Under the heading: Temple, Herod's

"Herod, desirous of gaining the favour of the Jews, proposed to rebuild it. This offer was accepted, and the work was begun (B.C. 18), and carried out at great labour and expense, and on a scale of surpassing splendour. The main part of the building was completed in ten years, but the erection of the outer courts and the embellishment of the whole were carried on during the entire period of our Lord's life on earth (Joh 2:16, Joh 2:19), and the temple was completed only A.D. 65."

So what was Jesus talking about after his arguments with the Sanhedrin when we reach Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21? Jesus could not have been speaking of ALL the outer courts.

"And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

"See ye not all these things?" The disciples weren't equipped with time-travel sight - they saw what they saw. After all, they were showing Jesus the buildings of the temple that existed on that day. Some have it that is was 31 AD, others say 33 AD, either way it was 32-34 years before completion "of the outer courts and the embellishment of the whole."

Even if viewing from the Mount of Olives - as some argue He was - they were not seeing the whole thing, probably only about 60% of it based on the number of years (approximately 50 out of 83).

An artists impression of the unfinished temple mount (borrowed from Alamy)

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