One of the most interesting and encouraging aspects of Bible study for me is eschatology. I think we often miss out on the blessing of knowing what Scripture has revealed because many Christians think it is less important than other things the Bible talks about. And for some, with so many interpretations of different passages floating around, the topic is just too controversial to get into deeply.

For many years of my life, the end times was an area where there were a lot of facts I knew about how things were supposed to go, but I couldn’t necessarily put all the pieces together to explain how Bible expositors got to those conclusions. Prophetic passages in the Bible seemed so foreign and symbolic, that I felt I didn’t have the eyes to understand the true meaning, or perhaps people were just making things up.

In order to properly understand what Scripture has revealed about God’s sure plan for the future, it is necessary to go back. Understanding the Old Testament and God’s redemptive program from the beginning of history is a prerequisite for understanding the context and the subsequent interpretation of difficult passages that can seem so cryptic and symbolic when we encounter them in Christ’s teachings or the writings of the apostles.

One Old Testament book that any interpreter of Scripture’s eschatological predictions cannot do without is the book of Daniel. This book is rightly known as the “indispensable key” to understanding biblical prophecy. Whoever would undertake a serious study of eschatology, I would strongly recommend to familiarize him or herself with this prophet writing from the period of Israel’s exile.

Of particular importance to eschatology is Daniel’s prophecy of the seventy weeks. What I want to address in this post is the importance of the number seventy. What is the significance of “seventy” weeks for this prophecy that is often referenced by end-times expositors?

In Daniel 9:24, the angel Gabriel tells Daniel in a vision that “Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place.”

In brief form, the angel Gabriel has summarized the program of God’s faithfulness to Israel, dramatically revealed in human history. What is important to know for the purpose of this blog is that Gabriel’s message is in response to Daniel’s prayer that came in the preceding verses of the chapter. Daniel cries out in repentance on behalf of his people Israel while they suffer in exile from their promised land. Daniel’s prayer is rich with reference to prior Old Testament history, and even his act of prayer is connected to the rich history of biblical Israel from centuries before his time (1 Kings 8:46–48).

In the context, Daniel has just been pouring over the book of Jeremiah (Dan. 9:2), and his quiet-time meditation pointed him to Jeremiah 29:10 where God prophesied that 70 literal years were required for the exile to take place in Babylon. The book of 2 Chronicles clues us into the reason 70 years were required for the exile to take place. Specifically, the final chapter of the book tells us in 36:21 that the exile lasted seventy years “to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths.”

Now, you might be wondering, ‘what does the Sabbath have to do with this passage dealing with eschatological promises?’ The answer is, just about everything. What I mean by this is that understanding this concept really focuses us in on the exactness with which the biblical books and prophecies were written and carried out. The authors of the Old Testament really took for granted that people reading would have a fairly decent understanding of prior written revelation. For instance, the rest of the verse in 2 Chronicles 36:21 states, “All the days that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years,” with reference to the land of Israel.

What this statement assumes is that you, the reader have prior knowledge of the Mosaic Covenant spoken and recorded on the plains of Moab as the covenant nation was about to enter the promised land. We find the reference in Lev. 25:1-4:

¹ The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, ² “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord. ³ For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, ⁴ but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. 

Just as the people of Israel were to observe a Sabbath rest every seventh day of the week (patterned after God’s creation of the world), so the land God was going to give them was to be given an entire year out of every seven which would be a Sabbath rest for the land. This is a big deal for an agrarian society. Maybe just not as big a deal for one where Yahweh is King and provider of every crop though.

It’s a simple concept, really. You can work hard and make the ground produce for you for six years, but then take a year off and let the land rest. God’s provision would be enough, there was no need to optimize the yield of the land to your benefit in that seventh year.

The problem, as with so many of the covenant stipulations, was that Israel failed to observe the sabbath rest as God commanded them. How many times had Israel failed to observe the Sabbatical year? At least 70 times, because that was the amount of years needed for the land to “enjoy its Sabbaths” as Jeremiah had spoken. This would be one year in every seven. So to follow the math, it would take 490 years for exactly 70 sabbath years to be violated. That’s exactly the situation we have in Daniel 9.

Daniel is lamenting about the exile that is right on schedule according to God’s sovereign time table—70 years for the land to make up the 70 sabbath rests it missed (cf. 2 Chr. 36, Jer. 29). Daniel is longing for a fuller picture regarding God’s plan for restoring the nation of Israel to its land and to its promised kingdom, over which Messiah reigns. The angel Gabriel gives him an amazing answer—seventy weeks are still ahead in the prophetic timeframe before Israel will reap the rewards of God’s program which is certain to be fulfilled. It will be fulfilled with exactness and precision according to every word that was spoken. Just as the Law of Moses was fulfilled with regard to Israel’s disobedience and God’s retributive justice.

This is an incredible aspect of biblical prophecy! What we believe about what will happen in the future is predicated upon God’s faithfulness and precision in previous predictions and promises. The word of God has never failed.

That’s all for this post. In my next post, we’ll examine the meaning of “seventy weeks” in more detail, including what is meant by the term “weeks” as translated in most English versions.

For further reading, and though I do not come to the same conclusions as the author in every aspect of his analysis, I recommend:

Gentry, Peter. “Daniel’s Seventy Weeks and the New Exodus.” https://sbts-wordpress-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/equip/uploads/2010/05/sbjt_v14_n1_gentry.pdf