Luke 13:2,3 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Suppose ye that these Galileans, &c.— Our Lord's hearers had insinuated a very wrong notion of Providence; for which cause he not only condemned it in the question just now mentioned, but told them expressly, that these Galileans were not to be reckoned greater sinners than others, because they had fallen by so severe a calamity; and exhorted them, instead of forming harsh judgments of others fromsuch examples of sufferings, to improve them as incitements to themselves to repent; assuring them, that if they did not, they should all likewise perish; or, as it may be rendered, you shall all perish thus: which is not only more literal, but the rather to be chosen; because, as Grotius, Tillotson, Whitby, and many others have observed, there was a remarkable resemblance between the fate of these Galileans, and that of the whole Jewish nation; the flower of which was slain at Jerusalemby the Roman sword, while they were assembled at one of their great festivals; and many thousands of them perished in the temple itself, and were, as their own historian represents it at large, literally buried under its ruins. See Josephus's Jewish War, b. 6. 100: 4.