In the Question Chair

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 12, 1901

In the Question Chair.

[Designed for the consideration of such questions as will be of interest and profit to the general reader. All correspondents should give their names and correct post-office address, that queries not replied to here may be answered by mail.]

838.—He Shall Confirm the Covenant.

WILL you kindly inform me to whom the pronoun “he” refers to Dan. 9:27? Refer me to authorities from which I can obtain information in regard to the different chronologies, as Usher’s, Jackson’s, Hale’s, etc. Would be pleased to see the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh verses explained a little more fully than in “Thoughts on Daniel.” The “prince” is applied by some to Titus, and the “covenant” to the Jewish war. How is this?

Mrs. E. F. H., Marquette, Mich.

ANSWER.—The seventy weeks are enumerated in verse 25 of Daniel 9. The commandment to restore and build Jerusalem was the decree of Artaxerxes Longimanus, issued to Ezra, in the seventh year of the reign of that king, B. C. 457. From this point we reckon the periods specified: 1. The seven weeks, or forty-nine years, allotted to the building of the wall, find a proper ending in the last act of reformation by Nehemiah, in the ninth year of Darius Nothus, B. C. 408. Next come the threescore and two weeks, which, added to the preceding seven weeks, make sixty-nine weeks, or four hundred and eighty-three years, to the Messiah the Prince. Christ was manifested as the Messiah, “the anointed One,” at His baptism (Acts 10:38; Luke 4:18); and His baptism occurred at the right time in A. D. 27, autumn, when Christ went forth preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.” This was just 483 years from the time Ezra received his commission from the king, and went up to Jerusalem. Ezra 7. The commandment could be said to have “gone forth,” not when the decree was promulgated (for that was doubtless in the year 458 B. C.), but when it began to be carried into effect. “Now Ezra began to go up to Jerusalem upon the first day of the first month.” He went up, of course, with the decree in his hand, which must have been promulgated long enough before this to bring it into the year 458 B. C. He arrived at Jerusalem on the first day of the fifth month. Verse 9. Allowing two months more for settlement and collection of material, Ezra and his companions would be prepared to drive the first stake for the beginning of the work from which to run their lines of measurement for the different divisions of the long period, in the seventh month of that year, which is the exact season of the year to make the prophecy fit into all the specifications given. Christ’s ministry, as measured by the evangelist John, continued just three years and a half. John 2:13; 5:1; 6:4; 13:1. This was His fourth Passover, in the spring of A. D. 31; and this was His last; for here He was crucified. This last week of the seventy was not a week of seven days, but a prophetic week of seven years. We have seen that the seventy weeks began with the work of building the wall, in the autumn of 457 B. C. And the period that reached to the Messiah the Prince (483 even years) reached to the baptism of Christ, in the autumn of A. D. 27. It is supposed, beyond question, that Christ attended every Passover that occurred during His ministry, but only four, as mentioned above, are recorded. Where would this bring His crucifixion? The Passover always occurred in the spring. Christ’s baptism, occurring in the autumn of A. D. 27, His first Passover would be in the spring of A. D. 28; His second in A. D. 29; His third in A. D. 30; and His fourth at the end of the three years and a half, in the spring of A. D. 31. Here the crucifixion took place. This agrees exactly with the prophecy. “And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself.” How long after?—Three years and a half. “And the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.” The Romans destroyed the city and the sanctuary. The “prince” here spoken of, then, is the prince of the Romans, Titus, who at the head of the Roman armies destroyed

Jerusalem. But “the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined. And he [who?—Christ] shall confirm the covenant with many for one week.” Verses 26, 27. This is the One who causes the sacrifice and oblation to cease. What covenant?—The new covenant, which Christ came to make and ratify. Although the Roman prince is brought in, in the latter part of verse 26, we must not forget that the Messiah is the burden of the prophecy in verses 24, 25, and the first part of verse 26. The prominent theme is the cutting off of the Messiah, His confirming of the covenant, and His causing the sacrifice and oblation to cease, in the midst (middle) of the week. All this points to His crucifixion, three and a half years from the beginning of His ministry in the autumn of A. D. 27. The sacrifice and oblation must refer to the Jewish service connected with the sanctuary, which did virtually cease when the veil of the temple was rent in twain at the crucifixion of Christ, just after He had said, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.” Matt. 23:37, 38.

But how could Christ confirm the new covenant one week (or seven years) when He was cut off, and the services of the temple ceased at and by the crucifixion in the middle of that week? Paul explains (Heb. 2:3): “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation [the new covenant]; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord [was confirmed by Him during the three years and a half of His personal ministry], and was [further] confirmed unto us by them that heard Him [the apostles].” After the crucifixion, in the middle of the last week of the seventy, which were “cut off,” or allotted, to Daniel’s people, three and a half years more remained to complete the whole period. Counting from the spring of A. D. 31, they would terminate in the autumn of A. D. 34; and by that time, and about that time, the Jews had permanently rejected the gospel, Stephen had been martyred, Paul converted, the middle wall of partition between the Jews and the rest of the world was broken down, and Paul and Barnabas waxed bold and said: “It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you [for they were the ones with whom the new covenant was to be made, Heb. 8:8]: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord.” Acts 13:46–48.

Such was the scene which took place when the first great dispensational section of the 2300 days came to an end, and the seventy weeks expired.

Another great epoch in that period remained—when the whole 2300 years should terminate. As the first 490 years ended in A. D. 34, autumn, 1810 years remained to complete the 2300. These, added to A. D. 34, autumn, bring us to the autumn of 1844, where the Grand Trunk of prophecy, the 2300 days, came to an end, and that stupendous move in the heavenly world took place—the transfer of the service in the temple on high from the holy to the most holy place, which ministration is accomplished once for all, and the cleansing of the sanctuary, pointed out to the prophet Daniel in the palace of the king of Babylon, over 2,400 years ago, began.

This scene should have made a greater commotion on earth than that which took place at the end of the seventy weeks. But by this time the theology of the world had been so lumbered up and obscured with the rubbish of error and tradition that but few understood it. But this, thank God, is being cleared away. The concentrated search-light of Rev. 18:1 is yet to shine forth on this subject. The Gentiles will come to the brightness of its rising, till multitudes more will rejoice for the consolation than glorified God for the gracious words spoken by Paul and Barnabas as recorded in Acts 13:48.

Nothing can exceed the beauty and sublimity of the subject of the sanctuary, the prophecies that point to it, and the scriptures that explain the modus operandi of the ministration of Christ for perishing men.

2. CHRONOLOGY.—In answer to the call for references to chronology, we would say that we have always regarded Hale’s chronology a standard on that subject. For a brief and condensed work on the subject, Bliss’s Analysis of Sacred Chronology, published at this Office, would probably be sufficient for all practical purposes.