Copyright © 2003
Unmodified copies of this document, in its entirety, may be freely
distributed
for non-commercial use.
I. Prayer
II. Purpose of Today’s Class: to understand...
A.
[Show schedule, timeline]
..\01_the_mystery_of_the_jews\israel_02_01_schedule.htm
..\01_the_mystery_of_the_jews\israel_02_01_timeline.htm
B. … the book of Daniel contains the prophetic key for understanding both Gentile and Jewish history from God’s perspective.
C. … the prophecy of “Seventy Sevens” given to Daniel indicates that seven years, yet future, are “determined” for the Jews and Jerusalem, prior to God’s kingdom on earth.
D. … the prophecy predicted, hundreds of years in advance, to the day, the presentation of Messiah to Israel.
III. The Nature of Chronology
A. Two most important dates in history are not known with certainty: the birth of Christ and His crucifixion.
B. An extremely difficult area fraught with difficulties and less-than reliable extra-biblical historical witness.
C. systems of interpretation[1]
1. Maccabean - Seventieth week fulfilled in the Maccabean period and describes Antiochus Epiphanes’ attempts to Hellenize the Jews (170-164 B.C.).
2. Roman - Seventieth week fulfilled in the Roman period, by Jesus and/or Titus.
a) The prince who is to come is seen as Jesus
b) the people of the “prince who is to come” who destroy the city are said to be the Jews who indirectly destroyed Jerusalem by rejecting Messiah (bringing the judgment of the Roman army).
c) Verse 27 seen to parallel verse 26
(1) Jesus makes a “covenant with many”
(2) 3½ years into his ministry, Jesus’ crucifixion which put an end to sacrifice and offering
d) (A serious problem of this view, among other significant problems, is that the latest the last week could possibly extend is 33 + 7 = 40 A.D., yet the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus would still be 30 years away.)
3. Eschatological - Seventieth week fulfilled in the events of the second advent.
IV. Preliminary Discussion in the Gospels
A. The Wise Men - were Gentiles paying closer attention to God’s Word than the Jews?
1.
Magi had a Medo-Persian
connection
”The historian Herodotus tells us that the Babylonian magi (Greek magoi,
plural) originally were one of the tribes of the Medes who acted as priests
under the Achaemenian Persians (600-400 BC)."[2]
2. Daniel appointed as head of the wise men of Babylon
a) Daniel 2:48 Then the king promoted Daniel and gave him many great gifts; and he made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief administrator over all the wise men[3] of Babylon.
3. Medo-Persia overthrows Babylon
a) Daniel 5:30-31 That very night Belshazzar, king of the Chaldeans, was slain. And Darius the Mede received the kingdom, being about sixty-two years old.
4. Were the ancestors of the Wise men privy to and even instructed in Daniel’s prophecies?
V. The Setting of Daniel
A. Captivity of Judah to Babylon
1. 3 captivities
a)
1st, 605-606 B.C.
Nebuchadnezzar went from Carchemish
down into Jerusalem and took away
the first group of Jewish deportees, including Daniel.
b)
2nd, 597 B.C.
In Nebuchadnezzar's return siege in 597 BC, king Jehoiachin surrendered and was
carried away to Babylon.
c)
3rd, 586 B.C.
Zedekiah's revolt in the ninth year of his reign brought about the complete
destruction of the city and the great Solomonic Temple...Zedekiah was blinded
and taken to Babylon in chains. Nebuchadnezzar placed a governor named Gedaliah
over the rest of the Jews who remained in the land.
B. Reason for captivity
1. the failure to keep the sabbatical years (Lev. 25:1-7) for a period of 70 sabbatical years = 490 years
a) Leviticus 26:33-34 I will scatter you among the nations and draw out a sword after you; your land shall be desolate and your cities waste. Then the land shall enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and you are in your enemies' land; then the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbaths.
b) 2 Chronicles 36:20-21 And those who escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon, where they became servants to him and his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths. As long as she lay desolate she kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.
2. Jesus makes a reference to the patience and forgiveness of God for these 490 years of disobedience (Mat. 18:21-22)
C. Daniel reads Jeremiah (Dan. 9:2)
1. Jeremiah 29:10 For thus says the LORD: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place.
2. His amazing intersession for “Your” (God’s) and “Your” (God’s) people (Dan. 9:3-19)
D. Gabriel responds with an interpretation of the vision regarding “your” (Daniel’s) people and “your” (Daniel’s) holy city.
VI. Daniel’s Seventy Sevens
A. The meaning of “seventy weeks”
1. Hebrew shAvuim shivim ( <y]u=b]v <y]u|b`v ) = “sevens seventy”
2. The sevens are groups of years (not days)
a) Israel had just spent 70 years in captivity because they failed to keep the sabbatical year (Lev. 25:1-7) for the land for 70 x 7 (490) years.
b) This prophecy sets forth an equivalent, but yet-future period of another 490 years.
c) 490 days would seem an insufficient time for all that is predicted to take place.
d) “The units of seventy can be layed out in the following way: (1) 70 x 7 sabbatical years violated prior to the Babylonian Captivity (Le 26:34-35,Le 26:43); (2) the seventy years of the Babylonian Captivity (Jer 25:11 Jer 29:10); (3) 70 x 7 decreed years remaining after the Babylonian Captivity (Da 9:24-27).”[4]
B. The scope of the prophecy: your people and for your holy city - the Jews and Jerusalem
1. This is to be contrasted with the visions of Gentile history found elsewhere in the book of Daniel (the ‘times of the Gentiles,’ ending in the Messianic Kingdom.[5])
2.
[see the “rule” column of the
Historic Timeline from session 1]
|
Beautiful
Statue |
Rapacious
Beasts |
Kingdom |
|
|
like a lion with eagle’s wings (Dan. 7:4) |
1 |
Babylon (Dan. 2:38) |
|
|
chest and arms of silver (Dan. 2:32) |
2 |
Medo-Persia (Dan. 2:39) |
|
|
belly and thighs of bronze (Dan. 2:32) |
3 |
Greece (Macedonian) (Dan. 2:39) |
|
|
legs of iron (Dan. 2:33) |
a unique beast dreadful and terrible (Dan. 7:7, 19-20, 23-25)[8] |
4 |
Rome (Dan. 2:40) |
|
feet partly of iron and partly of clay, [ten] toes (Dan. 2:33, 41) |
5 |
Rome divided and dispersed (Dan. 2:41-43) |
|
|
stone cut without hands, strikes statue, fills entire earth (Dan. 2:34) |
6 |
Messianic Kingdom (Dan. 2:44-45) |
|
C.
The Division of the period: 7
sevens, 62 sevens, 1 seven
OVERHEAD: israel_02_07_seventy_sevens.doc
D.
What is the primary purpose of
the entire period?
Jesus’ sacrifice made these six tasks possible, but the benefits will not be
applied until He returns and Israel
repents.
Six things (v. 24):
1. to [Piæ‘El - intensely] finish the transgression
a)
a specific singular
transgression?
”The one specific transgression in this context is the rejection of the
Messiahship of Jesus.”[9]
b) Possibly the course of Israel’s apostasy and dispersion[10]
2. to make an end of [hip‘îl - cause to finish] sin
a) to “seal up” sin, “the figure of the sealing stands here in connection with the shutting up in prison”[11]
b) Sin will be controlled during the millennium and completely during the eternal state. The kingdom of God includes both periods.[12]
3. to make reconciliation [Piæ‘El - to intensely atone or cover] for iniquity
a) Jesus’ work on the cross
4. to [hip‘îl - cause to] bring in everlasting righteousness
a) righteousness eternal (ages) (zedek olAmim)
b) the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth (Mat. 6:10).
(1) Isa. 9:7, Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice (zedakah) from that time forward, even forever (olAm).
(2) Jeremiah 23:5-6 "Behold, the days are coming," says the LORD, "That I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness; A King shall reign and prosper, And execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. In His days Judah will be saved, And Israel will dwell safely; Now this is His name by which He will be called: THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.
(3) Romans 11:26-27 And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "The Deliverer will come out of Zion, And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; For this is My covenant with them, When I take away their sins."
5. to seal up vision and prophecy
a) to ‘seal’ ¾ confirm with official endorsement
b) to bring to complete fulfillment
c) ‘vision’ refers to oral prophecy, ‘prophecy’ refers to written prophecy[13]
d) “indicates that no more is to be added and that what has been predicted will receive divine confirmation and recognition in the form of actual fulfillment. Once a letter is sealed, its contents are irreversible.”[14]
e) “When Christ comes back, there will be no more need for visions and prophecies.”[15]
f) OT vision and prophecy relates to the Messianic Kingdom, whereas NT contains revelation concerning the eternal state[16]
6. to anoint [the] Most Holy
a) definite article [the] is not in the Hebrew
b) “nowhere in Holy Writ is ~Yiv'd'q v,dq ('a most holy') applied to the Church or to a person... Each of the 39 occurrences of ~Yiv'd'q v,dq pertains to the Tabernacle, Temple (specifically the Holy of Holies), or the things of the Temple... A reasonable deduction from that fact is 'a most holy' is the Temple. The allusion is not likely to be the Holy of Holies proper because that term almost always has the article with it.”[17]
c) Probably the Millennial temple (Eze. 40-48)
d) Anointed by the presence of the Anointed One (Messiah, the very Shekinah of God). See Mat. 23:38-39 where Jesus predicts the Temple will be desolate until His return.
E. Seven Sevens
1. the rebuilding of the city required 49 years to complete
a) “True, it took just 52 days for Nehemiah and the people to finish the walls, but many years (in the days of no construction equipment) where required to clean up the city after decades of desolation. It would have been very difficult to construct the streets and moat (not to mention houses) if debris were in the way.”[18]
F. Seven sevens and sixty-two sevens (v 26)
1. until Messiah the Prince
2.
follow the seven sevens for a
total of 7 + 62 = 69 sevens
69 x 7 = 483 years
a) Who is giving Daniel this detailed prediction concerning Messiah? Gabriel.
b) Who announces to Mary that she is with child of the Holy Spirit and will soon give birth to Messiah? Gabriel! (Luke 1:26-38)
c) Jesus avoids popular attempts to be made king
(1) John 6:15 When Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take him by force, to make him a king, he departed again into a mountain himself alone.
d) The Day of Jesus Presentation, Luke 19:29-44
(1) Arranges to fulfill Zechariah’s prophecy concerning the presentation of the king.
(a) Zechariah 9:9 "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, Lowly and riding on a donkey, A colt, the foal of a donkey.
(2) Weeps over the city for a specific reason
(a) Luke 19:41-42 Now as He drew near, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, "If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.
3.
Calculating the Time
israel_02_07_calculation.doc
a) Solar Year is 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45.975 seconds
(1) That’s what leap years are for
(2) Jewish calendar adds a 13th month once every 3 years
b) Lunar Year (better “prophetic year”[19]) consists of 12 30-day months = 360 day year
(1) Evidence for using a 360-day lunar year in the calculations comes from
(a) the account of the flood, which lasted 5 months or 150 days (Gen. 7:11,24; 8:3-4)
(b) from the apparent equivalency of 3 ½ years, 42 months, and 1260 days (Dan. 7:25; Dan. 12:7; Jas 5:17; Rev. 11:2-3; Rev. 12:6,14; Rev. 13:5)
(c) The latter appears to represent ½ of the final week (Dan. 9:27).
(2)
When using lunar years, 69
sevens = 483 lunar years = 476 solar years.
”with modern astronomy one can reckon a year very precisely as being
'365.24219879 days, or 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45.975 seconds.' However,
in ancient times various systems were used. When one investigates the calendars
of ancient India, Persia, Babylonia and Assyria, Egypt, Central and South
America, and China it is interesting to notice that they uniformly had twelve
thirty-day months (a few had eighteen twenty-day months) making a total of 360
days for the year and they had various methods of intercalating days so that
the year would come out correctly. Although it may be strange to present-day
thinking, it was common in those days to think of a 360-day year.”[20]
c)
Decree to rebuild Jerusalem:
Artaxerxes Longimanus 20th yr to Nehemiah
(Neh. 2:1-8,13,17), March 5, 444 B.C..
d) Until Messiah, presentation of Jesus as King, March 30th, A.D. 33 (Luke 19:28-40)
e) March 5, 444 B.C. to March 30, A.D. 33.
(1)
LUNAR YEAR CALCULATION
69 x 7 = 483 years, 483 years x 360 days/lunar year = 173,880 days
(2)
SOLAR YEAR CALCULATION
444 B.C. to A.D.
33 = 476 years (only one year expires between B.C. 1 and A.D. 1)
476 years x 365 days/year = 173,740 days
173, 740 days + 116 days in leap years + 25 days (March 5 - 30) = 173,880 days[21]
[The period] begins Nisan 1 of Artaxerces' 20th year (March 5, 444 BC, Ne
2:5-9). Sixty-nine 'sevens' = 173,880 (29 x 7 x 360) days ending on the
Triumphal Entry on Nisan 10, AD 33 (March 30, AD 33, Lu 19:28-40). Messiah cut off after 69 weeks on Nisan 14
(April 3) AD 33. Calculation: 476 years x 365.24219879 days per solar year =
173,855 days. Days between March 5 and March 30 = 25. Total: 173,855 + 25 =
173,880 days.[22]
f)
This prophecy indicates that
Messiah has already come!
“Leopold Kahn, a European rabbi, studied the prophecy of the seventy weeks of
Daniel and, on the basis of verses 25 and 26, came to the conclusion that the
Messiah had already come. Puzzled by this, he approached an older rabbi and
asked, ‘Where is the Messiah?’
”The rabbi didn’t know the answer but told him he thought the Messiah was in New
York City. So Kahn sold almost everything he owned and
bought a passage to America,
seeking the Messiah. He arrived in New York
and began to wander up and down the streets, looking for Messiah. One night, he
walked past the door of a gospel mission and heard people singing. He went in,
sat down in the back of the room and heard a preacher talk about Jesus Christ,
the Messiah. That night Leopold Kuhn received Jesus Christ as his Savior.
”Soon after, Kahn bought a stable, swept it out, set up some chairs, and began
to hold his own gospel meetings. That was the first outreach of what was to
become the American Board of Missions to the Jews. It all started because a
rabbi read the ninth chapter of Daniel.”[23]
G. Gap - Evidence for a gap is as follows:
1. The grammar of verse 26 describes what happens after the sixty-ninth week and before the seventieth week, implying a temporal gap between the sixty-ninth and seventieth weeks.
2. Within this interval is both the cutting off of Messiah and the destruction of the city and sanctuary.
3. Intervals in the fulfillment of prophecies are a common Old Testament phenomenon. Each of the following sets of verses span over 1900 years (include references to both the 1st and 2nd coming of Christ): Isa. 9:6-7; Isa. 61:1-2 (cf. Luke 4:17-19 where Jesus reads only the 1st coming portion); Mal. 3:1-2; Mat. 3:11-12
4. The final week is treated separately from the first sixty-nine.
5. The last half of the seventieth week fits well with what we know elsewhere about the events of the last half of the Tribulation period (Dan. 7:25; 2Th. 2:3ff.; Rev. 12, 13, 19).
6.
Jesus speaks of the
abomination of desolation as yet future (Mat. 24:15; Mark 13:14).[24]
”The sixty-ninth week has already been set off as a distinct unit comprised of
the seven and sixty-two weeks. This would imply in itself that the events of
the seventieth week are to be treated separately. Further, the events in verse
26-'the cutting off of Messiah,' and of the 'people of the prince'--are stated
to occur after the sixty-nine weeks. If this was intended to occur in the
seventieth week, the text would have read here 'during' or 'in the midst of'
(cf. Daniel's use of hetzi, 'in the middle of,' v. 27). This language implies
that these events precede the seventieth week but do not immediately follow the
sixty-ninth. Therefore, a temporal interval separates the two. It is also
important to note that the opening word of verse 27 (higbbir, 'confirm') is
prefixed by the waw consecutive, a grammatical connective that indicates a
close consequential relationship to a preceding verb. This use indicates that
the events of verse 27 are subsequent to those of verse 26. Furthermore, the
very language of these two verses, first speaking of 'the prince [nagid,
'leader'] who is to come' (v. 26), and then of that prince that later comes
(the 'he' of v. 27), implies that a separation of time exists between these
events.” [25]
7. Reasons for a Gap
a) Expectation that the Messianic Kingdom would immediately attend the first advent (Acts 1:6-8)
(1) The timing - delayed (Acts 1:6-7).
(2) Pentecost (the creation of the Church) as an unexpected mystery (Acts 1:8)
(3) Surprise over Gentile inclusion in the work of God (Acts 10:44-47; 15:8)
b) Focus shifts to the Gentiles - the divine purpose in the rejection of Messiah
(1) Salvation has come to the Gentiles, Rom 11:11
(2) Their fall is riches for the world (but how much more their fulness!) Rom. 11:12
(3) Blindness in part until the fulness of the Gentiles has come in (Rom. 11:25)
c) The Church as a mystery [to be covered in session 9]
8. What takes place between the 69th and 70th seven? (v. 26)
a) Messiah shall be cut off - the crucifixion of Jesus
(1) “but not for himself” is better translated “and nothing for him” ol /y}a=w (we-eyn lo).
(2) Isaiah 53:8 He was taken from prison and from judgment, And who will declare His generation? For He was cut off from the land of the living; For the transgressions of My people He was stricken.
b) City and sanctuary destroyed
(1) by the “people of the prince who is to come”
(2) When was Jerusalem and the temple destroyed after it was rebuilt by Zerubbabel? After the 69 weeks?
(3) Jesus predicts this event in Mat. 24:2
(4) 70 A.D. Titus Vespasian
(5) Note the importance of historical context to biblical understanding here: the prince to come will be of Roman genealogy.
H. Final Seven
1. “he” shall confirm a covenant
a) “he will [hip‘îl - cause to make a firm] covenant” (NASB)
b) The identity of “he” is taken to be the “prince” of 9:26, not the “prince” of 9:25 (Messiah). The following reasons apply:
(1)