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[249]
So Titus retired into the tower of Antonia, and resolved to storm
the temple the next day, early in the morning, with his whole army, and
to encamp round about the holy house. But as for that house, God had, for
certain, long ago doomed it to the fire; and now that fatal day was come,
according to the revolution of ages; it was the tenth day of the month
Lous, [Ab,] upon which it was formerly burnt by the king of Babylon; although
these flames took their rise from the Jews themselves, and were occasioned
by them; for upon Titus's retiring, the seditious lay still for a little
while, and then attacked the Romans again, when those that guarded the
holy house fought with those that quenched the fire that was burning the
inner [court of the] temple; but these Romans put the Jews to flight, and
proceeded as far as the holy house itself. At which time one of the soldiers,
without staying for any orders, and without any concern or dread upon him
at so great an undertaking, and being hurried on by a certain divine fury,
snatched somewhat out of the materials that were on fire, and being lifted
up by another soldier, he set fire to a golden window, through which there
was a passage to the rooms that were round about the holy house, on the
north side of it. As the flames went upward, the Jews made a great clamor,
such as so mighty an affliction required, and ran together to prevent it;
and now they spared not their lives any longer, nor suffered any thing
to restrain their force, since that holy house was perishing, for whose
sake it was that they kept such a guard about it.
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