Jesus
said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone on another, which will not be thrown down.”
Mark 13:2
Mark 13 [1.] As he went out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Teacher, see what kind of stones and what kind of buildings!”
Mark 13 [2.] Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone on another, which will not be thrown down.”
Mark 13 [3.] As he sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, “Tell us, when will these things be? What is the sign that these things are all about to be fulfilled?”
Meaning:
One of the disciples had just pointed out the huge stones and splendid buildings of the temple (Mark 13:1). Jesus answered with one of the most startling prophecies in the Gospels. The temple that seemed permanent, the centre of Israel’s worship and national life, would be completely destroyed. About forty years later, in AD 70, his words came true when Roman armies burned Jerusalem and tore the temple down.
- “Do you see these great buildings?”
Jesus does not deny that the buildings are great. He asks the disciple to look again, this time with the eyes of a prophet. What looks strongest in the world is not what lasts. The temple had already been destroyed once, by the Babylonians in 586 BC, after the people trusted in it instead of obeying God. Jeremiah had warned that generation in the temple gate, asking whether God’s house had become “a den of robbers” in their eyes and reminding them that God had let the sanctuary at Shiloh be ruined (Jeremiah 7:11-14).
- “There will not be left here one stone on another”
The prophet Micah had spoken in the same way: “Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest” (Micah 3:12). Jesus stands in that line of prophets, but he speaks with his own authority.
The fulfilment was literal. During the Jewish revolt against Rome, the Roman general Titus besieged Jerusalem. In August of AD 70 the temple caught fire and was destroyed, and the city was then largely demolished. The historian Josephus, an eyewitness, described the ruin. Huge stones thrown down from the temple mount can still be seen lying where they fell at the foot of the southern and western walls. Only parts of Herod’s retaining walls, such as the Western Wall, were left standing; the temple building itself was never rebuilt.
- A sign that had already been given
Jesus’ prophecy did not come out of nowhere. Days earlier he had cursed a fig tree that had leaves but no fruit, and the next morning the disciples found it “withered away from the roots” (Mark 11:19-21). Between those two scenes he cleansed the temple. The tree was an acted parable: a religion full of show but without the fruit God looked for would come under judgment. Jesus also knew that the leaders would reject him, as he showed in the parable of the farmers who killed the owner’s son (Mark 12:1-9).
- A greater temple
Later, false witnesses at Jesus’ trial twisted his words into a threat to destroy the temple himself, and people at the cross mocked him as the one who would “destroy the temple, and build it in three days” (Mark 15:29). What he had actually said was, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”, and John explains, “he spoke of the temple of his body” (John 2:19-21). The stone temple would fall, but the risen Christ would become the true meeting place between God and people. As he told the Samaritan woman, “the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth” (John 4:23).
The Significance of Mark 13:2
- Nothing built by human hands is permanent
Even the most impressive institutions will pass away. Our security must rest in God and his word, not in buildings or traditions.
- Jesus’ words come true
The exact fulfilment of this prophecy gives us good reason to trust the rest of what Jesus said, including his promises about his return.
- God’s living temple
Believers in Christ are being built together “into a holy temple in the Lord” (Ephesians 2:21). God’s presence is found where Christ is honoured.
Cross-References:
Micah 3:12: "Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble" An earlier prophecy of the temple’s ruin.
John 2:19: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." Jesus speaks of the temple of his body.
Mark 15:38: "The veil of the temple was torn in two from the top to the bottom." A sign at Jesus’ death that the old order was ending.
Ephesians 2:21-22: "in whom the whole building, fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord" The new temple God is building.
Conclusion: When a disciple admired the temple’s great buildings, Jesus foretold that not one stone would be left on another. The prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70, when the Romans destroyed the temple. Like Micah and Jeremiah before him, Jesus warned that a house of God without true faith and fruit would not stand. Yet he also pointed to a greater temple: his own risen body, and the living people of God built on him, which can never be thrown down.
PIB Scriptures are derived from the World English Bible