Luke 21:6

Today I saw a tattoo on the back of some girls neck. I couldn't read what it said, but I saw Luke 21:6. I looked up Luke 21:6 and I don't get what it's saying.

King James Bible
"As for these things which ye behold, the days will come, in the which there shall not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

http://bible.cc/luke/21-6.htm

Huh? That seems like a pretty dark message for a tattoo.

If what you want doesn't happen, it is still possible to want/value what DOES happen.

I try to be kind of Buddhist about this question. I'm also interested in its ancestor, Hinduism.

Joseph Campbell said something once about when one realizes that one is really inevitably and unavoidably in free-fall, it's time to learn to love falling.

It's talking of Herod's Temple, the last Jewish temple on the Temple Mount. It was the pride and joy of the Pharisees/Sadducees, the symbol of what made Israel important.

It's saying that the day would come when there would be no stone of the temple left on top of another. Literal fulfillment, if you want to call this a prophecy, was the destruction of the Temple in what was it, 70 AD (CE)?

It's widely taken to mean more: That what we consider great will be utterly destroyed, showing how impotent we are prior to something better being built in its place. This also has two references: The first is the world/civilization/age. The second is each believer, a temple of God, who needs to be reconstructed in Christ's image.

There are other interpretations possible--some relying on traditional (or not so traditional) Xian beliefs, others just taking the quote utterly out of context and placing it in some other context.

Which is intended is entirely up to the quoter.

When I read it I wondered why someone would tatoo it to their body.

Humility's a good thing, as is an awareness of how transitory our existence is. Vanity of vanities, all is vanities. Etc.

It's a common enough kind of refrain:

... While we speak our invidious lifetimes will flee--seize the day ("carpe diem"), and trust the future as little as possible.

Art is long, life is short, opportunity fleeting, experiment dangerous, judgment difficult.

And lets not even get into some non-Wesern philosophical systems or Western monastic traditions.

On the other hand, some of the interpretations and possible meanings don't require a literal death, just a rebuilding of the self (or a reminder that the Temple was destroyed).

I suppose that's a rant better suited to the Lounge than R/T, however. :)

Maybe something just after or just before it changes the meaning. Maybe it has some personal significance that we just don't know. It's also possible that you (or she) got the verse wrong and it says something entirely different.