The works of the Reverend and learned John Lightfoot D. D., late Master of Katherine Hall in Cambridge such as were, and such as never before were printed : in two volumes : with the authors life and large and useful tables to each volume : also three maps : one of the temple drawn by the author himself, the others of Jervsalem and the Holy Land drawn according to the author's chorography, with a description collected out of his writings.

[CHRIST. LXVI] [NERO. XII] 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉. The Wars of the Jews began in the twelfth year of the reign of Nero, in the month of May. Joseph. de Bell. lib. 2 cap. 25.

If we take a view of the Nation, as it was at the present, and as it had been for thirty or forty years backward, we shall find that besides the ordinary and common wickedness that was among them, they had these four additions of iniquity monstrous and unparalleled, and in which they did, as it were, exceed themselves. 1. In regard that the appearance of the Messias was expected to be about the time that Christ appeared indeed, very many taking advantage of the time and of that expectation, took upon them, some to be Christ, others to be Prophets attending, and relating to his coming, Matth. 24. 24. Upon which Josephus and other Writers of that Nation will give us a very full commentary of experien∣ces. 2. There were multitudes of the Zelotae, and of the sect of Judas the Galilean, which would not yield any homage or subjection to be due to the Roman power which was now over them: and neither would they now themselves, nor would they suffer others, as far as they could hinder, to submit unto them. 3. The unbelieving Jews were generally sworn enemies and prosecutors of those that believed. And 4. which we have observed before, multitudes of those that had believed and imbraced the Gospell fell away, and became either seduced or the greatest seducers, and brought in horrid heresies and polluti∣tions. So that in these various and malignant distempers of men, there had been continual confusions, tumults, firings, murderings and plunderings among them for many years, and they had been the unquietest and most tumultuous Nation that had been under Heaven, and they had often provoked the Roman power against themselves, yet till this year had they never so visibly and professedly taken up Arms and open War against that power.

The first spark kindled in Caesarea upon the sea, about an inchroachment that a Gentile there made upon the way that went to the Jews Synagogue; and from thence it grew into a flame so fast through the whole Country [Florus the Governour helping it on] that by the sixteenth of May, his Souldiers by his Commission have plundred Jerusalem, slain 3600. persons: and even Berenice sister to King Agrippa escaped very narrowly with her life.

The Jews and Romans have divers skirmishes: Massada Castle taken and the Roman Ga∣rison put to the sword. The Temple and several parts of the Cities made Garisons for se∣veral parties, and suffer much by fire and battery. Twenty thousand Jewsslain in Caesarea on a Sabbath: whereupon all the Nation rise about to avenge this slaughter, and in Syria, Phaenicea, Samaria, Peraea and all round about, destroy Towns, Cities and persons all be∣fore them. Cestius the Governour of Syria rises with his forces, and destroys the Jews again, and their Towns all before him, and on the thirtieth of October enters Jerusalem and fires a good part of the City.

Yet do the Jews give him a brush upon his march away, and cut off above 4000 of his men: with which success they are so fleshed, that they resolve to fight it out, and accord∣ingly platform themselves into the model and posture of a long War: and the Country is only full of Fire, Sword, War and destruction.

The abomination of desolation had now begun to stand in the holy place, Matth. 24. 15. when the Temple is made a Garrison, and filled with slaughter; Antonia, the Castle of the Temple, besieged, taken, and the Roman Garrison put to the sword. The 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Tabernae, or part of the buildings at the East wall of the mountain of the House [the place where the Sanhedrin had once sitten,] fired and burnt down. Jerus. in Peah. fol. 16. col. 3. And in a word, the Temple from this time forwards, never but a Garrison, and full of slaughter and confusion till it be raked up in ashes.

Now it was time for those that were in Judea, who believed Christs prediction, to get into the Mountains, and to shift for themselves, for now begins the tribulation beyond parallel, such as was not since the beginning of the world, nor ever must again, Matth. 24. 21. It is commonly asserted that the Christians fled to Pella a City beyond Jordan: Eu∣seb. Eccles. Hist. lib. 3. cap. 5. which how to reconcile with Josephus, who saith Pella was one of the Cities that the Jews destroyed in avengement of the slaughter of the 20000 in Caesarea, De Bell. lib. 2. cap. 33. let the Learned find.

About these times therefore we may well conceive to have been the writing of

THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER. And that the rather from what he speaks in Chap. 1. ver. 14. I know that I must shortly put off this tabernacle, as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me. In which words, his thoughts reflect upon what Christ had spoken to John and him about their ends, John 21. where he not only gave intimation to Peter that he should be Martyred, ver. 18. but that he should be so, before his coming in Judgment against Jerusalem, which John must live to see, but he must not, ver. 22. He therefore in Babylon, understanding how affairs went in Judea and with the Jewish Nation all thereabout, and reading therein, from the words of his Master, Matth. 24. that the desolation was drawing on apace, concludes that his time was not long: and therefore improves the time he hath remaining the best he can, not only in teaching those amongst whom he was, but by writing this Epistle instructeth those that were remote and at distance from him; in which he doth more especially give them cau∣tion against false teachers: and characters the terrour of the judgment coming, and ex∣horts to vigilancy and holiness.

The first character that he gives of the false teachers is, that they bring in damnable He∣resies, denying the Lord that bought them, Chap. 2. 1. which he speaketh from Deut. 32. from whence also he useth other expressions, ver. 6. Is not he thy Father that hath bought thee? not meaning that these wretches were redeemed by Christ, yet became such wretches, as some would interpret it; but by buying is meant his buying out of Egypt this people for a peculiar people: which these wretches boasted and stood upon, yet by their introducing and practising the prophane principles they did, of fornication and communicating with Idols, they denied the true God which bought that people for his peculiar. He calls them spots, ver. 13. from Deut. 32. 5. and parallels them with the old world, Sodom, Balaam, nay the very fallen Angels.

He sets forth the destruction of that cursed Nation and their City in those terms that Christ had done, Matt. 24. and that the Scripture doth elsewhere, Deut. 32. 22, 23. 24. Jer. 4. 23. namely as the destruction of the whole world, The heavens passing away, the elements melting, and the earth burnt up, &c. And accordingly he speaks of a new heaven and a new earth, from Isa. 65. 17. a new state of the Church under the Gospel among the Gentiles, when this old world of the Jews state should be dissolved.

He citeth Pauls Epistle to the Hebrews, and giveth an honourable testimony to that, and to the rest of his Epistles: but acknowledgeth that in some places they are hard to be un∣derstood, and were misconstrued by some unlearned and unstable ones to their own ruine; yet neither doth he, nor Paul who was yet alive, and well knew of this wresting of his Epistles, clear or amend those difficulties, but let them alone as they were: for the holy Ghost hath so penned Scripture as to set men to study.

And here is the last that we hear in Scripture of this great Apostle Peter. His Martyr∣dom he apprehends to be near, and it was to be before Jerusalem was destroyed, which was not now full four years to come. We may well conceive him to have been put to death by the Jews in Babylonia where he now was: a madness having come upon that Nation in all parts: and a singular raging against the Gospel, the devil bestirring himself in them, now he knew their time was so short.