PEACE ON EARTH
This is taken from the publication, The Book of Mormon, Verse by Verse, by Ogden and Skinner, page 198.
“Some years ago, on a BBC television program, renowned Christian theologians were interviewed, followed by Elie Wiesel, the Nobel Prize winning Jewish author. Asked about Christianity Wiesel quipped: ‘One thing we know. When Messiah comes, there will be peace; Jesus came and there is no peace. From this perspective, (Christ) the Author of true Christianity, is relegated to dismal failure due to lack of peace in this world.
But (Jesus) himself said, ‘Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword’ (Matthew 10:34). Inherent in the great plan of happiness is a period of testing, when the war between good and evil, begun the premortal world, continues and the absence of total peace persists until the adversary is confined eternally to outer darkness and all flesh is brought under the Savior’s dominion. The title ‘Prince of Peace’ is, therefore, a prophecy of that Millennial Era, which assuredly will come.”
How was Jerusalem destroyed in 70 AD?
20. And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh.
21. Then let them which are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto. (Luke 21:20-21)
(The following is taken from the LDS Institute Pearl of Great Price Student Manual, phone download app version):
“Because of the nature of the (Jerusalem) temple’s construction, the prophesy of its destruction, (that occurred in 70 AD) may have seemed nearly impossible to the Jews. Elder Bruce R. McConkie, then a member of the Seventy, wrote: ‘Some single stones were about 67 and ½ feet long, 7 and ½ feet high and 9 feet broad; the pillars supporting the porches, all one stone, were some 37 and ½ feet tall. It is said that when the Romans destroyed and ploughed Jerusalem, six days battering of the walls failed to dislodge these mighty stones. The temple was, of course, finally leveled to the ground and…the stones were rooted out and scattered elsewhere and so was a once secure and great nation.” (Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, 3 vols. [1966-73], 1:637).
“The wickedness of the Jews at Jerusalem persisted and increased after the Resurrection of the Savior, setting the scene for the destruction that Jesus prophesied. Elder Ezra Taft Benson, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, referring to a history written by Will Durant, said: ‘The siege of Jerusalem under Titus [lasted] for 134 days.
(Hunger exceeded human endurance, blood flowed in the streets), during which 1,110,000 Jews perished and 97,000 were taken captive;…the Romans destroyed 987 towns in Palestine and slew 580,000 men and a still larger number, we are told, perished through starvation, disease and fire.’(Conference Report, Apr. 1950, 74).
‘Thousands [of Jews] were carried off to Egypt to work in the quarries and mines as lifelong slaves. Boys and women were sold to slave traders and thousands of others died of starvation in the prison camps. A remnant of this conquered people was scattered to the ends of the earth’ (H. Donl Peterson, “The Fall of Jerusalem,” Ensign, May 1972, 42)
“The suffering of the Jews following the death and Resurrection of Christ was clearly prophesied by Nephi and Jacob in the Book of Mormon (see 1 Nephi 19:14; 2 Nephi 6:9-11; 10:3-6; 25:9-16). (But what of the Jews who heeded Jesus’ warning and fled in haste? Guided by Revelation, as true saints always are, they fled to Pella in Perea and were spared.
Historical events, such as the Crusades, the Inquisition and the Holocaust, are other times since A.D. 70 when the Jews have been persecuted and destroyed.”
37. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! (Matthew 23:37)
