{The beginning of travail} (arch(8820)odin(936e)). The word means
birth-pangs and the Jews used the very phrase for the sufferings
of the Messiah which were to come before the coming of the
Messiah (Book of Jubilees, 23:18; Apoc. of Baruch 27-29). But the
word occurs with no idea of birth as the pains of death ( Ps
18:5  Ac 2:24 ). These woes, says Jesus, are not a proof of the
end, but of the beginning.