Definite Time Allotted to the Jews
By Jean Vuilleumier
Specific Prophecy of the Overthrow of the Jews as a Nation—The Time of Christ's First Advent Clearly Predicted
What Daniel the Prophet Saw
Last week Mr. Vuilleumier concluded his studies of the papacy as presented in the eighth and ninth chapters of Daniel's prophetic book. The article this week continues the studies in Daniel by considering that portion of the ninth chapter which foretells the overthrow of the Jews as an independent nation and the first advent of the Messiah. Next week his article will pertain to that part of the prophecy which deals with the termination of the period of two thousand three hundred prophetic days. When did these days terminate, and what great event marks their close? EDITOR. "In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans, in the first year of his reign." Dan. 9: 1, 2. A few short and eventful months had passed since the fall of Babylon into the hands of the Medes and Persians in 538 B. C. Cyrus, the general in chief and conqueror, had loyally stepped aside, and left the scepter of this new realm to his uncle and father-in-law, Darius the Mede, son of Ahasuerus (Dan. 5: 31), called by Xenophon Cyaxares II, son of Astyages. "I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years whereof the word of Jehovah came to Jeremiah the prophet, for the accomplishing of the desolations of Jerusalem, even seventy years." Dan. 9: 2. "THE GRAND OLD MAN" OF PERSIA
Daniel was then about eighty-six years of age. He was in more senses than one "the grand old man" of the empire, and had immediately received high recognition from the conquerors. But these earthly honors he considered only as means to the furtherance of God's work. His constant study of the divine parchments, and his solicitude for his exile people, enabled him to recognize in Cyrus the providential man named in the prophecy of Isaiah, one hundred and seventy-four years earlier — the one before whom God would "break in pieces the doors of brass," and who should say of Jerusalem, "She shall be inhabited," and to the temple, "Thy foundation shall be laid." Isa. 44: 26-28; 45: 1-3. From Daniel's study of the prophecies of Jeremiah also, he knew that the captivity of his people in Babylon was to terminate in about two years. He could not doubt that he had a responsibility in making Cyrus acquainted with his God-given mission in this important event. This was no small request to bring before a pagan ruler, the heir to the Babylonian throne. Again, Daniel felt that his people needed to be awakened to their duty to return to Judea when the way opened, and therefore to humble themselves before God for the sins that had caused their exile. Hence the anxiety and the earnest prayer of the aged prophet: "And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting and sackcloth and ashes." Dan. 9: 3. The prayer that follows is the most heartfelt and touching confession found anywhere. Then comes his supplication to God to let His anger be "turned away from Thy city Jerusalem, Thy holy mountain." CONCERNED FOR THE DESOLATED SANCTUARY
"Now therefore, O our God, hearken unto the prayer of Thy servant, and to his supplications, and cause Thy face to shine upon Thy sanctuary that is desolate." Dan. 9: 17. The desolation of God's sanctuary, that marvel of architecture built by Solomon, was a special cause for reproach against the Jewish nation. But more than that, the sanctuary was the center of the worship rendered to the true God; and while it lay in ruins, the work of God in the earth seemed to have come to a standstill. Daniel felt this all the more keenly from the fact that a few months before, in his last vision, an angel had spoken to him these mysterious words: "Unto two thousand and three hundred evenings and mornings; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed." Dan. 8: 14. What was this sanctuary? What were those two thousand three hundred days? Why had not this portion of his vision been explained, like the other portions, especially since the angel added, "And the vision of the evenings and mornings which hath been told is true"? Dan. 8: 26. All this increased the fervor of the prophet's petition, and he exclaimed in his utter helplessness:
"O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, hearken and do; defer not, for Thine own sake, O my God, because Thy city and Thy people are called by Thy name." Dan. 9: 19. The old Hebrew prophet and statesman was still lost in his devotions, when the very angel Gabriel who had been appointed to explain to him his last vision, drew near to him, and spoke on this wise:7
"O Daniel, I am now come forth to give thee wisdom and understanding. At the beginning of thy supplications the commandment went forth, and I am come to tell thee; for thou art greatly beloved: therefore consider the matter, and understand the vision." Dan. 9: 22, 23. How swift the answer, and how great the relief! Daniel has now lost all anxiety as to his interview with Cyrus, and the restoration of the temple, and the understanding of the mysterious vision. The angel resumed his explanations exactly where he had left them a few months earlier, and proceeded to explain prophetic periods. DEFINITE TIME FOR THE JEWS
"Seventy weeks are decreed upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy." Dan. 9: 24. The Hebrew word translated "decreed" is chatak, and as is agreed, should be rendered "cut off." The seventy weeks are cut off from some longer period. Which one? — Undoubtedly from the period of two thousand and three hundred days mentioned at the end of the former vision. From this long symbolic period of literal years, seventy weeks, or four hundred ninety days (seventy times seven equals four hundred ninety), representing literal years, are measured off upon the Jewish people, and upon the holy city of Jerusalem. What a solemn declaration! A little less than five hundred years was to be the whole period allotted to the favored Jewish nation. And when the times of the Jews expired, then "the times of the gentiles" were to begin. God's object in setting apart a people from all other nations was to be fulfilled in these remaining five hundred years by allowing the "transgression" of that people to reach its climax in the rejection of the Messiah, by bringing in the glorious victory over sin, and at the same time making "reconciliation for iniquity," and bringing in "everlasting righteousness." DEFINITE TIME MEETS THE PREDICTION
This was all to be achieved by the holy life and the atoning death of the Son of God. And as this was to occur at the exact time predicted, this wonderful fulfillment would "seal up" or fully demonstrate the divine veracity of this prophecy, and in fact of all prophecy. Even more: while, at the end of this period, the sanctuary of the old covenant was to disappear, a new sanctuary, or holy place, was to be "anointed" and inaugurated by the Son of God, thus to become the center of God's worship through "the times of the gentiles," or times of the new covenant. "Know therefore and discern, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Anointed One, the Prince, shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: it shall be built again, with street and moat, even in troublous times." Dan. 9: 25. The starting point of the whole prophetic period is here given. Both the two thousand and three hundred years, and the four hundred ninety years cut off from them, are to begin with a decree for the rebuilding and restoration of Jerusalem. And from that point, sixty-nine weeks of years, or four hundred eighty-three years (sixty-nine times seven equals four hundred eighty-three), will bring us to the Messiah Himself. (The English "Anointed" is the translation of the Hebrew word "Messiah.") When was the famous decree given? The decree of Cyrus given two years after this vision (536 B. C.), only provided for the rebuilding of the temple at Jerusalem; while the decree given to Esdras by King Artaxerxes (1 Esdras 7) fully answers to the terms of the prophecy, requiring the "restoration and the building" of the holy city. This decree was issued in the seventh year of Artaxerxes Longimanus, which fell on the year 457 B. C. This point of Biblical chronology, to which has been given exhaustive research, is absolutely beyond dispute. DID THE PROPHECY STAND THE TEST?
All we have to do, therefore, is to find out whether the specifications of the prophecy took place at the dates marked out. The first division of the period is the seven weeks allotted for building the "streets and moats" "in troublous times." Seven weeks correspond to forty-nine prophetic days or literal years (seven times seven equals forty-nine). It took exactly forty-nine years, says Prideaux, in his learned "History of the Jews," "to complete the reestablishment of the Jewish church and state in Jerusalem and in Judea." This brings us to 408 B. C. CAME AT THE PREDICTED TIME
The next division, "threescore and two weeks," or four hundred thirty-four literal years (sixty-two times seven equals four hundred thirty-four), counted from 408 B. C., brings us to the fall of 27 A. D. In that year, the Messiah was to be revealed. And so He was. On that year, Jesus, being then thirty years of age, was baptized, and "anointed" "with the Holy Spirit and with power." Immediately after that, He went into the synagogue at Nazareth, and read these words, which He applied to Himself: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me." And He added: "To-day hath this scripture been fulfilled in your ears." Acts 10: 38; Luke 3: 21, 22; 4: 18-21. It must be remembered that the Christian era was fixed, by mistake, four years later than the proper date. This explains why Jesus reached the age of thirty as early as the fall of 27 A. D. "And after the threescore and two weeks shall the Anointed One be cut off, and shall have nothing. . . . And He shall make a firm covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week He shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease." Dan. 9: 26, 27.
The last week of the seventy is divided into two equal parts: in the middle of the week (three and one half times two equals seven) the Anointed One (Hebrew, the "Messiah") was to be "cut off," and "cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease" by the offering up of Himself on the cross. This is precisely what took place three and a half years after the baptism of Jesus, in the spring of A. D. 31, when Jesus was crucified. "The Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world," had appeared. There was henceforth no more need of offerings to typify His coming. The services of the temple were henceforth useless, and the building itself had outgrown its significance and usefulness. Hence we read that as Jesus was yielding up His spirit, "behold, the veil of the temple was rent in two from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake; and the rocks were rent; and the tombs were opened; and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised." Matt. 27: 51, 52. Church historians state that at that very moment, as the priest was at the point of killing the paschal lamb, he was so terrified by these occurrences, that the knife fell from his hand, and the lamb escaped and disappeared. Christ was to "make a firm covenant with many for one week," by His personal work of teaching and healing during the first half of the week, and through the ministry of the apostles during the second half of the week, of seven years. At the end of that period, which closed forever the times of the Jews, soon after the martyrdom of Stephen, the apostle Paul was converted, to become the great apostle of the gentiles. "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 even unto the end shall be war; desolations are determined. . . . And upon the wing of abominations shall come one that maketh desolate; and even unto the full end, and that determined, shall wrath be poured out upon the desolate." Dan. 9: 26, 27. But this was not all. Terrible judgments were to fall on the people of the Jews for having rejected their Saviour, and for refusing to be converted under the earnest appeals of the apostles. In the year 70, the Romans laid siege before Jerusalem. It was at the time of the Passover, when thousands of Jews from abroad were in the city. Famine, pestilence, and murderous divisions among themselves, killed more Jews than did the Roman sword. The predictions written by Moses in the twenty-eighth of Deuteronomy, of the most horrible things, were literally fulfilled. Mothers devoured their own offspring. Eleven hundred thousand people perished inside the city. Ninety-seven thousand were sold as slaves. Many others were kept as victims to amuse the people by fighting wild beasts in Rome. The temple was burned, in spite of all the efforts536 Definite Time Allotted to the Jews
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of the Roman general to preserve it; and the golden candlestick and the table of shewbread, made in the wilderness of Sinai, fifteen hundred years before, were taken to Rome, where they adorned the triumph of Titus. From that time, the hand of God has been against all attempts to restore either the Jewish people or the temple. Since early in the seventh century, the Mohammedans have had the Holy Land in their possession, first under Arabian rule, then under Turkish. In the fourth century, as told by Eusebius, ("Ecclesiastical History," book 3, chapter 20), the emperor Julian commanded the Jews to rebuild their temple, offering them funds from the state's treasury. The work began. In the meantime, Julian went to make war in Persia. Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, publicly quoted to the builders the words of Jesus in Matthew 24, verses 2 and 15, saying that they would have their complete fulfillment. On the night following, a mighty earthquake shook and scattered the stones of the old foundations, shaking also the neighboring buildings. Thus wonderfully was the prophecy fulfilled upon the Jews. No less accurate will be the fulfillment of the predictions applying at the latter end of "the times of the gentiles."