Matthew 24:22 - Days shortened (1st century historical fulfillment?)

Matthew 24:22 (1st century historical fulfillment?)

Matthew 24:21 - Great tribulation (1st century historical fulfillment?):
Click here

Matthew 24:22

Matthew 24:23-25 - False christs and false prophets (1st century biblical fulfillment?):
Click here

Matthew 24:22: "And if those days had not been-shortened, no flesh would-have-been-saved. But those days will-be-shortened for the sake of the chosen (ones)."

What "days"?

Jesus said in the parallel account to Matthew 24:22 found in Mark 13:20: "And if (the) Lord had not shortened THE DAYS, no flesh would-have-been-saved". 

1 verse earlier, Jesus mentioned what "DAYS" (Mark 13:20) He may have been referring to, saying: "For THOSE DAYS will-be (an) affliction such-as has not taken-place such-as-this since (the) beginning (of the) creation which God created until now, and never will-take-place (again)" (Mark 13:19). Jesus seemed to have been referring to the "DAYS" of the "affliction" He just mentioned in Mark 13:19.

One understanding can be that this specific "affliction" (Mark 13:19) could refer to events happening around the time of the First Jewish-Roman War in the 1st century. 

For more information:

Matthew 24:21 - Great tribulation (1st century historical understanding?):
Click here

1st century events

Jesus said in the 1st century in Matthew 24:22: "if those days had not been-shortened, no flesh would-have-been-saved". 

During the First Jewish-Roman War in the 1st century, a few years after its start around the time of the destruction of Jerusalem around AD 70 the Romans started to become weary of killing Jews, even though there was yet a vast multitude still remaining alive. As a result, Caesar gave orders to keep most of the multitude alive. This order saved a multitude of people from being killed. This happened a few years short to the actual end of that war around AD 73, as if the days of the affliction during that war would have been shortened so that some flesh could be saved. 

The 1st century historian Josephus wrote in "The Wars of the Jews":

(6.9.2): "And now, since his soldiers were already quite tired with killing men, and yet there appeared to be a vast multitude still remaining alive, Caesar gave orders that they should kill none but those that were in arms, and opposed them, but should take the rest alive. But, together with those whom they had orders to slay, they slew the aged and the infirm; but for those that were in their flourishing age, and who might be useful to them, they drove them together into the temple… but of the young men he chose out the tallest and most beautiful, and reserved them for the triumph; and as for the rest of the multitude that were above seventeen years old, he put them into bonds, and sent them to the Egyptian mines. Titus also sent a great number into the provinces, as a present to them, that they might be destroyed upon their theatres, by the sword and by the wild beasts; but those that were under seventeen years of age were sold for slaves."

Early Christian author

An early Christian author would have written about this. 

In the 4th century, a Christian author named Chrysostom wrote in "Homilies on Matthew":

Homily 76: "And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved; but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened [Matthew 24:22]. By these things He shows them to be deserving of a more grievous punishment than had been mentioned, speaking now of the days of the war and of that siege. But what He says is like this. If, says He, the war of the Romans against the city had prevailed further, all the Jews had perished (for by no flesh here, He means no Jewish flesh)"

↺ Click here to return to the Table of Contents.