The Seventy Weeks I

Daniel 9

9:24 Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people

and upon thy holy city, to finish the

transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to

make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in

everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the

vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.

9:25 Know therefore and understand, that from the

going forth of the commandment to restore and to

build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall

be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the

street shall be built again, and the wall, even

in troublous times.

9:26 And after threescore and two weeks shall

Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the

people of the prince that shall come shall

destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end

thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end

of the war desolations are determined.

9:27 And he shall confirm the covenant with many

for one week: and in the midst of the week he

shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation

to cease, and for the overspreading of

abominations he shall make it desolate, even

until the consummation, and that determined shall

be poured upon the desolate.


From verse 24, there are six major events that

are identified over this prophetic period of

(seventy sevens) 490 years:
1. to finish transgression
2. to put an end to sin
3. to atone for wickedness
4. to bring in everlasting righteousness
5. to seal up vision and prophecy
6. to anoint the most holy
'As none of the six acheivements were explained,

it leaves the expositor to find a plausible

explanation.'p.251


As soon as an attempt is made to interpret this

490 year period, there is a wide range of

disagreement over which historic events represent

these six criteria listed in verse 24. It's

similar to the issues that arise from the book of

the Revelation. And I tend to agree with the

observation that Morris makes in his commentary

that, '...The Book of Revelation isn't hard to

understand -- it's hard to *believe*!' p.25 Same

for the book of Daniel. From Walvoord, 'As in

other problems in prophecy, so much of the

difficulty comes when interpreters fail to take

note of the particulars of the prophecy. Once it

is understood that prophecy needs to be fulfilled

literally and completely, many of the problems

disappear.' p.257 So, I just don't want to get

bogged down trying to answer every single

objection that's been raised against every

attempt at interpretation. Let's just try to

work out a timeframe of events, given that there

are 490 years and all but seven of those years

have been literally fulfilled.


The most relevant point in historic time is the

resurrection of Jesus. Our modern calendar is

structured in recognition of that singular event.

I'd lean toward the interpretation that the

first five of these six criteria have been met,

the first four were met by the life, sacrifice

and resurrection of Jesus. The fifth criteria

was met with the completion of the final book of

scripture -- the book of the Revelation recorded

by John on the Isle of Patmos. And the final

criteria represents the beginning of the

millennial reign of Jesus, the last event to

follow the completion of the remaining seven

years of the 490.


Looking at the record of history, the 490 years

begin with the passage recorded in Nehemiah 2:


1 In the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of

King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought for him, I

took the wine and gave it to the king. I had not

been sad in his presence before;

2 so the king asked me, “Why does your face look

so sad when you are not ill? This can be nothing

but sadness of heart.” I was very much afraid,

3 but I said to the king, “May the king live for

ever! Why should my face not look sad when the

city where my fathers are buried lies in ruins,

and its gates have been destroyed by fire?”

4 The king said to me, “What is it you want?”

Then I prayed to the G-d of heaven,

5 and I answered the king, “If it pleases the

king and if your servant has found favour in his

sight, let him send me to the city in Judah where

my fathers are buried so that I can rebuild it.”


Verse one provides an exact historic reference

for the date of this event. Scholars figure that

the date is 444-445 B.C. As far as I know, this

is not a controversial date. From Daniel 9:25-26

in the passage above, the exact time is given for

the period '...from the going forth of the

commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem

unto the Messiah the Prince...' That would be a

total of 483 years. But there is a discrepancy

since 444 B.C. to 33 A.D is 444 + 32 = 476. The

time has to be translated from prophetic years to

solar calendar years. In prophetic years, a 360

day calendar is used, so 360 x 483 = 173,880

days. To translate prophetic years to solar

calendar years is 476 x 365 + 116 days in leap

years + 24 days (March 5 - March 30) = 173,880

days. This is taken directly from Walvoord, p.254,

and I'd have to agree, for the most part. The only

quibble that I have with this calculation is that

I don't see any requirement for an exact count of

the number of days, because the prophecy was not

given as a specific number of days, only a

specific number of prophetic 'weeks', which

translate into years. I lean toward the idea

that the reason that years are used in this

prophecy, and others, rather than days is because

of the way that Jesus described the end times.


Matthew 24

35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words

will never pass away.

36 “No-one knows about that day or hour, not even

the angels in heaven, nor the Son, [Some

manuscripts: do not have nor the Son.] but only

the Father.

37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be

at the coming of the Son of Man.

38 For in the days before the flood, people were

eating and drinking, marrying and giving in

marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark;

39 and they knew nothing about what would happen

until the flood came and took them all away. That

is how it will be at the coming of the Son of

Man.


In other words, we are not given an exact, to the

day, hour and minute prophetic message because

there are some things that we do not need to

know. Jesus said that the exact time of his

return is one of the dates that we cannot know

about in advance, only that we can interpret the

'signs of the times'. 'As it was in the days of

Noah' sounds to me as if it will appear to be

just another ordinary day, except that there will

be a symbolic figure to represent the

construction of the ark by Noah. That symbolic

figure is the 'construction' of the covenant

nation of Israel (the ark). The symbolism is

there for a reason. The reason is not so that we

can pinpoint the exact day, hour and minute.


In fact, if it were just up to me, I would take

the prophecy of the 'weeks' of Daniel to conclude

that there is a range that can be somewhere in

the neighborhood of seven years (one week) that

will still satisfy a literal fulfillment of the

prophecy. But that's just me. It's not until we

get a look at the book of the Revelation that

future prophetic time frames become more

specific, and are given as an exact number of

days. I would apply the same standard to that

prophecy as well. The elapsed time can be within

a day and still satisfy the literal prophecy. I

mean, come on, how can anyone with any sense of

reason question the literal fulfillment of the

timeframe given by Daniel's seventy weeks from

the time of the rebuilding of Jerusalem under

Nehemiah until the crucifixtion of Christ? If

you are compelled to argue about that, even if

the prophecy was given in an exact number of

days, there would be an attempt to discredit it

based on a discrepancy of some number of hours.

So, I lean toward the idea that this prophecy and

its literal fulfillment has to be kept within the

context of its original language and recognize

that it is not intended to provide an exact day

count, but rather to outline historical periods.

And in that context, it has served a most

excellent purpose, and leaves us with one week on

the prophetic clock.