70 weeks

From: Satterlee Michael (mgs928532001@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Apr 29 2002 - 13:49:53 EDT

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    This letter was originally sent to Allen off the list.
    But since he posted his reply to it on the list, I
    thought I would also post the letter which he replied
    to on the list, so his reply could be read in context.

    Hello Allen,

    My regular E mail server seems to be down. So I am
    using a different server. Thus my different E mail
    address.

    Thanks for your letter. I have a greater appreciation
    for your position after reading it than before.
    However, I am still not convinced of its validity.
    Though I might be if I was not aware of what I believe
    is a better solution. Before sharing that solution
    with you I will comment on some of what you wrote.

    You wrote: Money was no problem, they were given Cart
    Blanch. They could have all the money they wanted for
    anything they wanted.

    This statement is obviously an exaggeration. If it
    were completely true, Ezra would have had no trouble
    doing whatever he set out to do. He could have
    completely rebuilt the city, if that was his intent,
    by hiring large regimens of mercenary guards to
    protect his workers or simply paying off all who
    opposed his rebuilding efforts.

    You wrote: There is one possible reference to the work
    Ezra did. ... Neh 1:3 "... The wall of Jerusalem is
    broken down, and its gates have been burned with
    fire." ... This breaking down of the wall and burning
    of the gates with fire could not be from the time of
    Nebuchadnezzar's destruction of Jerusalem. That would
    hardly have been news. ... Ezra [was] the only one who
    could have built the wall and put in the gates.

    I don't think the condition of the wall and the gate
    were being reported as "news." What was being reported
    was the low moral of the people living in Jerusalem,
    due to their city's continuing state of disrepair.
    Considering the fact that 2 Kings 25 tells us that the
    Babylonian armies broke down the wall of Jerusalem and
    set fire to everything in it that would burn, and the
    fact that we have no record in scripture of any
    subsequent acts of arson or wall destruction, I think
    it is poor exegesis to say that the wall and gate that
    was then being described to Nehemiah must have been
    new ones which were recently built by Ezra.

    You wrote: And we know that when Nehemiah came to
    inspect the city, he did so in secret so as not to let
    their enemies know what his plans might be. If the
    walls had been broken down and burned nearly a century
    before by Nebuchadnezzar, why was Nehemiah so
    cautious? This tells us that those that broke down
    and burned the walls were still harassing the Jewish
    people.

    No, it only tells us that someone was then harassing
    the Jewish people.

    You wrote: Ezra was to restore Jerusalem as a place of
    government and justice. How
    could that be done with no governmental or judicial
    buildings? There had to be rebuilding to allow for
    restoring of the government.

    That's a stretch. The American Indians had
    governmental and judicial systems for centuries
    without buildings. So did Israel in the wilderness for
    forty years. Ezra may have done some building. But, in
    the opinion of most who have studied this subject
    matter, not enough to make his meager efforts in that
    regard the object of Daniel's prophecy. Besides, we
    have no record that Ezra ever gave "the word" to begin
    rebuilding the city. Nehemiah gave just such an order.
    (Neh. 2:17) Artaxerxes' decrees merely gave Ezra and
    Nehemiah permission to do what they wanted to do.
    Artaxerxes' decrees did not order any work to be done.
    Nehemiah gave that order.

    You wrote: And again, just rebuilding the wall and
    habitations does not fulfill the second part of the
    prophecy -- to restore Jerusalem.

    That depends on your definition of the word "restore."
    I understand it to mean restore Jerusalem to its
    former glory. We could spend some time debating the
    exact meaning of this word with Hebrew lexicons at
    hand. I doubt such a discussion would prove decisive.

    You wrote: And another interesting point is that while
    the people were first rebuilding
    the Temple, God said through Zechariah (see Ezra 5:1):
      ZEC 2:3 "Then the angel who was speaking to me left,
    and another angel came to meet him 4 and said to him:
    "Run, tell that young man, `Jerusalem WILL BE A CITY
    WITHOUT WALLS because of the great number of men and
    livestock in it. 5 And I MYSELF WILL BE A WALL OF FIRE
    around it,' declares the LORD, `and I will be its
    glory within.'" ... So we need to ask, just how
    important to God was a wall around Jerusalem anyway?

    Well, considering the fact that the prophecy we are
    discussing, Dan. 9:24-27, said that the city would be
    rebuilt with a "plaza and moat" (NAS), with a "wall"
    according to the King James Version, for a "moat" is a
    trench that exists outside of a city's wall, I think
    it is very important.

    You wrote: Finegan [who dates Ezra's return to 458,
    not 457] makes the typical mistake of trying to date
    the decree and Ezra's trip according to the
    Babylonian-Persian calendar which went from spring to
    spring rather than the Jewish calendar which went from
    fall to fall.

    This is too debatable an issue for us to answer here
    with any certainty.

    You wrote: [Concerning the 15th year of Tiberius
    Caesar] Again the problem here is trying to use the
    Roman calendar and the Roman system of counting regnal
    years and claiming that that is what Luke used.

    Luke wrote his gopel to a Roman army officer. (Luke
    1:3) Thus it is highly doubtful that he would have
    dated the year of Christ's baptism in a way that would
    have cauused him to think it occurred two years later
    than it actually did.

    You wrote: The death of Christ in AD 33 is very
    unlikely ...

    I'll take the opinion of those who have studied this
    subject matter far more than you and I have. And I've
    studied this subject matter very thoroughly for years
    now. Finegan says AD 33. As do most other New
    Testament historians today.

    Something we should keep in mind is that if we hope to
    use the "70 weeks" prophecy as a means of convincing
    people that Jesus was the promised Messiah, it is
    helpful to be able to have our dates for the baptism
    and death of Jesus match up with those we can show
    them in common reference books. AD 29 is the date we
    will there find listed as the 15th year of Tiberius
    Caesar. AD 33 is the date we will find most often
    listed today for the death of Christ.

    In case you are curious, I'll tell you how now
    understand Daniel's "70 Weeks" prophecy.

    I believe that Daniel's "70 Weeks" began to run when
    Nehemiah ordered the work to begin on the rebuilding
    of Jerusalem's wall after Artaxerxes issued a decree
    in his 20th year which permitted Nehemiah to return to
    Jerusalem to rebuild that Holy City. (Neh. 2)

    Some see a problem with this understanding. For
    Daniel's "Seventy Weeks" are widely understood to
    refer to a period of 490 years, and all historians now
    assure us that Artaxerxes' 20th year of ruling Persia
    took place in 445 BC. And 490 years after 445 BC
    brings us to 46 AD, which was quite a few years after
    the death of Christ.

    How then can I understand that Artaxerxes' decree in
    his 20th year as king has anything to do with Daniel's
    "Seventy Weeks" prophecy? Because I am convinced that
    Nehemiah did not return to Jerusalem and give his
    command to begin rebuilding that city until the year
    440 BC, even though the Bible tells us that Nehemiah
    had been granted permission by Artaxerxes to issue
    such a command in Artaxerxes' 20th year as king of
    Persia, which historians assure us took place in 445
    BC. (Neh. 1:1-6)

    I believe this because the first century Jewish
    historian, Josephus, tells us that Nehemiah "came to
    Jerusalem" not "in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes"
    as the Bible seems to say, but in his "twenty and
    fifth year." (Ant. XI, 5, 7) The fact is that the
    Bible does not actually say that Nehemiah returned to
    Jerusalem in Artaxerxes' 20th year. It only tells us
    that Artaxerxes then gave Nehemiah permission to do
    so. While Josephus, on the other hand, tells us of the
    time that Nehemiah actually "came to Jerusalem." (It
    is also possible that Nehemiah reckoned the reign of
    Artaxerxes in a substantially different manner than
    historians do today and Josephus did in his day. I'll
    explain this later.)

    Concerning this matter, in his book, "History Of
    Israel" (third edition, 1981, pg. 381) John Bright
    tells us, "The Bible gives us the impression that
    Nehemiah set out at once, accompanied by a military
    escort (Neh.2:9). But Josephus (Ant. XI, 5, 7), who
    follows the Septuagint text, the first part of which
    is preserved in 1 Esdres, places his arrival only in
    440. Though assurance is impossible, this may be
    correct. If Nehemiah first went to Babylon and
    collected Jews to accompany him, as Josephus has it,
    and then having presented his credentials to the
    satrap of Abah-nahara, attended to the procurement of
    building materials before proceeding to Jerusalem, as
    he possibly did since work was begun soon after his
    arrival, the date is not unreasonable."

    Some who harmonize the accounts of Nehemiah and
    Josephus in this way point out that it took Solomon
    nearly four years to procure similar kinds of building
    materials before he was able to begin building the
    Temple. (2 Chr. chapters 1 and 2 and chapter 3, verses
    1 and 2) And Solomon was much better funded than
    Nehemiah, and unlike Nehemiah, Solomon was able to
    conscript all the labor he needed for his building
    project, rather than having to spend time finding
    volunteers.

    Other scholars agree with Bright's assessment of
    Josephus' probable accuracy in this matter. For
    instance, Sigmund Mowinckel, a highly regarded
    Scandinavian Bible scholar, believes that Josephus
    used a separate Greek version of Nehemiah that in
    several respects differed from that preserved in the
    LXX. He argues that Josephus' chronological
    information on the Persian kings did not result from
    his own calculations, or from any mistakes some say he
    must have made in this matter. Mowinckel argues that
    Josephus must have been quoting from a now lost Greek
    version of Nehemiah. On Josephus' statement about the
    25th year of Artaxerxes, Mowinckel maintains that
    Josephus' figures are most likely the original ones.
    He writes, "In my opinion the balance [of evidence] is
    in favor of [the figure] '25'." (Vol. 3, p.45 of
    Studien zu dem Buche Ezra-Nehema, Vols. 1-3, Oslo,
    1964)

    But how does the fact that Nehemiah did not give his
    order to begin rebuilding Jerusalem until 440 BC help
    us to make sense of Daniel's "Seventy Weeks" prophecy?
    As most students of Bible prophecy know, Daniel's
    "seventy weeks" are generally understood as referring
    to seventy weeks of years (seventy sets of seven
    years) totaling a period of 490 solar years. But the
    Jews used a lunar calendar! Their years were lunar
    years, not solar years. So a week of years to the Jews
    would have meant seven lunar years. And seventy weeks
    of years to the Jews would have meant 490 lunar years,
    not 490 solar years.

    At the time of Daniel, on average about every three
    years, the Jews added an extra month to the end of
    their lunar calendars to make sure that they never
    fell too far out of sync with the solar year. But at
    the time Daniel wrote his "Seventy Weeks" prophecy the
    Jews had no set system of doing so. When they decided
    that it was time to add an extra month to their
    calendars they called this extra month "second Adar."
    However, the fact that they then sometimes added an
    "intercalary" month to their lunar calendars does not
    change the fact that, to the Jews, a "year" normally
    meant 354 days. For that is the number of days which
    one of their calendars most often contained. Their
    calendars usually consisted of six 29 day months and
    six 30 day months. So, to the Jews who lived at the
    time Daniel wrote his "Seventy Weeks" prophecy, a
    ìyearî would have been understood to mean a lunar
    year, and a "week" of years (literally a ìsevenî of
    years) would have been understood to mean seven lunar
    years. And ìseventy weeksî of years would have been
    understood to mean 490 lunar years, none of which were
    then either automatically or routinely solar-adjusted.

    Now, since one lunar year contains 354.367 days, 490
    lunar years contain 173,639.83 days. And 173,639.83
    days divided by 365.2425 (the number of days in a
    solar year) equal 475.40 solar years. With these
    things in mind, I have come to conclusion that
    Daniel's "seventy weeks" were a period of 475.4 years
    which ran from 440 BC to 36 AD. I believe those 475.4
    years began at the time Nehemiah gave his "commandment
    to restore and to build Jerusalem" (Dan. 9:25 KJV;
    Neh. 2:17,18). And I believe those 475.4 years ended
    at the time God acted to "confirm the [new] covenant
    with many" by pouring His Holy Spirit out on Gentiles
    for the first time (Dan. 9:27 KJV; Acts 10). I believe
    the "many" here referred to were the "many nations"
    God promised Abraham that he would one day become the
    father of. (Gen. 17:4)

    As anyone who has thoroughly studied the history of
    this prophecy's interpretation knows, this is by no
    means a new idea or a novel one. In the year 221 AD
    Julius Africanus in his work entitled "Chronographia"
    argued that the 490 years were lunar years of 354 days
    each, which he converted into 475 solar years. He
    counted them from the 20th year of Artaxerxes, which
    he correctly dated to the 4th year of the 83rd
    Olympiad (=445/444 BC). From this date, he said, to
    "the 16th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar (30/31
    AD, his date for the death of Christ), there are
    reckoned 475 years, which take 490 according to the
    Hebrew numeration, as they measure the years by the
    course of the moon; so that, as is easy to show, their
    year consists of 354 days, while the solar year has
    365 1/4 days." (Africanus' Chronographia XVI, 3
    translated in The Ante-Nicence fathers, Vol. VI ed. A.
    Roberts & J. Donaldson, p. 135) Many later expositors
    followed Africanus in doing this.

    I believe that the facts of history, together with a
    knowledge that the Jews used a lunar calendar, combine
    to show that the Messiah (meaning "anointed one") was
    first presented to Israel in the year 29 AD by John
    the baptist, after sixty-nine weeks of lunar years had
    passed, when John anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the
    waters of his baptism in "the 15th year of Tiberius
    Caesar." (Luke 3:1,21). At that time Jesus Christ was
    "cut off" from his people and, quite literally, "had
    nothing for himself." (Dan. 9:26) For he then began a
    forty day long fast in the wilderness. Then, after
    three and a half years, in the middle of Daniel's
    seventieth week, in the spring of 33 AD, Christ's
    sacrificial death brought an end to the Jewish system
    of sacrificial offerings. (Dan. 9:27) Finally, three
    and a half years later, at the end of Daniel's
    "Seventy Weeks," in the early fall of 36 AD, Christ
    "confirmed a covenant with many" (Dan. 9:27) when he,
    for the first time, poured out his Holy Spirit on
    non-Jewish people. (Acts 10)

    Doing so confirmed the fact that God, from that time
    forward, would give everyone who put their faith in
    Jesus Christ, both Jews and Gentiles, complete
    forgiveness of their sins and eternal life. With this
    fact in mind, the good news of what Jesus Christ had
    done for mankind then began to be preached to all
    people on earth, just as Christ said that it would be.
    (Math. 24:14)

    There is another solution to this ancient puzzle that
    also fits all the facts of history. This solution
    eliminates the problem of Nehemiah taking five years
    to get to Jerusalem, which some people have a hard
    time accepting. Historians tell us that Artaxerxes did
    not gain legal control of Persia's throne until six
    years after the assassination of his father Xerxes.
    Because he did not, it is very possible that Nehemiah
    did not count the first six years of Artaxerxes' reign
    during which its legality was being contested. Those
    who have thoroughly studied the way in which Bible
    writers reckoned the reigns of Israel's and Judah's
    kings tell us that they apparently employed this
    "legal count" system of reckoning.

    If this is true, then when Nehemiah referred to
    Artaxerxes' 20th year he would have been referring to
    the same year Josephus referred to when he told us
    Nehemiah came to Jerusalem in Artaxerxes' 25th year,
    440 BC.

    The historical information which strongly suggests
    that Nehemiah very likely employed this "legal count"
    system of reckoning is contained in the works of
    several ancient historians. I'll here give you a
    condensed version of it.

    Artaxerxes came to the throne of Persia in August of
    465 BC following the murder of his father Xerxes. To
    gain the throne for himself Artaxerxes and his
    supporters, the real murderers, blamed Xerxes' murder
    on the rightful heir to the throne, Artaxerxes' older
    brother crown prince Darius. They then had Darius
    unjustly executed. For the next six years Artaxerxes'
    legal right to rule Persia was hotly disputed. Why?
    Because ancient Persia was not a "banana republic" in
    which anyone willing to assassinate their country's
    head of state and then take his place with the support
    of several armed friends had just as much a legal
    right to run their country's government as anyone else
    did. Ancient Persia was then governed by a hereditary
    monarchy. In that monarchy, upon the death of a king,
    the right to rule legally passed from a father to his
    first born son. If that first born son was, for some
    reason, legally disqualified from becoming king, the
    right to rule then passed to the king's next oldest
    son. If a king had no son who was legally qualified to
    inherit the throne, upon his death the right to rule
    passed to his oldest brother.

    Following king Xerxes' murder and the execution of
    crown prince Darius, Artaxerxes' older brother
    Hyspases was legally next in line to inherit Persia's
    throne. However, Hyspases was then away governing the
    Persian Provence of Bactria. Because he was,
    Artaxerxes was able to sit on his father's throne. It
    is said that for the next few years Hyspases rightly
    maintained that he held the legal right to rule
    Persia. Sometime during the first few years of
    Artaerxes' legally disputed reign as king, he and his
    older brother Hyspases met on the field of battle to
    resolve this issue, and some others. In Artaxerxes'
    effort to suppress what historians call "the Bactrian
    revolt," he then killed his older brother Hyspases.
    However, when Artaxerxes killed Hyspases he did
    nothing to remove the cloud of illegitimacy that then
    hung over his rulership of Persia. If anything, he
    only darkened that cloud. For a son or a brother of a
    king who killed the king was not legally allowed to
    inherit the kingdom from the king he had killed. So,
    at the time Artaxerxes killed Hyspases, the right to
    rule Persia legally passed to Xerxes full brother,
    Achamenes, who was then away governing Egypt.

    It was not until the year 459 BC that Artaxerxes
    finally gained the legal right to rule the Persian
    empire, an empire he had been illegitimately ruling
    since 465 BC. For it was in that year that Artaxerxes'
    uncle Achamenes was killed in a battle in Egypt. It
    was only at that time, in 459 BC, that Artaxerxes was
    finally able to legally wear the crown of the king of
    Persia.

    Nehemiah serving at the King's court would have been
    aware of these legal matters which put the legality of
    the first six years of Artaxerxes' reign in question.
    If Nehemiah, like other Bible writers who recorded
    chronological information, did not count years of a
    king's rule in which their right to rule was legally
    in question, he would have counted 459 BC as
    Artaxerxes' first year as Persia's king. And if
    Nehemiah counted 459 BC as Artaxerxes' first year, he
    would have counted 440 as Artaxerxes' 20th year.

    In other words, we have strong reason to believe that
    Nehemiah reckoned the reign of Artaxerxes differently
    than the way in which it was then commonly reckoned,
    the way in which Josephus' sources reckoned it, and
    the way in which it is commonly reckoned today. When
    Nehemiah wrote of Artaxerxes' "20th year" it appears
    likely that he was not referring to the year 445 BC,
    as has long been thought, but to 440 BC, just as
    Josephus clearly was when he told us that Nehemiah
    came to Jerusalem in Artaxerxes' "25th year."

    And sixty-nine "sevens" of years (483 lunar years)
    after 440 brings us to AD 29, the year Jesus became
    the Messiah.

    My verse by verse commentary of Dan. 9:24-27 (NAS) is
    [in brackets.]

    24 "Seventy weeks [490 lunar years] have been decreed
    for your people and your holy city, to finish the
    transgression, to make an end of sin, to make
    atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting
    righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to
    anoint the most holy place.
    25 "So you are to know and discern that from the
    issuing of a decree ["from the going forth of the
    commandment" - KJV] to restore and rebuild Jerusalem
    [Nehemiah's on site order to begin rebuilding
    Jerusalem's wall, upon his return to Jerusalem in
    Artaxerxes' 25th year, as per Josephus, which
    historians identify for us as 440 BC] until Messiah
    the Prince [Jesus Christ] there will be seven weeks
    and sixty-two weeks [7 x 7 lunar years + 62 x 7 lunar
    years = 483 lunar years. 483 lunar years from 440 BC =
    29 AD, which was "the fifteenth year of Tiberius
    Caesar," in which year Jesus was baptized]; it will be
    built again, with plaza and moat, even in times of
    distress. [The first "seven weeks" - 49 lunar years -
    ran from July of 440 BC until January of 392 BC,
    during which time the city of Jerusalem was completely
    rebuilt, despite great opposition from neighboring
    nations.]
    26 "Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be
    cut off and have nothing [Following Christ's baptism
    he cut himself off from all human contact while he
    literally "had nothing," as he then fasted in the
    wilderness for forty days.], and the people [Rome's
    armies] of the prince who is to come [General Titus,
    the son of the Roman Emperor Vespasian, thus a
    "prince"] will destroy the city and the sanctuary
    [Rome's destruction of Jerusalem and her Temple in 70
    AD]. And its end will come with a flood [the hoards of
    soldiers who then descended upon the city]; even to
    the end there will be war; desolations are determined.
    [All of the words in verse 26, following its reference
    to "the Messiah" being cut off and having nothing,
    should be read parenthetically. For they refer to
    events which would occur 30 - 34 years after the
    "seventy weeks" came to an end.]
    27 "And he [the Messiah] will make a firm covenant
    with the many ["confirm a covenant" - NIV - referring
    to the "New Covenant" which was established by the
    death of Christ and confirmed with "many" by the
    outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the gentiles, as
    recorded in Acts chapter 10. Romans 15:8-12 tells us
    that the covenant promises which Christ "confirmed"
    were those God made to the patriarchs concerning the
    Gentiles. The "many" here referred to are all the
    nations of the earth, Jews and Gentiles. God told
    Abraham, in Gen. 17:4, that he would become the father
    of "many nations."] for [The word "for" here is absent
    from the Hebrew. I believe the context strongly
    suggests that the word "after" should instead be here
    inserted.] one week [at the end of the 70th "week"
    which ended in 36 AD], but in the middle of the week
    [again the 70th "week," the middle of which was the
    spring of 33 AD] he [the Messiah] will put a stop to
    sacrifice and grain offering [which Jesus Christ's
    sacrificial death brought an end to]; and on the wing
    of abominations will come one who makes desolate [In
    Mark 13:14 and its parallel passage, Luke 21:20, Jesus
    himself clearly identified the "abomination of
    desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet" as the
    "armies" which he said would "surround Jerusalem"
    prior to its destruction in 70 AD.], even until a
    complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured
    out on the one who makes desolate." [Jerusalem's
    desolator, General Titus, became Emperor of Rome in 79
    AD. Within months Mount Vesuvius erupted burying
    Pompeii. The following year, 80 AD, a fire destroyed
    much of Rome. Titus uttering "the fire has ruined me"
    was forced to sell or strip all of his imperial
    estates to hasten Rome's recovery. Then, in the fire's
    wake, one of the worst plagues on record descended
    upon Italy. Finally, on September 1, 81 AD, for
    reasons unknown, Titus fell painfully ill and died,
    only two years after gaining Rome's throne.]

    Mike Satterlee

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