What is the meaning of Luke 21:23? How miserable those days will be Jesus is speaking during the Olivet Discourse, looking ahead to a specific season of judgment. He foresees the Roman siege of A.D. 70 as a literal, historical calamity (Luke 21:20; Luke 19:41-44), yet His words also stretch toward the final tribulation immediately preceding His return (Matthew 24:21; Daniel 12:1). • “Those days” are marked by unparalleled suffering—a fulfillment of covenant warnings such as Deuteronomy 28:49-57. • The sorrow is not merely social or political; it is divinely decreed justice, underscoring God’s faithfulness to both promise and warning. Pregnant and nursing mothers “Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!” (BSB; see also Matthew 24:19; Mark 13:17). • Pregnancy and infancy magnify every hardship—escape is harder, food scarcer, fatigue greater. • Siege conditions historically included famine so severe that mothers struggled even to keep newborns alive (2 Kings 25:3; Lamentations 2:11-12). • Christ’s lament shows His compassion; He is “gentle and humble in heart” (Matthew 11:29) even while announcing judgment. • The sanctity of life in the womb and at the breast is affirmed by His special mention (Psalm 139:13-16; Isaiah 49:15). Great distress upon the land The “land” is Judea, with Jerusalem at its center. When Titus encircled the city in A.D. 70, Josephus records starvation, violence, and over a million deaths—precisely the “great distress” Jesus predicted (Luke 21:21-24). • Previous sieges (2 Kings 25; Jeremiah 19:9) prefigure this ultimate one, showing Scripture’s consistent pattern of discipline for covenant unfaithfulness. • Yet the phrase also parallels Revelation 6-16, indicating a future, worldwide escalation of the same kind of distress. • God’s warnings are gracious invitations to repentance before judgment falls (2 Peter 3:9). Wrath against this people Wrath is not random; it is God’s measured response to persistent rejection of His Son (John 1:11; Luke 13:34-35). • Jesus had wept over Jerusalem, foretelling that “not one stone will be left on another” (Luke 19:44). • Paul explains that a partial hardening has come “until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (Romans 11:25-27), showing wrath and mercy intertwined in God’s redemptive plan. • Even in wrath, promises remain: national Israel will yet recognize her Messiah (Zechariah 12:10), proving the steadfastness of God’s covenant love. summary Luke 21:23 records Christ’s heartfelt lament over a literal judgment that would soon devastate Jerusalem and yet foreshadows a greater tribulation still ahead. The verse highlights: • the unparalleled misery of those judgment days, • the heightened vulnerability of mothers and infants, • the severe distress destined for the land of Judea, and • the righteous wrath of God against unrepentant rejection of His Son. Together these truths call believers to trust the accuracy of Scripture, heed divine warnings, and rest in the compassionate justice of our Lord. |
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