The Prophecies of Daniel
Part 9: Seven + Sixty-two + One (Daniel 9)
We are still working our way through the prophecies God gave to the Old Testament prophet Daniel. We have seen visions of giant statues, wild beasts, little horns, and a ram and a goat. All of these visions are God’s way of revealing to His children what they were going to have to face in the future. They all concern a period of time known as the Times of the Gentiles.
Last week we began to look at the prophecy found in Daniel chapter nine, which most prophecy scholars would claim to be the most important prophecy found in the Bible. It is the prophecy of the Seventy Weeks. All Bible Prophecy centers around the Jewish people, and this prophecy is no exception. In fact in verse 24 of this chapter we read specifically that the prophecy of the Seventy Weeks is determined upon the Jews, Daniel’s people.
The Seventy Weeks covers a period of time that lasts 490 years in length. It is the length of time determined by God that the Jews would have to face oppression from the Gentiles because of their disobedience to Him. They had let 70 Sabbath years pass without observance and since this Sabbath year occurred only every seven years, they had 70 x 7 or 490 years which to atone for.
Now, the study of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks is a very advanced prophetical study. I’ve tried to keep it as simple as possible, but if you pick up a copy of this morning’s teachings on your way out, you will find that I’ve included more information there than what I’m going to present to you this morning. The reason I did this is because, one, I don’t have enough time to go into great detail from the pulpit, and two, there is some information that you just have to read and study and absorb some before you can understand it.
So, if you take a copy and find yourself bogged down in the extra details or confused, I’d be happy to discuss it with you and try to explain it. Call me or come in before services one Sunday morning and we’ll discuss it. If you don’t take a copy of this teaching, I’m covering the basics this morning. So you should have a good understanding of the Seventy Weeks without the extra details.
So, let’s reread our passage in Daniel 9:24-27 (NKJV), to familiarize ourselves with what we are trying to interpret. “Seventy weeks are determined for your people [Jews] and for your holy city [Jerusalem], to finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, to make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy. [25] Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublesome times. [26] And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself; and the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end of it shall be with a flood, and till the end of the war desolations are determined. [27] Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week; but in the middle of the week he shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate, even until the consummation, which is determined, is poured out on the desolate.”
I. Prophetic Time
When we take a look at the Seventy Weeks of Daniel we see that it is divided up into three parts. It’s separated into a first period of seven weeks, another period of sixty-two weeks, and a third period of one week.
Last Sunday, we learned that on God’s calendar while He is dealing with the Jews, a week stands for a period of seven years. So this time of punishment for the Jews is divided into a period of 49 years, a period of 434 years, and a period of 7 years, which total up to 490 years.
But before we can put these periods of time into history and actually calculate them out and see where they fit we have to know a few things first.
A. Which Calendar?
First, we need to know God’s prophetic calendar. Last week we talked about a day standing for a year when we calculated how long 70 weeks was. This week, since we’re talking about years and we’re going to try to put these 490 years into history, we need to know how long a year is on God’s calendar.
Now, you may be thinking, well, that’s simple. Everyone knows a year is 365 days long with an extra day occurring every fourth year. But it’s not that simple, because over the course of history calendars have changed. Besides the solar calendar, which we follow today, there are at least three other calendars that we could choose from when it comes to calendars as relating to the Jewish people.
1. Ancient Calendar
The first calendar is the Ancient Calendar. Before the year 701 BC all ancient cultures of the world (Assyrians, Chinese, Greek, Babylonians, Egyptians) used what I call the Ancient Calendar. It was a calendar based on a 30-day month and a 360-day year.
We know that God counted time with this calendar by a reference in the Flood story. In Genesis 7:11 you will find that the Flood began on the 17th day of the second month. Then in Genesis 8:3-4 we find that the floodwaters covered the earth for 150 days and that the ark came to rest on the 17th day of the seventh month.
So if you calculate from the 17th day of the second month to the 17th day of the seventh month you have exactly 5 months. And the floodwaters covered the earth for 150 days. So 150 days divided by 5 months gives us a 30-day month. Which is the exact time used by the Ancient Calendars of the world. But somewhere around 701 BC the calendar changed. I’m not sure why. But what’s interesting is that there has been talk about the United Nations adopting the 360-day year once again.
2. Lunar Calendar
A second calendar, which can be associated with the Jews at one point in the history, is the Lunar Calendar. This is a calendar based on the cycles of the moon. It had a 354-day year and it had some major problems because over time the feasts that were supposed to occur in the fall were occurring in the summer. They had to add another month seven times every nineteen years, and it just became too complicated.
3. Jewish Calendar
Then there is the Jewish Calendar, which I’m not positive about, but I believe it is the one they use presently. This is a lunar/solar calendar in which their months are based on the cycles of the moon and their years are based on the cycle of the sun. Don’t ask me how that works, I don’t have a clue.
4. Gregorian Calendar
And then of course we have our own Gregorian Calendar, which is a solar calendar that was set up based on the birth of Christ. This is the most widely used calendar in the world today. So that leads us to the question, when trying to figure out where this prophecy of the Seventy Weeks fits into history, which calendar do we use? This is important because we can get vastly different answers based on which calendar we use.
Well, after reading several prophecy studies by prominent scholars and commentaries and just studying this myself, I feel safe to say that God uses the Ancient Calendar of a 360-day year and a 30-day month when He counts time with the Jews. I say this for several reasons, but I’ll just list two of them.
One reason is that elsewhere in Scripture we have passages that talk about the length of the Tribulation (which is for the Jews) being 3 and a half years or 1,260 days. Three and a half years is only equal to 1,260 days if you are using the Ancient Calendar. On our calendar three and a half years is approximately 1,277 days.
The second reason is that God gave this vision to Daniel the year the Babylonian Empire fell, and we know that Babylon used the Ancient Calendar it was the calendar Daniel would have been familiar with, so it makes since that this would be the calendar God was using to calculate the 490 years of this vision.
II. Dividing Up the Seventy Weeks
So, let’s try to place Daniel’s Seventy Weeks into history. I’ve included a handout charting this topic so that you can visualize the timing as we go through.
A. Starting Point
To begin counting out the 490 years of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks, we first need to have a starting point. We need to know when God started His time clock on this period of time for the Jews. We can find the answer by looking at two passages of Scripture.
First, Daniel 9:25, “Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublesome times.”
God tells Daniel that He will start counting time with the decree or command to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. So, when did this decree occur? Nehemiah tells us. Nehemiah was the cupbearer to the king of the Medo-Persian Empire.
Nehemiah 2:1-6, “In the month of Nisan [March/April] in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes [445 BC], when wine was brought for him, I [Nehemiah] 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 forever! Why should my face not look sad when the city where my fathers are buried [Jerusalem] 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 God of heaven, [5] and I answered the king, “If it pleases the king and if your servant has found favor in his sight, let him send me to the city in Judah where my fathers are buried [Jerusalem] so that I can rebuild it.” [6] Then the king, with the queen sitting beside him, asked me, “How long will your journey take, and when will you get back?” It pleased the king to send me; so I set a time.”
From this passage we see that Nehemiah was the one who persuaded the King of the Persian Empire to let the Jews rebuild their city. Verse one tells us that this occurred in the month of Nisan, which occurs in our months of March and April, and the twentieth year of Artaxerxes reign, which can be dated to 445 BC. Through historical documents many scholars pinpoint the exact date of these decree to rebuild Jerusalem as March 14, 445 BC.
So God began counting down the 490 years which He determined upon the Jews on March 14, 445 BC.
But as we mentioned before, Daniel’s Seventy Weeks is divided up into three parts. The first part is 7 weeks long or 49 years. What happened forty-nine years later that was so significant that God separated the time at this point? While I could not find an exact date, it is generally taught that it took 49 years to totally rebuild the city of Jerusalem and that is what the reference to the first seven week period is referring to.
B. The Ending Point
The second part of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks is sixty-two weeks long. In verses 25 and 26 of chapter nine we are told about what happens at the end of these 62 weeks or 434 years. “Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, there shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublesome times. [26] And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself;…”
So, the second part or division of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks will end when the Messiah is cut off or killed, but not for Himself. This of course is referring to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ who died for our iniquity and to save us not to save Himself, as foretold in the book of Isaiah 53:7-8, “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. [8] By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And who can speak of his descendants? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was stricken.”
The exact date for this event is hard to pinpoint and is actually controversial. Some scholars have the end of this 62-week period occurring when Jesus made His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. Some use the date of His actual crucifixion. And even then, scholars can’t seem to agree on an exact date. Some say He was crucified in the year 30 AD, others say it was 32 AD or 33 AD. For the purpose of this teaching and in making my own calculations I chose the most popular date of April 6, 32 AD.
So, Daniel’s Seventy Weeks began on March 14, 445 BC and sixty-nine of those weeks have passed and concluded on April 6, 32 AD. 483 years of the 490-year “sentence” have been fulfilled. (See “Calculations of Daniel’s First 69 Weeks”)
I’ve included in the take-home teaching a section called “Calculations of Daniel’s first 69 Weeks in which I show you that these dates can be proven as the beginning and ending points of the 69 Weeks.
III. Time Gap and Daniel’s 70th Week
This brings us to the third part or division of the Seventy Weeks. The first part was 7 weeks long, then the second part was 62 weeks long, and that leaves us with a part that will be 1 week or 7 years long. I say, “will be,” because this part has never been fulfilled. God stopped His time clock at the end of the 69th Week and is still waiting to count out the final seven years that are determined for the Jews. This week is a future event.
This fact confuses many people. They don’t understand this large gap of time between the 69th and 70th Weeks. They say that you can’t find that in the text. However, God said that He had determined Seventy Weeks upon the Jews and Jerusalem, He didn’t say they were consecutive years.
A. The Israel In Unbelief Theory
Now, I want to insert something right here before we go on. There is a popular theory that is being taught by many of the most well-known prophecy teachers that talks about the time gap between the 69th and 70th weeks in Daniel. This theory is based on the idea that God only counts time amongst His people the Jews, when the majority of Jews and their religious leaders are faithful to Him. They claim that when the Jews are in a period of unbelief, when they’ve turned their backs on God, or when they are in a period of servitude or slavery to another nation, then God stops His time clock.
They have even gone through the Bible to prove this theory and said that God has done this before, - had a cycle of 490 years determined upon the Jews. They claim there are four of these cycles beginning with the birth of Abraham and then subtracting the years when the Jews were in captivity or unbelief. They say this proves their theory. They then say that this is why there is a gap between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel. That the Jews are presently in unbelief, and God won’t start counting time with them again until they are once again following Him.
Now, this is a good theory, and in fact I was all ready to present it to you this morning and show you the previous cycles of 490 years that they calculated. But as I was trying to prepare this section of the teaching I kept running into problems that I couldn’t solve and discrepancies that I couldn’t answer. So, while I don’t totally discount this theory of God not counting time with the Jews when they are in unbelief, I don’t support it either. Therefore, I’m not going to teach it to you since I can’t agree with it. (If you are curious about it and want to know the theory and discuss it, I’d be happy to do so at a later date.)
B. Verse 26 Shows the Time Gap
But, back to the gap between the 69th and 70th weeks. I can’t say that the reason God stopped His time clock with the Messiah being cut off is because the Jews are in unbelief. But I do not deny that He did appear to stop counting off the 490 years in 32 AD. And I believe He shows us this fact right in our Scripture passage.
Daniel 9:26-27 (NIV), “After the sixty-two ‘sevens,’ the Anointed One [Messiah, Jesus Christ] will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed. [27] He [Antichrist] will confirm a covenant with many for one ‘seven.’ In the midst of the ‘seven’ he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.”
These two verses cover a vast amount of time. The beginning of verse 26 refers to Jesus’ first coming and His death. Then with the very next sentence we have a reference to Titus and the Romans who destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 AD.
And the last sentence of verse 26 appears to be talking about the entire Church Age from Christ to the coming Antichrist when it say wars will continue to the end. That one sentence is our time gap. Because with the beginning of verse 27 we see that the Antichrist has appeared on the scene. His making a covenant with the Jews will mark the beginning of the last seven years or Daniel’s 70th Week.
We also know that God returns to counting this last week as a set of seven 360-day years because of references in Revelation that tell us half of the week or three and a half years is equal to 1, 260 days. This is only true on the Ancient Calendar. Since God counted the first 69 weeks as 360-day years, it only makes sense that He would count the last week in 360-day years.
The seven-year Tribulation Period is often called Daniel’s 70th Week because as you can see from verse 27 they are referring to the same time period. The Tribulation is the last seven years of judgment the Jews have to bear in order for their 490-year punishment to be fulfilled.
We will be taking a break for the next two weeks from the prophecies of Daniel because of the Easter Season. After that we will see where the Spirit leads, if we will finish the last few chapters of Daniel or turn our attention elsewhere.
Sermon Sources
Larkin, Rev. Clarence. The Book of Daniel. Clarence Larkin Estate, Glenside, PA. Copyright 1929.
Stone, Dr. Perry. Sixty-Nine Weeks and One To Go. Two Hour Videotape Teaching. VOE.org. Copyright.
Calculations of Daniel’s First 69 Weeks
(Daniel 9)
Introduction
The purpose of this additional section of teaching is to try to explain how I calculated the first 69 weeks of Daniel 9:24-27. Math is not my strong point, so I apologize if there are any errors in my calculations. Likewise, though I enjoy history, I am not an historian, therefore, the dates used are the most popular and accepted dates put forth by historians and Bible scholars. However, I acknowledge the fact that should new information be found to negate such dates that the proof I am about to show you would be invalid.
There is also the added difficulty of counting time when it crosses from BC to AD or vice versa on our present calendar. Some claim that we must count the years 1 BC and 1 AD as the same year, while others say that we need to count them as two separate years. I do not know which idea is correct, but for the basis of my calculations I considered 1 BC and 1 AD as the same year, thus just counting them as one year and not two.
So, having made you aware of all of these factors which could ultimately affect the outcome of this exercise, take my results for what they are worth – the best efforts of a rank amateur.
Calculating the 69 Weeks
From our teaching in Part 9 of our studies of the prophecies of Daniel, we learned that God uses the Ancient Calendar when counting time with the Children of Israel. The Ancient Calendar has 360 days per year.
We also learned that the starting and ending dates for calculating the first 69 weeks are March 14, 445 BC and April 6, 32 AD. But these dates are based on our present solar calendar, which has 365 days per year with an extra day every fourth year.
So in order to see if we have the correct starting and ending dates and therefore have interpreted the prophecy of Daniel 9 correctly, we must convert years to days for both periods of time. We do this because no matter which calendar we use the length of the day is the same. Therefore we can compare days to days instead of years to years which are of different lengths in each calendar.
Convert 69 Weeks to Days
The first step would be to convert the 69 weeks to days. Since the 69 weeks is based on God’s timing, we must use the Ancient Calendar year of 360 days in our calculations.
1 week = 7 years
69 weeks = 69 x 7 = 483 years
483 years x 360 days per year = 173,880 days
69 weeks in God’s timing is equal to 173,880 days.
Convert March 14, 445BC – April 6, 32AD Into Days
Now, in order to see if we chose the correct starting and ending dates in our interpretation of this prophecy, we must now see if there are 173,880 days between March 14, 445BC and April 6, 32 AD on our solar calendar.
To begin this calculation we must first find out how many years are between these two dates. From 445 BC to 1 BC/AD there are a total of 444 complete years.
445 – 1 = 444 years
We don’t count the year 445 BC, because it was not a complete year. We will only count the days between March 14 and December 31, 445 BC. We will add those days in later.
From 1BC/AD to 32 AD there are a total of 31 complete years.
32 – 1 = 31 years
Again we don’t count the year 32 AD since it was not a complete year. We will only count the days between January 1 and April 6, 32 AD. We will add those days in later as well.
So when we add these two amounts together we see that from 445 BC to 32 AD there are a total of 475 years on our calendar.
444 + 31 = 475 total years on the solar calendar.
Now we need to convert these to days to begin our comparison. We must multiply the number of years by 365 days, because this is the solar calendar.
475 years x 365 days per year = 173,375 days
Leap Years
But we are not done yet. We need to add the leap years in as well. If we take the 475 years between our starting and ending dates and divide that number by 4, since a leap year occurs every four years we will get the total number of leap year days we need to add to our total.
475 years / 4 = 118.75 leap years between 445 BC and 32 AD
173,375 days + 118 leap year days = 173,493 days
(I did not add in the .75 because this is not a complete day. It just shows us that three years had passed since the last leap year.)
Partial Years
So, we’re getting closer. Now we must add in the days of the two partial years. As I said before, 445 BC was not a complete year, so we couldn’t count it as a 365-day year. But since we are working with days in our comparison, we must add in the days from March 14 to December 31, 445 BC.
From March 14 to March 31 there were 17 days. (31-14 = 17) We do not count March 14 as a day because it was not a complete 24-hour period. The first 24-hour day occurred on March 15 so there are only 17 days from March 14 to March 31 instead of 18.
445 BC
March = 17 days
April = 30 days
May = 31 days
June = 30 days
July = 31 days
August = 31 days
September = 30 days
October = 31 days
November = 30 days
December = 31 days
17 + 30 + 31 + 30 + 31 + 31 + 30 + 31 + 30 + 31 = 292 days
So, from March 14 to December 31, 445 BC there were 292 days. Add these days to our total.
173,493 + 292 = 173,785 days
And likewise, 32 AD was not a complete year so we can only add the days between January 1 and April 6 of 32 AD. Again we don’t count April 6 because it was not a full 24-hour day. So in the month of April we will only count 5 full days instead of 6.
32 AD
January = 31 days
February = 28 days
March = 31 days
April = 5 days
31 + 28 + 31 + 5 = 95 days
From January 1 to April 6, 32 AD there were a total of 95 days. Add these to our total.
173, 785 + 95 = 173,880 days
69 weeks equals 173,880 days on God’s calendar, and from March 14, 445 BC to April 6, 32 AD we have a total of 173,880 days on our solar calendar. Therefore we have proven our interpretation of Daniel 9 to the very day.
