Daniel 9
 24 “Seventy ’sevens’ are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy.
 25 “Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven ’sevens,’ and sixty-two ’sevens.’ It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble. 26 After the sixty-two ’sevens,’ the Anointed One 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 will confirm a covenant with many for one ’seven.’ In the middle 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. “
God told Daniel, through Gabriel, that the Jews would one day be righteous forever. This is not a promise about each individual Jew who has lived, but the promise of a time when the Jews in general, as a people, would act in righteousness and would do so forever. That time has not yet come. How do I know? Because they do not believe everything that has come from God. They do not obey everything that has come from God. They are not zealous to defend God’s name in the world, and while threaten to met out justice, they let the United States and United Nations stop them. Were they to believe and obey everything God has told them about their role in the world, as a nation, they could act against enemies who want them annihilated and wiped off the earth (I’m not counting peaceful Muslims who just want peace with Israel), and God would be with them. But, they do not, and will not… at not until this prophecy predicts. And when is that?
The prophecy predicts the rebuilding of Israel some time after Daniel wrote this, and that did happen. According to verse 26, after 62 sevens — a time established by Christian theologians to be around the time of Christ – ”the Anointed One will be cut and will have nothing.” I believe Jesus to be the “Anointed One”, and this verse to be a prophecy of His crucifixion.Â
Then, “The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary.” This verse speaks of a ruler who will come. Generally, one would expect “the people” to come after the ruler… but could they come before? The wording allows for it being before or after. Well, the temple was destroy in AD 70, and so fulfills this prophecy, whether the ruler who will come has come yet or not.
Verse 26 can also refer to a time future to even that, to a ruler who has still not come, and a people who have still not destroyed anything… which would make sense if the prophecy refers (only or also) to the destruction of modern Israel, and to a sanctuary not yet built. Personally, I believe this to be a double-prophecy, one that is to be fulfilled twice… hence the wording. Therefore, we are awaiting a ruler of a people who will destroy Jerusalem, and the sanctuary that is yet to be built… though it is in planning! The only thing stopping its construction today is politics… but that will one day be resolved. And when it is, watch, because as verse 26 goes on to say:
The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed. 27 He will confirm a covenant with many for one ’seven.’ In the middle 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.
The end will come suddenly, like a flood. It may even be like how the world collectively views Noah’s flood… going over the entire world, yet localizing in one place (in this, Israel), depending on your perspective, and the end will come in war, which will continue until the end, it has been ordered for Israel to be made a ruin… in particular, Jerusalem and the sanctuary.
Shortly before then however, 1 seven to be precise (which I believe to be 7 years), “the ruler” will make a covenant with Israel, and that is when the sanctuary will be built. Sacrifices will resume as they did in old times, and I suspect that people will be outraged, but they will continue for 3.5 years, the time when the rule will set up an abomination that will cause the destruction of the sanctuary, and ultimately Israel. However, that destruction will not be complete until after the complete 7 years is done. And that is where verse 24 comes in.
 24 “Seventy ’sevens’ are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy.
Notice that in verse 25, the Anointed One will come before the 70th week… in fact, right after the 69th. However, it isn’t after the 70th week when Israel will actually anoint Him. To summarize the sequence:
- Rebuilding of Jerusalem, in times of trouble (v. 25)
- After 69 weeks, the Anointed One (Jesus) comes (v. 25)
- The Anointed one will be cut off (Jesus crucified) (v. 26)
- The sanctuary (temple) will be destroyed in AD 70, by the people of the “ruler who will come” (v. 26)
- Israel was re-established in 1948
- Jerusalem was re-obtained in 1967
- The ruler (antichrist) in verse 26 will eventually come (v. 26)
- The ruler will make a covenant with modern Israel, and that starts the 70th week (v. 27)
- The sanctuary will be rebuilt and ritual sacrifice will be resumed (or else it cannot be cut off in vs. 27)
- In the middle of the week (3.5 years into the covenant), the ruler will end sacrifice and offering (v. 27)
- He will then set up an abomination on the wing of the temple which will eventually cause the desolation of the temple. (v. 27)
- This will continue until the end he prescribed for Israel (v. 26) is turned back on him (v. 27)
- This end will occur at the end of the 70th week (v. 24)
- At that point, Israel will do the following: end their sin, atone for wickedness, turn to righteousness, seal up vision/prophecy, and anoint the most holy (i.e., Jesus)
It is always interesting for me to note that the Anointed one comes before being anointed by Israel… and in between those events He’s cut off. As a Jew, I find these verses very reassuring to my Christian faith. Knowing history makes these verses easy to interpret. It also reassures me of what I’ve been studying about righteousness, but God’s justice. Just yesterday, I was writing about Ezekiel, who wrote that someone who turns from wickedness and lives in righteousness will be saved, because God is just. Then, the next day, my verse is an illustration of the end times when God’s final justice will come for Israel. It will come.