New Testament letter composed under the guise of a presumably lost letter of the Apostle Paul, the Epistle to the Laodiceans. The books of the New Testament were all or nearly all written by Jewish Christians—that is, Jewish disciples of Christ, who lived in the Roman Empire, and under Roman occupation. Luke, who wrote the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, is frequently thought of as an exception; scholars are divided as to whether Luke was a Gentile or a Hellenistic Jew. A few scholars identify the author of the Gospel of Mark as probably a Gentile, and similarly for
Luke 21 "some people" i.e. not specifically disciples of Jesus. The "beautiful stones" and the "gifts dedicated to God" both contribute to the splendor of the temple. Matthew and Mark state that Jesus spoke privately to his disciples on Mount Olivet about the end times and the destruction of Jerusalem: see Olivet Discourse. Luke does not present this teaching as delivered privately: This parable was told by Jesus Christ and in the New Testament is found in Matthew , Mark , and Luke . This parable, about the Kingdom of God, involves a fig tree, as does the equally brief parable of