What Does Matthew 24:1 Mean?

XXIV. (1) **And Jesus went out.**—Better, following the best MSS., *Jesus departed from the Temple, and was going on His way, when His disciples.* St. Mark and St. Luke report the touching incident of the widow’s mite as connected with our Lord’s departure. **His disciples** **came** **to him.**—We may well think of their action as following on the words they had just heard. Was that house, with all its goodly buildings and great stones, its golden and its “beautiful” gates (Acts 3:2)—through which they had probably passed—its porticos, its marble cupolas, the structural and ornamental offerings which had accumulated during the forty-six years that had passed since Herod had begun his work of improvement (John 2:20), to be left “desolate”? Would not the sight of its glories lead Him to recall those words of evil omen? This seems a far more natural explanation than that which sees in what they were doing only the natural wonder of Galilean peasants at the splendour of the Holy City. They had seen it too often, we may add, to feel much wonder.