This dire prediction soon found its literal fulfilment. In the great conflict with the Roman legions under Titus, many of the Jews had taken refuge within the temple courts, seemingly hoping that there the Lord would again fight the battles of His people and give them victory. But the protecting presence of Jehovah had long since departed therefrom and Israel was left a prey to the foe. Though Titus would have spared the Temple, his legionaries, maddened by the lust of conflict, started the conflagration {62} and everything that could be burned was burned. The slaughter of the Jews was appalling; thousands of men, women and children were ruthlessly butchered within the walls, and the temple courts were literally flooded with human blood. This event occurred in the year 70 A. D.; and according to Josephus, in the same month and on the same day of the month as that on which the once glorious Temple of Solomon had fallen a prey to the flames kindled by the king of Babylon.[102] Of the temple furniture the golden candlestick and the table of shewbread from the Holy Place were carried by Titus to Rome as trophies of war; and representations of these sacred pieces are to be seen on the arch erected to the name of the victorious general. Since the destruction of the splendid Temple of Herod no other structure of the kind, no Temple, no House of the Lord as the terms are used distinctively, has been reared on the eastern hemisphere. Sometime between 361 and 363 A. D. the Roman emperor Julian, surnamed because of his reversion from Christianity to paganism Julian the Apostate, attempted to reconstruct the Temple at Jerusalem. His purpose was not that of devotion to nor love for God; but that of controverting prophecy, and thus proving false the Christian belief.[103] So ends the category of Temples reared to the name of the living God prior to the dispensation of the fulness of times. FOOTNOTES 1. Exodus 3:5. 2. Exodus 16:32-34. 3. See Exodus 31:18; 25:16; 32:15; 34:28, 29. 4. Exodus 33:7-11. 5. In the Authorized Version of the Holy Bible this sanctuary is called the Tabernacle of the Congregation; in the Revised Version it is designated the Tent of Meeting; preponderance of authority is in favor of the latter reading. 6. Exodus 24:9, 10, 18; read the entire chapter. 7. Exodus 25:1-9. For details of the building and furnishings of the Tabernacle of the Congregation see Exodus chapters 25-31, more particularly chapter 25, which account is in part repeated in 36:8-38. 8. Exodus 36:5-7. 9. The cubit is an ancient measure of length, the value of which varied in different countries and at different times. As the term occurs in the Bible, it denotes varying lengths. In line with modern encyclopedias, Bible dictionaries, etc., the length herein adopted is one foot six inches. See Encyclopaedia Britannica. Smith's Bible Dictionary, etc. 10. Exodus 37:1-9; compare 25:10-22. 11. See Exodus 37:10-29; compare 25:23-40. 12. Exodus 40:34-38.