END TIMES

Seventy Weeks

Dan 9:25 : Know therefore and understand ...

In Daniel 9:24-27, a future timeline for the Jews, Jerusalem, and the Messiah is presented. It is the prophetic passage that is commonly called Daniel's Seventy Weeks. It forms the basis for understanding who the Messiah is and how the end times will unfold. Here is an overview of the Seventy Weeks.

Seventy Weeks — A Quick Overview
Dan 9:24 : Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.	• “Seventy weeks” is 70 times 7, or 490 years. • “Thy people,” Daniel's people, are the Jews, and “thy holy city” is Jerusalem. • These promises, applied to the nation of Israel, will be fulfilled at Christ's second coming.
Dan 9:25 : Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.	• The commandment to rebuild Jerusalem is recorded in Neh 2:1-8. The “twentieth year of Artaxerxes” (Neh 2:1) was around 446/445 BC. • “Seven weeks” is 7 times 7, or 49 years, and “threescore and two weeks” is 62 times 7, or 434 years.
Dan 9:26 : And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and 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 unto the end of the war desolations are determined.	• After 434 years, or after a total of 483 years (49 years plus 434 years), Christ will be “cut off” or put to death. • “The people of the prince that shall come” are the Romans who destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 AD. • There is a time gap here with verse 27 still in the future.
Dan 9:27 : And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.	• “He” is the “prince that shall come,” the Antichrist. • “One week” is the Seventieth Week, the last seven years of the 490 years. • The Antichrist will make a peace treaty with Israel, but “in the midst of the week,” or after 3½ years, he will desecrate the Temple and cause the Abomination of Desolation.

LINKS — Additional Information
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Next up — Weeks, Years & Days — Different time measurements in Daniel.

Doing the Math — Adding up the numbers of the Seventy Weeks.

Significance of Seventy — Why the Seventy Weeks are so important.

The Coming Prince — Sir Robert Anderson's book on the Seventy Weeks.

Companion Bible Appendix 91 — The “Seventy Weeks” of Daniel 9:24-27.