Matthew 24:6-8
And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these things are the beginning of sorrows.
Parallel: Mk 13:7-8; Lk 21:9-11
| WARS AND RUMORS OF WARS...NATION WILL RISE AGAINST NATION
"So Vitellius prepared to make war with Aretas, having with him two legions of armed men... but when on the fourth day letters came to him, which informed him of the death of Tiberius, he obliged the multitude to take an oath of fidelity to Caius; he also recalled his army, and made them every one go home..."
(Josephus, The Antiquities Of The Jews, 18:5:3)
"And now it was that a great sedition arose between the Jews that inhabited Cesarea, and the Syrians who dwelt there also... they came to throwing stones at one another; and several were wounded, and fell on both sides, though still the Jews were the conquerors. But when Felix saw that this quarrel was become a kind of war, he came upon them on the sudden, and desired the Jews to desist; and when they refused so to do, he armed his soldiers, and sent them out upon them, and slew many of them..."
(Josephus, The Antiquities Of The Jews, 20:8:7)
The Jews "...were all zealously disposed to go to war with the Romans..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 2:17:2)
"And at this time it was that some of those that principally excited the people to go to war, made an assault upon a certain fortress called Masada. They took it by treachery and slew the Romans that were there, and put others of their own party to keep it."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 2:17:2)
"Now the people of Cesarea had slain the Jews that were among them on the very same day and hour [when the soldiers were slain], which one would think must have come to pass by the direction of Providence; insomuch that in one hour's time about twenty thousand Jews were killed, and all Cesarea was emptied of its Jewish inhabitants..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 2:18:1)
"...the other cities arose up against the Jews that were among them; those of Askelon slew two thousand five hundred, and those of Ptolemais two hundred, and put not a few into bonds; those of Tyre also put a great number to death, but kept a greater number in prison..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 2:18:5)
"The history on which I am entering is that of a period rich in disaster, terrible with battles, torn by civil struggles, horrible even in peace. Four emperors fell by the sword, there were three civil wars, more foreign wars, and often both at the same time."
(Tacitus, The Histories, 1:2)
FAMINES, PESTELINCES AND EARTHQUAKES
"And in those days prophets came from Jerusalem to Antioch. Then one of them, named Agabus, stood up and showed by the Spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout all the world, which also happened in the days of Claudius Caesar."
(Acts 11:27-28)
"...others advised to let the banks alone, but to lie still before the city, to guard against the coming out of the Jews, and against their carrying provisions into the city, and so to leave the enemy to the famine, and this without direct fighting with them..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 5:12:1)
"But the famine was too hard for all other passions, and it is destructive to nothing so much as to modesty; for what was otherwise worthy of reverence was in this case despised; insomuch that children pulled the very morsels that their fathers were eating out of their very mouths, and, what was still more to be pitied, so did the mothers do as to their infants, and when those that were most dear were perishing under their hands, they were not ashamed to take from them the very last drops that might preserve their lives..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 5:10:3)
"Now of those that perished by famine in the city, the number was prodigious, and the miseries they underwent were unspeakable; for if so much as the shadow of any kind of food did anywhere appear, a war was commenced presently, and the dearest friends fell a fighting one with another about it, snatching from each other the most miserable supports of life."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 6:3:4)
"...Now when they were slaying him, he made this imprecation upon them, that they might undergo both famine and pestilence in this war, and besides all that, they might come to the mutual slaughter of one another; all which imprecations God confirmed against these impious men..."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 4:6:1)
"...they lay all night before the wall, though in a very bad encampment; for there broke out a prodigious storm in the night, with the utmost violence, and very strong winds, with the largest showers of rain, with continual lightnings, terrible thunderings, and amazing concussions and bellowings of the earth, that was in an earthquake. These things were a manifest indication that some destruction was coming upon men when the system of the world was put into this discord, and anyone would guess that these wonders foreshowed some grand calamities that were coming."
(Josephus, The Wars Of The Jews, 4:4:5)
"Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed."
(Acts 16:26)
"Several prodigies occurred in that year. Birds of evil omen perched on the Capitol; houses were thrown down by frequent shocks of earthquake, and as the panic spread, all the weak were trodden down in the hurry and confusion of the crowd."
(Tacitus, The Annals, 12:43)
"Apamea, too, which had been shaken by an earthquake, had its tribute remitted for five years."
(Tacitus, The Annals, 12:58)
"How often have the cities of Asia and Achaea fallen with one shock! How many cities have been swallowed up in Syria! How many in Macedonia! How often has Paphos become a ruin! News has often been brought to us of the demolition of whole cities at once!"
(Seneca)
"One of the famous cities of Asia, Laodicea, was that same year overthrown by an earthquake..."
(Tacitus, The Annals, 14:27)
"An earthquake too demolished a large part of Pompeii, a populous town in Campania."
(Tacitus, The Annals, 15:22)
Other earthquakes are reported to have occurred between 45 - 65 A.D. with much frequency in Hierapolis, Colosse, Crete, Smyrna, Miletus, Chios, Samos, Judea, Rome and other places. These cases are recorded by authors and historians such as Seneca, Philostratus, Eusebius, Orosius, Sentonius, etc..
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