the word which he announced to Daniel, Dan 9:24-27. The sentence, “for thou art a man greatly beloved” (חמוּדות = חמוּדות אישׁ, Dan 10:11, Dan 10:19, vir desideriorum, desideratissimus), does not contain the reason for Gabriel's coming in haste, but for the principal thought of the verse, the going forth of the word of God immediately at the beginning of Daniel's prayer. המּראה stands not for revelation, but is the vision, the appearance of the angel by whom the word of God was communicated to the prophet. מראה is accordingly not the contents of the word spoken, but the form for its communication to Daniel. To both - the word and the form of its revelation - Daniel must give heed. This revelation was, moreover, not communicated to him in a vision, but while in the state of natural consciousness.
Verse 24
Dan 9:24The divine revelation regarding the seventy weeks. - This message of the angel relates to the most important revelations regarding the future development of the kingdom of God. From the brevity and measured form of the expression, which Auberlen designates “the lapidary style of the upper sanctuary,” and from the difficulty of calculating the period named, this verse has been very variously interpreted. The interpretations may be divided into three principal classes. 1. Most of the church fathers and the older orthodox interpreters find prophesied here the appearance of Christ in the flesh, His death, and the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. 2. The majority of the modern interpreters, on the other hand, refer the whole passage to the time of Antiochus Epiphanes. 3. Finally, some of the church fathers and several modern theologians have interpreted the prophecy eschatologically, as an announcement of the development of the kingdom of God from the end of the Exile on to the perfecting of the kingdom by the second coming of Christ at the end of the days.[1],
- ↑ The first of these views is in our time fully and at length defended by Hävernick (Comm.), Hengstenberg (Christol. iii. 1, p. 19ff., 2nd ed.), and Auberlen (Der Proph. Daniel, u.s.w., p. 103ff., 3rd ed.), and is adopted also by the Catholic theologian Laur. Reinke (die messian. Weissag. bei den gr. u. kl. Proph. des A.T. iv. 1, p. 206ff.), and by Dr. Pusey of England. The second view presents itself in the Alexandrine translation of the prophecy, more distinctly in Julius Hilarianus (about a.d. 400) (Chronologia s. libellus de mundi duratione, in Migne's Biblioth. cler. univ. t. 13, 1098), and in several rabbinical interpreters, but was first brought into special notice by the rationalistic interpreters Eichhorn, Bertholdt. v. Leng., Maurer, Ewald, Hitzig, and the mediating theologians Bleek, Wieseler (Die 70 Wochen u. die 63 Jahrwochen des Proph. Daniel, Gött. 1839, with which compare the Retractation in the Göttinger gel. Anzeigen, 1846, p. 113ff.), who are followed by Lücke, Hilgenfeld, Kranichfeld, and others. This view has also been defended by Hofmann (die 70 Jahre des Jer. u. die 70 Jahrwochen des Daniel, Nürnb. 1836, and Weissag. u. Erfüllung, as also in the Schriftbew.), Delitzsch (Art. Daniel in Herz.'s Realenc. Bd. iii.), and Zündel (in the Kritischen Uterss.), but with this essential modification, that Hofmann and Delitzsch have united an eschatological reference with the primary historical reference of Dan 9:25-27 to Antiochus Epiphanes, in consequence of which the prophecy will be perfectly accomplished only in the appearance of Antichrist and the final completion of the kingdom of God at the end of the days. Of the third view we have the first germs in Hoppolytus and Apollinaris of Laodicea, who, having regard to the prophecy of Antichrist, Dan 7:25, refer the statement of Dan 9:27 of this chapter, regarding the last week, to the end of the world; and the first half of this week they regard as the time of the return of Elias, the second half as the time of Antichrist. This view is for the first time definitely stated in the Berleburg Bible. But Kliefoth, in his Comm. on Daniel, was the first who sought to investigate and establish this opinion exegetically, and Leyrer (in Herz.'s Realenc. xviii. p. 383) has thus briefly stated it: - ”The seventy שׁבעים, i.e., the καιροὶ of Daniel (Dan 9:24.) measured by sevens, within which the whole of God's plan of salvation in the world will be completed, are a symbolical period with reference to the seventy years of exile prophesied by Jeremiah, and with the accessory notion of oecumenicity. The 70 is again divided into three periods: into 7 (till Christ), 62 (till the apostasy of Antichrist
