, “See to it that no one deceives you.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Kai ho Iēsous apokritheis eipen autois Blepete mē tis planēsē hymas

Word by word11 · parsed
ΚαὶKaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ὁhoG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
ἸησοῦςIēsousJesusG2424
√ Ἰησοῦς — Jesus (iNounNominative Masculine Singular
ἀποκριθεὶςapokritheisansweredG611
√ ἀποκρίνομαι — to conclude for oneself, iVerbAorist Participle PassiveNominative Masculine Singular
apokrinomai: to answer, to conclude for oneself Aorist passive participle in form but active in sense, the standard Septuagintal idiom for taking up speech. The formality of "answering, he said" marks what follows as formal reply, not conversation.
εἶπενeipen. . .G2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
αὐτοῖςautois. . .G846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounDative Masculine 3rd Person Plural
ΒλέπετεBlepeteSee to itG991
√ βλέπω — to look at (literally or figuratively)VerbPresent Imperative Active2nd Person Plural
blepō: to look at Present imperative, durative: the watching never finishes. It is the pivot of the whole discourse's ethics. Asked for a date, Jesus answers with a verb of attention, and Pulpit summarises the move exactly: he withdraws them from the speculative to the practical.
μήmēthat no oneG3361
√ μή — (adverb) not, (conjunction) lestAdverb
τιςtis. . .G5100
√ τὶς — some or any person or objectInterrogative / Indefinite PronounNominative Masculine Singular
πλανήσῃplanēsēdeceivesG4105
√ πλανάω — to (properly, cause to) roam (from safety, truth, or virtue)VerbAorist Subjunctive Active3rd Person Singular
planaō: to cause to roam, to lead astray The root gives the English planet, the wanderer. The verb recurs in v5 in the future active ("they will lead many astray"), so v4 and v5 form a single frame: the command not to be made to wander, then the promise that many will be. Geneva enlarges it into a doctrine of the Church's whole history: continual conflict with false prophets until the day of victory.
ὑμᾶςhymasyouG4771
√ σύ — thouPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative 2nd Person Plural
5

For many will come in My name, claiming, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

gar polloi eleusontai epi mou tō onomati legontes Egō eimi ho Christos kai planēsousin pollous

Word by word15 · parsed
γὰρgarForG1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
πολλοὶpolloimanyG4183
√ πολύς — (singular) much (in any respect) or (plural) manyAdjectiveNominative Masculine Plural
ἐλεύσονταιeleusontaiwill comeG2064
√ ἔρχομαι — to come or go (in a great variety of applications, literally and figuratively)VerbFuture Indicative Middle3rd Person Plural
ἐπὶepiinG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
μουmouMyG1473
√ ἐγώ — I, mePersonal / Possessive PronounGenitive 1st Person Singular
τῷtōG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleDative Neuter Singular
ὀνόματίonomatinameG3686
√ ὄνομα — a "name" (literally or figuratively) (authority, character)NounDative Neuter Singular
onoma: a name, authority, character With ἐπί and the dative the phrase means to come resting upon that name as one's ground. This is the exact counterfeit of Jesus's own practice of coming in the name of the Father. Benson quotes Campbell's rendering, "many will assume my character," as nearer the sense than "come in my name."
λέγοντεςlegontesclaimingG3004
√ λέγω — properly, to "lay" forth, iVerbPresent Participle ActiveNominative Masculine Plural
ἘγώEgōIG1473
√ ἐγώ — I, mePersonal / Possessive PronounNominative 1st Person Singular
εἰμιeimiamG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbPresent Indicative Active1st Person Singular
eimi: I exist (used when emphatic) The lexicon's own note matters: εἰμί is written out only when emphatic. So Ἐγώ εἰμι is doubly emphatic, and what the impostors seize is a form of speech. The gravity of the warning lies here: the words of the claim can be flawless while the claimant is false, so the test cannot be the words.
ὁhotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
ΧριστόςChristosChristG5547
√ Χριστός — anointed, iNounNominative Masculine Singular
Christos: anointed With the article, the office and not a description. Barnes notes the expectation was universal at the time (he points to Matthew 2:1-2), so the market for the claim already existed. Ellicott is the sober voice: no direct fulfilment in the strict sense is recorded either in the NT or in Josephus, whereas Gill and Barnes name Theudas, the Egyptian, Simon Magus, Dositheus and Menander. The evidence for the sign is real but softer than the confident lists suggest.
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
πλανήσουσινplanēsousinwill deceive manyG4105
√ πλανάω — to (properly, cause to) roam (from safety, truth, or virtue)VerbFuture Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
planaō: to lead astray Future active indicative: no longer a possibility to guard against but an announced outcome. Success is granted to the deceivers in advance, which is why the imperative of v4 is addressed to the hearer's watchfulness and not to the Church's power to stop them.
πολλοὺςpollous. . .G4183
√ πολύς — (singular) much (in any respect) or (plural) manyAdjectiveAccusative Masculine Plural
6

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. These things must happen, but the end is still to come.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

de mellēsete akouein polemous kai akoas polemōn horate mē throeisthe gar dei genesthai all’ to telos estin oupō

Word by word18 · parsed
δὲdeG1161
√ δέ — but, and, etcConjunction
μελλήσετεmellēseteYou willG3195
√ μέλλω — to intend, iVerbFuture Indicative Active2nd Person Plural
mellō: to intend, to be about to The auxiliary future. Ellicott sees in it either a double future or a transitional stage between the old Greek future and an auxiliary construction, which is a grammatical observation about the state of the language and not a theological claim.
ἀκούεινakoueinhear ofG191
√ ἀκούω — to hear (in various senses)VerbPresent Infinitive Active
πολέμουςpolemouswarsG4171
√ πόλεμος — warfare (literally or figurativelyNounAccusative Masculine Plural
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἀκοὰςakoasrumorsG189
√ ἀκοή — hearing (the act, the sense or the thing heard)NounAccusative Feminine Plural
akoē: hearing, the thing heard The same root as the infinitive beside it. Reports of war are named as a category of sign, which means the discourse anticipates disciples who will be governed by news they cannot verify. The command that follows is addressed to exactly that condition.
πολέμωνpolemōnof warsG4171
√ πόλεμος — warfare (literally or figurativelyNounGenitive Masculine Plural
ὁρᾶτεhoratebut see to itG3708
√ ὁράω — by extension, to attend toVerbPresent Imperative Active2nd Person Plural
μὴmēvvvG3361
√ μή — (adverb) not, (conjunction) lestAdverb
θροεῖσθεthroeisthethat you are not alarmedG2360
√ θροέω — to clamor, iVerbPresent Imperative Middle or Passive2nd Person Plural
throeō: to clamor, to be in an uproar Rare: three verses. The Verifier finds one of the other two at 2 Thessalonians 2:2, where Paul tells the Thessalonians not to be θροεῖσθαι by a message claiming the day of the Lord has come. Same rare verb, same subject, same prohibition: the apostolic answer to eschatological panic is this word.
γὰρgar[These things]G1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
δεῖdeimustG1163
√ δεῖ — also deon deh-on'VerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
dei: it is necessary Impersonal, present indicative. The necessity is stated without an agent, and the commentators fill it differently: Gill by divine determination and judgment, Pulpit by human perverseness. Both readings are in the brief, and the Greek supports the bare claim rather than either explanation.
γενέσθαιgenesthaihappenG1096
√ γίνομαι — to cause to be ("gen"-erate), iVerbAorist Infinitive Middle
ἀλλ’all’butG235
√ ἀλλά — properly, other things, iConjunction
τὸtotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Neuter Singular
τέλοςtelosendG5056
√ τέλος — properly, the point aimed at as a limit, iNounNominative Neuter Singular
telos: the point aimed at, the limit Not merely a stopping point but the goal. Gill restricts it to the end of the Jewish state; Pulpit points to Paul's use of "the end" for the second advent at 1 Corinthians 15:24. The word itself is the reason both readings are possible, and v3 has already fused them in the disciples' question.
ἐστὶνestinisG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
οὔπωoupōstill to comeG3768
√ οὔπω — not yetAdverb
oupō: not yet A function word doing heavy work: it converts every sign in the list into a non-sign. Whatever the hearer is looking at, this adverb says it is not the last thing.
7

Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

gar ethnos egerthēsetai epi ethnos kai basileia epi basileian kai esontai limoi kai seismoi kata topous

Word by word16 · parsed
γὰρgarG1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
ἔθνοςethnosNationG1484
√ ἔθνος — a race (as of the same habit), iNounNominative Neuter Singular
ethnos: a race, a people Anarthrous and generic. The pairing with βασιλεία gives peoples and their polities, so the whole created order of nations is in view rather than a named war. Ellicott, Benson and Barnes all supply first-century instances; Pulpit judges those instances too small for the words.
ἐγερθήσεταιegerthēsetaiwill riseG1453
√ ἐγείρω — to waken (transitively or intransitively), iVerbFuture Indicative Passive3rd Person Singular
egeirō: to waken, to raise Future passive. The Verifier finds the same lexeme in the parallel at Mark 13:8. The passive is worth sitting with: in a discourse where the disciples are told what is necessary (v6, δεῖ), the nations are described as roused rather than rousing, which fits the grammar of judgment better than the grammar of politics.
ἐπὶepiagainstG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
ἔθνοςethnosnationG1484
√ ἔθνος — a race (as of the same habit), iNounAccusative Neuter Singular
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
βασιλείαbasileiakingdomG932
√ βασιλεία — properly, royalty, iNounNominative Feminine Singular
ἐπὶepiagainstG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
βασιλείανbasileiankingdomG932
√ βασιλεία — properly, royalty, iNounAccusative Feminine Singular
basileia: royalty, kingdom, rule The same noun the Gospel uses for the kingdom of heaven. Here it is plural and human, and set against itself. Matthew's reader has heard βασιλεία on almost every page as the thing Christ brings; the word is now on the lips of the same Christ describing kingdoms devouring each other.
καὶkaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἔσονταιesontaiThere will beG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbFuture Indicative Middle3rd Person Plural
λιμοὶlimoifaminesG3042
√ λιμός — a scarcity of foodNounNominative Feminine Plural
limos: a scarcity of food Twelve verses in the Greek NT, and the Verifier finds two of them in the synoptic parallels (Mark 13:8, Luke 21:11). The commentators converge on the famine Agabus foretold in Acts 11:28, which Barnes, Benson, Gill, Ellicott and Poole all name independently. That is the one datum here with broad attestation.
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
σεισμοὶseismoiearthquakesG4578
√ σεισμός — a commotion, iNounNominative Masculine Plural
seismos: a commotion, a shaking Ellicott's judgment is striking and is his own: perhaps no period in history was so marked by these convulsions as the years between the Crucifixion and the fall of Jerusalem. He supports it from Josephus, Tacitus and Seneca. It remains a judgment about frequency, not a verifiable count.
κατὰkatainG2596
√ κατά — (prepositionally) down (in place or time), in varied relations (according to the case (genitive, dative or accusative) with which it is joined)Preposition
τόπουςtopous[various] placesG5117
√ τόπος — a spot (general in space, but limited by occupancyNounAccusative Masculine Plural
topos: a spot, a place Distributive with κατά. The adverbial phrase is the quiet corrective in the verse: the shakings are local and repeated, so none of them is the single decisive event the disciples asked for in v3.
8

All these are the beginning of birth pains.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

de panta tauta archē ōdinōn

Word by word5 · parsed
δὲdeG1161
√ δέ — but, and, etcConjunction
πάνταpantaAllG3956
√ πᾶς — all, any, every, the wholeAdjectiveNominative Neuter Plural
ταῦταtautathese [are]G3778
√ οὗτος — the he (she or it), iDemonstrative PronounNominative Neuter Plural
houtos: this, these Demonstrative, gathering the catalogue. The same pair of words closed the inventory in v2.
ἀρχὴarchē[the] beginningG746
√ ἀρχή — (properly abstract) a commencement, or (concretely) chief (in various applications of order, time, place, or rank)NounNominative Feminine Singular
archē: a commencement, or a chief Anarthrous and predicative. The word does the work of the whole verse: everything catalogued in vv 5 to 7 is demoted from sign-of-the-end to first contraction. It is the formal answer to the question of v3, and it refuses to give a date while insisting on a direction.
ὠδίνωνōdinōnof birth painsG5604
√ ὠδίν — a pang or throe, especially of childbirthNounGenitive Feminine Plural
ōdin: a pang, especially of childbirth Rare: four verses in the Greek NT, and the Verifier locates the others at Acts 2:24 and 1 Thessalonians 5:3. That is a remarkable distribution for so small a word: the pangs of death that could not hold Christ, the pangs that come suddenly on the day of the Lord, and here the pangs that only begin. Ellicott and Pulpit both read the figure toward new birth and cite Romans 8:22; Gill records that Jewish writings already spoke of "the sorrows of the Messiah" and offered remedies for escaping them.

The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.

⚙

Grand Commentary — the unit, read whole

synthesis · verify

AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.

i. The Lord goes out, and the building is put on show — vv 1 to 2

⚙ The grammar sets the scene before anyone speaks. An aorist participle (ἐξελθὼν) puts the leaving behind him and an imperfect (ἐπορεύετο) keeps him walking, so the disciples must overtake a man already in motion. Gill says he took his final leave of the temple, "never to return more to it," and that in departing he began to fulfil the desolation he had foretold; Pulpit says the same in almost the same words. Ellicott presses a further point that is easy to miss: the disciples are not gawking Galileans, since "they had seen it too often" for that, but answering the dreadful word of Matthew 23:38, as if to ask whether this could really be left desolate. Their verb is the rare ἐπιδεῖξαι (7 verses in the Greek NT), to exhibit, which Pulpit glosses "to display." Cambridge supplies what was displayed: the Temple rising "with its colonnade of dazzling white marble, surmounted with golden roof and pinnacles," which Milman said looked "literally like a mount of snow." The reply refuses the exhibition on its own terms. Jesus makes them admit the sight (οὐ βλέπετε expects yes), swears by ἀμὴν, and then denies with the strongest negative Greek has (οὐ μὴ plus subjunctive) that one stone will be let remain (ἀφεθῇ) on another. Benson is the honest witness here: the phrase is "a proverbial and figurative expression to denote an utter destruction," and would have been amply fulfilled without every stone being moved; and then he shows that the letter was met anyway, Titus ordering the foundations dug up. Barnes adds the measure of the improbability: at the moment of speaking, the nation was at peace and this was its pride.

ii. Two questions, or three, fused into one — v 3

⚙ Across the valley, seated (a genitive absolute holds the posture under the whole discourse) and κατ’ ἰδίαν, the disciples ask for a σημεῖον. Whether they ask one thing or three is the oldest dispute in the chapter, and the brief preserves all of it: Barnes counts three questions, Cambridge says the twofold question "points to the nearer and the more distant event," Benson insists the clauses "seem to be only different expressions to denote the same period," and Poole reports that divines disagreed in his own day. Two words decide how much is at stake. Ellicott notes that παρουσίας is here "the first occurrence of the word" in the New Testament, and that its plain sense is presence, not coming; Cambridge adds that the technical word "coming" does not occur in this prophecy at all. And συντελείας τοῦ αἰῶνος is the completion of an age, not the end of a world. Ellicott shows the two-age scheme was ordinary speech, carried "from the schools of the Rabbis into popular use." So the question, read from the Greek up, is narrower and stranger than the English suggests: when will you be here, and when will this age be brought to its completion? The answer will separate what the question joined, but it will not give a date.

iii. Watch, because the deceit will work — vv 4 to 5

⚙ Asked when, Jesus answers with an imperative of seeing. Βλέπετε is the same verb he aimed at the buildings in v2, now present tense and permanent: keep looking, lest anyone make you wander (πλανήσῃ, whose root is to roam from safety). Pulpit states the move plainly: "he withdraws them from the speculative to the practical." Then the reason, and it is not reassuring: many will come resting upon his name (Pulpit on ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου: "grounding their pretensions thereon"), saying Ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ Χριστός, and they will lead many astray, future indicative. Benson quotes Campbell's sharper rendering, "many will assume my character." How far this was met before AD 70 is genuinely contested in the brief. Gill and Barnes name Theudas, the Egyptian, Simon Magus, Dositheus and Menander; Barnes reports a tally of twenty-four false Messiahs from Hadrian to 1682 and Pulpit says critics have counted twenty-nine. Ellicott dissents: "no direct fulfilments of this prediction are recorded, either in the New Testament, or by Josephus, or other historians," and he removes Bar-Cochba as fifty years too late. Cambridge takes a third route and lets the apostolic Church testify for itself, citing 1 John 2:18, "even now are there many antichrists." Geneva generalises past the first century to the Church's whole career: "a continual conflict with infinite miseries and offences, and furthermore, with false prophets, until the day of victory and triumph comes."

iv. The noise that is not the end, and the pangs that are a beginning — vv 6 to 8

⚙ The catalogue that follows is built to be discounted. You will be destined to hear (Bengel's "audituri eritis," quoted by Pulpit) wars and the hearings of wars; do not be thrown into uproar (θροεῖσθε, a rare verb, 3 verses); it is necessary (δεῖ) that these happen; and the end is οὔπω, not yet. Ellicott hears in "be not troubled" a watchword that "must have kept the believers in Christ calm in the midst of agitation." On the necessity the commentators divide: Gill grounds it in divine determination and judgment for sin, Pulpit denies absolute necessity and grounds it in "men's passions and perverseness." On the reference of the end they divide again, Gill restricting it to "the end of the Jewish state," Pulpit pointing to Paul's use of the word for the second advent. Then nation is raised against nation (passive, ἐγερθήσεται), with famines and shakings place by place. Benson and Barnes fill this with Caesarea, Scythopolis, Alexandria and Agabus's famine; Ellicott judges that perhaps no period was ever so marked by convulsions as the years between the Crucifixion and the fall of the city; Pulpit objects that local riots "could hardly have been indicated in such grand terms" and reads the clause out into later and modern history. Cambridge quotes Tacitus on the same years. And then one word resolves the whole list. ὠδίνων is not sorrow but labour: Ellicott, "the beginning of travail pangs"; Cambridge, "pains of travail, that preceded the birth of a new order of things, a fresh æon"; Geneva, "just like women in childbirth." Barnes keeps the sober edge, that heavier things are still to come. The catalogue of terrors has been re-described as the first contraction.

Read under Sola Scriptura — this tool’s own fallible reading (⚙)

⚙ This is the tool's own fallible reading, offered to be tested against the text and against the named voices above. Read from the Greek up, this unit is a sustained refusal to answer the question it was asked, and the refusal is the teaching. The disciples ask when and ask for a σημεῖον, a readable marker. They are given a rare imperative of attention (Βλέπετε, present, unending), a list of events explicitly labelled not-the-end (οὔπω), and finally a metaphor that reclassifies the whole list: ἀρχὴ ὠδίνων, beginning of birth pangs. Three grammatical facts carry the weight. First, the passives: the stone will not be left, the nations will be raised, and no agent is named in either. The text declines to make Titus the subject of history, and it equally declines to say plainly who is. Second, the necessity is impersonal, δεῖ without a subject, which is why Gill can fill it with divine judgment and the Pulpit editors with human perverseness and neither can be refuted from the clause itself. We think the honest position is that the clause states the certainty and withholds the mechanism, and that a reader who needs the mechanism should say so out loud. Third, the pangs are called a beginning and nothing more, which forbids both of the errors the passage is usually made to serve: the panic that reads every war as the last one (the very thing θροεῖσθε prohibits, and the thing Paul prohibits with the same rare verb at 2 Thessalonians 2:2), and the complacency that hears "not yet" as "not really." Where we hold back: we do not think this unit can be made to yield a timetable, and we do not think the four verses of signs can be assigned cleanly to AD 70 or to the last day. The Pulpit Commentary's confession seems to us exactly right and worth adopting as method, that "to limit these to one event only is to set bounds to the Omniscient." What the unit does settle is smaller and harder: the glory that can be exhibited is the glory that will be unknit, and the pain that follows is not the end of the story but its labour.

He walked out of the house while they were still showing it to him, and every terror he then listed he called a first contraction. (This line is machine synthesis, not Scripture.)

⚙

Canonical Threads — out to the whole of Scripture

cross-refs · verify

AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.

Mark's telling of the same sentence on the same stones verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ Mark 13:2 is the synoptic parallel to v2 and shares three lexemes with it, including the noun the disciples used for what they displayed. The overlap is not a matter of theme: οἰκοδομή (G3619, 18 verses), ὧδε (G5602) and ἀφίημι (G863) reproduce the wording of the saying, and Cambridge and Poole both note that Mark names the speaker among the disciples where Matthew leaves him anonymous. Poole adds that "all three evangelists agree in the substance of our Saviour's reply," which is the soundest statement of the relation.

Mark 13:2

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexemes G3619 οἰκοδομή (in 18 vv), G5602 ὧδε (in 59 vv), G863 ἀφίημι (in 131 vv). Greek to Greek, and the relatively rare οἰκοδομή plus the identical construction mark this as the same saying reported twice, not a shared motif.

The rare verb of eschatological panic, and Paul's use of it verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ θροεῖσθε (G2360) occurs in only three verses of the Greek NT, and the Verifier puts one of the other two at 2 Thessalonians 2:2, where Paul asks the Thessalonians not to be thrown into uproar by a word claiming the day of the Lord is already present. The subject matter is identical to v6: a report arrives, it concerns the end, and the instruction is against the panic rather than against the report. Ellicott reads "be not troubled" in Matthew as a standing watchword for believers living through those forty years, which is precisely the pastoral use Paul makes of the same rare word.

2 Thessalonians 2:2

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G2360 θροέω (in 3 vv), a rare lexeme, Greek to Greek, in both cases negated and applied to reports about the end. No claim that Paul cites Matthew; the verbal link itself is what is recorded.

Birth pangs: four verses, three of them decisive verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ ὠδίν (G5604) appears in four verses of the Greek NT. The Verifier finds two of the others at Acts 2:24, where God looses the pangs of death in raising Jesus, and at 1 Thessalonians 5:3, where destruction comes on the secure as labour comes on a pregnant woman. Set beside Matthew 24:8 the three make a single figure with three moments: pangs that only begin (here), pangs that could not hold the Christ (Acts), pangs that arrive suddenly on the day of the Lord (1 Thessalonians). Ellicott and Cambridge both insist the word means travail and not mere sorrow, and Ellicott draws the same inference toward new birth, citing Romans 8:22.

Acts 2:24 · 1 Thessalonians 5:3

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G5604 ὠδίν (in 4 vv), rare, Greek to Greek. The link is lexical and confirmed; the theological arrangement of the three moments is ⚙ synthesis and is marked as such.

Matthew's own definition of "the completion of the age" verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ συντέλεια (G4930) is rare, six verses in the Greek NT, and the Verifier finds four of them in Matthew (13:39, 13:40, 13:49 and 28:20) plus Hebrews 9:26. This means the phrase the disciples use in v3 is not an outside category imported into the Gospel: Matthew has already filled it with harvest and separation in the parables, and he will close the book by placing Jesus with his own until it. Hebrews 9:26 puts Christ's appearing at the completion of the ages, which cuts against reading the term as purely future. Ellicott shows the two-age vocabulary was already popular speech, so the disciples are using a current idiom and Matthew is the one giving it content.

Matthew 13:39 · Matthew 13:40 · Matthew 13:49 · Matthew 28:20 · Hebrews 9:26

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexemes G4930 συντέλεια (in 6 vv, rare) and G165 αἰών (in 97 vv) across Matthew 13:39, 13:40, 13:49, 28:20 and Hebrews 9:26. Greek to Greek, same phrase, all within the NT.

The synoptic list of signs, told three times verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ The Verifier's two highest-scoring candidates for this unit are Mark 13:7 and Mark 13:8, with Luke 21:11 close behind, and the shared lexemes track the list item by item: the rare θροέω and τέλος in v6, ἐγείρω, λιμός and τόπος in v7, and σημεῖον with the famines in Luke. Cambridge, Barnes and Poole all work from the parallels as a matter of course, and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown go further, declining to comment on Matthew at all and referring the reader to their exposition of Mark 13. Luke's list differs at one point that matters textually: he certainly has pestilences, where Matthew's best manuscripts do not (see the apparatus).

Mark 13:7 · Mark 13:8 · Luke 21:11

basis: Verifier: Mark 13:7 shares G2360 θροέω (in 3 vv, rare), G191 ἀκούω (in 398 vv), G5056 τέλος (in 39 vv); Mark 13:8 shares G1453 ἐγείρω (in 138 vv), G3042 λιμός (in 12 vv), G5117 τόπος (in 89 vv); Luke 21:11 shares G4592 σημεῖον (in 69 vv), G3042 λιμός, G5117 τόπος. Greek to Greek, the same discourse reported in three Gospels.

Zion plowed as a field: the prophets who said it first structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ Three of this unit's commentators reach for the same Old Testament sentence when they reach v2, and they do it independently. Barnes quotes Maimonides reporting that Terentius Rufus tore up the temple foundations with a plowshare "that the prophecy might be fulfilled, 'Zion shall be plowed as a field,'" and names Micah 3:12. Gill cites the Talmudic tradition that Turnus Rufus "ploughed up the temple" to fulfil the same words. Poole cites both Jeremiah 26:18 and Micah 3:12 together and says the plough was drawn over it "as God had said." So the recorded basis of this link is not a shared word but a shared act of judgment on the same site, first announced by Micah, quoted by the elders in Jeremiah's defence, and (on the commentators' reading) enacted a second time. The connection is real and old; it is not a quotation, because Matthew does not quote it.

Micah 3:12 · Jeremiah 26:18

basis: Cross-Testament, Greek to Hebrew, so no shared Strong's number is possible and no verbal tier is available. The recorded basis is the shared judgment pattern on one site (Zion plowed, the house of the Lord made a ruin), cited at this verse by Barnes (naming Micah 3:12), Gill (the same rabbinic tradition) and Poole (naming Jeremiah 26:18 and Micah 3:12). Matthew makes no citation formula here.

Nation against nation: an older formula for the same disorder structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ The bare, article-less formula of v7, nation raised against nation and kingdom against kingdom, belongs to a pattern the prophets already used for the disorder God sends among peoples: Egyptian set against Egyptian at Isaiah 19:2, and nation against nation with no peace at 2 Chronicles 15:6. Matthew's clause is passive (ἐγερθήσεται), which fits that pattern: the nations are roused, not simply rousing. Whether the clause was met in the first century is disputed in the brief itself, Benson and Barnes filling it with Caesarea, Scythopolis and Alexandria, Pulpit answering that such riots "could hardly have been indicated in such grand terms." That dispute is about scope, not about the pattern, and the pattern is where the link lies.

Isaiah 19:2 · 2 Chronicles 15:6

basis: Cross-Testament, Greek to Hebrew: shared Strong's numbers cannot be computed across the testaments, so the verbal tier is unavailable by rule. The basis is a shared prophetic formula for God-given internal war among peoples, with the passive voice of ἐγερθήσεται (G1453) matching the pattern's grammar. No quotation formula appears in Matthew.

The travail of the day of the LORD typological

⚙ "Birth pangs" is not a fresh image in v8. The Pulpit Commentary names the precedents outright at this verse: Isaiah 26:17, Jeremiah 13:21 and Hosea 13:13, and Ellicott adds Isaiah 37:3, where the children come to the birth and there is no strength to bring forth. Isaiah 13:8 sets the pangs in the day of the LORD against Babylon, and Jeremiah 6:24 puts them on the daughter of Zion at the sound of the invader. Matthew takes that prophetic figure of terror and does one thing to it that the prophets did not: he calls it beginning. The typological reading is that the woes of judgment are labour, and that the age being ended is being delivered of something. Ellicott and Cambridge both take it that way and both are explicit that the metaphor points to new birth, Cambridge to "a fresh æon," Ellicott to the regeneration of Matthew 19:28 and Romans 8:22. We mark this reading as ancient and widely held among these commentators, and we mark the specific pairing of verses as our own selection from the ones they name.

Isaiah 13:8 · Jeremiah 6:24 · Hosea 13:13 · Isaiah 26:17

basis: Cross-Testament, Greek to Hebrew, so no shared-lexeme basis can be computed and no verbal tier is permitted. Figural reading of ὠδίν (G5604, in 4 vv) as the prophets' travail of the day of the LORD, reaching its birth in the new age. Attestation: widely held, not novel. Pulpit cites Isaiah 26:17, Jeremiah 13:21 and Hosea 13:13 at this verse; Ellicott cites Isaiah 37:3 and Romans 8:22; Cambridge reads it of "a fresh æon."

Show us a sign: the same rare verb in two hands structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ The verb the disciples use in v1, ἐπιδεῖξαι (G1925), is rare, seven verses in the Greek NT, and the Verifier finds it at Matthew 16:1, where the Pharisees come tempting him to show them a sign from heaven, and at Matthew 22:19, where he asks them to show him the coin of the tribute. In all three places something is put on display before Jesus, and in all three the exhibit is turned against the exhibitor: the sign is refused, the coin convicts, the buildings are sentenced. That is a real pattern built on a rare word, but Matthew is not quoting himself, so we claim pattern only.

Matthew 16:1 · Matthew 22:19 · Luke 17:14

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G1925 ἐπιδείκνυμι (in 7 vv, rare), Greek to Greek, at Matthew 16:1 (with G4592 σημεῖον and G4334 προσέρχομαι), Matthew 22:19 and Luke 17:14. Deliberately tiered structural rather than verbal: the shared word is a common-stock verb of showing, not a quoted phrase, and the recurring motif of an exhibit turned against the exhibitor is ⚙ observation.

⚙Christ in the Unittypology · verify

AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.

The house he walked out of, and the temple raised in three days ancient/widely-held

⚙ The unit's first fact is a departure: a participle of going out, an imperfect of walking on, and a building left behind that will not keep one stone on another. Gill and Pulpit both read the exit itself as the beginning of the desolation, Pulpit tying it back to the house left desolate at Matthew 23:38. The redemptive-historical reading, which is as old as the Gospels themselves, is that the glory does not simply leave, it relocates. When Jesus was asked for a sign in the temple court he answered, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up," and John records that he spoke of his body, while the hearers thought of the forty-six years of Herod's work that Ellicott mentions at John 2:20. So the same two verbs govern both temples: this one will be loosed down (καταλυθήσεται) and not raised; that one will be destroyed and raised. What the disciples exhibit in v1 is the shell of a dwelling whose tenant is walking out of it toward a cross.

Matthew 24:1 · Matthew 24:2 · John 2:19 · John 2:20

Travail, and the one whose pangs were loosed ancient/widely-held

⚙ The unit ends on ἀρχὴ ὠδίνων, and the commentators are unanimous that this is childbirth and not mere grief: Ellicott ("the beginning of travail pangs"), Cambridge ("pains of travail, that preceded the birth of a new order of things"), Geneva ("just like women in childbirth"), Pulpit ("because they usher in the new creation"). Ellicott and Pulpit both take the next step with Paul at Romans 8:22, that the whole creation groans and travails, and both point to "the regeneration" of Matthew 19:28. Here is the redemptive-historical center of the unit. The pains of a world in labour are not self-interpreting, and Christian reading of them rests on one prior event: Peter at Pentecost says God raised Jesus, having loosed the pangs of death, because it was not possible that death should hold him. The rare noun in Matthew 24:8 is the rare noun in Acts 2:24. Because those pangs were once loosed, the pangs still running can be called a beginning rather than an ending.

Matthew 24:8 · Acts 2:24 · Romans 8:22 · Matthew 19:28

"I am the Christ" on the wrong lips novel

⚙ This reading is our own and we mark it novel rather than received. In v5 the deceivers are quoted, and their words are flawless: Ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ Χριστός, with the article, the very confession Peter makes and the very title the Gospel is written to establish. The lexicon notes that εἰμί is written out only when emphatic, so the sentence is doubly emphatic, and it comes to the hearer resting upon Jesus's own name (Pulpit: "grounding their pretensions thereon"). The point we draw, and it is ⚙ inference, is that the test of the true Christ cannot be the sentence "I am the Christ," because the counterfeits say it correctly. The discourse therefore hands the hearer a verb instead of a formula, Βλέπετε, keep watching, and the discriminating mark it eventually supplies is not a better claim but a cross and an empty tomb. Cambridge, staying closer to the sources, simply lets the apostolic Church answer with 1 John 2:18, "even now are there many antichrists," and Geneva generalises the conflict to the Church's whole history. Our step beyond them is the observation about the counterfeit's correct grammar; treat it as a suggestion to be tested.

Matthew 24:4 · Matthew 24:5 · 1 John 2:18

Apparatus & Provenance

The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.

Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:

  • Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834)
  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, — (1880s)
  • Charles Ellicott, Commentary for English Readers (1878)
  • Geneva Study Bible, Marginal Notes (1599)
  • Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)
  • John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible (1746–63)
  • Joseph Benson, Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1810s)
  • Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706)
  • Matthew Poole, Annotations upon the Holy Bible (1685)
  • The Pulpit Commentary, Spence & Exell, eds. (1880s)

⚙ Honesty notes for this unit. Text. Two places matter. In v1 the best manuscripts read "went out from the temple, and was going on his way" rather than the older English "went out and departed from the temple," and Ellicott, Cambridge and Pulpit all say so; BSB follows the better reading, and our literal follows the Greek participle plus imperfect. In v7 the word for pestilences (λοιμοί) is absent from the best manuscripts of Matthew and is almost certainly imported from Luke 21:11, where it is genuine. Ellicott says the word "is not found in the best MSS." and notes how easily λιμός and λοιμός could be confused by a copyist; Pulpit reports that many editors expunge it. The interlinear in this brief has no such word, so v7 carries famines and shakings only, and every commentator note in the brief about pestilence (Ellicott, Barnes, Gill, Pulpit) is commentary on a reading our text does not have.

Sources and their limits. Nearly every historical detail in this unit reaches us through Josephus, and it reaches us twice over: the commentators quote him, and they do not always agree on what he said. Barnes gives the great stones as 45 cubits long, 5 high and 6 broad; Gill quotes both that figure and another of 25 by 8 by 12 from a different place in Josephus; Benson reports 40 cubits for the foundation stones and 45 for the marble. These are the sources disagreeing, not the commentators inventing, and we have not harmonised them. Barnes's count of "24 false Messiahs ... between the time of the Emperor Adrian and the year 1682" is unsourced and its span runs far past the generation addressed; Pulpit's parallel claim is that critics have enumerated twenty-nine. Both are nineteenth-century commonplaces and we have flagged them as such rather than repeating them as data.

What is genuinely uncertain. First, the reference of the signs. Gill reads "the end" of v6 strictly as the end of the Jewish state; Pulpit reads v7 out into modern European history and explicitly refuses to confine the clauses to one event. Benson takes the three clauses of v3 as one question, Cambridge as two, Barnes as three, and Poole reports the same disagreement among divines in 1685. We have not resolved this, and our sola-reading says why we think it cannot be resolved from these eight verses. Second, the first-century fulfilment of v5: Gill, Barnes and Poole name impostors, Ellicott denies that any direct fulfilment is recorded in the NT, Josephus or elsewhere, and we have printed his dissent rather than burying it. Third, provenance of the Old Testament links. Matthew does not use a citation formula anywhere in this unit. Every thread pairing this Greek text with a Hebrew one is therefore tiered structural or typological, never verbal, both because shared Strong's numbers cannot be computed across the testaments and because no quotation is claimed by the text itself. Where a commentator supplies the Old Testament reference (Barnes and Poole for Micah 3:12, Poole for Jeremiah 26:18, Pulpit for Isaiah 26:17, Jeremiah 13:21 and Hosea 13:13), we have said which commentator. Where the pairing is our selection, the badge says so.

Voices. All ten authors present in the brief are quoted somewhere in this unit. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown write no verse-level note here at all: their entire entry is the chapter heading and a referral to Mark 13, and we quote the heading and say what it is. Matthew Henry's note is a single block covering Matthew 24:4-28, so his excerpt is drawn from a comment wider than the verse it sits under. Gill's remarks on Jewish expectation in vv 6 and 8 carry the polemical tone of his century; we quote him because he is also our source for the rabbinic material he is disputing, and we have said so in an editorial note rather than silently softening him.

✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)