Matthew 24:3

Signs of the End of the Age

24:3 As ¹  he was sitting on the Mount of Olives, his disciples came to him privately and said, “Tell us, when will these things ²  happen? And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”

Matthew 24:6

24:6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars. Make sure that you are not alarmed, for this must happen, but the end is still to come. ³ 

Ezekiel 7:5-7

7:5 “This is what the sovereign Lord says: A disaster ⁴  – a one-of-a-kind ⁵  disaster – is coming! 7:6 An end comes ⁶  – the end comes! ⁷  It has awakened against you ⁸  – the end is upon you! Look, it is coming! ⁹  7:7 Doom is coming upon you who live in the land! The time is coming, the day ¹⁰  is near. There are sounds of tumult, not shouts of joy, on the mountains. ¹¹ 

Ezekiel 7:10

7:10 “Look, the day! Look, it is coming! Doom has gone out! The staff has budded, pride has blossomed!

[24:3]  ¹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[24:3]  ² sn Because the phrase these things is plural, more than the temple’s destruction is in view. The question may presuppose that such a catastrophe signals the end.

[24:6]  ³ tn Grk “it is not yet the end.”

[7:5]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew term often refers to moral evil (see Ezek 6:10; 14:22), but in many contexts it refers to calamity or disaster, sometimes as punishment for evil behavior.

[7:5]  ⁵ tc So most Hebrew mss; many Hebrew mss read “disaster after disaster” (cf. NAB, NCV, NRSV, NLT).

[7:6]  ⁶ tn Or “has come.”

[7:6]  ⁷ tn Or “has come.”

[7:6]  ⁸ tc With different vowels the verb rendered “it has awakened” would be the noun “the end,” as in “the end is upon you.” The verb would represent a phonetic wordplay. The noun by virtue of repetition would continue to reinforce the idea of the end. Whether verb or noun, this is the only instance to occur with this preposition.

[7:6]  ⁹ tc For this entire verse, the LXX has only “the end is come.”

[7:7]  ¹⁰ sn The day refers to the day of the Lord, a concept which, beginning in Amos 5:18-20, became a common theme in the OT prophetic books. It refers to a time when the Lord intervenes in human affairs as warrior and judge.

[7:7]  ¹¹ tc The LXX reads “neither tumult nor birth pains.” The LXX varies at many points from the MT in this chapter. The context suggests that one or both of these would be present on a day of judgment, thus favoring the MT. Perhaps more significant is the absence of “the mountains” in the LXX. If the ר (resh) in הָרִים (harim, “the mountains” not “on the mountains”) were a ד (dalet), which is a common letter confusion, then it could be from the same root as the previous word, הֵד (hed), meaning “the day is near – with destruction, not joyful shouting.”