Ride On to Die (Intro)

This next song is called Ride On to Die
And it has to do with Jesus entering into Jerusalem
If you know the gospels, you'll know that He, He laments more than once
Ah, as He comes into Jerusalem
People call it the triumphal entry, I call it the so-called triumphal entry

Because as Jesus is entering the city, He's wiping tears from His eyes
So it's not the triumph that we would think it is
And so often when He speaks of Jerusalem
He, He speaks of the suffering of the women, you know
Pray that your flight won't be-, you know
Pray for nursing mothers and that sort of thing, that their flight won't be in winter

And ehm, I wanna read to you an essay that is taken from one of ah, Josephus writings
On the suffering that happened at the siege of Jerusalem in '70
Because when Jesus is lamenting, that what He's lamenting
He sees in his prophetic imagination the suffering of the city
And that's why he laments, and I think this is important
Because the woman that Josephus talks about
May very well be, I think, one of the women that Jesus has in mind when he's lamenting

Mary, the daughter of Eleazar, was from the village of Balthazar
She was from a family that had prospered on the other side of the Jordan
So when, late in AD 69, word reach their village that the Roman commander Titus
And the tenth Roman legion were on their way to siege Jerusalem
She and all her relatives fled to the city for the protection of the walls with only her possession

Once the legions had surrounded the city
Jews partisan chiefs, along with their bodyguards
Plundered what little she had left, leaving her with her infant son, destitute
She cursed the looters, screaming at them to kill her out of anger or pity
Later, when the partisan returned, to their horror
They discovered that she had murdered her own baby and was roasting him over a fire
"Eat" she told them with a ghastly stare, "For I also have eaten"
Josephus said, the battle hardened chiefs went away trembling

And that's the kind of suffering, unimaginable suffering that happened
And I think that's what causes Jesus to burst into tears as he's entering the city
So that's just for you to file away in your imagination
When you, next time you read up Jesus' so-called triumphal entry