Edwards ( The Blank Bible 
, 907) pre-channels NT Wright in his comments on Jesus’ warning in Luke 13: “Christ in these words seems to have respect to something more than merely their perishing, as well as they, unless they repented. He seems also to have regard to the ‘remarkable resemblance between the fate of these Galileans, whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifice, and of those ‘on whom the tower of Siloam fell,’ and that of the whole Jewish nation, the flower of which was slain at Jerusalem by the Roman sword, while they were assembled at one of their great festivals. And many thousands of ‘em perished in the temple itself,’ as these Galileans were slain by the Roman sword while they were worshipping in the temple at a public feast. So [the] nation, in the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, as it were perished under the ruins of the holy city. Yea, ‘many thousands of ‘em were literally buried under the ruins’ of the temple (as Josephus represents at large), as those eighteen were buried under the tower of Siloam, a part of that city near the temple over a basin that received the water from the fountain of Siloam, where the Jews were wont to wash and purify themselves to fit themselves for the temple service, and therefore was especially frequented at the time of their festivals. ‘Tis therefore probable that it was at some such time that the tower fell on eighteen that were there at once purifying themselves.”
