• Dissertation XVIII - Part I
• Dissertation XVIII - Part II
• Dissertation XVIII - Part III
• Dissertation XVIII - Part IV

Our Saviour's Prophecies Relating to the Destruction of Jerusalem

Which Have Remarkably Been Fulfilled

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By Thomas Newton D.D.

Late Lord Bishop of Bristol (London 1700)

Dissertation XX - Part III

WE are now come to the last act of this dismal tragedy, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the final desolution of the Jewish polity in church and state, which our Saviour for several reasons might not think fit to declare nakedly and plainly, and therefore chooseth to clothe his discourse in figurative language. “He might possibly do it,” as Dr. Jortin conceives, “to perplex the unbelieving persecuting Jews, if his discourses should ever fall into their hands, that they might not learn to avoid the impending evil.” ¹ ’Immediately after the tribulation of those days, shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.’ Commentators generally understand this, and what follows, of the end of the world, and of Christ’s coming to judgment; but the words ’immediately after the tribulation of those days,’ show, evidently, that he is not speaking of any distant event, but of something immediately consequent upon the tribulation before mentioned, and that must be the destruction of Jerusalem. It is true, his figures are very strong, but no stronger than are used by the ancient prophets upon similar occasions. The prophet Isaiah speaketh in the same manner of Babylon, 13:9, 10,- ’Behold the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate ; and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven, and the constellations thereof, shall not give their light; the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.’The prophet Ezekiel speaketh in the same manner of Egypt, — 32:7, 8, ’and when I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light. All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord God.’ The prophet Daniel speaketh in the same manner of the slaughter of the Jews by the little horn, whether by the little horn be understood Antiochus Epiphanes, or the power of the Romans; 8:10 — ’And it waxed great, even to the host of heaven; and it cast down some of the host, and of the stars to the ground, and stamped upon them :’ and the prophet Joel, of this very destruction of Jerusalem, 2:30, 31,- ’And I will shew wonders in the heavens, and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come.’ Thus it is, that, in the prophetic language, great commotions and revolutions upon earth are often represented by commotions and changes in the heavens. Our Saviour proceedeth in the same figurative style, ver. 30, — And then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven; and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory.’ The plain meaning of it is, that the destruction of Jerusalem will be such a remarkable instance of divine vengeance, such a signal manifestation of Christ’s power and glory, that all the Jewish tribes shall mourn, and many will be led from thence to acknowledge Christ and the Christian religion. In the ancient prophets, God is frequently described as coming in the ’clouds,’ upon any remarkable interposition and manifestation of his power ; and the same description is here applied to Christ. The destruction of Jerusalem will be as ample a manifestation of Christ’s power and glory, as if he was himself to come visibly in the clouds of heaven.

The same sort of metaphor is carried on in the next verse, ver. 31, And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. This is all in the style and phraseology of the prophets, and stript of its figures meaneth only, that, after the destruction of Jerusalem, Christ, by his angels or messengers, will gather to himself a glorious church out of all the nations tinder heaven. The Jews shall be ’thrust out,’ as he expresseth himself in another place, Luke, 13:28, 29,- ’and they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south; and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. ’No one, ever so little versed in history, needeth to be told, that the Christian religion spread and prevailed mightily after this period ; and hardly any one thing contributed more to the success of gospel than the destruction of Jerusalem, falling out in the very manner, and with the very circumstances, so particularly foretold by our blessed Saviour.

What Dr. Warburton hath written upon the same subject will much illustrate and enforce the foregoing exposition. “The prophecy of Jesus, concerning the approaching destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, is conceived in such high and swelling terms, that not only the modern interpreters, but the ancient likewise, have supposed, that our Lord interweaves into it a direct prediction of his second coming to judgment. Hence arose a current opinion in those times that the consummation of all things was at hand., which hath afforded a handle to an infidel objection in these, insinuating, that Jesus, in order to keep his followers attached to his service, and patient under sufferings flattered them with the near approach of those rewards, which completed all their views and expectations. To which, the defenders of religion have opposed this answer : That the distinction of short and long, in the duration of time, is lost in eternity ; and with the Almighty, ’a thousand years are but as yesterday,’ &100.

“But the principle both go upon is false; and if what hath been said be duly weighed, it will appear, that this prophecy doth not respect Christ’s second coming to judgment, but his first; in the abolition of the Jewish policy, and the establishment of the Christian : that kingdom of Christ, which commenced on the total ceasing of the theocracy For as God’s reign over the Jews entirely ended with the abolition of the temple service, so the reign of Christ, ’in spirit and in truth,’ had then its first beginning.

“This was the true establishment of Christianity, not that effected by the donations or conversions of Constantine. Till the Jewish law was abolished, over which the ’Father’ presided as king, the reign of the ’Son’ could not take place; because the sovereignty of Christ over mankind, was that very sovereignty of God over the Jews transferred, and more largely extended.

“This therefore being one of the most important eras in the economy of grace, and the most awful revolution in all God’s religious dispensations ; we see the elegance and propriety of the terms in question, to denote so great an event, together with the destruction of Jerusalem, by which it was effected : for in the whole prophetic language, the change and fall of principalities and powers, whether spiritual or civil, are signified by the shaking of heaven and earth, the darkening the sun and moon, and the falling of the stars; as the rise and establishment of new ones are by processions in the clouds of heaven, by the sound of trumpets, and the assembling together of hosts and congregations.’ ²

This language, as he observes in another place, was borrowed from the ancient hieroglyphics. “For, as in the hieroglyphic writing, the sun, moon, and stars, were used to represent states and empires, kings, queens, and nobility; their eclipse and extinction, temporary disasters or entire overthrow, &100. so in like manner the holy prophets call kings and empires by the names of the heavenly luminaries; their misfortunes and overthrow are represented by eclipses and extinction; stars failing from the firmament are employed to denote the destruction of the nobility, &100. In a word, the prophetic style seems to be a speaking Hieroglyphic. These observations will not only assist us in the study of the Old and New Testament, but likewise vindicate their character from the illiterate cavils of modern libertines, who have foolishly mistaken that for the peculiar workmanship of the prophet’s heated imagination which was the sober established language of their times, and which God and his Son condescended to employ as the properest conveyance of the high mysterious ways of providence in the revelation of themselves to mankind.” ³

To St. Matthew’s account St. Luke addeth, ’And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations; and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled,’ — 21:24. The number of those who ’fell by the edge of the sword,’ was indeed very great. “Of those who perished during the whole siege, there were,” as Josephus saith, “eleven hundred thousand.” ⁴ Many were also slain at other times and in other places. ⁵ By the command of Florus, who was the first author of the war, there were slain at Jerusalem three thousand and six hundred: ⁶ by the inhabitants of Ceasarea above twenty thousand: ⁷ At Scythopolis above thirteen thousand : ⁸ At Ascalon two thousand five hundred, and at Ptolemais two thousand: ⁹ At Alexandria, under Tiberius Alexander, the president, fifty thousand: ¹⁰ At Joppa, when it was taken by Cestius Gallus, eight thousand four hundred: ¹¹ In a mountain called Asamon, near Sepphoris, above two thousand : ¹² at Damascus ten thousand: ¹³ In a battle with the Romans at Ascalon ten thousand: ¹⁴ In an ambuscade, near the same place, eight thousand: ¹⁵ at Japha fifteen thousand. ¹⁶ ’Of the Samaritans, upon Mount Garizin, eleven thousand and six hundred: ¹⁷ At Jotapa forty thousand: ¹⁸ At Joppa, when taken by Vespasian, four thousand two hundred: ¹⁹ At Tarichea six thousand five hundred, ²⁰ and after the city was taken, twelve hundred: At Gamala four thousand slain, besides five thousand who threw themselves down a precipice: ²¹ Of those who fled with John from Gischala six thousand : ²² Of the Gadarenes fifteen thousand slain, besides an infinite number drowned: ²³ In the villages of Idumea above ten thousand slain: ²⁴ at Gerasa a thousand: ²⁵ At Machaerus seventeen hundred : ²⁶ In the wood of Jardes three thousand: ²⁷ In the castle of Massada nine hundred and sixty: ²⁸ In Cyrene, by Catullus, the governor, three thousand. ²⁹ Besides these, many of every age, sex, and condition, were slain in this war, who are not reckoned ; but of these who are reckoned, the number amounts. to above one million, three hundred fifty seven thousand, six hundred and sixty; which would appear almost incredible, if their own historian had not so particularly enumerated them.

But besides the Jews who ’fell by the edge of the sword,’ others were also to ’be led away captive into all nations:’ and considering the number of the slain, the number of the captives too was very great. There were taken, particularly at Japha, two thousand one hundred and thirty: ³⁰ At Jotapha one thousand two hundred: ³¹ At Tarichea six thousand chosen young men were sent to Nero, the rest sold, to the number of thirty thousand and four hundred, besides those who were given to Agrippa: ³² Of the Gadarenes two thousand two hundred: ³³ In Idumea above a thousand. ³⁴ Many besides these were taken at Jerusalem, so that as Josephus himself informs us, “the number of the captives taken in the whole war amounted to ninety-seven thousand; the tall and handsome young men Titus reserved for his triumph ; of the rest, those above seventeen years of age were sent to the works in Egypt, but most were distributed through the Roman provinces, to be destroyed in their theatres by the sword or by the wild beasts; those under seventeen were sold for slaves.” ³⁵ Of these captives, many underwent hard fate. Eleven thousand of them perished for want. ³⁶ Titus exhibited all sorts of shows and spectacles at Caesarea, and many of the captives were there destroyed, some being exposed to the wild beasts, and others compelled to fight in. troops against one another. ³⁷ At Caesarea, too, in honour of his brother’s birthday, two thousand five hundred Jews were slain; and a great number likewise at Berytus, in honour of his father’s. ³⁸ The like was done in other cities of Syria. ³⁹ Those whom he reserved for his triumph were Simon and John, the generals of the captives, and seven hundred others of remarkable stature and beauty. ⁴⁰ Thus were the Jews miserably tormented, and distributed over the Roman provinces ; are they not still distressed, and dispersed over all the nations of the earth ?

As the Jews were ’to be led away captive into all nations,’ so Jerusalem was to be ’trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.’ And accordingly Jerusalem has never since been in the possession of the Jews, but hath constantly been in subjection to some other nation, as first to the Romans, and afterwards to the Saracens, and then to the Francs, and then to the Mamalucs, and now to the Turks.

Titus, as it was related before, commanded all the city as well as the temple to be destroyed; ⁴¹ only three towers were left standing for monuments to posterity of the strength of the city, and so much of the wall is encompassed the city on the west, for barracks for the soldiers who were left as a garrison. All the rest of the city was so totally demolished, that there was no likelihood of its ever being inhabited again. The soldiers who were left there, were the tenth legion, with some troops of horse and companies of foot, ⁴² under the command of Terentius Rufus. ⁴³ When Titus came again to Jerusalem in his way from Syria to Egypt, and beheld the sad devastation of the city, and called to mind its former splendour and beauty, he could not help lamenting over it, and cursing the authors of the rebellion, who had compelled him to the cruel necessity of destroying so fine a city. ⁴⁴ Vespasian ordered all the lands of the Jews to be sold for his own use; and all the Jews, wheresoever they dwelt, to pay each man every year the same sum to the capitol of Rome, that they had before paid to the temple at Jerusalem. ⁴⁵ The desolation was so complete, that Eleazar said to his countrymen : “What is become of our city, which was believed to be inhabited by God ? It is rooted up from the very foundations, and the only monument of it that is left, is the camp of those who destroyed it, still pitched upon its remains. Some unhappy old men sit over the ashes of the temple, and a few women reserved by the enemy for the basest of injuries.” ⁴⁶

The first who rebuilt Jerusalem, though not all exactly on the same spot, was the Roman emperor AElius Adrian., and he called it after his own name AElia, and placed in it a Roman colony, and dedicated a temple to Jupiter Capitolinus in the room of the temple of the true God. ⁴⁷ While he was visiting the eastern parts of the empire, he came to Jerusalem, as Epiphanius informs us, ⁴⁸ forty seven years after its destruction by Titus, and found the city all levelled with the ground, and the temple of God trodden under foot, except a few houses: and he then formed the resolution of rebuilding it, but his design was not put into execution till towards the latter end of his reign. The Jews, naturally of a seditious spirit, were inflamed upon this occasion into open rebellion, to recover their native city and country out of the hands of heathen violators and oppressors: ⁴⁹ and they were healed by a man called Barchochab, ⁵⁰ a vile robber and murderer, whose name signifying the ’son of a star,’ he confidently pretended that he was the person prophesied of by Balaam in those words, Numb. 24:17, -’There shall come a star out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall rise out of Israel.’ They were successful in their first enterprises through the neglect of the Romans; ⁵¹ and it is probable, as the rebellion was raised for this purpose, that they made themselves masters of AElia, or the new Jerusalem, and massacred or chased from thence the heathen inhabitants, and the Romans besieged and took it again ; for we read in several authors, in Eusebius, ⁵² in Jerome, ⁵³ in Chrysostom, ⁵⁴ and in Appian ⁵⁵ who lived at that time, that Jerusalem was again besieged by the Romans under Adrian, and was entirely burnt and consumed. However that be, the Jews were at length subdued with most terrible slaughter ; fifty of their strongest castles, and nine hundred and eighty-five of their best towns were sacked and demolished ; ⁵⁶ five hundred and eighty thousand men fell by the sword in battle, besides an infinite multitude who perished by famine, and sickness, and fire, so that Judea was almost all desolated. The Jewish writers themselves reckon, that doubly more Jews were slain in this war, than came out of Egypt; and that their sufferings under Nebuchadnezzar and Titus were not so great as what they endured under the emperor Adrian. ⁵⁷ Of the Jews who survived this second ruin of their nation, an incredible number of every age and sex were sold like horses, and dispersed over the face of the earth. ⁵⁸ The emperor completed his design, rebuilt the city, re-established the colony, ordered the statue of a hog in marble to be set up over the gate that opened towards Bethlehem, ⁵⁹ and published an edict strictly forbidding any Jew upon pain of death to enter the city, or so much as to look upon it at a distance. ⁶⁰

In this state Jerusalem continued, being better known by the name of AElia, till the reign of the first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great. The name of Jerusalem had grown into such disuse, and was so little remembered or known, especially among the Heathens, that when one of the martyrs of Palestine, who suffered in the persecution under Maximin, was examined of what country he was, and answered of Jerusalem, neither the governor of the province, nor any of his assistants could comprehend what city it was, or where situated. ⁶¹ But in Constantine’s time it began to resume its ancient name; and this emperor enlarged and beautified it with so many stately edifices and churches, that Eusebius said move like a courtier than a bishop, that this “perhaps was the new Jerusalem, which was foretold by the prophets.” ⁶² The Jews, who hated and abhorred the Christian religion as much or more than the heathen, assembled again, as we learn from St. Chrysostom, to recover their city, and to rebuild their temple: ⁶³ but the emperor with his soldiers repressed their vain attempt ; and having caused their ears to be cut off, and their bodies to be marked for rebels, he dispersed them over all the provinces of his empire, as so many fugitives and slaves.

The laws of Constantine, and of his son and successor Constantius, were likewise in other respects very severe against the Jews: But Julian called the Apostate, the nephew of Constantine, and successor of Constantius, was more favourably inclined towards them ; not that he really liked the Jews, but disliked the Christians. and out of prejudice and hatred to the Christian religion resolved to reestablish the Jewish worship and ceremonies. Our Saviour had said that ’Jerusalem should be trodden down of the Gentiles;’ and he would defeat the prophecy, and restore the Jews. For this purpose he wrote kindly to the whole body or “community of the Jews.” ⁶⁴ expressing his concern for their former ill treatment, and assuring them of his protection from future oppression : and concluding with a promise, that “if he was successful in the Persian war, he would rebuild the holy city Jerusalem, restore them to their habitations, live with them there. and join with them in worshipping the great God of the universe.” ⁶⁵ His zeal even exceeded his promise; for before he set out from Antioch on his Persian expedition, “he proposed to begin with rebuilding the temple at Jerusalem with the greatest magnificence.” ⁶⁶ He assigned immense sums for the building. He gave it in charge to Alypius of Antioch who had formerly been lieutenant in Britain, to superintend and hasten the work. Alypius set about it vigorously. The governor of the province assisted him in it. But horrible balls of fire bursting forth near the foundations, with frequent assaults, rendered the place inaccessable to the workmen, who were burnt several times: and in this manner the fiery element obstinately repelling them, the enterprise was laid aside.” What a signal providence was it, that this no more than the former attempts should succeed and prosper; and that rather than the prophecies should be defeated, a prodigy was wrought even by the testimony of a faithful heathen historian ? The interposition certainly was as providential, as the attempt was impious : and the account here given is nothing more than what Julian himself and his own historian have testified. There are indeed many witnesses to the truth of the fact, whom an able critic hath well drawn together, and ranged in this order: “Ammianus Marcellinus a Heathen, Zemuch David a Jew, who confesseth that Julian was divinitus impeditus, hindered by God in this attempt : Nazianzen and Chrysostom among the Greeks, St. Ambrose and Ruffinus among the Latins, who flourished at the very time when this was done: Theodoret and Sozomen orthodox historians, Philostorgius an Arian, Socrates a favourer of the Novatians, who wrote the story within the space of fifty years after the thing was done, and whilst the eye-witnesses of the fact were yet surviving.” ⁶⁷ But the public hath lately been obliged with the best and fullest account of this whole transaction in Dr. Warburton’s Julian, where the evidence for the miracle is set in the strongest light, and all objections are clearly refuted, to the triumph of faith and the confusion of infidelity.

Julian was the last of the Heathen emperors. His successor Jovian made it the business of his short reign, to undo as much as was possible, all that Julian had done : and the succeeding emperors were generally for repressing Judaism, in the same proportion as they were zealous for promoting Christianity. Adrian’s edict was revived, which prohibited all Jews from entering into Jerusalem, or coming near the city ; and guards were posted to enforce the execution of it. ⁶⁸ This was a very lucrative station to the soldiers : for the Jews used to give money for permission to come and see the ruins of their city and temple, and to weep over them, especially on the day whereon Jerusalem had been taken and destroyed by the Romans, ⁶⁹ It doth not appear that the Jews had ever the liberty of approaching the city, unless by stealth or by purchase, as long as it continued in subjection to the Greek emperors. It continued in subjection to the Greek emperors till this as well as the neighbouring cities and countries, fell under the dominion of the Saracens. Only in the former part of the seventh century after Christ, and in the beginning of the reign of the emperor Heraclius it was taken and plundered by Chosroes king of Persia, and the greatest cruelties were exercised on the inhabitants. ⁷⁰ Ninety thousand Christians are said to have been sold and sacrificed to the malice and revenge of the Jews. But Heraclius soon repelled and routed the Persians, rescued Jerusalem out of their hands, and banished all Jews, forbidding them, under the severest penalties, to come within three miles of the city.

Jerusalem was hardly recovered from the depredations of the Persians, before it was exposed to a worse evil by the conquering arms of the Saracens. It was in the beginning of the same seventh century, that Mohammed himself began to preach and propagate his new religion: and this little cloud which was at first no bigger than a man’s hand soon overspread and darkened the whole hemisphere. Mohammed himself conquered some parts of Arabia. His successor, Abubeker, broke into Palestine and Syria. Omar, the next caliph, was one of the most rapid conquerors who ever spread desolation upon the face of the earth. His reign was of no longer duration than ten years and a half; and in that time he subdued all Arabia, Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia, and Egypt. His army invested Jerusalem. ⁷¹ He came thither in person; and the Christians after a long siege being reduced to the greatest extremities, in the year of the city capitulation. He granted them honorable conditions; he would not allow any of their churches to be taken from them ; but only demanded of the Patriarch, with great modesty, a place where he might build a mosque. The Patriarch showed him Jacob’s stone, and the place where the temple of Solomon had been built, which the Christians had filled with ordure in hatred to the Jews. Omar began himself to cleanse the place followed in this act of piety by the principal officers of his army ; and it was in this place that the first mosque was erected at Jerusalem. Sophronius, the Patriarch, said, upon Omar’s taking possession of the city, ’This is of a truth the abomination nation of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place.’ ⁷² Omar the conqueror of Jerusalem is by some authors said also to have died there, being stabbed by a slave at morning prayers in the mosque which he had erected. Abdolmelik the son of Merwan, the twelfth caliph, enlarged the mosque at Jerusalem, and ordered the people to go thither on pilgrimage, instead of Mecca, which was then in the hands of the rebe Abdollah; ⁷³ and afterwards when the pilgrimage to Mecca was by any accident interrupted, the Mussulmen used to repair to Jerusalem for the same purposes of devotion. ⁷⁴

In this manner the holy city was transferred from the possession of the Greek Christians into the dominion of the Arabian Mussulmen, and continued in subjection to the caliphs till the latter part of the eleventh century, that is, above 400 years. At that time the Turks of the Selzuccian race had made themselves masters of’ Persia, had usurped the government, but submitted to the religion of the country ; and being firmly seated there, they extended their conquests as far as Jerusalem, and farther. ⁷⁵ They drove out the Arabians, and also despoiled the caliphs of their power over it; and they kept possession of it, till being weakened by divisions among themselves, they were ejected by the caliph of Egypt. The caliph of Egypt, perceiving the divisions and weakness of the Turks, advanced to Jerusalem with an army ; and the Turks expecting no succour, presently surrendered it to him. But though it thus changed masters, and passed from the Arabians to the Turks, and from the Turks to the Egyptians, yet the religion professed there was still the same, the Mohammedan being authorized and established, and the Christian only tolerated upon payment of tribute.

The Egyptians enjoyed their conquests but a little while; for, in the same year that they took possession of it, they were dispossesed again by the Franks, as they are generally denominated, or the Latin Christians. ⁷⁶ Peter, the hermit of Amiens in France, went on a pilgrimage to Palestine, and there having seen and shared in the distresses and miseries of the Christians, he represented them at his return in such pathetic terms, that by his preaching and instigation, and by the authority of pope Urban II, and the Council of Clermont, the west was stirred up against the east, Europe against Asia, the Christians against the Mussulmen, for the retaking of Jerusalem, and for the recovery of the holy land out of the hands of the infidels. It was the epidemic madness of the time ; and old and young, men and women, priests and soldiers, monks and merchants, peasants and mechanics, all were eager to assume the cross, and to set out for what they thought the holy wars. Some assert that the number of those who went out on this expedition amounted to above a million. They who make the lowest computation affirm, that there were at least three hundred thousand fighting men. After some losses and some victories the army sat down before Jerusalem, and after a siege of five weeks took it by storm, on the fifteenth of July in the year of Christ 1099; and all, who were not Christians, they put to the sword. They massacred above seventy thousand Musselmen; and hit the Jews in the place they gathered and burnt together; and the spoil that they found in the mosques was of inestimable value. Godfrey of Boulogne, the general, was chosen king; and there reigned nine kings in succession; and the kingdom subsisted eighty-eight years, till the year of Christ 1187, when the Mussulmen regained their former dominion, and with scarce any interruption have retained it ever since.

At that time the famous Saladin, having subverted the government of the caliph , had caused himself to be proclaimed sultan of Egypt. Having also “subdued Syria and Arabia, he formed the design of besieging Jerusalem, and of putting an end to that kingdom. ⁷⁷ He marched against it with a powerful and victorious army and took it by capitulation on Friday the 2d of October, after a siege of fourteen days. He compelled the Christians to redeem their lives at the price of ten pieces of gold for a man, five for a woman, and two for a boy or girl. He restored to the oriental Christians the church of the holy sepulchre ; but forced the Franks or western Christians to depart to Tyre or other places, which were in the possession of their countrymen. But though the in the hands of the Mussulmen, yet the Christians had still their nominal king of Jerusalem : and for some time Richard I of England, who was one of the most renowned crusaders, and had eminently distinguished himself in the holy wars, gloried in the empty title. The city however did not remain so assured to the family of Saladin : ⁷⁸ but thirty years after his nephew Al Moadham, sultan of Damascus, was obliged to demolish the walls, not being able to keep it himself, and fearing lest the Franks, who were then again become formidable in those parts, should establish themselves again in a place of such strength. Afterwards, in the year 1228, another of Saladin’s family, ⁷⁹ Al Kamel, the sultan of Egypt, who after the death of his kinsman Al Moadham enjoyed part of his estates, to secure his own kingdom, made a treaty with the Franks, and yielded up Jerusalem to the emperor Frederic II, upon condition that he should not rebuild the walls, and that the mosques should be reserved for the devotions of the Mussulmen. Frederic was accordingly crowned king there, but soon returned into Europe. Not many years intervened, before the Christians broke the truce: ⁸⁰ and Melecsalah, sultan of Egypt, being greatly offended, marched directly towards Jerusalem, put all the Franks therein to the sword, demolished the castle which they had built, sacked and raised the city, not even sparing the sepulchre of our Saviour’ which till that time had never been violated or defiled ; and before the end of the same century, the crusaders or European Christians were totally extirpated out of the holy land having lost in their eastern expeditions, according to some accounts, above two millions of persons. ⁸¹ Before this time the Manialucs or the foreign slaves to the Egyptian sultans had usurped the government from their masters : and soon after this Kazan the chan of the Mogul-Tartars made an irruption into Syria, routed Al Naser the Sultan of Egypt, had Damascus surrendered to him, and ordered Jerusalem to be repaired and fortified. [⁸² But being recalled by great troubles in Persia, he was obliged to quit his new conquests, and the Mainaluc sultan of Egypt soon took possession of them again. In like manner, when the great Timur or Tamerlane, like a mighty torrent, overwhelmed Asia, and vanquished both the Turkish and Egyptian sultans, he went twice in passing and repassing to visit the holy city, gave many presents to the religious persons, and freed the inhabitants from subsidies and garrisons. ⁸³ But the ebb was almost as sudden as the flood. He died within a few years, and his sons and grandsons quarrelling about the succession, his vast empire in a little time mouldered away; and Jerusalem with the neighbouring countries reverted to the obedience of the Mamalucs again. It was indeed in a ruined and desolate state, as Chalcocondylas describes it, ⁸⁴ and the Christians paid large tribute to the sultans of Egypt for access to the sepulchre of Jesus. And in the same state it continued, with little variation, under the dominion of the Mamalucs, for the space of above 260 years, till at length this with the other territories of the Mamalucs fell a prey to the arms of the Turks of the Othman race.

It was about the year 1516, that Selim, the ninth emperor of the Turks, turned his arms against Egypt ; ⁸⁵ and having conquered one sultan, and hanged another, he annexed Syria, Egypt, and all the dominions of the Mamalucs, to the Othman empire. In his way to Egypt, he did as Kazan and Tamerlane had done before him; he went to visit the holy city, he seat of so many prophets, and the scene of so many miracles. ⁸⁶ It lay at that time miserable deformed and ruined, according to the account of a contemporary historian, not inhabited by the Jews, who were banished into all the world, but by a few Christians, who paid large tribute to the Egyptian sultans for the possession of the holy sepulchre. ⁸⁷ Selim offered up his devotions at the monuments of the old prophets, and presented the Christian priests with as much money as was sufficient to buy them provisions for six months ; and having stayed there one night, he went to join his army at Gaza. From that time to this, the “Othman emperors have possessed it under the title of Hami, that is, of protectors, and not of masters :” ⁸⁸ though they are, more properly, tyrants and oppressors. Turks, Arabians. and Christians of various sects and nations, dwell there out of reverence to the place; but very few Jews; and of those, the greatest part, as Basnage says, are beggars, and live upon alms. ⁸⁹ The Jews say, that when the Messiah shall come, the city will undergo a conflagration, and inundation, in order to be purified from the defilements, which the Christian and Mohammedan have committed in it; and therefore they choose not to settle there. But the writer, just mentioned, assigns two more probable and natural reasons. “One is, that the Mohammedans look upon Jerusalem as a holy place: and therefore there are a great many Santons and devout Mussulmen, who have taken up their abode there, who are persecutors of the Jews, as well as of the Christians, so that they have less tranquillity and liberty in Jerusalem than in other places: and as there is very little trade, there is not much to be got ; and this want of gain drives them away."

By thus tracing the history of Jerusalem, from the destruction by Titus to the present time, it appears, evidently, that as the Jews have been ’led away captive into all nations,’ so Jerusalem hath been ’trodden down of the Gentiles.’ There are now almost 1700 years , in which the Jewish nation have been a standing monument of the truth of Christ’s predictions, themselves dispersed over the face of the whole earth, and groaning under the yoke of foreign lords and conquerors : and at this day there is no reason to doubt but they will continue in the same state, nor ever recover their native country, ’until the tines of the Gentiles be fulfilled.’ Our Saviour’s words are very memorable, ’Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.’ It is still trodden down by the Gentiles, and consequently the times of the Gentiles are not yet fulfilled. When ’the times of the Gentiles’ shall be “fulfilled,” then the expression implies, that the Jews shall be restored : and for what reason, can we believe, that though they are dispersed among all nations, yet, by a constant miracle, they are kept distinct from all, but for the farther manisfestation of God’s purposes towards them? The prophecies have been accomplished, to the greatest exactness, in the destruction of their city, and its continuing still subject to strangers ; in the dispersion of their people, and their living still separate from all people: and why should not the remaining parts of the same prophecies be as fully accomplished too, in their restoration, at the proper season, when ’the times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled ?’ The times of the Gentiles will be fulfilled when the times of ’the four great kingdoms’ of the Gentiles, according to Daniel’s prophecies, shall be expired, and ’the fifth kingdom,’ or the kingdom of Christ, shall be set up in their place, and ’the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.’ Jerusalem, as it has hitherto remained, so probably will remain in subjection to the Gentiles, ’until these times of the Gentiles be fulfilled;’ or, as St. Paul expresseth it, Rom. 11:25, 26,— ’until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in: and so all Israel shall be saved,’ and become again the people of God. ’The fulness of the Jews’ will come in, as well as ’the fulness of the Gentiles.’ For, ver. 12, &100. ’if the fall of them be the riches of the world,’ and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fulness ?’ For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, that blindness in part has happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in: and so all Israel shall be saved.