The Seventy Weeks

For Antiochus arose, the one surnamed Epiphanes, who came of Alexander’s line. After he had reigned in Syria and had brought all Egypt under him, he went up to Jerusalem, entered the sanctuary, and seized all the treasures in the house of the Lord — the golden lampstand, the table, and the altar — and he made a great slaughter in the land, just as it is written: “And the sanctuary will be trampled underfoot, evening and morning, one thousand three hundred days.” For the sanctuary did in fact lie desolate through that stretch of time, three and a half years, so that the thousand three hundred days would be filled out — until Judas Maccabeus rose up after the death of his father Mattathias, stood against him, destroyed the camp of Antiochus, freed the city, recovered the sanctuary, and restored it exactly according to the law.

Since, then, the angel Gabriel also recounted these things to the prophet — as we have understood them, and as they in fact happened, and as they are all clearly set down in the books of the Maccabees — let us look further at what he says about the other weeks. When Daniel read the book of Jeremiah the prophet, where it was written that the sanctuary would be desolate for seventy years, he made confession with fasting and pleading, and prayed that the people might come back sooner from their captivity to the city of Jerusalem. Here is how he tells it: “In the first year of Darius son of Ahasuerus, of Median descent, who was king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans, I, Daniel, understood from the books the number of the years, as the word of the Lord had come to Jeremiah the prophet, for the completing of the desolation of Jerusalem — seventy years,” and so on.

After his confession and his pleading, the angel says to him: “You are a man of desires” — for you long to see things that I am going to tell you about, and in their own time they will be fulfilled. And he touched me, saying: “Seventy weeks are decided upon your people and upon the holy city, to seal up sins and to wipe away wrongs, and to seal up vision and prophet, and to anoint the Most Holy. And you will know and understand that from the going out of the word for the answer, and for the building of Jerusalem, to Christ the Prince, there will be seven weeks, and sixty-two weeks.”

So, having named seventy weeks and having divided them into two parts, in order that what he said to the prophet might be better understood, he goes on: “To Christ the Prince there will be seven weeks” — which comes to forty-nine years. It was in the twenty-first year that Daniel saw these things in Babylon. So the forty-nine years added to the twenty-one make up the seventy years that the blessed Jeremiah spoke of: “The sanctuary will be desolate for seventy years, from the captivity that came upon them under Nebuchadnezzar; and after that the people will return, and sacrifice and offering will be presented, when Christ is their Prince.”

Now which Christ is he speaking of, if not Joshua son of Jozadak, who came back at that time along with the people and offered sacrifice according to the law, in the seventieth year, when the sanctuary was built? For all the kings and the priests were called christs, because they were anointed with the holy oil that Moses prepared long ago. They carried the name of the Lord in their own persons, then, showing the pattern in advance and holding up the image, until the perfect King and Priest appeared from heaven, the one who alone did the Father’s will — as it is also written in Kings: “And I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who will do everything according to my heart.”

So, to show the time when the one the blessed Daniel longed to see would come, he says, “And after seven weeks there are another sixty-two weeks” — a span of 434 years. For after the people returned from Babylon under the leadership of Joshua son of Jozadak, and Ezra the scribe, and Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, of the tribe of David, there were 434 years until the coming of Christ, so that the Priest of priests might be made known in the world, and the one who takes away the sins of the world might be plainly set out, as John says about him: “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” And Gabriel says the same thing: “To wipe away wrongs, and to make atonement for sins.” But who has wiped away our wrongs? The apostle Paul teaches us: “He is our peace, who made the two one”; and then, “wiping out the handwritten note of the sins that stood against us.”

This shows, then, that wrongs are wiped away and that atonement is made for sins. And who are the ones whose sins are atoned for, if not those who trust his name and win his favor by good works? And that there was a span of 434 years from the return of the people from Babylon until the time of Christ’s birth is easy enough to see. For since the first covenant was given to the children of Israel after a period of 434 years, it follows that the second covenant should be marked off by the same length of time, so that the people would be expecting it and the faithful would recognize it easily.

And this is why Gabriel says, “And to anoint the Most Holy.” And the Most Holy is no one else but the Son of God alone, who, when he came and showed himself, said to them, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me,” and so on. So everyone who trusted the heavenly Priest was cleansed by that same Priest, and their sins were wiped away. But whoever did not trust him, looking down on him as merely a man, had their sins sealed up, as sins that could not be taken away. That is why the angel, seeing ahead that not everyone would trust him, said, “To finish sins, and to seal up sins.” For all who went on refusing to trust him, right to the end, did not have their sins finished, but sealed and kept for judgment. But all who will trust him as one able to forgive sins have their sins wiped away. And so he says, “And to seal up vision and prophet.”

For when the one came who is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets — since the law and the prophets were until John — it was necessary that the things they had spoken should be confirmed, that is, sealed, so that at the Lord’s coming everything loosed might be brought to light, and the things bound long ago might now be loosed by him. So the Lord himself said to the rulers of the people, when they were indignant at a cure on the sabbath: “You hypocrites, does not each one of you loose his ox or his donkey from the stall and lead it away to water? And should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound these eighteen years, be loosed on the sabbath?” So everyone Satan had bound in chains, the Lord at his coming loosed from the bonds of death, having bound our strong enemy and set the human race free. As Isaiah also says: “Then he will say to those in chains, Come out; and to those in darkness, Show yourselves.”

And that the things spoken long ago by the law and the prophets were all sealed, and unknown to people, Isaiah states when he says: “And they will hand the sealed book to someone who is educated and say to him, Read this; and he will say, I cannot read it, for it is sealed.” It was fitting and necessary that the things spoken long ago by the prophets should be sealed to the Pharisees, who would not trust and who thought they understood the letter of the law, and opened to those who did trust. So the things that were sealed long ago are now, by the grace of God the Lord, all open to his holy ones.

For he himself was the perfect Seal, and the church is the key: “He who opens, and no one shuts; and shuts, and no one opens,” as John says. And again the same John says: “And I saw, in the right hand of the one seated on the throne, a scroll written inside and out, sealed with seven seals; and I saw an angel proclaiming in a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the scroll and to loose its seals?” and so on. “And I looked, and in the middle of the throne and of the four living creatures, a Lamb standing, slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent out into all the earth. And he came and took the scroll out of the right hand of the one seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, holding harps and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the holy ones. And they sing a new song: You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you bought us for God.” He took the scroll, then, and loosed it, so that the things said about him long ago in secret might now be announced openly from the housetops.

For this reason, then, the angel says to Daniel, “Seal the words, for the vision is until the end of the time.” But to Christ it was not said “seal,” but “loose” the things bound long ago — so that by his grace we might know the Father’s will and trust the one he has sent for the salvation of humanity, Jesus our Lord. And so he says, “They will return, and the street will be built, and the wall” — which is in fact what happened. For the people returned and built the city, and the temple, and the wall around it. Then he says: “After sixty-two weeks the times will be fulfilled, and one week will make a covenant with many; and in the middle of the week sacrifice and offering will be taken away, and in the temple will be the abomination of desolations.”

For when the sixty-two weeks are finished, and Christ has come, and the good news is preached in every place, and the times are then complete, there will remain only one week, the last, in which Elijah will appear, and Enoch; and in the middle of it the abomination of desolation will be revealed — that is, Antichrist, announcing desolation to the world. And when he comes, the sacrifice and the offering will be taken away, which are now offered to God in every place by the nations. Having recounted all this, the prophet describes yet another vision to us. For he had no other concern than to be taught exactly all the things that were to come, and to prove himself a teacher of such things.

He says, then: “In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia, a word was revealed to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar; and the word was true, and great power and understanding were given him in the vision. In those days I, Daniel, was mourning for three full weeks. I ate no choice bread, no meat or wine came into my mouth, and I did not anoint myself at all, until the three full weeks were over. On the fourth day of the first month I humbled myself” — he says — “twenty-one days,” praying to the living God and asking him to reveal the mystery. And the Father did indeed hear me, and sent his own Word to show what was going to happen through him. And that took place by the great river; for it was fitting that the Son should be shown there, where he was also to take sins away.

“And I lifted up my eyes,” he says, “and look — a man clothed in linen.” In the first vision he says, “Look, the angel Gabriel was sent.” Here, however, it is not so; here he sees the Lord — not yet as complete man, but with the look and the shape of a man, as he says: “And look, a man clothed in linen.” For in being clothed in a coat of many colors he was pointing, as in a mystery, to the many kinds of grace in our calling. The priest’s coat was made of different colors because different nations were waiting for Christ’s coming, so that we might be made into one body out of many colors. “And his waist was bound with the gold of Ophaz.”

Now the word “Ophaz,” a word carried over from Hebrew into Greek, means pure gold. So it was with a pure belt that he was bound around the waist. For the Word was going to carry us all, binding us like a belt around his body in his own love. The complete body was his; but we are limbs in his body, joined together and held up by the Word himself. “And his body was like Tharses.” Now “Tharses,” translated, means “Ethiopians.” For the prophet had already announced beforehand that he would be hard to recognize, indicating that he would be made known in the flesh in the world, but that many would find it hard to recognize him. “And his face like lightning, and his eyes like lamps of fire” — for it was fitting that the fiery and judging power of the Word should be signaled in advance, the power by which he will make the fire of his judgment fall justly on the godless and burn them up.

He added these words too: “And his arms and his feet like polished bronze,” to mark the first calling of people and the second calling like it — the calling of the Gentiles. “For the last will be as the first; for I will set your rulers as at the beginning, and your leaders as before. And his voice was like the voice of a great crowd.” For all of us who trust him in these days speak oracles, saying by his mouth the things he has appointed.

And a little later he says to him: “Do you know why I have come to you? And now I will go back to fight with the prince of Persia. But I will show you what is written down in the Scripture of truth; and there is no one who holds with me in these things except Michael your prince, and I left him there. For from the day you set your face to be afflicted before the Lord your God, your prayer was heard, and I was sent to fight with the prince of Persia” — for a decision had been made not to let the people go — “so that your prayer might be granted quickly, I stood against him and left Michael there.”