Daniel 9:27

The “Seventieth” Week

            Verse 27 of Dan 9 is probably the most interesting verse in the Seventy Week prophecy as it contains some key chronological and prophetic statements that help to firmly establish what  the overall interpretation and understanding of the Seventy Weeks should be. Therefore an accurate translation of this verse, and a proper interpretation of its prophetic predictions is absolutely crucial especially in the light of all of the varying end-time prophetic scenarios that have been developed from varying interpretations of this single verse.

            The main two interpretations of this verse have been along the following lines:

            (1) Since the time for the Seventy Weeks seemed to have apparently run out at the end of verse 26, then verse 27 has been said, by some interpreters, to be referring to events that would follow the last event in verse 26, namely the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. These events are then predicted to be entirely removed from the Messianic theme and context of the previous three verses of this prophecy. This interpretation is the basic position that the school of Futurism has taken.              

            (2) The other main way in which this verse has been interpreted is the linguistically supported possibility that this verse 27 is actually restating the events of verse 26 but with greater details and with more precise chronological specifications.^N1

            An acceptance of either one of these views, will immediately affect the translation of this verse as it will determine the exact way in which the opening flexible waw-conjunction of this verse should be rendered as it serves to indicate the actual relationship between verse 26 and verse 27. Based on the first view that verse 27 is representing events that are remotely separate from the Messianic theme and context of Dan 9:24-26, then this opening waw-conjunction has been understood to be functioning as either a “disjunctive” waw or a  “consecutive/relative” waw. Therefore it has been translated as either “Now” or “Then,”^R2 respectively. If this waw was indeed a disjunctive waw, then it would be signaling that a radical change of scenery and participants had occurred in this verse, but, as Waltke and O’Connor have pointed out, such a function for a waw is usually qualified by the introduction of the new participants.^B3 Interestingly enough, a “disjunctive” waw would also not necessarily, or not automatically, indicate a radical separation of the verse, or clause that it is introducing from its preceding context, since such a waw is used to introduce a situation with a continuity of setting that either: (1) contrasts with the situation that precedes it, or (2) specifies contemporary circumstances or causes; or (3) simply provide a comparison.^B4

            Also if this opening waw is translated as the consecutive/relative waw-“Then”- then this would mean that the events in verse 27 would occur sometime after the 70 A.D. destruction, but the supposition that new participants are involved here cannot be supported contextually or syntactically, and therefore such a conclusion would be nothing more than a supposition.

            Now if verse 27, on the other hand, is simply reiterating what has been said in verse 26 but this time in a more elaborate and precise way, then this waw-conjunction would be functioning as an expegetical waw^R5 as verse 27 would then be simply "expounding" on verse 26. This opening waw-conjunction would then be translated into English as “that is,”^R6 and would be introducing the upcoming elaboration of the preceding verse.

            Since the precise function of this opening waw-conjunction, and also the relationship of  verse 27 to verse 26 and to the rest of the Seventy Week prophecy can only be determined by what the content of verse 27 is actually referring to, then a careful, critical and exegetical analysis of this verse has to first be done here.

            Now taking into consideration the theoretically possible translations of the waw-conjunction that could begin verse 27, the opening statement in this verse would then read as [traditional  translation]:

            “[‘Now;’ ‘Then’ or ‘That is’] he shall confirm a covenant with the many for one week.”^N7 

Who is "He"?

            This opening statement immediately poses a very important question, namely: Who is the third person singular pronoun “he” referring to? Is this an allusion to (1) a future Antichrist as Futurist-Dispensationalist interpreters have supposed, or (2) is this a reference to Antiochus Epiphanes, as Preterist interpreters say, or (3) is this a reference to Jesus Christ the Messiah, who has thus far been the main character and focus of this Messianic prophecy? This question is actually answered by identifying the actual antecedent of this third person personal pronoun here.

            There are three contextual proper names that can be considered here as the antecedents of the third person singular pronoun "He" in Dan 9:27, namely: "Messiah, the ‘King’" (vs. 25), "Messiah" (vs. 26),  and (“surfacely” speaking)"the King" (vs. 26).^N8  Now since the Biblical interpretation of this prophecy has thus far shown with consistency that all of these three absolute titles refer to Jesus Christ, then the only conclusion that can be made here is that this third person personal pronoun "He" is also a reference to Jesus Christ since no other singular figure has been mentioned in this prophecy. While this conclusion quickly resolve the identification question here, there is a very interesting, theological observation that can be seen when the exact antecedent for this personal pronoun is more precisely specified here. This precise antecedent is determined by a strict adherence to the syntactical rules for identifying the natural antecedent of a pronoun.

            Although the title of "King"(ngîd) in vs. 26 is physically the closest ‘antecedent’ to the pronoun "He," it actually does not qualify here as an antecedent of this pronoun, or, for that matter, as an antecedent period, since it is neither the subject, nor the object of the clause that it is found in. As it appears in the phrase “the people of the ‘King’ who is to come,” in verse 26, it is grammatically subordinate to the actual subject of that clause -"the people"- and is simply serving there to qualify this people which we have seen were the unbelieving Jews..

            The other two choices of: "Messiah the King" and "Messiah" both do qualify here as true antecedents, but because the single title "Messiah" of verse 26a is closer than the double title "Messiah, the ‘King’" of verse 25 to the pronoun "He" in verse 27, then it is the one that qualifies as the natural antecedent of the personal pronoun in verse 27.

            What this choice of antecedent of  "Messiah" comes to mean theologically, is that it would be Jesus Christ, functioning here in His role of Messiah, who would be performing the action that is described in the opening statement of this verse. In other words it is Jesus, "the Messiah," who had been "cut off" in verse 26, who was now specifically being referred to here in this prediction, and not Jesus the ruling “King of the Jews” who had pronounced a judgement of doom upon His rebellious people. So we should therefore expect the prediction in vs. 27 to have some Messianic implications in it and, of course, for its predicted action to be carried out by Jesus Christ.

            The next two questions that now need to be answered are: (1) What is "He," Jesus, the Messiah, going to do for one week? and (2) With whom?

“The "higbîr" of a "b^erît"”

            Like the other key statements that were made in this prophecy, the question now of: "What is Jesus the Messiah going to do?" is actually answered by a syntactically accurate translation of the text here, and particularly of the action verb that pinpoints exactly what this Messianic action would entail.

            The Hebrew verb that is used in this statement is higbîr. Lexicographers have identified the basic meaning of this expression as: "be strong, mighty;"^B9  "to be strong;"^B10  "prevail, be mighty, have strength, be great;"^B11 "be superior, prevail, succeed increase."^B12 So its literal translation in verse 27 should also be along these lines of something "becoming stronger" or "prevailing."

            The verbal expression higbîr is grammatically identified here as a Hiphîl stem,^R13 but it is more specifically identified syntactically as a causative Hiphîl since it would be a transitive verb in the Qal stem as it would govern an object in that verbal stem.^R14 So this verb would have an element of causation in its translation and/or meaning, and would thus be literally translated as "cause to prevail."^R15 

            The next key expression in this verse is the expression b^erît. It has accurately been translated by almost all of the major English versions of the Bible,^R16 and also by most commentators,^R17 as "a covenant."^N18 This translation of  "a covenant" would then make the opening statement in Dan 9:27 predict that, Jesus Christ the Messiah would "cause a covenant to prevail."

            The covenant that Jesus would "cause to prevail" here was of course the promise of the New Covenant which, in New Testament theology is actually referred to as the “Second”[Gk.-deuteras] Covenant (see Heb 8:7; 10:9) with the “First” [Gk.-prōtē] Covenant having been the one of the Levitical priesthood of Aaron and his descendants (Heb 7:11). This “prevailing” of this “Second Covenant”had been anticipated quite early in the Old Testament times,^N19 when, in about the 8^th century B.C., (which was about 700 years before Christ's advent and about 700 years after the making of the “First” Covenant at Sinai), God had anxiously declared through the prophet Jeremiah that:

            “The days are coming, [ . . . ] when I will make a new covenant with the house

            of Israel and Judah not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers

 in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, . . But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” Jer. 31:31-34^S20

                                                               

            Jesus clearly, and deliberately, fulfilled this promise of establishing this “new and better Covenant” (cf. Heb 8:6b) by (1) clarifying the blameless, though inefficacious, stipulations of the First One^S21  and then by (2) adding and modifying some of its stipulations that could not have been reasonably introduced before His advent and the Revelation of His grace.^S22 He then went on to seal this “better” Second Covenant through His ratifying death on the cross.^S23   

            Now what needs to be further clarified here is: Who is the “many” in that prediction specifically referring to?

            This question is answered by an understanding of how the Hebrew expression for "many," rabbîm, is usually used in the Bible. When rabbîm occurs by itself in the OT, as it does here in Dan 9:27, that is without being in combination with a noun, it is then is rightly and simply translated as "many,"^S24 but a Biblical example that helps to determine to who this "many" actually extended to, is provided by a similar use of this expression rabbîm in another Messianic context, namely in the prophecy of the ‘Suffering Servant’ in Isaiah 53. Speaking of the coming Messiah there, it was said in verse 11 that:

                        “By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many.” (NKJV)

            This “many” here was clearly a reference to those who would come to accept and follow the teachings of Jesus and believe in Him. Since a grand scale rejection of the Messiah had been expected and foretold in Daniel’s Messianic prophecy (Dan 9:26) and similarly in Isaiah’s (Isa 53:3), then the parallel “many” in Dan 9:27 should therefore not be understood to be a "many" of  "totality" or of a "majority;" i.e., the Jewish nation as a whole, or most of the Jewish nation, but rather as a reference to a "many" of only those who would come to believe in Jesus as the Messiah. Therefore it would be referring to the select, minority group of future believers, i.e., a remnant.^S25 This more precise meaning would then also add to the theological significance that was indicated by the syntactically-accurate choice of the antecedent "Messiah" for the pronoun "He" in Dan 9:27, as it then makes this statement indicate that ‘the Messiah would cause this covenant to prevail, for one prophetic week, with, specifically, the many believers in Him.’

            Interestingly enough, while Jesus was in the process of actually sealing this Second Covenant, He used some expressions that were very similar to the ones that had been expressed in Dan 9:27, as He said during the Last Supper:

“This is My blood of the covenant, which is to be shed on behalf of many^N26 for                forgiveness of sins.” Matt 26:28 [NASB] (cf. Heb 9:20, 22).

            The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews^N27 goes on to indicate that the promise of this Second Covenant was indeed fulfilled during the advent of Christ. (See Heb 8:6-10)

            The establishment of this Second Covenant was not without its difficulties and spiritual battles since it carried with it some eternal cosmic implications and ramifications as it was this Covenant that would fulfill the long-awaited for promise of  ‘crushing of the serpent’s head’ (Gen 3:14, 15; cf. John 12:31). Nevertheless, Jesus, by His steadfast determination to do carry out His Father’s will, and by His great courage in taking on the cross of Calvary (Luke 9:51; 12:49, 50; 22:41-45; cf. Heb 12:2); did ‘caused this Second Covenant to prevail’ despite the tremendous opposition from the powers of darkness and from other humans opposition. (See e.g., Matt 4:8-11; 11:20-24; 16:21-23; Luke 9:51-56; etc).

            This great, overall struggle was somewhat foreseen in the Seventy Week prophecy as a perfect tense was used with the future verb “cause to prevail” rather than an imperfect tense, to predict this action. The imperfect tense would here indicate that this “prevailing” event would be a logical consequence of something, but instead the perfect tense was actually indicating that this event would actually be an “accident,”^B28 meaning that the actual prevailing of this Second Covenant wouldn’t be a given. Tremendous efforts had to constantly put into it in order to eventually cause it to prevail.

            After His death, resurrection and ascension to Heaven, Jesus still continued to cause this Second Covenant to prevail with the Jews, through the ministry of His disciples (cf. Heb 2:3b), as He first sent them exclusively to the Jews (cf. Acts 1:8a). At Pentecost, 3000 people came to believe in Him and accepted this Second Covenant (Acts 2:2; cf. 1:4-8) and another 5000 did the same on another occasion (Acts 4:4). But despite the great results here in the apostles labors^S29 in confirming this Second Covenant, it was clearly understood by them that it was the Lord who did the “calling” (Acts 2:39), and that it was the Lord who: “added to the church daily those who were being saved” (Act 2:47). As Paul would later say concerning the calling of Israel to this Second Covenant:

           

“How then shall they call upon Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?...” Rom 10:14 NASB.           

                                                           

             So, in summary, the opening statement in Dan 9:27 had predicted that:

                        “He [Jesus] will cause a covenant to prevail with the many [believing Jews]” . . .

            Now the length of time in which this covenant would be caused to prevail with, and also amongst, the "many" Jews who would come to believe, was specified in Dan 9:27 as one prophetic week. This “week” has been unanimously, and rightly, understood as a period of seven literal years and if we now attach it to the end of the 483 years (69 weeks) that were already fulfilled at the time of Christ’s baptism  in 27 A.D., then this would mean that these seven years would cover the period from 27 A.D. to 34 A.D.

Chronology of the 70 Weeks  [7 Years]

It will now be seen how the chronology in this prophetic week was fulfilled.

The Chronology of the 70^th Week

The Expression "h^aşî "

            The next key expression that appears in Dan 9:27 is the chronological expression h^aşî. Its precise meaning and use in Dan 9:27 is seen by how it is similarly used in some other places in the Old Testament. First of all when h^aşî is used with units of measure, like a cubit or an acre, it has the sense of a "half."^S30  When it used in reference to "people," it also mostly has the sense of "half;" especially in describing the "half of a tribe."^S31  However, when h^aşî is used with a period of time, as it is in Dan 9:27, it then usually refers to the midpoint of that given period.^S32  So the literal translation of wah^aşî in Dan 9:27 in relation to the prophetically temporal expression “the week” [hašbû^⊂a] would then be:

                                     “and in the midst/middle of the week . . .” ^R33

            Chronologically speaking, this prophetic specification was predicting that there would be an event that would take place 3½ years into the final 7-year period of the prophecy. Since this last “week” had started in the Fall of 27 A.D. than this “midst” period would be in the Spring of 31 A.D. What would this event be? The prophecy goes on to state that:

                        “In the midst/middle of the week He will yaš^ebît  zebah ûminhah”

            Since Jesus is the only singular figure that has been mentioned in this prophecy, then the third-person personal pronoun "He" here in this statement can only again be a reference to Him; and also, more specifically, to Him in His role of Messiah since the absolute title “Messiah” in verse 26 is again the natural antecedent of this personal pronoun.. What then is the action that is predicted by the expression yaš^ebît in relation to the last two expressions: zebah ûmin^ehah?

The Expression "yaš^ebît"(zebah ûminhah)

            The expression yaš^ebît is a form of the verb šabbat which literally means "to cease"^R34  i.e., "to rest" in the sense of a ‘rest of cessation.’^S35 As the verbal expression yaš^ebît appears in Dan 9:27, it is syntactically classified here as another causative Hiphîl, and is therefore more precisely translated as "cause to cease."^S36 So what was being predicted here was that Jesus would cause something to “cease” in the middle of the last prophetic, week and that is namely here: a "zebah" and a "minhah."

            These expressions, zebah and minhah, are two terms that refer to the offerings made in the Levitical Temple system and a surface look at theses institutions go on to reveal exactly what is meant here in Dan 9:27.

            In the Levitical system there were five different kind of offerings that were made.^R37 There was:

(1) The Burnt Offering [^⊂ôlāh (a.k.a. kālîl)]-for an act of Worship and/or Consecration. (Lev 1)

(2) The Grain or Meal^N38Offering [minhah]-as an (additional) gift. (Lev 2)

(3) The Peace Offering [šelem]-for occasions of Thanks. (Lev 3)

(4) The Sin Offering [^aţ^⊃h]^N39-for God-ward sins, and sins out of ignorance. (Lev 4)

(5) The Guilt or Trespass Offering [^⊃āšām]-for deliberate, and man-ward sins.(Lev 5-6:8)^N40

            What is interesting here is that the only kind of offering that did not involve an animal sacrifice was the “grain” or “meal offering”-the minhah- as it was only an unleavened meal or simply unleaven bread.^R41 Now since the expression “zebah” is one that is used to refer in general to an animal sacrifice (i.e., a bloody sacrifice),^R42 it can therefore be seen here that the statement “zebah  ûminhah” in Dan 9:27 was used to refer to every different type of sacrificial offerings done in the Levitical system. (I.e. the four animal sacrifices, and the one non-animal offering).

            So based on these definitions, a complete translation of the statement in Dan 9:27 would then say:

                                    “He (Jesus) will cause sacrifice and meal-offering to cease.”

             Now based on the function of the animal sacrifice and the meal-offering in the Sinaic Covenant as sin-offerings, this statement would therefore be predicting that Jesus would cause the offerings that dealt with the forgiveness and remission of sins in the First Covenant to “cease.” How then did He fulfill this prediction? The precise meaning and fulfillment of this prediction can be arrived at by an in-depth analysis of some key syntactical points here.

            Since the verbal expression šabbat was expressed as a causative Hiphîl rather than as a (resultative) Piel, then it was being said here that is wasn’t a complete and radical outcome of ceasing of the Jewish’s sin-offerings that was to occur at the exact time of the Messiah’s death. This is because the Hiphîl stem here was actually primarily depicting the causing of this action or an event that would eventually be fulfilled,^R43 and was also not placing an emphasis on this state that would result from it,^R44 while a Piel stem would have been indicating the effecting of a state of "cessation."^R45 In other words, the resultative Piel would be indicating that Jesus would actually make both "sacrifice and meal-offering" come to a physical and objective state of "cessation," while the causative Hiphîl was here only indicating that Jesus would simply cause a subjective action of ceasing to begin to take place at the time of His death. Therefore it can be seen, that it was an action of cessation that was predicted to occur at the time of Christ’s death and not the ushering in of an observable state of cessation. So while a Piel prediction would have Jesus going to the Temple immediately after His resurrection, to objectively bring about the outcome of a physical state of cessation for these sacrifices; this Hiphîl prediction simply predicted that Jesus would only cause a subjective cessation of these sacrifices and offerings to take place at that time.

            Also the use of an imperfect tense with this verb “to cease” here rather than a perfect tense, comes to indicate that the distinct, internal phases of this gradual process of cessation were being emphasized here rather than the "complete" or "grand picture" (a “whole” situation) of the sacrifice and meal-offering being ceased to be offered.^R46 This imperfect tense was also indicating that this future ceasing event would be foreseen event occurring as a logical consequence of something; i.e., because of the Messiah’s prior, anti-typological death, these sin-offerings would eventually, consequentially, and logically have to “cease.”

            This conclusion in this last statement was also indicated by the fact that contrary to an object in the Hiphîl stem, an object in the Piel stem, is passively transposed into a new state or condition as it makes no contribution to the verbal notion,^B47 but, as it was stated before,^R48 in the Hiphîl this object actually participates, at varying degrees, in the event expressed by the verbal root, and even as an indirect second subject. So based on this syntactical feature, the use of a Hiphîl stem here then meant that the object of; “sacrifice and meal-offering,” would in some degree “participate” in this action of ceasing. The example that Waltke and O’Connor have given to illustrated this notion is the sample phrase: “John caused the cabbage to cook,” in contrast to the Piel notion that would say: “John made the cabbage cooked.”^B49 In the first example, the cabbage "participated" in this act of cooking because it could be cooked as it was actually made to be cooked. So John didn’t make the cabbage do something that it couldn’t, or wasn’t, suppose to do. In a similar manner the sacrifice and meal-offering in Dan 9:27 "participated" in the action of ceasing there because they were supposed to cease one day and be fully replaced as they were only substitutionary and thus temporary in nature. They were to function until the time when Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God (John 1:29), would offer Himself up as the ultimate sin sacrifice. As Paul would indicate, this Mosaic institution only functioned as a "tutor" until Jesus, the schoolmaster would come (See Gal 4:1-5). So it was only natural for them to lose their function and meaning after Jesus had died.

            Some other significant arguments that can be emphasized here as they will help establish how this “ceasing” action should be viewed and understood are found in the grammar of the expressions "zebah" and "minhah."

            First of all both these words appear in Dan 9:27 in the singular form: and neither one of them are qualified by a definite article; i.e., "a sacrifice" and " a meal-offering." These two points are quite significant because, first of all, if the actual ritual of daily sacrifices and meal-offerings was being predicted to come to a radical end at the time of the crucifixion, then it would have been more appropriate for them to be expressed in the plural form rather than in the singular because they would then be clearly saying that it would be all “sacrifices and meal-offerings” that would cease to be offered.  If this same radical cessation meaning was used here with the two singular terms in Dan 9:27, then it would strangely literally mean that the death of Jesus Christ would only make one "sacrifice" and one "meal-offering" cease to be offered. This of course would not make any sense theologically. Secondly, the absence of a definite article before "sacrifice" and "meal-offering" would further make a translation of  “one sacrifice and one meal-offering ceasing" inaccurate here since an accurate translation of this phrase could not be definitely pinpointing two particular offerings. So this non-definite, singular expression was therefore indicating here that it was not the actual physical sacrifices that were being pointed out here, but rather the symbolic meaning that they had as they were generically being referred to here as "sacrifice and meal-offering." Therefore based on these grammatical indications it can then be seen that the prediction in Dan 9:27 would indeed make more sense if it was the abstract substance and meaning that was given to these two particular sin-offerings that would come to "cease" at the time of the crucifixion, when type (sin-offering) would meet anti-type (Jesus the Lamb of God).^S50

            So when this anti-typological and theological significance of Christ’s atoning death is fully  understood,^R51 then it can be seen how the "ceasing" prediction in Dan 9:27 was fulfilled at the exact time of Jesus’s sacrificial death on the cross. It did indeed, in essence put an end to these sin-offerings although they were still continued to be offered for a while after that by, not only unbelieving Jews, but also by the early Jewish-Christians who had not yet fully understood the antitypical meaning of Christ’s death. But as we have seen here, Christ’s superior sacrifice had already completely taken away the role and significance that had made these sin-offerings effective.^S52 So it was in this sense that Jesus caused these sin-offerings “to cease.”

            The abstract cessation here of these sin-offerings was actually visibly signaled to have gone into effect at the exact time of Christ’s death when the veil in the Temple that shielded the, now departed, Shekinah glory of God in the Most Holy Place,^E53 was torn from top to bottom by an unseen hand.^N54 This was a sign from God that He had "closed the ceremonial Law books" of the system for making atonement for sin in the First Covenant (see Heb. 7:11). He had once instituted this system to serve as a concrete depiction of His atonement process with fallen man, but from the time of the Second Covenant on, it would only be Jesus, His Son, and no longer earthly priests, who would serve as the Mediator between God and man (1 Tim 2:5, 6; cf. Heb 8:6; 9:15). From then on, anyone could “come boldly to the throne of grace,” “by the blood of Jesus and by the way which He [had] dedicated for us through the veil” in order to obtain pardon. (Heb 4:16; 10:19, 20). The earthly temple and its system had fulfilled its tutoring purposes (cf. Gal 4:1-5) as now “One greater than the Temple” had come (Matt 12:6). Interestingly enough, Jesus’s death on the cross, at the ninth hour^E55 [6:00 p.m.], was the exact time of the offering of the evening sin-offerings in the Temple (cf. Matt. 27:45, 50).  Therefore the transition here from type to antitype (“in the place of ” the type) was perfect! (cf. 1 Cor 5:7).

            It is also interesting to note here that while God's presence had departed from the Temple at precise time of Christ's death, the Temple itself still remained standing, as we have seen,  for about 40 more years. But since God had officially departed from it, then it was in essence completely void and desolate. In a similar way, while sacrifices and meal-offerings continued to be offered for a number of years after Christ’s death, they too were  “void and desolate.” They would eventually come to an utter end at the time of the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D. This would, so-to-speak, be their resultative Piel state of cessation. Even the unbelieving Jews, after this physical destruction, did not feel that it was necessary to revive and reestablish this system of bloody sacrifices. They instead adjusted their theology to compensate for the absence of a physical Temple. So this “new revelation” of the ceasing of the First Covenant services was then made clear to all in 70 A.D. by this utter destruction of the Temple and the abolishment of its services.

            Also since Jesus did not actually tell His disciples right away that He had caused the meaning of these offerings to cease, it is then understandable why they and other very early (Jewish) Christian believers customarily continued to offer them as they did not immediately know what had taken place. They of course would later come to fully understand this ceasing action as they gradually came to fully understand the meaning and implications of Christ’s anti-typical death, mainly through the guidance of the Holy Spirit (cf. John 16:12,13) as revealed in the inspired and radical teachings of the enlightened Paul, God’s chosen instrument for this purpose. As an ex-teacher of this ceremonial aspect of the Mosaic Law (cf. Phil 3: 5, 6), Paul better understood the full implication of what Jesus had “caused to cease” by His death on the cross.

             In the light of all of this concerning the "ceasing" of animal sacrifices by the event of Jesus Christ’s death, it then would seem quite strange on the part of God if He felt, as some popular modern-day end-time prophetic scenarios of some Christian expositors strangely enough predict, that the reviving of animal sacrifices and sin-offerings before the end of time would be an absolute necessity for the salvation of ethnic Jews, and that this reviving of bloody sacrifices would be endorsed and watched over by, of all people, Jesus Christ Himself, and also that it would be conducted in a rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem. Such a basis for prophetic interpretations really has no Biblical support and is actually nothing more than a theological/prophetical pre-supposition, which actually goes against the plain fundamental and essential teaching of the Bible on salvation by faith in Jesus Christ and His Sacrifice alone!  It is either everyone, both from the First Covenant Era and from the Second Covenant Era, will be saved by faith in Jesus Christ, by either having: looked forward to His ultimate sacrifice at Calvary, or by looking back to this eternal event; or God will have, and make, some people be saved by the "works of the [Mosaic] law."  If the apostle Paul were alive today, he would categorically and emphatically refute such a teaching by saying:

       

“A man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even as we [Jewish and Gentile Christians] have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.” Gal 2:16 [i.e.s and explanation supplied]. (Cf. Acts 13:38, 39; Rom 4:1-3, 10:1-4; Heb 10:1-4).^N56

       

            It was because of the impossibility that anyone could be saved by the works of the Mosaic law (Heb 7:18, 19) that God purposely had Jesus be born ‘under this law, in order that He might redeem those who were under it.’ (Gal 4:4, 5).^N57 Also as Paul said in his monumental polemic epistle to the churches in Galatia on salvation by grace through faith alone, such an understanding would “set aside the grace of God” and actually mean that Christ had died in vain (Gal 2:21). And also as Paul said twice for an emphatic warning against such a heresy: ‘let a messenger with such a message be anathema’ (Gal 1:8 & 9); and that is even if  he (or she) appears to have come down from heaven (vs. 8). That is because any messenger that had truly "come down from heaven" would not be ‘distorting/perverting the Gospel of Christ’ with such teachings (vs. 7), or even be coming close to remotely suggest that what Jesus had done “once for all” (Heb 10:10) was insufficient and in vain, especially since they would have had a behind the scene look all that took place at Calvary. Such a messenger with this message would rather have come form the infamous “abyss.”^R58 It must also be kept in mind here that Paul had made this strong reprimand at a time when the full meaning of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ was not yet fully understood and sacrifices were still being offered in the Temple, even by Christians. So then how much more then should this warning be heeded today, 2000 years later, when the meaning of this eternal event has fully been revealed!

            So really, the last thing that a Christian should be doing today is encouraging the rebuilding of a Temple in Jerusalem, for the reviving of bloody animal sacrifices and other sin-offerings. Instead Christians should be trying to help the people of the Jewish nation understand what Jesus of Nazareth had “caused to cease” (Heb 7:26, 27) when He was redeeming all of us from the curse of the law by Himself becoming a curse for us and hanging on the “cursed tree.” (Gal 3:13; cf. 1 Pet 2:24).

                                       

The Year of the Crucifixion

            We have thus far seen that the prediction of the cessation of sin-offerings by the Messiah in Dan 9:27 was a clear reference of the effects of Jesus’s sacrificial death on the cross, and now,  since the prophecy specified that this event would occur in the “midst” of the final week, we therefore have to verify if the theological fulfillment of this prediction harmonizes with its chronological specification. This can be done by determining the actual year of the crucifixion.

            Due to the fact that varying dates for the year of the crucifixion have been suggested (ranging from 21 A.D. to 36 A.D.^R59), an original dating of the crucifixion will have to be done here.

              Since Pontius Pilate, who reigned from 27 A.D. to 37 A.D.,^R60 was in office at the time of Christ’s trial (Matt 27:2), and since we have already established that the baptism of Christ historically occurred in the year A.D. 27,^R61 we can therefore, theoretically, narrow down the range of possible dates for the crucifixion from 27 A.D. to 37 A.D.^N62

          The first step that has usually been taken in dating the crucifixion has been to determine the exact date of the month, and also the exact day of the week on which it took place. The exact determination of this has been greatly hampered by the apparent fact that there is a dating discrepancy between the Synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke) and the Gospel of John. This is because of the fact that while these four gospels all agree that the crucifixion took place on a Friday afternoon,^S63 and that Jesus partook of a meal, “the Last Supper,” with His disciples on the night before the crucifixion, and prior to being arrested,^S64 there is an apparent contradiction as to the actual calender date of the Last Supper. The Synoptic Gospels seem to say that Jesus had this Last Supper “on the first (lit. foremost^N65) (day)” of the [Feast of] Unleaven Bread”^S66 (which was the day of Passover^N67), while the Gospel of John, on the other hand, indicates that this Last Supper took place “before the Passover,” and before the Passover Lamb was eaten (John 13:1 & 18:28). Since the Jews had been instructed to observe the Passover on the 14^th day of the month of Nisan (Exod 12:6), and also sacrifice and eat the Passover Lamb on that day (vss. 6, 8), this therefore would mean that the Matthew, Mark, and Luke had said that the Last Supper had occurred on the evening of Nisan 14, and that the crucifixion had occurred on the afternoon of Nisan 15, while John would have (contrarily) said that the Last Supper had occurred on the evening of Nisan 13, and the crucifixion on the afternoon of Nisan 14.

            Various propositions have been made over the years to try to resolve this discrepancy, but the one suggestion that actually does resolve it quite neatly is the one that takes into account that there existed two methods of reckoning a day throughout Bible times, including in the time of Jesus.^R68 One of these methods was the "sunrise-to-sunrise" reckoning which would consider a new day to begin in the morning while the other method was the "sunset-to-sunset" reckoning which began a new day in the evening. (The sunrise calender would be half a day ahead of the sunset calender). It is believed that the Galileans and the Pharisees, used the sunrise-to-sunrise method to reckon their days, whereas the Judeans and the Sadducees used the sunset-to sunset method.^R69 Accordingly, Nisan 14 would have begun on the Thursday morning of the Passion Week for the Galileans and Pharisees, while it would have begun on the evening of that Thursday for the Judeans and Sadducees. This would mean that Jesus and His disciples, who were Galileans, would have prepared for their Passover Supper starting on that Thursday morning and would have had their supper later on in the evening of that day (Matt 26:17, 20; Mark 14:12, 16, 17; Luke 22:7, 8, 13-15), while the Judeans and Sadducees would have eaten their Passover on the evening of their Nisan 14 which would only come on the following Friday evening. So they would indeed not yet have eaten their Passover Supper when Jesus was being tried in Pilate’s court as John had said (John 18:28). They would instead still be in the preparation stages of this Supper at the time of the crucifixion (19:14).^R70

            So what seems to have been the case in the Passover Supper storyline between John and the Synoptic Gospels is that John was retelling the Passion story according based on a sunset-to-sunset method, while the Synoptic Gospels had used a sunrise-to-sunrise method.

            So based on this resolution, the final events in the public ministry of Jesus would have occurred on the following days and dates:

[Blue= dates of sunset reckoning/Red= dates of sunrise reckoning]

Day and Date of the Last Supper

        Now while this resolves the problem of the discrepancy between the Synoptics and John concerning the date of the Last Supper it goes cause a dilemma as to the actual calender date of the crucifixion. Did it take place on Nisan 15 as the sunrise reckoning indicates or on the Nisan 14 of the sunset reckoning. This is somewhat easily resolved based on the fact that both the Synoptics and John demonstrated in the rest of their Gospels that they (personally) subscribed to the sunrise reckoning.^N71  This would then mean that the Gospel writers would have unanimously and personally considered  the crucifixion to have taken place on the calender date of Friday, Nisan 15, even though, as we have seen, John had chosen (for some reason) to retell in his Gospel, the Last Supper event, according to the sunset reckoning.

            With a date for the crucifixion established, the next traditional step that has been taken by commentators (who had actually mostly concluded a Friday, Nisan 14 date) has been to find a year in the Jewish first century calender, preferably in the decade of the 30's, in which Nisan 14 fell on a Friday but since no first century calender of the Jews actually exist today, the best that these commentators have been able to do has been to scientifically and mathematically reconstruct a calender and base their choice for the year for the crucifixion on it. Unfortunately, as Roger T. Beckwith^B72 (and also the US Naval Observatory-Astronomical Application Department)^W73 have separately pointed out, this apparently “scientific” method actually cannot be depended upon to provide a definite solution to dating the crucifixion since such a scientifically-based calender is actually not a precise reconstruction of the actual, or better real, calender of the Jews in the first century.

            This is because the Jews used a very arbitrary method in reckoning their calender which greatly depended on conditions that cannot be figured out today, and therefore cannot be taken into consideration by scientifically reconstructed calenders. The main problem being that the Jews began a new month based on the visual observations of the crescent of a new moon: the “new light,”^R74 and if the atmospheric conditions were not favorable to observe this new crescent, then the first day of the month would be delayed by a day or so. Today, since there is absolutely no way of determining what the daily atmospheric conditions of Palestine were like at that time, it is therefore impossible to know which months, in the first century, missed the first day of the appearance of the moon due to bad weather and beclouded skies.^R75

            This arbitrary and unscientific way in which the Jews reckoned their calender has indeed caused many problems among commentators today, and therefore no two reconstructed calender seem to agree with each other and, there is obviously no standard that can be used to determine which one of them is the most accurate. This has then led to various years being suggested for the crucifixion. For example, while some commentators, insist that only 30 A.D. can be viewed as the year of the crucifixion,^R76 others have come to see some astronomical problems with that year,^R77 or have calculated that Nisan 14, that year, fell on a Thursday.^R78

            The same is true for the year A.D. 33 since commentators have said, based on their varying calenders and calculations, that their day for the crucifixion-Nisan 14 in A.D. 33- could have either fallen on a Thursday ^R79 or a Friday,^R80 or even on a Saturday, April 4.^B81 The astronomical calculations that led to the choice of A.D. 33 are at times also based on the assumption that the Jewish calender of the time of Jesus was calculated exactly the same way as the revised one which came into use centuries after the death of Christ, but this was actually not the case.^R82

            Those who choose the year A.D. 33 also further assume that there was no intercalary month in A.D. 33,^R83 but this conclusion cannot be proven today as it cannot be shown through scientific methods that the year A.D. 33 was not given an extra month (intercalated). The Jewish calender at times included this extra (intercalary) month for various arbitrary and unscientific reasons which indicated whether or not signs of Spring had appeared yet by the end of the twelfth month of the year (Adar=Feb./Mar).^R84 Examples of these reasons are: (1) the immaturity of the corn crops; (2) the immaturity of the fruit trees; (3) the remoteness of the Spring equinox;^N85 (4) the Passover ovens not yet being dry; (5) the Jews from the Dispersion (Jews outside of Jerusalem), who were on their way to Jerusalem had not arrived yet; (6) the roads and bridges leading to Jerusalem were still in need of repairs after the winter.^R86 Since Jewish first century calenders do not exist today, and since the reasons for intercalation were not fixed reasons, it is therefore impossible to determine which year in the first century was intercalated. So this unattainable certainty would obviously cause a great discrepancy between a scientifically reconstructed calender of the first century and what would be the actual one.

            Also concerning the year of A.D. 33, it has been reasonably argued that since the year A.D. 34 was a sabbatical year,^R87 and since it had become prohibited to intercalate a sabbatical year or the year following it,^R88 i.e., A.D. 34 and 35, because of the scarceness of crops caused by the non-sown sabbatical year (Lev 25:1-7); then the year preceding this sabbatical year (A.D. 33) would more than likely have been intercalated, in order to maximize the harvest of that year and thus compensate for the upcoming two "unintercalable" years. This would then mean that the Passover in A.D. 33 would not have fallen at its regular time, before the Spring equinox, and it therefore would not for certain have fallen on a Friday.^R89

            Therefore, based on all of these reasons which show that the scientific method for dating the crucifixion is greatly dependent on inaccurate calender reconstructions, this method cannot be considered as a reliable one.^R90 So in order to determine the year of the crucifixion, we are therefore left only with the internal evidence provided by the gospels account. Since we have already seen that the baptism of Christ took place in A.D. 27, we would then just have to determine from the gospels the actual duration of Christ’s public ministry and then add this total to the date of the baptism in order to arrive at the calender year when His public ministry came to an end, and thus the year when the crucifixion took place..

            Of the four gospel accounts, the gospel of John provides the most detailed chronology for Christ’s public ministry as it names the major feasts (mostly pilgrimage feast) that Jesus  attended during His ministry.^S91 It is specifically the Passover feasts that John names that will  help to determine the length of Christ’s public ministry since their every occurrence would indicate that another year in Christ’s ministry had gone by.

            The first Passover that John mentions is in John 2:13, which we have already discussed in great detail,^R92 and seen that based on the chronological statement provided in John 2:20, it had occurred in the year A.D. 28.^R93

            The next Passover that is explicitly mentioned by John is in John 6:4, but prior to the mention of this feast there is another “feast of the Jews” that is mentioned in John 5:1, that based on a comparison of key statements in John 4:35, 5:1 and 6:4 seems to have been the Passover Feast in A.D. 29. This is seen in more detail as follows:

            Following His stay in Jerusalem for the Passover (John 2:13-3:21), Jesus is said to then have ministered in the surrounding area in Judea (John 3:22). Then after His stay there, He left the area of Judea and headed north to His hometown of Galilee, but on His way there He stayed  a while in Samaria where He met the Samaritan woman at the well. (See John 4:3, 4ff). During this stay Jesus made a statement that gives us a clue to the time of the year when this visit had occurred. Speaking to His disciples, He said in John 4:35:

       

“Do you not [habitually] say, 'There are still four months and then comes the harvest'? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest.” (NASB)^N94

       

            Based on the fact that the present tense verb “say” here^B95 is understood as referring to a customary action and thus is classified syntactically as a Customary Present^R96 an since logically a “four-month” statement is made ... four months before the mentioned event, and since the force in using an habitual four-month statement occurs when it is referred in the time when this statement is  “habitually” made; and also further since the grain harvest in Palestine occurs in April and May, then it is apparent that here Jesus had made use of an observation that had very recently been made by the disciples themselves concerning the upcoming harvest,^N97 then it can be concluded here that this exchange and therefore this entire episode had occurred either January or February, of now the newly turned year: A.D. 29.

            Now after completing His trip to Galilee (John 4:43ff), John then says that Jesus returned to Jerusalem because there was a feast of the Jews. (John 5:1). Since Jesus actually made a special trip to Jerusalem for this feast then this more than likely was one of the major Spring pilgrimage feasts, either Passover or Pentecost. Now a comparison of John 5:1 and 6:4 show that this was the Passover feast. In John 6:4, the gospel writer John apparently made a explanatory clarification of the phrase “a feast of the Jews”^N98 which he had mentioned back in John 5:1 but not so specifically.. He says there that: “Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.” This phrase in somewhat strange because the intended readers of John’s Gospel, established early Christians where fully aware that the Passover was a feast of the Jews. Furthermore when he had first made a reference to the Passover in his gospel in John 2:13, he did not add this additional explanatory clause. It therefore appears that in making this additional statement in John 6:4, John was trying to explain to his readers that the “feast of the Jews” which he had mentioned earlier in his account had also been a Passover feast. The rules of Greek syntax^R99 does indeed allow for this as a definite article could be used to remind or point the reader back to who or what had been mentioned previously. This function of the definite article is known as an “anaphoric” use which means  “to bring back, or bring up,” and, interestingly enough, this previous mention would have been in an indefinite form (case in point- “a feast”). So rather than going back and inserting the whole phrase “the Passover,” or a definite article in John 5:1, John simply made an explanatory, anaphoric correction in John 6:4 which then would make his statement there fully read as:

“Now, the Passover, (which also was the feast of the "feast of the Jews" previously mentioned [5:1]^N100), was at hand,”

            So in summary the “feast mentioned” in John 5:1 was explained in John 6:4 to have been a Passover feast and it would have occurred in A.D. 29.^N101

            Now, in continuing with our chronology here, all of this would in turn mean that the Passover mentioned in 6:4 would have occurred in A.D. 30) and therefore the last Passover of Christ’s ministry that is mentioned in John (12:1) would have been the one of A.D. 31. This arrived at conclusion would therefore indicate a date of A.D. 31. for the crucifixion of Christ.

            This Spring of A.D. 31. date is one that concretely supported by a statement that Jesus made in Luke 13:31-33, and which like the one in John 4:35 contains datable and chronological indications.

            At that time some Pharisees came to Jesus and advised Him to:

            “Get out and depart from here, [Jerusalem]^S102 for Herod wants to kill You!” (vs. 31).

            This warning was made after Herod had already martyred John the Baptist for the Synoptic Gospels indicate that it was around the time of John’s death that Herod first "heard the report about Jesus" and feared that it was John the Baptist who had risen from the dead. (Matt 14:1, 2; Mark 6:14-16; Luke 9:7-9). Now a comparison of the Synoptic Gospels’ storyline following this event with John’s Gospel, help us to determine the exact year when this statement was made. Since they first all stated that the event in Christ’s public ministry that immediately followed this report of John’s death to Jesus was the feeding of the 5000+ (Matt 14:12ff, Mark 6:32ff, Luke 9:10ff), and the Gospel of John goes on to indicate that this feeding of the 5000+ took place a few days before the Passover feast of John 6:4 (cf. John 6:1-4), which we have demonstrated was the Passover of A.D. 30.; and since Luke, who in his gospel was writing “a sequential (kathexes^N103) account” of the life of Christ (Luke 1:3), places the exchange between Christ and the Pharisees (Luke 13) after the event of the feeding of the 5000+ (Luke 9:10-17), it is therefore evident here that the exchange here between Jesus and the Pharisees had taken place after the Passover of A.D. 30, and also very late in Christ’s public ministry.

            Now of the two statements in Luke 13:32, 33 that Jesus made in response to this warning of the Pharisees, the one in verse 32, was, as we will see, a figurative allusion, by Jesus, to the overall time that had divinely been appointed for Him to minister publicly.^R104 A literal translation of this statement actually said:

“Go and tell that fox,^N105 Behold, I cast out demons and perform healings today  and tomorrow and the third, I will myself^N106 bring to an end [or ‘finish’].” [i.e.s]

            The precise chronological significance of this statement of Jesus is fully revealed by the fact that although He had been anointed for His ministry at the time of His baptism,^S107 and before the event of the wedding feast at Cana in early 28 B.C., He still refused at first to perform any "signs" (miracles) at that wedding feast because, as He said to Mary, His “hour had not yet come” (John 2:4). John then went on to say that after Jesus went ahead and performed this miracle, that this was the beginning of His signs which manifested His glory (vs. 11). On the other hand, shortly after this wedding feast, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for the Passover, and, apparently, willingly performed some “signs” there (John 2:13, 23). Since, based on John 6:2, where it is seen that these “signs” also included healing miracles, it then becomes apparent that Jesus knew that He was suppose to only start performing miracles at the time of the Passover of A.D. 28 and that, from that date on, He would have three full years to carry out His public ministry.

            So if we started to count off this set time of exactly three years from that beginning Passover of A.D. 28, it is seen that indeed, this is precisely the time that had passed from that first Passover to the last one in A.D. 31, as the following table demonstrates:

                                    Year #1-   Passover A.D. 28 -to- Passover A.D. 29

                                    Year #2-   Passover A.D. 29 -to- Passover A.D. 30

                                    Year #3-   Passover A.D. 30 -to- Passover A.D. 31

            Thus the three “days” that Jesus mentioned in Luke 13:32 would have actually been a symbolical representation of this three-year period and He therefore would have been explicitly using the symbolic/prophetic day-year principle here!

            The statement that Jesus then further made in Luke13:33 went on to emphasize that He indeed had been given three full years to accomplish His public ministry, and that this period had started and ended at the Passover feasts. Whereas Jesus was using symbolic language in the statement of verse 32, it is obvious that He was here using literal time in verse 33, even though this statement was expressed in a similar way to the symbolic statement in verse 32. He added:

“Nevertheless, I must journey today and tomorrow and the following; for it is not acceptable that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.”

       

            The Greek word dei is translated here as "I must," and literally means: "it is necessary,"^R108 but when it is used in a theological context, as it is here, then it has the extended meaning of: "it is in God's plan."^R109  Examples of this extended meaning for dei could be seen in passages like (1) Luke 4:43 where Jesus actually meant "it was in God’s plan" (dei) for Him to preach the kingdom of God to other cities also, because it was for this purpose that He had been sent, and (2) John 3:14 where Jesus said that "it was in God’s plan" (dei)  for Him to be “lifted up” as the serpent of Moses was lifted up in the wilderness (cf. John 12:34), and so on.^S110 Since the stops in Jesus’s upcoming itinerary from Jerusalem (Luke 13:22) and back would actually take him more than 3 days, as He would raise Lazarus in Bethany after a 4-day delay (John 11:1-44); and also heal the blind Bartimaeus (Mark 10:46-52, Luke 18:35-43), and visit Zacchaeus, in Jericho (Luke 19:1-10); which was about a three-day journey from Bethany; and then “six days” before His final Passover in Jerusalem (John 12:1) He would return to Bethany and see Mary and Martha (John 11:55-12:1);^N111 it therefore becomes self-evident that Jesus had not here said that it would only be three literal days before He would return Jerusalem and die, but rather that despite Herod’s present desire to put an end to His public ministry, it was contrarily in God’s overriding and foreordained plan that He would journey for a few more days, for: “today and tomorrow and the following [necessary days],” until He should return to Jerusalem during the Passover Celebration and at that time be put to death as it had been precisely planned.^N112

            So in summary, Jesus had essentially said in these two verses in Luke 13 that His ministry would last for three full years (from the Passover of A.D. 28) and that it would not be prematurely aborted by anyone, but that He would Himself bring it to an end by allowing Heaven’s mandatory plan to be accomplish at the end of these 3 years.^S113 Many times during His public ministry, Jesus alluded to this notion that He was journeying according to a set chronological time clock, as we saw earlier,^R114 and that His end would not come before the appointed time. For example in John 11, when He was about to go to Bethany to raise Lazarus, His disciples were afraid that if He returned to Bethany, He would be put to death by the Jews who were seeking to take His life there (John 11:7, 8), but to this He replied: “Are there not twelve hours in a day, etc...”  (vs. 9),

meaning that as long as He continued to walk in the "light" of His Father's will, His final hour would not come before its time.^S115

            If we now add to this period of three years the period of six months that had elapse between Christ’s Fall baptism in 27 A.D. to His first Passover in the Spring of 28 A.D., then we can see that this would total a period of 3½ years. This would then mean that 3½ years had elapsed between Christ’s baptism (in the Fall season of 27 A.D.) and His crucifixion (in the Spring season of 31 A.D.). This would harmonize perfectly with the prophetic prediction in Dan 9:27 which said that the Messiah's significant death would occur in the middle of last prophetic week; i.e., 3½ years after His coming on the scene as the Messiah. (Dan 9:25).

            Also, Jesus seemed to have used the imagery of the parable of the fig tree in Luke 13:6-9, to make an allusion to a period of about 3-4 (or possibly 3½) years of a ministry to Jewish Nation, which apparently was an allusion to the combination of His ministry with that of John the Baptist. John had started this fig tree symbolism when he said to some of the hypocritical people that had come to him to be baptized:

“You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore bring fruits in keeping with repentance; and do begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father,’ for I say to you, that God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. And also the axe is already laid at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”  Luke 3:7-9 (NASB) [i.e.s].

            Jesus continued this symbolism of the Jewish Nation as this fig tree by symbolically saying that if it did not bear fruit in the fourth year, then it would be cut down. With John the Baptist’ ministry having started a little before Christ’s baptism; and continuing until (and after) Jesus began His starting in the Spring of 28 A.D., (See John 3:22, 23) it can then be seen that these two ministries did indeed fulfill this 'within-four-years' parable. Therefore the cutting down of the symbolic fig tree (the Jewish nation), would have occurred at the time of the rejection of Christ at His crucifixion in 31 A.D. and would therefore indeed have occurred within this four-year period.

            So this death of Christ in the Spring of 31 A.D. would therefore mean that He was crucified exactly 69½  prophetic weeks, or 486½ literal years, after the mōşā^⊃ of the Seventy Weeks in the Fall (Sept/Oct) of 457 B.C. as prophesied!

Chronology of the 70 Weeks  [31 A.D.]

            The chronology of this prophecy could really not be any more precise!

The Results of Rejecting the Messiah

            Following the chronological prediction of the exact time of the Messiah’s death, verse 27 of Daniel 9 goes on to make an allusion to the judgement that was to come upon the Jewish Nation and Jerusalem as a result of their rejection of the Messiah. The next to last statement in Dan 9:27 is transliterated from the Hebrew as:

                                                 w^e⊂al k^enap šiqqûşîm m^eşōmēm

            An analysis of the key terms: k^enap and m^eşōmēm, will help us to arrive at the accurate translation and understanding of this phrase.

The Expression "k^enap"

            The expression k^enap has been defined by lexicographers as: "wing, skirt, extremity, end,"^B116 "wing, edge, extremity,"^B117 "wing, skirt, outermost (edge),"^B118  "wing, extremity,"^B119  These definitions indicate that this expression could be used both concretely and abstractively. It is used concretely to refer to the "wings" of flying creatures,^S120 or to a "skirt" or a "garment,"^S121 and is also used abstractively to describe God’s (wing of) protection and His deliverance.^S122 The meaning for k^enap that seems to best harmonize with the context of Dan 9:27 is the one that indicates the "extremity" of something. This meaning is seen in a statement found in the apocryphal book Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) which says:

“Give a meal offering with a memorial and offer a fat sacrifice to the utmost [k^enap] of thy means.”^B123

            Encouragement is given here for a person to give until he or she reaches their highest (personal) level (or capacity) for giving. It is in this sense that k^enap šiqqûşîm (“abominations”) in Dan 9:27 should be understood; that is as: "the utmost-i.e., greatest, or most extreme, of abominations." So this means that among the many abominations committed by the Nation of Israel during their history (e.g., idolatry, faithlessness, killing of prophets), we have to find here, one that God would considered as the 'greatest', 'most extreme', or the 'most abhorring' to Him. Jesus gives us a great indication as to what this capital sin would actually be as in the allegorical parable of the wicked “tenant-farmers”^R124 (Matt 21:33-44), which allegorically depicted the long rebellious history of Israel as God’s chosen people (cf. Isa 5:1-7). Jesus showed there that Israel repeatedly abused and murdered the messengers, in the form of prophets, that God would send to them (vss.34-36), yet God did not lose hope with them and kept on sending them in order to preserve His people. It wasn’t until the wicked tenants of the vineyard killed the vine owner’s own son that the vineyard was finally taken away from them. Similarly, it wasn’t until Israel killed God’s own Son , the greatest Prophet ever sent to them that God divorced Himself, and His kingdom from them. So, unarguably, the "most abhorring" abomination that Israel ever committed was when they rejected and killed Jesus the Messiah.

The Expression "m^ešōmēm"

            Another key expression that occurs in the phrase with k^enap šiqqûşîm is: m^ešōmēm. In its present form it is a combination of the (performative) prefix mem (discussed below) and the expression šōmēm. This expression šōmēm itself is one that occurs about 153 in the OT and has usually been translated as: “to desolate” and  “a desolation.” Contextual analysis of the expression šōmēm reveal that it is actually more of a theological term that stands in-between the Hebrew expression for a “desert or wilderness” -midbār^E125 and the one for a “physical destruction” -horbāh. When šōmēm is used in relation to a non-personal subject, it is consistently used to represent an area that was (1) adequately populated, and/or (2) fully functional and/or (3) thriving, but then that has suddenly, forcefully, and vindictively been depopulated, disbanded and/or deprived of life and activity.^S126 This expression šōmēm therefore consistently used to refer to something losing a key agent that made it properly and fully functional.^{S127, N128} In deeper theological contexts, šōmēm is repeatedly used to represent a last resort punishment of God on a rebellious community, which eventually leads to its utter physical destructions.^S129 When it is used in reference to a sanctuary it specifically refers to it as having been abandoned (e.g., Dan 8:13; 9:17, 18). This use for šōmēm in Lev 26:31 further shows that this abandonment or "desolation" of God of His sanctuary is that He no longer partakes of its services.

            Notwithstanding the theological meaning for šōmēm in the Hebrew OT, the authors of the Greek version of the OT repeatedly used the Greek word “erēmos,” which literally means "a desert" or "a wilderness" to express the theological Hebrew expression šōmēm. This is also the case with the New Testament authors as erēmos was used with both a literal meaning,^S130 and also with a more theological meaning.^S131

            Concerning the performative prefix mem, it is one that is used with a ‘specifying force.’^B132 It is used to make the application of the expression that it is attached to be more vivid and definite. It can be used to indicate that the word is either:

(1) a substantive^E133 of location,- e.g., midbār (a “range, steppe”); māqôm (a “place”);

                  môšāb (an “assembly”);  

            (2) an instrument term- e.g., map^etēha (a “key”); ma^⊃kelet (a “knife”);

(3) and an abstraction- e.g., miš^epāţ (a “judgement”); mar^⊃eh (an “appearance”);

                   mar^⊃āh (a “vision”); mam^elākāh (a “kingdom, reign”).^R134

           

             So the expression m^ešōmēm in Dan 9:27 would be identified with one of these more specific forces for its root "desolation" meaning and interestingly enough, all of these three forces have been argued for by various translators/interpreters of this verse as it has been translated as:

            (1) "a desolate place”^R135 -(a substantive of location).

            (2) "something used for desolating-"^R136 - (an instrument).

            (3) "a desolation"^R137 -(an abstraction).              

            Many interpreters have quickly chosen the second option with the meaning of "someone who makes desolate" but in doing that, they have inaccurately applied this expression to a human figure.^R138 This forcefully goes against the root/inherent aspect of the expression šōmēm since it is a stative expression (describing a state) and not a fientive one (describing an activity).^R139 So an ‘instrument used for desolating’ here would actually have to be ‘a circumstance that bring about a desolation’ as is the case in Dan 11:31 which speaks of: ‘[an] abomination that makes desolate.’ (cf. e.g., RSV).  To make this “instrument” refer to a person, a single person no less, as the singular form here indicates, would come to make that person be entirely responsible for that desolation as the Piel verb indicates. The Old Greek of Daniel (ca. 150 B.C.) and the Theodotion version (ca. 180 A.D.) both saw this expression in Dan 9:27 would indeed be best interpreted as a stative and therefore translated it as: “erēmos” (understood theologically as: “a desolation’).^R140 So these more syntactically accurate translations therefore rule out the interpretations of this expression as a reference to a human historical figures such as: Antiochus IV Epiphanes (2^nd century B.C.-Historical-Critical); Flavius Titus (70 A.D.-Historicist-Messianist); or an Apocalyptic figure such as an alleged Future Antichrist (???- Futurist-Dispensationalist).^R141  So only a stative and therefore non-personal event can be taken into consideration as a possible “instrument” meaning for the prefixed expression m^ešōmēm.

            Despite this slight narrowing down of translation possibilities here, there are still theoretically 200+ possible interpretations/translations that can be made of the phrase: w^e⊂al k^enap šiqqûşîm m^ešōmēm due mainly to the flexible opening waw-conjunction+^⊂al-preposition combination (w^e⊂al), and the mem prefixed expression m^ešōmēm. As we mentioned earlier, the waw-conjunction can be translated to function conjunctively, sequentially, disjunctively or expegetically.^R142 and Waltke and O’Connor^B143 have made allusions to about 17 slightly varying ways in which the preposition ^⊂al could actually function as.^N144 Then there are on top of that the 3 possible meanings that the m^ešōmēm could have. Hence the 200+ (4x17x3) translation possibilities here. So the actual interpretation/translation of this phrase will have to be determined by the its immediate Messianic context. Then this conclusion can be verified by its larger Biblical/Historical-fulfilment context. So after various combination attempts, the one interpretation/translation of the phrase: w^e⊂al k^enap šiqqûşîm m^ešōmēm that best harmonizes with the overall Messianic context here, and that can also be supported Biblically and Historically is as follows:    

            w^e⊂al -        "But because of" [disjunctive-contrasting-waw + Cause-(reason) preposition]

            k^enap -       "the most extreme of"

            šiqqûşîm -  "abominations"

            m^ešōmēm - "[. . .] a desolate place."[a substantive of location]           

            There are two further key syntactical observations that can be made about this phrase here based on the fact that expression m^ešōmēm is grammatically identified as a Polel participle.^R145 First of all, in reference to its participial aspect, since the immediate context here is making a reference to a situation that is in fact future, and is denoting  a circumstance that accompanies a future event, then it is a participle that can be labeled with the Latin terms “futurum instans”^B146 ("to also be  present"). This function of the participle expresses such an attending circumstance: (1) with specivity (i.e., "namely"); (2) with certainty; and (3) with immanency (i.e., an inherently or naturally resulting circumstance). It also occurs with some logical connection to another clause in the context. This kind of participle is also best translated into English with the phrase “going to (be)-with stative verbs.^B147 So in reference to our present case, this would all come to mean that: ‘the most extreme of abominations’ would right away, and  automatically, lead to a place becoming desolate.’

            Now since the expression m^ešōmēm is a Polel stem which is one that is derived from the Piel verbal stem, it also share the same basic characteristic functions of the Piel stem.^R148  As we have explained before,^R149 this is a stem that indicates an action that is “made to happen” as it would ordinarily (or of itself) not take place. It is also an action whose effect is “direct and immediate,” (i.e., instantaneous). Also since the expression šōmēm in the simple Qal stem is intransitive, as its stative Qal meaning of: “to be astonished”^S150 does not govern an object, it therefore goes on to form a “factitive Piel,”^R151 which is a type of Piel that designates the “bringing about of a state depicted by an adjective without regard to the process.”^B152 This is different from the resultative Piel (form by transitive Qal stem verbs) which designates the bringing about of the outcome of the action indicated by the base root verb in question (i.e., the eventual outcome of a ‘desolation’ which the OT shows was complete depopulation and loss of communal life and usually utter physical destruction.). Also in the Piel stem, the object or receiver of this Piel stem "stative action" would then be passively transposed into a new state or condition because it makes no contribution to the notion expressed by the verb.^B153 It is also "accidentally" transposed into this new state because this new state is one that is not “essential” to it (i.e., it is foreign to it and uncharacteristic of it).

            In further understanding of the use of the Polel stem, contrasted to the Poel stem, rather than denoting a sort of habitual/profession action/state as this latter stem, is rather denotes a sudden/instantaneous, especially hostile, transformation into that state of profession, to aim/endeavor to achieve an action/state.^R154 So it would be indicating something that is suddenly transformed into a new state that it was not before.

             So in summary, this would all mean that the meaning of the factitive Polel participle  m^ešōmēm in Dan 9:27 would be indicating ‘a place’ that is, suddenly, passively and accidentally (which could be understood as: ‘forcefully’) made to be transposed into a new state of being ‘desolated.’ This  would mean that it would be ‘deserted’ or ‘deprived’ of what made it “thrive,” “functional,” and thus also “respectful.” So based on all of this, the complete translation of the predictive statement: w^e⊂al k^enap šiqqûşîm m^ešōmēm in Dan 9:27 would be:

“but because of the most extreme of abominations there is going to be a place that suddenly will (forcefully) be made to become desolate.”

            So after the Angel Gabriel would have mentioned the major triumphs of the Messiah by Him (1) causing a covenant to prevail with “many” and (2) causing “sin offerings” to cease, he would then have sadly announced the great consequences for the predicted occurrence of  “the most extreme of abominations”which was the crucifixion of Christ.^N155                   

            This specific prediction was fully and accurately fulfilled by Jesus when, a few days before His crucifixion He indicated to the Jewish nation that they had come to pass a point of no return by now sealing their rejection of Him. He expressed this new "desolate" condition of Jerusalem, the Temple and the Jewish nation in His passionate and memorable Lament as He then said:

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and the one that stones  those who have been sent to her! How often I wished to gather your children together the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! Behold! Your house is being left unto you desolate [erēmos]! For I say to you, you will never come to perceive Me, from now on until [a day when] (you should) say, "Having been blessed is He coming in the name of the Lord!”^N156 Matthew 23:37-39; (=Luke 13:34-35; cf. Jer 22:5).^N157

            Here, Jesus directly linked the "desolation" of Jerusalem with the  departure of God from the Temple. As we have seen, this "departure of God” was later concretely indicated when the veil in the temple was torn in two.^S158  From then on, He no longer honored their Temple services (cf. Lev 26:31), but since Jesus used a present indicative tense to say: “your house is being left to you desolate,”^R159 which is a tense that is used to “assert something which is occurring while the speaker is making the statement,”^R160 and since this statement was made early during Passion Week (Monday), it then was apparently the case that God had actually deserted the Jerusalem’s Temple on that very day and at the very time when Jesus had made His statement.^N161 This is supported by the fact that Matthew then indicated in his Gospel that after this statement, Jesus then “went out from the Temple [Courts],” and preceded to tell His disciples about the sure (“Amēn, Amēn”) future utter destruction of the Temple edifice and its surrounding buildings (Matt 24:1, 2).

-----------

            With this first part of the last statement in the Seventy Week prophecy so accurately interpreted we can now figured out exactly the translation of  the next two statement that follows in Dan 9:27 namely:

                                       w^e⊂ad-kālāh  w^eneherāşāh tittak^{e ⊂}al šōmēm       

            Unlike the statement just prior to this one, which we have just interpreted, this statement only contains a couple of minor flexible expressions, namely the conjunction+ preposition combination w^e⊂ad, the conjunction w^e that is attached to the expression neherāşāh  and the ^⊂al preposition. Since this preposition is in a construct relationship with the expression šōmēm (‘desolate’) it somewhat narrows down its possible interpretive functions here. Again various translation combination attempts would reveal that this phrase would be best translated into English as:

w^e⊂ad-             "and even before" -[conjunctive-waw+ Temporal preposition ‘marking                                                                  the time before which an event takes place.’^B162].

            kālāh-             "the utter end."^S163

            w^eneherāşāh- "Then, that which had been (firmly^S164) determined,"                                                                            [sequential.-waw]. 

            tittak^e-            "will be poured out"

                ^⊂al-                 "upon" (Metaphorical and somewhat ‘dutiful’ function^R165]

            šōmēm-          "the desolate."

[‘...And even before the utter end. Then that which had been (firmly) determined, will poured out on the desolate.’]

         

            The opening statement: “And even before the utter end” would be continuing from the statement made just before it which had said that ‘there would be a place that would be made to be desolate. This “utter end” would be the war that was spoken of back in verse 26 when the Temple would then be utterly destroyed. As we have seen Jesus declared Jerusalem and the Temple to be desolate as early as 31 A.D., but they both still continued to stand intact physically for close to 40 more years as if nothing had happened to them, yet they were still in a deep state of desolation as they were completely lacking of God’s presence.

            What is also interesting to point out here is the use of Qal stems in two expressions in the phrase: “poured out upon the desolate.” Since the Qal stem indicates something that is not "caused" or "made to happen," this would then be indicating here two "non-caused" events, meaning a "non-caused" ‘pouring out’ event and a "non-caused" ‘state of desolation.’ This would mean that at the time when judgement would be “poured out upon the desolate” in 70 A.D., it would not be ‘caused to be poured out’ nor ‘made to be poured out’ but would ‘naturally be poured out’ and on a Temple that would then not have to then be  ‘caused to be desolate,’ or “made to be desolate’ but that would ‘already be desolate.’          Also, with the verb tittak^e (“poured out”) being in a (future) imperfect tense,^B166 this then meant that the future "pouring out" of judgement on Jerusalem and the Temple would be a situation that would arise as a ‘logical consequence of some other situation,’^R167 which we have already seen was the rejection of Christ as the Messiah back in 31 A.D.. 

            So based on all of this, the final prediction in the Dan 9:27 which immediately followed the predictions about the triumph of the Messiah would say:

‘But because of the most extreme of abominations there is going to be a place that is (forcefully) made to be desolate. And, even before the utter end. Then that which has been determined will be poured out on the place that is (already) desolate.’

         

            Therefore, it is this desolate condition of Jerusalem’ Temple that should be understood as the predicted "desolation" in Dan 9:27. The eventual physical destruction of the city in 70 A.D., by the Roman armies, was only a logical, natural, and inevitable consequence of this previous abstract desolation of the Temple. It had only been God's presence that had made the Temple and thus the city  “Holy.”

"The Abomination of the Desolation"

[to Bdelugma th~~v ἐjrhmwsewv]

[to bdelugma tës erëmöseös]

Matt 24:15; Mark 13:14a; (Luke 21:20)

            The expression “Abomination of Desolation” (“A of D”) is one that is often cited in connection with the prophecies of Daniel where verse 9:27 (70 Weeks) & 11:31 (King North vs. South) are either one of the claimed allusions or, relatedly, both. That of course all stems from the admonition found in the Matthew account which says, (potentially by Jesus himself, but not likely*), that: ‘the A of D was spoken by/through the prophet Daniel’. In popular interpretational circles it is commonly thought, based pointedly on Mark 13:14 rendering constructio ad sensum (‘(grammatical) constructions according to sense’ rather than strict grammatical concord) this statement this is to be a future antichrist (masculine) person (e.g., TDNT 1:600). However this belief by interpreters is actually circularly determined by a supposed prophetical understanding. Upon a more indepth exegetical studies, which give a more paramount influence to context, the conclusion that it should instead be a constructio ad sensum in harmony with Luke’s parallel account of this statement of Christ is best supported as it says/explains there that this “A of D” is to be the “Roman armies”  (neuter plural - Luke 21:20). Here, succinctly, are the main supporting points for this understanding. (All of the following exegetical points are contributive to the final translation from the Greek as rendered in the section title above).

Morphological

-Istemi is a (class v-6) mi-declension, and in the perfect active participle its inflections are identical in the masculine singular accusative; nominative neuter plural; and accusative neuter plural.^R168 This therefore, by at least the possible occurrence of a constructio ad sensum, allows for either one of these 3 to be applicable.

Background

-Luke’s account of the Olivet discourse appears to be Christ’s original, straightforward statement to his disciples. Luke was writing a most personal letter, to a ‘Roman Official’ who evidently was quite sympathetic to Christianity, and quite apparently wanted to convert to it, (hence this informational history by Luke), and apparently did convert as the dropping of “Most Excellent” in Luke subsequent letter to him of Acts may suggest (Acts 1:1).^R169 Therefore Luke would not have been fearful to be quite straightforward with him and relate, verbatim, this most striking prophetical statement of Christ. (Cf. Luke 19:41-44^N170). On the other hand, it appears that Matthew and Mark chose to “encrypt” Christ’s plain statement in their (intendedly) more “open letter” accounts, written for Jewish and Roman audiences, respectively, for reasons of not attracting unwanted legal/state attention to themselves, if they would have similarly so plainly spoken of ‘the Roman Army’s actions against the Jewish capital city.’ This encryption can be seen in the statement: “let the reader understand”.^F171

           

Context

-The common titular rendition of “Abomination of Desolation”, though quite convenient and ingrained by long time mention, is not a normal/default reading here and would in fact be the only time that such an: ‘article-accusative noun-article-genitive noun’ construction is rendered as a title and not simply as a regular prose in, at least, the NT. The expression is indeed specific here as the Greek articles indicate, but is merely referring to specific/known terms and not expressing titles. It is thus solely referring to ‘the most abhorring part of the desolation that was spoken by Daniel the prophet.’ And this “abomination = most abhorring part” was ‘the end in an overflowing war and utter physical destruction,’ as priorly explained in Dan 9:26b.

Lexical

-The term “standing” does not only have to describe ‘a physical posture of a person,’ but is also used to refer to things “being/remaining established, set up”^R|S172

-In fact, from comparative lexical studies, the 2nd form for istemi as istano seems to be strictly intended/used for the sense of mere standing (posture) vs.“being established”.

Grammatical

So, based on these understandings and possibilities so far, it can be seen that Mark, in 13:14, could just as easily have chosen to “encrypt” Christ’s (=Luke’s) plain statement of “(Roman) armies” as a nominative/accusative neuter plural “estekota” as these are identical in morphological form to the accusative neuter singular.^R173 Indeed Luke’s explanatory “specification” makes this the most likely/probable possibility.

                                   

Syntactical

As Daniel Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics shows:

- The possible nominative case participle can indeed be a constructio ad sensum. (Wallace, 652)

-As a nominative, it can also be functioning as a Nominative Absolute (nominativus pendens) as it ‘enunciates the logical, and not grammatical, subject (i.e., the “armies” of Luke 21:20) (cf. Wallace, 654). [= ‘these ones (= ‘the armies’)’].

-The participle can be a “Participle of Means” in showing ‘by what means’ one would come to “see the most abhorring part of the desolation spoken by Daniel,” i.e, ‘by the means of them (i.e., the Roman Armies) having been established’ (cf. Wallace, 652)

Historical

-Jewish Christian were able to escape the siege on Jerusalem by escaping to the transjordanian city of Pella in northern Perea when they saw the first siege attempt of Cestius that was followed by a withdrawal, and heed Christ’s instructions in Luke 21:20, 21.^N174

            Indeed here, in more detail, in the writings of Church Fathers Eusebius of Caesarea (the well-known Church historian writing in the early 4^th century A.D.) and Epiphanius of Salamis (a bishop of the metropolis on the island of Cyprus, who had previously lived in Palestine, and was writing in the late 4^th century A.D.),^R175 it is recorded, based on two non-interdependent sources^N176 that the Jewish Christian were divinely “commanded” to flee Jerusalem (and Judea) “before the (outbreak) of the war” (i.e., before the siege of Titus).

            Eusebius says:

‘The people of the Church in Jerusalem, in accordance with a certain oracle that was given through revelation to the approved (ones) there [the prophets or apostles of  the Jerusalem Church], were commanded to migrate from the city before the war...’ ^B177

            Epiphanius says:

‘For when the city was about to be seized by the Romans, all the disciples were forewarned by an angel to migrate away from the city, since it was about to be utterly destroyed.’^N178

            The following outline of the four-year war period (66-70 A.D.) shows that this "Spirit-led" escape from Jerusalem occurred sometime after the sudden retreat of Cestius and his forces in November of 66 A.D.,^N179 but sometime before the Zealots came to be in control of Jerusalem starting in the Spring of 68 A.D. and prevented anyone from fleeing the city. ^R180 Based on Christ’ expressed concern towards the adversity fleeing during the winter conditions in Judea (Matt 24:20; Mark 13:18), this divine warning was then more than likely given to the Christians at the beginning of the Spring season of 67 A.D. as it is demonstrated below:

        Date                                                Event                                      Referernce^N181

            late Oct. 66 A.D.                       Cestius attacks Jerusalem           2.19.1 [#515] - 2.19.6 [#539]

            early Nov 66 A.D.                    Cestius suddenly retreats            2.19.7 [#540] - 2.19.8 [#555]

            Win. 66/67 A.D.                        Wars in and around Galilee        2.20.1 [#556] - 4.2.5 [#120

[Escape of the Jerusalem Church]

            Wn/Sp 66/67- Spr 68 A.D.      Civil strife in Jerusalem            4.3.1 [#121] - 4.7.2 [#409]

Spr. 68 A.D. - Spr. 69 A.D.     Roman Wars in Judea                4.3.3 [#410] - 4.9.9 [#555]

            Spr. 69 A.D.  - Spr. 70 A.D.     Some Roman civil problem      4.10.1 [#585] - 4.11.5 [#663]

            Spr. 70 A.D. - late Sum. 70 A.D.  The Siege of Titus                 5.1.1 [#1] - 6.8.5 [#408]     

            According to a reliable^R182 Church tradition, these fleeing members of the Jerusalem Church temporarily settled in a city called Pella which was located in the foothills east of the Jordan River, about 17 miles south of the Lake of Galilee.^N183 [See Map#3].

Setting

-The common assumption that ‘a standing in the holy place/where they ought nought (Matt 24:15|Mar 13:14) refers to an area in the Temple is not a very logical warning signal to Christians as it would entail that the Roman armies had already taking full control of the city of Jerusalem and thus the possibility of a flight by Christians then would be practically impossible. Case in point, historically, the Romans set up their pagan ensigns in the Temple area and worshiped them only right after the war, when the Jewish Temple edifice had been burnt down;^R184

-However, the (anarthrous = (non-articular)) “a place (topos) that is holy” (Matt 24:15) could easily include the area just beyond the walls of Jerusalem which served as an open square where judicial cases where heard and decided, even during Monarchial times (e.g., 1 Kgs 22:10). So it would have equally been violated by the Roman armies setting up camp, and their siege works there, starting with the military contingent under Cestius in 66 A.D.^R185

Final Translation:

            All these contributing exegetical points lead to the following (new) understanding/translation of Mark 13:14:

“When you see the most abhorring part of the desolation that was spoken by the Prophet Daniel by the means of them (i.e., the Roman armies - Luke 21:20) having been established where they ought not (i.e., “in a place that is holy” Matt 24:15)....”^N186

The End of the Seventy Weeks

            With the final part of the Dan 9:27 having been interpreted and confirmed historically, it would therefore appear that the interpretation of the Seventy Week prophecy has reached its end, but this then would mean that 3½ years of the prophecy had remained unfulfilled as no event seemed to have mark the end of the prophecy which would have fallen in the year 34 A.D. The death of Christ in the Spring of 31 A.D. would seem to be a most logical choice for its end, but as Charles Boutflower once stated, it was a full 70 weeks that had been determined on the Jewish nation and not 69½.^B187 Another seemingly logical choice for the end of the Seventy Weeks would have been the decisive event of the predicted destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., but that would then cause the overall time of the prophecy of 490 years to be stretched to 526 years. Since we have thus far seen that the chronology of the prophecy has been quite literal in the number of years that it covered, and that its historical fulfillments have had great chronological precision and accuracy, it would then seem rather strange that the remaining 3½ prophetic weeks would now suddenly represent a period of 39 literal years instead of 3½ years. What event then marks the end of the chronology of the Seventy Weeks?

            Since the four gospels end their accounts of Christ’s life on earth 9 (at the most) 40 days after His resurrection (Acts 1:3), we therefore have to turn to the historical book of the Acts of the Apostles to see if in the events surrounding the rise of the early Christian Church, there was an event that fulfilled the end of this probationary time period for as Carl A. Auberlen had stated long ago concerning the book of Acts: it “serves the same purpose in regard to the terminus ad quem^E188 [of the Seventy Weeks] as Ezra and Nehemiah served for the terminus quo^E189 [457 B.C].”^B190

            Indeed, in the book of Acts we find a very interesting event that does provide a fitting end for the 490 years of probation that had been set apart for Jewish nation and the city of Jerusalem. This event is the martyrdom of Stephen in the hands of the Sanhedrin, the highest Jewish civil and religious court of the day.^R191 We will first analyze this event from a theological perspective to see if it does provide a fitting contextual end for this probation period, and then we will analyze it from a chronological perspective to see if its historical date harmonizes with the accurate reckoning of the Seventy Weeks.

            When the brief ministry, trial and death of Stephen^N192 is closely examined here, there are amazingly, at least eight striking parallels that are seen between Stephen and Christ that makes it evident that in Stephen, God raised up a "type" of Christ in order to give the Jewish nation a final but fair warning to help them realize the great Sin they had committed in rejecting and crucifying Jesus of Nazareth.^N193

           

            These parallels are:

(1) Both Jesus and Stephen performed great "signs and wonders"^S194 and both had

a wisdom and a spirit that their adversaries could not resist.^S195

           

(2) As mentioned before, both Jesus and Stephen were tried by the Highest Jewish

court of their day, the Sanhedrin, and although the book of Acts doesn’t specify who was presiding over Stephen’s trial, it was more than likely the same High Priest, who had presided over the trial of Jesus: Caiaphas (Matt 26:3, 57) since he held this office the High priest in Jerusalem until the year A.D. 36.^R196 This Caiaphas also took part in the trials of some of the followers of Christ shortly after the feast of Pentecost of 31 A.D. (See Acts 4:6, 7).

           

(3) Both Jesus and Stephen were charged with the similar false accusations of

blasphemy and of speaking against the Temple. (Compare Matt. 26:59-61 and Acts 6:11-14). Clearly no one in the NT Church since Jesus had raised this crucial covenantal development and issue of the non-indispensability of the physical Jewish Temple, which was indeed a Capital issue amongst the Jews.

           

(4) It was revealed to the accusers of Stephen and Christ, through a sudden

manifestation of  supernatural physical glory, that they were both highly favored by God. Acts 6:15 says that the face of Stephen shone like an angel during his trial; and similarly, when Jesus was being arrested in the garden of Gethsemane, the gospel of John (18:4-6) says that He asked the people who had come to arrest Him: “Who are you looking for?” When they said: “Jesus of Nazareth,” He replied by literally saying: “I Am” (ego eimi), which was a statement that unmistakably identified Him as the Eternal, Self-Existent God of the Old Testament. (cf. Exod 3:14). John then says that:

“when therefore He said to them 'I AM'- they drew back and fell to the ground.”

Now what in Christ’s response would have caused this armed mob to suddenly

“draw back and fall to the ground,” if it wasn’t that, at that very moment, a supernatural sign of Divine glory and approval had been visibly manifested? Interestingly enough a similar 'terror and falling-to-the-ground' reaction happened to the soldiers who were at Christ’s tomb on the day of His resurrection when as Matthew says “the angel of the Lord” descended to role away the stone (Matt 28:2) and:

“the angel’s countenance was like lightning and his clothing as white as snow and the guards shook for fear of him, and became like dead men.”  Matt 28:3 [i.e.s]

           

John the Revelator also had a similar experience/reaction in Patmos when he saw

the glorified Christ in vision. At that time, he did not simply fall to the ground at Jesus’s feet, but he “fell at His feet as dead.” (Rev 1:17 [i.e.s]).^N197

It therefore is apparent that a similar demonstration of divine approval had also

occurred with Jesus, at the time of His arrest in Gethsemane.    

(5) There are also many similarities between the speech that Stephen had made to

the Sanhedrin and Christ’s final warning to the Jewish leaders in the parable of the wicked tenant-farmers (or “vinedressers”). (Matt 21:33-46).

Stephen began this speech by retelling the Sanhedrin of how God had called

Abraham out of the land of the Chaldees to make of him a great nation which would become His Chosen people. (Acts 7:2-16). Then he went on to tell about the trials and rejections of the Patriarchs Joseph and Moses to point out the fact that although these two great men had been despised and mistreated by "Israel," they were still the ones that God had chosen to save the nation (vss.17-36). Stephen emphatically pointed this out by saying that it was:

“This Moses whom they had refused saying: ‘who appointed you a ruler and a judge,’ it is this same one whom God sent to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the Angel who had appeared to him in the thornbush.” (Acts 7:35)

Then Stephen went on to point out to them the Promise of the coming of a

Messiah in human form as it had been emphasized by the prophecy of Moses  (vs. 37 cf. Deut 18:15); and after reminding the religious leaders about Israel’s past acts of rebellion  and apostasy (vss. 38-43), he then told them about the limitedness of their present Temple (vss. 44-50).

Then after this he abruptly summed up his speech by clearly pointing out the great

sin of the religious leaders and Israel and boldly saying:

“You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.  Which of the prophets did your Fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers who have received the law by the direction of angels and have not kept it.” (Acts 7:51-53 cf. John 7:19)

This last statement led the Sanhedrin to turn a final deaf ear to Stephen and seal

their rejection of him.

           

Jesus also, during His final moments with the Jewish nation had given a very

similar message of warning to them in the parable of the wicked tenant-farmers (Matt 21:33-46). At that time, He first spoke about the habitual sin of Israel of rejecting the chosen ones that God had sent to save them (Matt 21:33-36). He then figuratively spoke of His coming rejection by Israel by telling of the rejection and murder of the vineyard owner’s son (Matt 21:37-39). He then spoke about the inevitable consequences of this last great rejection by asking the question:

“Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenant-farmers?” (Matt 21:40).

To this the Jews replied:

“He will destroy those wicked men miserably and lease his vineyard to other tenant-farmers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons.” (Matt 21:41).

As the Jews had unknowingly pronounced their own sentence of doom, Jesus

concluded His message of warning by saying:

“The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes. Because of this I say unto you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing fruits of it.” (Matt 21:42-45).

There are three further parallels between Christ and Stephen that come to seal their

parallel divinely-appointed mission of warning to the Jewish nation.

(6) They both prayed an intercessory prayer for their undeserving enemies (Luke

23:34 and Acts 7:60).

(7) They both commended their Spirit (lit. “breath”- Gk. pneuma) to Heaven as

they were breathing their last (Luke 23:46-48 and Acts 7:59, 60), and

(8) As Stephen was about to die, he received a glorious vision of heaven of the Son

of Man standing^E198 at the right hand of God (Acts 7:55, 56). Passage like Isa 3:13 & 14 and Dan 12:1 shows that this “standing” occurs when God is about to ‘enter into judgement’/“contend” (= Isa 3:13a) with those who do wrong amongst or against His faithful people. I.e., this indicates that judgement will be executed upon transgressors, and thus here indicated that the Jewish people had sealed their doom warningly stated earlier by Christ. This revealed development thematically also was a fulfillment of the first part of the prophetic statement that Jesus had made to this same Sanhedrin at the time of His trial by saying:

“Nevertheless, I say to you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven.” Matt. 26:64 [i.e.s].

The parallel statement to this one that was made later on by Stephen must have

reminded the Sanhedrin about their trial with Jesus of Nazareth, and judging from the fact that, at both trials, they decided to carry out the death sentence on Jesus and Stephen because of this statement. It must have seemed like a déjà vu for them. (cf. Matt 26:65, 66 and Acts 7:57). But tragically, they only showed with this Capital Punishment that they would have repeated their past sin of crucifying Jesus, and they probably would have done it with their own hands this time. Indeed with Stephen, this was really the first full extent test of them on this regards, and they indeed again completely failed.

            Following this second collective rejection of Christ by the Jewish religious leader, the book of Acts goes on to say that ‘at that time a great persecution arose against the Church which was at Jerusalem and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria ...’ (Acts 8:2) These believers who were then scattered went everywhere preaching the gospel (Acts 8:3). So from that time on the good news about Jesus Christ was not just limited to the city of Jerusalem and the Jewish nation as it also began to be preached to other surrounding Gentile nations.

            Therefore based on all these parallels between Christ and Stephen, we can see that the event of Stephen’s martyrdom does indeed provide a fitting theological or contextual end for the probationary period of the Seventy Weeks, as it became a most striking reminder to the Jewish Sanhedrin about their rejection of Jesus Christ. The question that now needs to be answered is: Does this event fit the chronological specification of the prophecy?

                                               

The Date of Stephen’s Martyrdom

             The dating of Stephen’s martyrdom is largely determined by the date of Paul’s conversion since the wording of Luke’s account in the book of Acts concerning this event strongly indicates that this conversion took place a short while after Paul had witnessed the stoning of Stephen (cf. Acts 7:58; 8:1-3; 9:1-7). So if we can determine the date for Paul’s conversion we can come within a few months to the actual the date when Stephen made his final speech of warning to the Sanhedrin.

             The date of Paul’s conversion is mainly determined by two chronological statements that he made in his letter to the Galatians (1:18 and 2:1). He first briefly retells in Gal 1:15-18 about his life-changing encounter with Christ while he was on his way to Damascus (to basically, purge the city of Christians, like He had just done in Jerusalem (Acts 8:3)). He then says that following this conversion experience, he did not immediately return to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles, but instead went to the region of Arabia and then to Damascus (vs. 17); (with this time of course, a radically different agenda (Acts 9:1, 2, 27)). Then in Gal 1:18, Paul states that ‘after three years’ he went back to Jerusalem which was his very first visit to Jerusalem since his conversion. Now Luke, in the book of Acts clearly indicates that this visit occurred shortly after Paul had escaped from Damascus (Acts 9:23-28), and because of a statement that Paul made about this incident in 2 Cor 11:32, 33, which has some interesting historical and chronological indications, we are able to closely approximate the probable years when this escape from Damascus could have taken place, and thus also approximate the probable years when Paul had made his first visit to Jerusalem.

            In 2 Cor 11:32, 33, Paul states that his escape from Damascus, occurred while a certain King named Arestas had control over Damascus. This “King Arestas” has been historically confirmed to have been the Nabataean King Arestas IV Philopatris.^N199 It was this illicit union that John the Baptist had [privately?] rebuke King Herod (Cf. Matt 14:4 & Mark 6:18) for and had nearly convinced him to repent, but all this, as Christians know, ended up costing John the Baptist his life because of the infamous hellish birthday wish of Herodias’s daughter. Interestingly enough, Josephus also mentions this [consequential] death of John the Baptist and also Herod’s fear of Him [See Antiquities, 18:5.2 [#116-#119]. He is said to have died in either 39 A.D. or 40 A.D., but since his reign began in 9 B.C and since the last minted coin in his reign was dated as the 48^th year of his reign,^B200 then the date of 39 A.D. for his death is the one that is the most probable.^R201 So then based on this information, the latest that Paul could have been in Damascus would have been 39 A.D.^R202

            Now the year that Arestas IV and the Nabataeans could have first exercised political control over this city has been said by commentators to be the year of 37 A.D.,^R203 at the time of the change of Roman Emperors from Tiberius Caesar to Gaius (a.k.a Caligula), because of  the following reasons:

            The ruling policy of Emperor Tiberius strongly opposed client kingdoms on the eastern frontier of the Roman Empire,^R204 but this policy was radically changed after his death in the spring 37 A.D., when the new Emperor Gaius began to immediately allocate the political control of different parts of the eastern frontier to some of his political "friends." In 37 A.D., Gaius gave the district of Commagene and the coast district of Cilicia to be an independent kingdom to a certain Antiochus^B205 and then in the next year (38 A.D.), a flurry of political allocations occurred,^R206 upon the approval of the Senate, as Gaius gave: (1) the area of the Arabian Ituræans to a certain Soaimus;^R207 (2) Lesser Armenia and later parts of Arabia to a certain Cotys;^R208 (3) the former territory of Cotys to Rhœmetalces^R209 and (4) and his ancestral domain to a certain Polemon.^R210 All this probably stemmed from Gaius’s overall desire to be “popular” as Roman historian Suetonius said.^B211

            Also, back in about late 36 A.D./early 37 A.D., Emperor Tiberius had dispatched the governor of Syria, Vitellius, on a punitive mission against King Arestas, but while on his way to accomplish this mission, Vitellius and his legions did not go through the city of Damascus which would have been the strategic thing to do if this city had then been under the control of Arestas.^R212  Instead, Vitellius and his legions marched to the city of Ptolemais and then moved on toward the city of Petra.^R213 [See Map#3].

            While on his way to Petra, Vitellius made a stop in Jerusalem on a sort of a peace-mission with the Jews, and while he was there a letter came to him announcing the death of the Tiberius Caesar. Knowing that his expedition mission was thus aborted because of the death of the Emperor who ordered it, Vitellius waited for a renewing order to come from the new Emperor Gaius, but it never came. On the contrary Gaius adopted a friendly attitude toward King Arestas and the Nabataeans, which was probably largely due to the long-ago friendship that Arestas had had with Gaius’s father Germanicus.^N214 Based on all of this, it would then seem that it was around the time of Gaius’s flurry of political allocations that the city of Damascus was given over to Nabataean control.^R215  Therefore we can conclude that the only time period when Arestas and the Nabataeans could have been in control of Damascus would have been from the spring of A.D. 37 until his death in A.D. 39.^N216 And since, as some commentators have remarked, the negotiations about this transfer of Damascus probably were not completed before that summer in 37 A.D.,^R217 we can further narrow this range of years to the summer of 37 A.D. to sometime in 39 A.D. Therefore Paul’s expulsion from Damascus must have occurred at some time within this two-and-a-half year period. If we now subtract from this period, the three years that Paul said had elapsed between his conversion experience and his first trip back to Jerusalem after the Damascus expulsion (Acts 9:23-28; Gal 1:18), then the possible time of Paul’s conversion would have been in either 34, 35 or 36 A.D.

            The selection of one specific year from these three, can now be determined based on the second chronological statement, that Paul made in Gal 2:1 as he literally said:

                                    “Then after fourteen years again I went up to Jerusalem”^R218

            Paul’s use of the unmistakable sequential expression epeita dia [“Then after”] strongly suggests here that he was saying that these fourteen years came after the three-year period of Gal 1:18, so these two time periods are to be considered as two separate time periods and not as two overlapping or inclusive periods with the three years being a part of the 14 years, as some have supposed.^R219

            Also Paul’s use of the preposition palin “again” here also suggests that he hadn’t made a trip to Jerusalem prior to this second one. This is emphasized by his overall line of thought/defense in Gal 1:11-2:21 as he was defending the exclusive origin of his God-ordained gospel message, and was trying show that when he first came to the area of Galatia to minister (Acts 13:13-14:25), he hadn’t again been back to Jerusalem since that visit after 3 years [and (thus?) apparently hadn’t had contact with the leaders there also]. His second visit only occurred when the Apostolic conference took place (Compare Acts 15:1-30 with Gal 2:1-10), which was after the time of his first ministry in Galatia.^N220 He was doing this to emphasize to the Galatians that he had not received his message from the leaders of the Jerusalem Church, but actually only through the direct revelation of Jesus Christ (Gal 1:11). So although the Jerusalem Church had now come to the same conclusion as him concerning the function of the ceremonial law (see Acts 15:23-29), Paul was showing here that he had understood this a long time ago, without any consent from anyone, including the Jewish Christians.

            So now since, as we have already seen that the visit to Jerusalem after three years that Paul mentioned in Gal 1:18 theoretically could have fallen in either 37, 38, 39 A.D., and since his second trip to Jerusalem, for the Apostolic Conference, did not occur until 14 years after this 3-year period, then his second visit to Jerusalem would have theoretically fallen in the years 51, 52, or 53 A.D. So in order to determine which date is correct here we have to determine the date for the Jerusalem Council. This can actually be done by working backwards from a concretely dated period in Paul’s ministry, namely his one and a half year stay in Corinth (Acts 18:1-11), which is largely determined by the date of his appearance before the Roman proconsul Gallio (Acts 18:12-17).

            Acts chapter18 begins by retelling of Paul’s ministry in Corinth and Luke says in verse 11 that Paul had stayed there for one year and six months. Then in the next verse Luke tells of a time during this stay in Corinth when Paul was brought before the proconsul Gallio by the Jews of Corinth. For a long time it was impossible for NT scholars to concretely date this event, but in  recent years (around the early 1900's) the fragments of an inscription that was found in the ruins a city called Delphi which was a city located across the Gulf of Corinth [See Map#3] came to provide a means of dating this episode. This inscription was originally a response letter from Emperor Claudius (41-54 A.D.) to the citizens of Delphi and the part of it that is of consequence to this discussion read in (the transliterated) Greek as:^N221

            line 1-  Tiberios Klaudios Kaisar Sebastos Germanikos, dēmarchikēs exou-

            line 2-  sias to IB, autokratōr to KZ, patēr patridos ... chairein.

            line 3-  Palai men tēi polei tē tōn Delphōn ēn ou monon eunous all’ epimelēs ty

            line 4-  chēs aei d’ etērēsa tēn thrēskeian tou Apollōnos tou Pythiou. epei de

            line 5-  nyn legetai kai poleitōn erēmos einai, hōs moi arti apēngeile L. Iou

            line 6-  nios Galliōn philos mou kai anthypatos, boulomenos tous Delphous

            line 7-  eti hexein ton proteron kosmon entelē etellomai hymein kai ex al

            line 8-  lōn poleōn kalein eu gegontas eis Delphous hōs neous katikous kai

            line 9- autois epitrepein ekgonois te ta presbeia panta echein ta tōn Del-

            line10-phōn hōs poleitais ep’ isē kai homoia. ei men gar tines ... hōs polei

            line 11-tai metōkisanto eis toutous tous topous, kr...

            and is translated into English as:

         

            line 1-  Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, invested with tribunician power

line 2-  for the 12^th time, acclaimed imperator for the 26^th time, Father of the Fatherland ... send greeting to...^N222

line 3-  For a long time I have been not only well disposed toward the city of Delphi, but also solicitous for its

            line 4-  prosperity, and I have always supported the cult of Pythian Apollo. But

            line 5-  now since it is said to be destitute of citizens, as L. Jun-

line 6-  ius Gallio, my friend and proconsul, recently reported to me, and being desirous  that Delphi

            line 7- should continue to retain intact its former rank, I order you [plural] to invite well-born people also from

            line 8- other cities to Delphi as new inhabitants and to

            line 9- allow them and their children to have all the privileges of Delphi

            line 10-as being citizens on equal and like (basis). For if some ...

            line 11-were to transfer as citizens to those regions . . .

          It has been unanimously accepted by NT scholars that the mention of Gallio in line 6 as a being “proconsul” implies that Gallio was functioning in that office at the time that this letter was written and that this proconsulship was in the province in question here: Achaia. Gallio’s brother, L. Annaeus Seneca, who was a well-known philosopher, does confirm in his writings^R223 that Gallio had indeed been proconsul of in Achaia at some time, as we will see later. Although Seneca does not specify exactly when this proconsulship took place, we are still able to arrive at the probable date based on the date that can be arrived at for this letter of Claudius.

            Claudius mentions in this letter that, at that time, he was acclaimed as imperator (victorious commander) for the 26^th time.^N224 Based on other documents which make mention of some of Claudius’s previous military acclamations,^R225 it is seen that Claudius’s 22^nd -25^th acclamations occurred in his 11^th regnal year (Jan 25, 51 A.D. - Jan 25, 52 A.D.),^B226 and an inscription of Kys in Caria indicated that Claudius’s 26^th acclamation occurred in his 12^th regnal year (Jan 25, 52 A.D. -Jan 25, 53 A.D.).^N227 So the terminus quo for his 26^th acclamation would be Jan 25, 52 A.D. Now since another inscription further indicated that by August 1, 52 A.D. Claudius had been acclaimed imperator for the 27^th time,^R228 then this establishes the terminus ad quem for his 26^th acclamation to Aug. 1, 52  A.D. and thus means that his letter to the citizens of Delphi had been written sometime between January 25 and August 1 of 52 A.D. This range can be further narrowed down since the Battle season did not usually run through the adverse winter months^S|N229 and so wars were usually not fought and/or decided at that time.^R230 This then meant that Claudius would not have received his 26^th acclamation before the spring of 52 A.D.^R231 So the most probable time when Claudius probably wrote this letter would be from about March/April 52 A.D. to August 1, 52 A.D.

            Now, according to a previous  ruling of Emperor Tiberius, Gallio’s term in office would have begun on July 1,^N232 and would have lasted for the norm of one year,^N233 i.e., until June 30 of the next year. Since Claudius’s letter implies that Gallio was in office at the time it was written, then the question that now needs to be answered would be: Was Gallio just starting his one-year term (a 52-53 term) in office when this letter was written, or was he finishing one up (a 51-52 term)? Based the fact that a report by Gallio's brother Seneca showed that Gallio did not complete his full appointed year in office, a "beginning-a-term" theory is the one that seems most likely to have been the case here. Seneca had said that:

“When, in Achaia, he [Gallio] began to feel feverish, he immediately took ship, claiming that it was not a malady of the body but of the place.”^B234

            Murphy-O’Connor comment on this passage by saying:

“the natural interpretation of Seneca’s sardonic reference to ‘a malady of the place’ is that Gallio was antipathetic to Achaia and used the excuse of a minor illness to leave. This type of instinctive aversion normally results from a first impression. It does not usually begin late, although it may intensify with the passage of time.”^N235

            Since Seneca had pointed out that Gallio “immediately took ship,” he would therefore also have left Achaia at a time when the sailing season was open since it was closed down from November 11 to March 10,^R236 because it would be very unlikely that he would have ordered a military ship to come and get him during the dangerous winter season and then risk sailing back to Rome at that time.^N237 It then seems here that Gallio had not been in Achaia for the remaining part, (the summer) or the most part (winter, spring, summer) of his one-year term. Therefore we can conclude that Claudius’s letter was not written in the last part of a full term of Gallio, i.e., the Spring or early Summer, but rather in the early part of this term. Now since Claudius letter seems to be a response letter of a report that Gallio had sent to him about a depopulated Delphi, then the most logical conclusion that could be made here is that immediately upon his arrival in Achaia, Gallio had sent a report of this depopulation problem to Rome and the Emperor, almost as a part of a "check-in report" procedure, and that Claudius had immediately responded to this matter since his letter would have had to have been written (and not actually received) before Claudius was saluted with his 27^th imperial acclamation, i.e., before August 1, 52 A.D.  This quick response on Claudius’s part is not at all unlikely based on the apparent personal interest and concern that he had for the city of Delphi as he stated in this letter (See lines 3 & 4). Also the way he referred to Gallio as “my friend and proconsul Gallio” seems to be sort of a way for him to affirm the, would-be, newly-arrived Gallio to the people of Delphi. So based on all of this, the most probable date for Gallio’s one-year proconsulship in Achaia would have been from July 1, 52 A.D. to June 30, 53 A.D.

            With this date established we can now answer the question of: When, within this less-than-one-year period, was Paul brought before Gallio? The almost unanimous supposition among commentators has been that the Jews in Corinth tried to take advantage of a "new and untried" Gallio when they brought Paul before him. This would suggest a date very early into Gallio’s term, i.e., the summer of 52 A.D.,  and this conclusion can be supported by two corroborating dates, namely the dates of the start and end of Paul’s 1½ year stay in Corinth (Acts 18:11) which we will examine below, along with the “many days” that Luke said that Paul went on to still spend in the city of Corinth after this trial (18:18).

            First of all, it is safe to say that Paul left Corinth after the sailing season was opened^N238 (between March 10 and November 11) since he obviously did sail away from there to Ephesus (see Acts 18:18, 19). Now since the reason he gave for not staying long in Ephesus (and being in a hurry) was because he felt that he “must [dei], by all means keep [the] coming feast in Jerusalem,”^N239 it can then be seen that he theoretically left Corinth either a little before the Spring Pilgrimage Feasts of Jerusalem or a little before its Fall Pilgrimage Feasts. Since it seems that he had planned to attend this feast in advance, based on his calculated “I must” reason, but yet he was still in a hurry, then it therefore seems that he was on his way to attend the Spring feasts since, if this were the Fall feasts, he would more than likely have cut his days shorter in Corinth and left in sufficient time to make it to these feast without having to rush as he did. With the fact that the sailing season reopened on March 10, it can then be seen why he would be in a hurry here to keep sailing on and not stay too long at his in-between stops since he had a 840-mile trip ahead of him which would take him about month to accomplish.^N240 So all of this strongly suggests that in Acts 18:21, Paul left Corinth in about early March of 53 A.D., in order to attend the Spring Feast in Jerusalem. This would then automatically mean that his 1½-year stay in Corinth had begun back in about September or October of 51 A.D.  This arrival date is supported by the fact that Paul had sailed from Berea to Athens (see Acts 17:14, 15) just prior to arriving in Corinth (18:1), which obviously meant that the sailing season was still open at that time and thus confirms that conclusion he had arrived in Corinth in September or October of 51 A.D.,  since this would be before the sailing season closed for the winter.

            So, according to this reconstruction, Paul would have been brought before the newly arrived Gallio in about in July/August of 52 A.D., which would be about 10 months after his arrival in Corinth. He then would have stayed there for another 8 months after that which would satisfactorily verify the “many days”statement in Act 18:18.                  

            The conclusion that Paul began his extended ministry in Corinth in about September of 51 A.D. also harmonizes with another event that Luke alluded to in connection with this Corinthian ministry. In Acts 18:2. he stated that upon his arrival in Corinth, Paul met “a certain Jew named Aquila ... who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla (because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from Rome)...”

This expulsion of Claudius is validated historically as it is mentioned in the writings of Roman historian Suetonius^B241 as he says that:

“He [Claudius] expelled Jews from Rome^N242 who were constantly making disturbances at the       instigation of Chrestus” (i.e., “Christ”^N243).

            Based on the testimony of a fifth century Christian writer by the name of Paulus

Orosius, this expulsion has been dated to the ‘ninth year of Emperor Claudius’ (Jan 25, 49 A.D. to Jan 24, 50 A.D.).^N244 So then when Paul met Aquila and Priscilla, they would have had only been in Corinth for about two years.

            So now based on all the above discussion, Paul’s ministry in Corinth and the other events surrounding it, can be charted on a chronological time-line in the following way:

Timeline of Paul's Ministry in Corinth- A

            Now, since Paul embarked on his second missionary journey soon after the memorable Apostolic Conference (see Acts 15:30-36) and ended it when he arrived in Corinth, we can, by using the arrival date of Paul in Corinth of Sept/Oct of 51 A.D., and by determining the most probable duration of Paul’s second missionary journey which is recorded in detail in Acts 15:36-18:1, come to firmly establish the actual date of Paul’s visit to Jerusalem for the Apostolic Conference and thus his “second visit” to Jerusalem mentioned in Gal 2:1.

            The probable duration of Paul’s second missionary journey can be determined because of the following three observations:                           

            1) Since at the very beginning of this missionary trip, Barnabas is indicated to have “sailed” to Cyprus shortly after he had parted company with Paul (because their disagreement over John Mark; see Acts 15:36-39), then the second missionary trip therefore began at a time when the sailing season was opened or was about to be opened. I.e., sometime between (ca.) March 10 and November 11.

            2) Since Luke does not indicate any “long time”stays during this mission as he did in his account of the first journey (see Acts 14:3, 28), and he does not say anywhere that during these travels Paul “wintered” anywhere, as he, and also Paul, specifically indicate in other places (see Acts 27:12; 1 Cor 16:6; Titus 3:12; cf. also Acts 28:11).

            3) Since the purpose of this trip was to visit churches that were already established, and not to start new ones (Acts 15:36), and since Paul, in four letters 1 & 2 Thessalonians and 1 & 2 Corinthians, and also particularly in reference to his stays during this second missionary journey (1 Thess 2:2~Acts 16:22-24), points out that he did all he could in order not to be a burden to those whom he visited (see 1 Thess 2:9; 2 Thess 3:8-15; 1 Cor 9:12b-15a; 2 Cor 11:9) then, unless otherwise indicated in the account of Luke (e.g., Acts 16:12b, 17:2), the very minimum number of days of (i.e., less than a week^R245) should be chosen for the length of Paul’s stays in these cities. Apparently it was because Paul had found a opportunity for work in Corinth (Acts 18:3) and therefore support himself that he remained there so long (1 year and 6 months- Acts 18:11).

            All of this therefore strongly suggests that (1) the first part of this second missionary journey up to Paul’s arrival in Corinth, did not take more than a year, and (2) that it did not extend into a winter season. This would then theoretically mean that all of the travels of this journey, from Antioch (in Syria) (Acts 15:35, 36) to Corinth (18:1), would have been done within the eight months of the "open sailing season," i.e., between March 10 and November 11. Therefore a timed outline of Paul’s itinerary from Antioch to Corinth for this second missionary trip would be as follows [See Map#4 for sketch]:

        Text                 Travels and Stays      Distance^N246     Time^N247 

Ministry in Antioch (Acts 15:30-40)

#1. Acts 15:30a               Jerusalem to Antioch             330 mi             17 days

#2. Acts 15:30b-35         Antioch Church                        ------               14 days

                                   

                                              -Start of the Second Missionary Trip-

Ministry in Syria & Cilicia (Acts 15:41a)

#3. Acts 15:41a               Travels in Syria & Cilicia     150 mi?              8 days

#4.                                                Stays                             -----               10 days

Ministry in Lycaonia (Acts 15:41b-16:5)

#5. Acts 16:1a                  Tarsus to Derbe                       114 mi             6 days

#6.                                       Stay                                    ------                3 days

#7. Acts 16:1a                  Derbe to Lystra                         36 mi             2 days   

#8.                                            Stay                                    ------              3 days

Ministry in Mysia (Acts 16:6-8)

#9. Acts 16:8                    Lystra to Troas                          383 mi         20 days            

#10.                                           Stays                                   -----              3 days

Ministry in Macedonia (Acts 16:9-17:13)

#11. Acts 16:11      Troas to Samothrace to Neapolis      134 mi (sea)   5 days

#12. Acts 16:12a              Neapolis to Philippi                     21 mi          1 day

#13. Acts 16:12b-13a                   Stay                              ------         10 days

#14. Acts 17:1a                Philippi to Amphipolis                 20 mi         1 day

#15. Acts 17:1a                Amphipolis to Apollonia              21 mi         1 day           

#16. Acts 17:1b                Apollonia to Thessalonica            31 mi        2 days

#17. Acts 17:2                                 Stay                                  -----       21 days

Ministry in Achaia (Acts 17:14-18:1)

#18. Acts 17:10a                Thessalonica to Berea                26 mi           1 day  

#19. Acts 17:10b-11                      Stay                                 -----           14 days

#20. Acts 17:14, 15a           Berea to Athens                      279 mi (sea)10 days

#21. Acts 17:15b-17                       Stay                                 -----            7 days

#22. Acts 18:1                    Athens to Corinth                       32 mi          2 days

___________________________________________

                                             Sub-Totals    Land Travel   834 mi         44 days

                                                                     Sea Travel   414 mi         15 days

                                               Total Travels                     1248 mi         59 days

                                                           Duration of Stays   ------            71 days                            

                                               Total Length of 2^nd Trip                        130 days

          Now if the estimated period of 31days that Paul spent ministering in Antioch right after arriving from the Jerusalem Conference (Entries #1 & #2) is added to this total estimated period of 130 days of these journeys (4 months, 10 days), then it can be seen that a total period of about 160 days (5 months, 10 days) had elapsed between the Apostolic Conference and Paul’s Arrival in Corinth. It can now also be seen how this period could indeed have taken place between the theoretical 8-month period of the open sailing season.

            So based on all of this, what can be concluded here is that Paul began his 2^nd missionary trip some time around March 10 and ended it about 5 months and 10 days later, in August/September [of 51 A.D.] as he arrived in Corinth to stay for a year and a half. All of this therefore means that the Apostolic Conference would have taken place sometime during the winter of 50-51 A.D.,  as the following updated time-line demonstrates:                                      

Timeline of Paul's Ministry in Corinth- B

            So now if we count backwards from this point the “14 years” mentioned in Gal 2:1 and then the “3 years” mentioned in Gal 1:18, leaving open the very likely possibility that Paul had counted part of a year, either at the beginning or end of either one of these periods, as a full year (this was a common method among Jews known as "inclusive reckoning"), then it can be seen that Paul’s escape from Damascus would have taken place in the year 37 A.D., which was the first year Arestas’s possible control of that city. It can also then be seen that Paul’s conversion would then have taken place in the winter of 34-35 A.D., which would be exactly 17 (inclusive) years before his second visit to Jerusalem for the Apostolic Conference in the winter of 50-51 A.D., as the following table demonstrates:

                                         #         Year A.D.              #       Year A.D.  

                                              1- Winter 34-35 A.D.        9- Winter 42-43 A.D.

                                              2- Winter 35-36 A.D.      10- Winter 43-44 A.D.

                                              3- Winter 36-37 A.D.      11- Winter 44-45 A.D.

                                              4- Winter 37-38 A.D.         12- Winter 45-46 A.D.

                                              5- Winter 38-39 A.D.          13- Winter 46-47 A.D.

                                                6- Winter 39-40 A.D.          14- Winter 47-48 A.D.

                                              7- Winter 40-41 A.D.          15- Winter 48-49 A.D.

                                              8- Winter 41-42 A.D.          16- Winter 49-50 A.D.

                                                                     17- Winter 50-51 A.D.

                                                               

            So based on these chronological conclusions an overall outline of Paul’s early ministry would then look like this:

                                    Conversion..........................................Winter of 34/35 A.D.

                                    Three Year Time-Span........................................34-37

                                    Escape from Arestas.......................Spring/Summer 37

                                    First Visit to Jerusalem ..................Spring/Summer 37

                                    Fourteen Year Time-Span...........Spring/Summer37-51

                        Apostolic Conference...........................Winter of 50/51

                                    Paul’s 2^nd Missionary Trip...............March-Aug/Sep 51

                                    Paul’s Arrival in Corinth.............................Aug/Sep 51

                                    Appearance before Gallio ......................July/August 52

                                    Departure from Corinth .................................March 53^N248

           

            Now concerning the relationship of this date for  Paul’s conversion and the date of the theologically-correct termination event for the Seventy Week prophecy: the Martyrdom of Stephen, this date for Paul’s conversion of sometime in the winter of 34/35 A.D. would  mean that since it had occurred shortly after the stoning of Stephen, then Stephen’s death would have occurred in apparently the Fall of 34 A.D. Due to the lack of Biblical data that would help us to determine the exact month when Stephen was put to death, but also due to the fact that this event does now also provide a fitting chronological end for the Seventy Week prophecy, then there is not a good enough reason, to not now give it the benefit of the doubt and approximate its probable date in the Fall of 34 A.D. to more specifically the month of September/October, which would be the seventh Jewish month. This would then mean that it would have occurred exactly 3½ years after the crucifixion of Christ in the Spring of 31 A.D., and all of this would most accurately fulfill the remaining last half of the 70^th prophetic week in Dan 9:27. So then the entire time period of the Seventy Weeks would have been fulfilled in a chronologically accurate way from the Fall [the seventh Jewish month] in 457 B.C to the Fall [the seventh Jewish month] in 34 A.D.!

Chronology of the 70 Weeks  [34 A.D.]

            With the interpretation and chronology of Dan 9:27 now being complete, we can now go back and compare its interpretation with Dan 9:26 to concretely establish the kind of relationship that exists between these two verses.                                                                                   

           

The Relationship Between Verse 26 and Verse 27

The last two verses of the Seventy Weeks dealt with the themes of:

            (A) The (Significant) Death of the Messiah

            (B) The Result of the Rejecting he Messiah

            (C) The Consummation of this Result

            in the following related ways:

            (A) According to the translations that have been presented and supported here, Dan 9:26 began by stating that:

 “And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah will allow himself to be cut off, but will have no sin to Him.”

            Dan 9:27 then added some chronological specivity to this statement by saying that this significant "cutting off" or death of the Messiah would occur in the middle of the seventieth week and that it would be the integral part of the establishment of a Second Covenant that would make the Old one that was based on offerings and animal sacrifices void. Interestingly enough, the verbal expression krat “cut off” (conjugated as yikkrēt in Dan 9:26) is also one that is often used for “cutting a covenant.”^N249

            (B) -Dan 9:26 had said that ‘the people of this coming King’ (i.e., the unbelieving Jews), would cause the future utter destruction of the city and the sanctuary and in a similar way Dan 9:27 spoke of this same causation event by indicating that because the people would have committed the ‘most extreme of abominations’ by rejecting this ‘coming King’ they would make the Temple be desolated of God’s presence and this would eventually result in a destruction.

            (C) -Dan 9:26 had said that the determined "desolations" would be in the form of a future war (“a flood”) and Dan 9:27 continued this understanding by stating at the time of this war ‘that which had been determined (the predicted utter destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple)’ would then be “poured out” on the place that was (already) desolate.

            These parallel themes and thoughts between verse 26 and 27 therefore indicate that Dan 9:27 was simply restating what had already been said in Dan 9:26, but this time with more contextual and chronological precision. Verse 27 was therefore in an epexegetical relationship with verse 26,^R250 and this would then mean that the waw---conjunction that occurs at the beginning of Dan 9:27 would be translated as the epexegetical waw-“That is.”^R251

            So following the compact theological exposition on the Messiah’s death and its result in Dan 9:26; Dan 9:27 would then picked up the theme and chronology of the Seventy Weeks where verse 26 had left of, and would have begun to elaborate on it by saying:

          “That is, He shall cause a covenant to prevail with many for one week,...etc.”

            This established Biblical conclusion now means that the popular, modern-day eschatological teaching of the end-time Tribulation would last for specifically 7 years should be abandoned and discontinued from any end-time discussions, since it was based on an incorrect interpretation and application of the “Seventieth Week” of Dan 9:27.^{R252, N253}

God’s New, but Enduring, Israel

            Since the period of 490 years that had been determined on the Jewish nation and on Jerusalem came to a radical end in the Fall of 34 A.D., then the question that now needs to be answered is: Where did the radical end of this probationary period leave God’s Israel?

            Well for one thing, as we have already pointed out, the book of Acts clearly indicated that from the time of the martyrdom of Stephen, the gospel message was no longer confined to the city of Jerusalem (Acts 8:1). From then on, through especially the revolutionary ministry of Paul to the Gentiles, the Christian Church would not only be comprised of only believing Jews,^R254 but also of believing Gentiles.^R255 Also, from then on, God’s purposes for the salvation of the human race would not only be revealed and carried out through "Israelites" (covenant keepers) who were of Jewish ethnicity, but also through any other non-Jewish "Israelites" who actually believed in Jesus Christ and who accepted His Second Covenant. As Jesus had said in the parable of the Wicked tenant-farmers: The kingdom of God had be taken away from the Jewish Nation and had given to a new nation that would bear the fruits of it. (Matt 21:43). So from then on salvation would no longer be “of the Jews” (John 4:22-25), but of this integrated New Israel.

            In the ministry of the apostles, following the time of the cross, they repeatedly tried to help the newly formed Christian church realize that they were now God’s New Israel and His chosen people.  For example James, the brother of Jesus, identified the New Testament church as “the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad” (James 1:1; cf. Matt 19:28). Peter also did the same in his first Epistle, when, after retelling of how the Jewish Nation had “stumbled” on Jesus the true cornerstone (1 Pet 2:7, 8), he went on to address the present body of believers as: “a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, [God’s] own special people” (vs. 9), since they were now “the people of God.” (vs. 10). These were all terms that had been used earlier by God Himself to describe His former chosen people that were made up of (predominantly) ethnic Jews. (See Exod 19:6; Isa 43:20-21; Hos 1:6, 9; 2:1). Also from the explanations given by the apostle Paul, it is clear that the term 'Israel' was not limited to only ethnic Jews, and based on passages like Num 15:26, 30a and Isa 56:3-8, it can be seen that this had actually never been God’s intention that it would. Paul pointed this out to the Jews with statements like:

         

“He is not a Jew who is one outwardly...but he is a Jew who is one inwardly.” Rom 2:28, 29.

           

            and:

“They are not all Israel who are Israel, nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham;... but the children of the Promise [Jesus] are counted as the seed” for “If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the Promise.” Rom 9:6-8; Gal. 3:29. (See also Eph 2:14-21 & 3:4-7).^R256

            Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi comments on the clear olive tree illustration that was given by Paul in Roman 11:17-24 to explain this new Israel concept by saying that:

“... Paul describes the integration of Gentiles into Israel by using the effective imagery of ingrafting wild olive branches (Gentiles) into the one olive tree of the Israel of God (Rom 11:17-24). Note that for Paul the salvation of the Gentiles results not in the shooting forth of a new olive tree, but rather in the ingrafting of Gentiles into the same olive tree. The tree of Israel is not uprooted because of unbelief, but rather is pruned, that is, restructured through the ingrafting of the Gentile branches. The [Christian] Church lives from the root and trunk of the Old Testament Israel (Rom 11:17-18). By means of this expressive imagery Paul describes the unity and continuity that exists in God’s redemptive plan for Israel and the Church.”^B257

           

            Indeed it is through this deliberate imagery and its unfolding that it is seen that God’s Israel which stemmed back from its OT establishment and history, though it was now going through a major Theological furtherance in the New Covenant, was really the same Israel of God, i.e., the same Tree. It was only the branches that were going to be changed to allow for the addition of Believing Gentiles or the removal of Unbelieving Jews, with still each action being undoable as the need manifests itself.

            Similarly in the imagery in the parable of the wicked tenant-farmers, Jesus had not said that the owner of the vineyard (God) would find another vineyard (Israel; cf. Isa 5:1-7) to work with, but that He would actually take this same vineyard (Israel) and give it to another nation. Therefore from the time of Stephen’s execution, the former tenants of the vineyard (the Nation of Israel) would be left without a vineyard, meaning that their privilege of being God’s Israel would be completely taken away from them.  The term "Israel" was therefore meant to apply to anyone who accepted and followed the stipulations of God's Covenant which, in the Second Covenant were all based on faith in Christ, namely a Gentile convert or to a "Messianic" Jew. (See Eph 2:11-18).

            The full intention on the part of God to still include believing Jews from Ancient Israel in this Second Covenant can further be seen in the “mission statement” of Christ to His disciples just before His ascension when He said that they would His witness first in Jerusalem and in all Judea and then in Samaria and then to the end of the world. (Acts 1:8). Obviously Jesus still felt that the Jews had a part in God’s immediate plans and that it actually was a primary position in these plans as the gospel message was to first go exclusively to them. (see Rom 1:16; cf. Matt 10:5, 6).^N258 

            Paul later on would continue in this same understanding as he, intentionally, first reasoned with the Jews who were in the towns that he ministered in (see Acts 9:20; 13:5, 14; 14:1; 17:1, 2, 10,16, 17; 18:4, 19; 19:8). As he told the Jews of Antioch who had come to turn a deaf ear to his message:

“It was necessary that the word of God should be spoken to you first; but since you reject it, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, behold, we turn to the Gentiles.” Acts 13:46 (see also Acts 18:6).

           

            Based on the many severe trials that he endured in the hands of the Jews (See e.g., 2 Cor 11:24; cf. Acts 21:4-14) in his attempts to convert them to the Gospel and accept this Second Covenant, it is evident that he did not believe that God's plan for ethnic Israel had come to radical end at the cross only to be taken up again at some later time. If that had been the case, then God surely would have revealed this to Paul, the "Apostle to the Gentiles" (Acts 9:15; Rom 11:13; Eph 3:1), when He called him to this office 3 ½ years after Jews had rejected Jesus Christ. This would have saved His ‘[key] chosen vessel’ (cf. Acts 9:15a), from these, would-be, unnecessary hardships that the Jews inflicted on him (See e.g. Acts 21:10-14; 2 Cor 11:24). This radical, dichotomic, ethnic dispensation, as popularly taught today, was quite obviously not in God's salvifique plans (cf. Acts 9:15b, 16). Furthermore, when Jesus did not answer head on Peter’s question in Acts 1:6 (in 31 A.D.) about the final fate of ethnic Israel it can be seen that it was because there were still 3½ years for them to firmly determine (Dan 9:27b) for themselves what their ultimate role in God’s Advancing Israel would end up being. If they failed, which they did in 34 A.D. with Stephen, then God would have to exclusively work, and that, relatively and institutionally-speaking, from scratch, through the “Called Out Ones”, i.e., the Church.

            So now since the New Testament Church is clearly God's New, but Enduring, Israel, then Christians should therefore look for the fulfilment of some of the promises that were made to the former keepers of the covenant of the Old Testament times in the experiences of the New Testament Christian Church. While most of the promises made to ancient Israel were conditional (Deut 30:15-20; cf. Jer 18:5-10), many of them can still find a spiritual fulfillment today in and through God's New Testament Israel because most of them were of an inherently spiritual nature and did not necessarily need to have a strictly literal fulfillment in order to actually be fulfilled. For example Abraham's seed was promised to inherit a city, "whose maker and builder is God." (Heb 11:10; cf. Rom 4:13-17a), this city was not necessarily the present Jerusalem, but is actually the New Jerusalem in Heaven which is the inheritance of all believers as they all are ‘heirs (of Father Abraham) according to the Promise’ (Gal 3:29; cf. Rom 4:13). That is why, according to Rev. 21:12, 14, the names of the twelve tribes of Ancient Israel are written on the 12 gates of the New Jerusalem, (which is certainly a most important place since all must pass through these gate in order to enter the city) and the names of the twelve apostles are written on the twelve foundations. The Bible therefore clearly reveals that God’s plans and future kingdom are inclusive of both Jewish and Gentiles believers,^N259 and this should therefore be the theological frame of mind of the Christian believer today since such an understanding goes on to greatly affect the interpretation and understanding of the unfulfilled promises/prophecies in the Old Testament, which are to now be interpreted Christologically, (i.e., in the light of the Second Covenant established by Christ), along with the predictions especially found in the book of Revelation which were given in about the mid-90's A.D., which was a time that was 56+ years after Ancient Israel had officially lost its previous status in God’s plans, and 20+ years after the “desolation” of Jerusalem and the Temple had been had been consummated.^N260

Notes to "Verse 27"

1. A third main interpretation of this verse had been that it centered on the ruthless actions of Antiochus IV Epiphanies during the 2^nd century B.C., but this interpretation has been completely made void by the precise chronology of the first 3 verses of the prophecy that revealed that the prophecy did not culminate in the 2^nd century B.C. but rather extended into New Testament times.

2.. For these translations for such waw-conjunctions see Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 650-652 [39.2.3a-c].

3.. Ibid., 652 [39.2.3c].

4.. Ibid., 651 [39.2.3b].

5.. See Ibid., 652-653 [39.2.4a-c].

6.. Ibid., 653 [39.2.4c].

7.. Some commentators have suggested here the translations: "And one week shall confirm a covenant" [e.g., E. W. Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament and a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Translated by Theod. Meyer and James Martin. 4 vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1956, reprint of the British edition, 1872-78),  142], or: "A covenant will prevail for the multitude for one seven" [Goldingay, 226]; but neither of these two translations are in complete harmony with the Hebraic syntax of this phrase as Owusu-Antwi (197) has demonstrated.

8. Although the expression "the people" [^⊂am] in verse 26 is in the singular grammatically, it is still plural in sense,  as a singular people does not mean one person, so for that reason  it would not qualify here as an antecedent for the singular pronoun "He." [Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 198].

9.. BDB, 149.

10.. John N. Oswalt,  "gābar," TWOT, 1:148.

11.. KBL, 167.

12.. CHAL, 54.

13.. Cf. Owens, Analytical Key OT, 4:744.

14.. See Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 434 [27.1.1d]; 441 [27.3a]; 694 "transitive verb."

15.. Cf. H. Kosmala, "gābhar," TDOT, 2:368;  idem, "The term geber in the Old Testament and in the Scrolls,"  Congress Volume, Rome, 1968, SVT, 17 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969), 159-169; Meredith G. Kline, "The Covenant of the Seventieth Week," In  The Law and the Prophets: Old Testament Studies Prepared in Honor of Oswald Thompson Allis, ed. John H. Skilton (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian Reformed Publishing Co., 1974), 465. 

16. E.g., JB; KJV; NASB; NIV; NKJV; NRSV; RSV; etc.

17.. See Goldingay, 230; Porteous, 143; D. S. Russell, Daniel. The Daily Study Bible. (Edingburgh: Saint Andrews Press, 1981), 190; Driver, 141; Towner, 144; Bevan, 160; Montgomery, 385; Lacocque, 187; Slotki, 79; Walvoord, 231, 234; A. Bekerley Mickelson, Daniel and Revelation: Riddles or Realities? (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1984), 122; Archer, 177; H. C. Leupold, Exposition on Daniel. 2d ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1956), 431; Young, 209; Oswald T. Allis, Prophecy and the Church (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1945), 121; Baldwin, 171; Mauro, Seventy Weeks, 86; Robert M. Gurney, God in Control (Worthing: H. E. Walter, 1980), 114; Shea, "Prophecy of Daniel 9:24-27," 95; etc.

18. Some recent English versions of the Bible have translated b^erît here to mean a “league” (NEB, REB) or an “alliance” (NJB), but these translations are more interpretive in this context than literal. These two translations of b^erît here, in these somewhat military terms, are largely due to the incorrect understanding that the antecedent of the pronoun "He" in verse 27 is the title nāgîd of vs. 26, and that this title is referring to a "military prince." This misunderstanding has already been proven to be without any exegetical and Biblical support (See “The Identity of māšîah nāgîighlight3d” Ch. 5,  pp.), so these translations are indeed incorrect here.

19. That is more specifically the times from the establishment of the “First Covenant” with Israel at Sinai.

20.. Cf. Jer 32:39-41.

21.. See in the "Sermon on the Mount" in e.g. (among other places) Matt 5:17-7:29; Cf. Matt 13:52.

22.. See e.g. Matt 5:21-43; etc.

23.. Matt 26:26-29; Mark 14:22-25; Luke 22:15-20; cf. Heb 9:13-22.

24.. See e.g., Isa 52:14; Psa 3:2; 71:7; 109:30; Job 4:3; 11:19; Pro 10:21; 14:20.

25.. See John 6:69; 7:31; cf. Rom 9:24-29; 11:5. See also Owusu-Antwi, 184, 185.

26. He, interestingly enough, did not say that His blood was “shed in behalf of all” since the only ones who would actually benefit from His shed blood would be those who would “believe” in Him, as John 3:16 indicates (cf. Matt 20:28b; Rom 5:15; Heb 9:28).

27. Since the message of the Epistle to the Hebrews is so Christocentric and Pauline in its message, it very well may have originally been composed in Hebrew (more specifically Aramaic), by Paul himself, as many early Church Fathers have claimed (see below), for His Jewish-Christian brothers and sisters (cf. Heb 2:3, 4). This epistle would then have been translated into its present Greek form at a later time by someone else (Apollos? based on Acts 18:24-28). This would then explain the slight difference in the Greek writing style that is used in it in comparison to the Greek style in Paul’s other epistles. The fact that this epistle does not have the typical Pauline greeting and ending would also be because they would have been left out during this translation (for-wider-circulation?) process.

Furthermore, since, unlike Paul’s other epistles, the epistle to the Hebrews was actually a sermon and not a letter of correspondence, this would then explain its more literary and structured form.

            Church Fathers Eusebius and Clement of Alexandria were two of several early Church Fathers to claim the view of an original Pauline authorship and then a later translation into Greek by someone else. They suggested that this translation was done by Luke. (See e.g., Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica,* 6:14.2ff).

            What also further suggests a Pauline authorship to the Epistle to the Hebrews is that in the oldest known copy of Pauline correspondences P⁴⁶ (Papyri #46-see Stevens, 286), which only has the non-Pastoral Epistles and is dated to about 200 A.D., the book of Romans is immediately followed by the book of Hebrews.

            A would-be Biblical parallel to the “Epistle to the Hebrews,” written originally in Aramaic, for Hebrews and then later translated into Greek would be the gospel of Matthew since, according to the testimony of an early church bishop named G. Papias (ca. 60- ca. 130 A.D.), who had apparently been a disciple of John the Beloved, Matthew had originally

written his Gospel in Aramaic for Jews. [See Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica, 3:39.16].

            Another would-be parallel, although it is non-Biblical, would be the work “War of the Jews” by Jewish Historian Flavius Josephus since he indicates in the Preface to this work that it was originally written in Aramaic for the Jews, but then: “For the sake of such as live under the government of the Romans,” he fine-tuned his Literary Greek skills and translated it “into the Greek tongue.” (See Josephus, Preface to The War of the Jews, 1 [#3]).

28. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 511 [31.6.2a].

29. See e.g., Acts 2; 4:8-12; etc.

30.. See e.g., Exod 25:10; 27:5; 1 Kgs 7:31; 1 Sam 14:14.

31.. See e.g., 1 Sam 19:40; Num 32:33; 34:13, 15; Josh 1:12; 4:12; 1 Chr 2:52; 5:26.

32.. See e.g., Exod 12:29; Judg 16:3 (2X); Ruth 3:8; Psa 102:24; Jer 17:11.

33.. KJV, NKJV.

34.. BDB, 992. See e.g., Neh 6:3; Pro. 22:10; etc.

35.. See Gen 2:2, 3; Exod 16:30, 23:12, 31:17; etc.

36.. For other examples of this translation for the causative Hiphîl of “to cease” see e.g., (esp. in KJV): Neh 4:11; Isa 13:11; 30:11; Jer 48:35; Pro 18:18; Ezek 26:13; etc.

37. For a somewhat indepth exposition on these different offerings see M. L. Andreasen, The Sanctuary Service, 2^nd ed. rev. (Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald, 1947), 88-169; SDABD, 963-967.

38. The KJV has “Meat Offerings” for this kind of offering but this is inaccurate as flesh meats were never used in these offerings under the Levitical system established at Sinai.

39. This is also the Hebrew word that is used for “a sin.”

40. The minhah could also be used as a substitute for an animal for a Guilt or Tresspass Offering by an Israelite who couldn’t afford an animal for sacrifice. (See Lev 5:11ff; cf. Singer, ed., "meal-offering," The Jewish Encyclopedia, 8:397).

41.. Cf. Isaac Landham, "sacrifice," The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia, 9:307.

42..  J. Bergmann, "zabhach," TDOT, 4:12; Isaac Landham, "sacrifice," The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia (New York: UJE, Inc), 9:307; Herbert Wolf, "zebah," TWOT, 1:233.

43. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 433, 434 [27.1b, d].

44. Cf. Zodhiates, "Hiphîl Stem," TCWS-OT, 2274.

45. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 399, 400 [24.1h-i].

46. Cf. Ibid., 480 [30.1b-c].

47. Ibid., 435 [27.1d].

48. See in “The Predicted Destruction of Jerusalem,” Ch. 6, pp.

49. Ibid., 355 [21.2.2b-c].

50.. See Heb 10:1-12; Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 316.

51.. See the exposition of Owusu-Antwi (310-316[@]).

52.. Cf. Heb 9:13, 14.

53. It must be pointed out that the veil actually kept anyone, including Israelites, who was not authorized and/or ceremoniously worthy to enter the Sanctuary's most holy place out. The very presence of God was contained within that veil, and even the High Priest could be struck dead if He entered it with unconfessed and atone for sins. [Ref] Hence the bells around his garment to indicate that he was still alive and also a rope around his waist to pull him out in case he was struck dead. [Ref] As anyone entering the presence of God still had to come with all sins dealt with, even in the New Covenant, this all therefore all points more to the fact that the presence of God had suddenly left this place, as Jesus Himself said it would (Matt 23:38) and/or OT atoning ceremonies were no longer required. (Case in point, evidently no one was said to have been struck dead when the veil was rent and they could freely look into the Most Holy Place.)

54. (Matt 27:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45). The veil was not rent by the earth quaking as the “natural” man would say for “he does not receive the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Cor 2:14). So these gospel writers were indeed Spirit-led when they “discerned” the spiritual link between Christ’s death and the top-to-bottom tearing of the veil. Mark and Luke, who were writing to a Roman audience did mention the tearing of the curtain at the time of Christ’s death, but they did not mention the earthshaking or the rocks splitting probably to avoid the quick erroneous conclusion that the more “natural men” they were writing to could make. They also do not mentioned the “unseen hand” but they do indicate that it was indeed a supernatural event as Mark mentions the “top to bottom” tearing, while Luke specifies that it the veil was (equally) torn “ in (the) middle [Gk.-meson]”.

55. The first hour of the day in Jewish reckoning was 9 a.m.

56. Since Paul uses the term “law”  interchangeably to refer to both the Mosaic law and the Ten Commandment Law (and also to the “law” of sinful human nature, see e.g., Rom 7:23), it is therefore always necessary to carefully examine the context of his “law statements” in order to determine which law he is referring to. Since in this context Paul is rebuking Peter for the hypocritical way in which he had been acting (vss. 11-13) because he did not want to considered as “defiled” by other Jews who would have seen him eating and fellowshipping with uncircumcised Gentiles; it is therefore apparent that Paul was here referring to the Ceremonial law. Also, since this practice of these “Judaizers” in Galatia was a tradition and not actually a stipulation from the Mosaic Law, as Jesus clearly had shown (see e.g., Matt 9:10-13; Luke 15:1-7; etc.), and as Peter should have fully understood by now based on his previous shock-experience with the Roman centurion Cornelius (Acts 10:1-11:18) and on his very own confession (Acts 15:7-11) at the recently concluded Apostolic Conference in Jerusalem (comp. Acts 15:22ff, 30a, 34, 35 and Gal 2:11); then it therefore appears that Paul used this circumstance to emphatically make a sweeping theological statement about the inefficacity of the Ceremonial law in general.

57. This “law” is to be understood as the Mosaic law and not be confused with the Ten Commandment Law (Ex 20:1-17) for as Paul says in other salvifique passages: “For all who have sinned without the Law will also perish without the Law and all who have sinned under the Law will be judged by the Law; for not the hearers of the Law are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified.” Rom 2:12, 13 [i.e.s]; cf. Rom 2:14, 15; 3:31.  

58. See the theological location of this place in: Luke 8:31; Rom 10:7; Rev 9:1, 2, 11; 11:7; 17:8; 20:1, 3.

59.. Cf. Hoehner, 95.

60.. See in the “Date of Christ’s Baptism,” Ch. 5,  pp.

61.. See in the“Date of Christ’s Baptism,” Ch. 5,  pp.

62. Within this range, the following dates have been argued for by commentators but rather inconclusively and/or without accurate and strong supporting evidences. These are:

A.D. 28: Paul Winter, On the Trial of Jesus, Studia Judaica, 2^nd ed. Revised by T. A. Burkill and Geza Vermes (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1974), 1:73, n. 5. A.D. 29: Alfred Loisy, Les Evangiles Synoptiques (Ceffonds: Loisy, 1907-08), 1:386-389; 2:490. A.D. 30: Philip Mauro.  The Chronology of the Bible (New York: George H. Doran Co., 1922) 119, 120; Leslie P. Madison, "Problems of Chronology in the Life of Christ."  Th.D. dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1963. 149-163; Eugen Rucksthul.  Chronology of the Last Days of Jesus. Transl. by Victor J. Drapela  (New York: Desclee Co., 1965), 6; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus, trans. A. Ehrhardt (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1966), 11-13; A.T. Olmstead, Jesus in the light of History (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1942), 278-281. A.D. 31: SDABC, 5:252-254.  A.D. 32: Andersons24 , 121-128; Ernst Bammel, "Philos tou Kaisaros," TLZ 77 (1952): 205-210.  A.D. 33: George Ogg, The Chronology of the Public Ministry of Christ  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940), 244-277; J. K. Fortheringham, "The Evidence of Astronomy and Technical Chronology for the Date of the Crucifixion."  JTS 35. (1934): 142-162; Maier, 3-13; Hoehner, Chronological Aspects, 97-114.  A.D. 35: Kirsopp Lake, "Date of Herod’s Marriage with Herodias and the Chronology of the Gospels," Expositor 4 (1912): 462-477. A.D. 36: Nikos Kokkinos, "Crucifixion in A.D. 36: The Keystone for Dating the Birth of Jesus," Chronos, Kairos, Christos: Nativity and Chronological Studies presented to Jack Finegan, ed. Jerry Vardaman and Edwin M. Yamauchi (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1989), 133-163.

63.. Matt 27:57-62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31, 42.

64.. Matt 26:17, 20; Mark 14:12, 16, 17; Luke 22:7, 8, 13-15; John 13:1-4, 27-30; 18:1-3.

65. The Greek expression prōtē_i which is used in the phrase “on the foremost of Unleaven Bread” (Matt 26:17, 20; Mark 14:12, 16, 17), is one that designate a rank of first place. So it does not simply mean: first in order, but actually: first in importance.

66. Matt 26:17; Mark 14:12; Luke 22:7

67. As Luke clarified in Luke 22:7, the Feast of Unleavened [Bread] was equivalent to the [Feast of] Passover. (cf. Exod 12:8, 15, 17, 18).

68. See Bacchiocchi, The Time of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection (Berrien Springs, MI: Biblical Perspectives, 1985) 66-89; Hoehner, Chronological Aspects, 85-88.

69. Julian Morgenstern, "The Calender of the Book of Jubilees, its Origin and its Character," VT  5 (1955), 64, 65 note 2; Finegan, Handbook of Biblical Chronology, 452, 453; G. R. Driver, "Two Problems in the New Testament," JTS 16 (October, 1965), 327.

70. Cf. Hoehner, Chronological Aspect, 87.

71. This can be seen by the fact that: (1) Matthew says in Matt 28:1 that Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to the tomb “after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn towards the first (day) of the week (i.e.s).” He would not have said that “it began to dawn towards the first day of the week” if that day had already begun in the evening of Saturday night. (cf. Mark 16:1, 2) (2) By John stating that the meeting of Jesus with his disciples during the evening of resurrection day was also “on that day, the first (day) of the week,” (John 20:19; cf. vs. 1) suggests that he personally subscribed to the sunrise reckoning.

72.. Roger T. Beckwith, "Cautionary Notes on the use of Calenders and Astronomy to Determine the Chronology of the Passion." Chronos, Kairos, Christos: Nativity and Chronological Studies presented to Jack Finegan, ed. Jerry Vardaman and Edwin M. Yamauchi (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1989).

73. See [@]: http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/crucifixion.html

74.. Cf. Colin J. Humphreys and W.G. Waddington, "Astronomy and the Date of the Crucifixion." in Chronos, Kairos, Christos: Nativity and Chronological Studies presented to Jack Finegan, ed. Jerry Vardaman and Edwin M. Yamauchi (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1989), 168, 169.

75.. Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 320.

76.. E.g., A. T. Olmstead, "The Chronology of Jesus’ Life," ATR 24 (1942): 4; Smith B. Goodenow, Bible Chronology Carefully Unfolded (New York: Fleming R. Revell Co.  1896),  37;  Herman von Soden,  "Chronology," Encyclopedia Biblica, (1899, ed.), 1:799-843;  Madison, 157-161.

77.. Cf. Hoehner, 102, 103.

78.. E.g., Jeremias, 12, 13; cf. The computerized calculations of H. H. Goldstine that have been used to support this latter conclusion: Herman  H. Goldstine, New and Full Moons, 1001 B.C. to A.D. 1651 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1973), 86.

79.. E.g., Olmstead, "The Chronology of Jesus’ Life," 4.

80.. E.g., Jeremias, 13.

81.. Ibid.

82.. Cf. Beckwith, "Cautionary Notes on the use of Calenders and Astronomy," 185-189; Owusu-Antwi, 322.

83.. See Hoehner, 99, 100; Finegan, 294-296; Fotheringham, 160, 161.

84. See Calenders in Appendix A.

85. One of the two times in the year, in about March 21, when the sun crosses the equator, making the night equal in length to the day. The other time in the year when this occurs is around September 23.

86.. These reason for intercalation are from (Tosepta) Sanhedrin 2:2, 12; Baraitas in (Babylonian Talmud) Sanhedrin 11a-b; Quoted in Beckwith, "Cautionary Notes on the use of Calenders and Astronomy," 194, 195.

87.. See B. Zuckermann, Sabbatical Cycle and the Jubilee, 61.

88.. Cf. (Tosepta) Sanhedrin 2:9, and Baraitas in (Babylonian Talmud) Sanhedrin 12a.

89.. Cf. Beckwith, "Cautionary Notes on the use  of Calenders and Astronomy," 193 note 17; SDABC 5:252.

90. Cf. Beckwith, "Cautionary Notes..." 188, 189.

91.. See John 2:13; 5:1; 6:4; 7:2; 10:22; 12:1.

92.. See “The Date of Christ’s First Passover Visit,” Ch. 5, pp.

93.. See in reference of above Note (#87).

94.. The fact that Jesus was expecting his disciples to answer this (rhetorical) question in the affirmative is indicated grammatically by the presence of this negative particle “not” [Gk.-ouch].  (see P.-G. Müller, "ou," EDNT,  2:539).

95. Zodhiates, TCWS-NT, 313.

96. See Wallace, 521, 522 for a further explanation of the Customary Present.

97. If not on that very day as they were contemplating what to eat during this “pit stop” in their trip (cf. John 4:6, 8).

98. Textual evidence of the reading of John 5:1 is almost equally divided between a reading of: "a feast of the Jews," or "the feast of the Jews." (See manuscript list in GNT, 329 {John 5:1}). It is more than likely that if the original reading had had an article here that it would that it would have been changed by copyist who thought it was a mistake. So the original reading was apparently indeed: “a feast of the Jews.”

99. See Brooks and Winbery, 74; Wallace, 217, 218.

100. Of course the Passover in John 5:1 and John 6:4 were not one and the same Passover celebrations as John habitual transitional statement: “after these things” in John 6:1 (Gk-. meta tauta) clearly indicate that was an episode that occurred sometime after the previously related events. (See John’s familiar use of this expression as such in: John 3:22; 5:1; 6:1; 7:1; 21:1).

101. The arrival of this date of the Spring of A.D. 29 for the (Passover) feast of John 5:1 would then mean in chronological retrospect that following His first Passover visit in Jerusalem in A.D. 28 Jesus would have minister in Judea (John 3:22ff) for a period of about 9 or 10 months, up until the time when He left for Galilee (John 4:1-4, 45) in what we have seen because of the statement in John 4:35  was in January or February. Since also, both Matthew and Mark add that at this very time John was taken into prison then it is seen here that it was also in January or February of A.D. 29 that John the Baptist was imprisoned by Herod. Later evidence (See pp. ) will show that John remained was imprisoned for about a year and 4 months until Herod decapitated him around the time of the Passover of A.D. 30.

102.. Cf. Luke 13:22.

103. Cf. G. Schneider, "kathexēs," EDNT,  2:221. See Luke use of this word kathexēs four more times in Luke and Acts to say:

-“And it came to pass soon afterwards,...” (Luke 8:1, NASB).

-“Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, ...” (Acts 3:24, NKJV).

-“But Peter began speaking and proceeded to explain to them in orderly sequence,...” (Acts      11:4, NASB);

-“... he departed and went over the region of Galatia and Phrygia successively (margin)...”       (Acts 18:23, NKJV).

104.. Cf. Balz and Schneider, eds., "aurion," EDNT, 1:179.

105. Herod Antipas (4 B.C. - 39 A.D.). Various suggestions have been made by commentators to explain what Jesus meant here by this term “fox” here. Most commentators say that this term was an epithet that alluded to Herod’s possible sly, deceiving and cunning character [See Darell L. Bock, BECNT, Vol 2 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1996), 1247]; others claim that it was a reference to Herod as a person of no significance in the eyes of the Jews [Ibid.], especially since he was a “half-bred” Jew; but the one suggestion that can be supported contextually, is the one that says that Jesus was referring to Herod as a "destroyer" [Cf. Ibid.] because he was now sleekly hunting Him down as a fox hunts down its prey to destroy it (cf. Luke 9:7-9).   

106. The inclusion of this reflexive pronoun ‘myself’ is due to the fact that the verb "epiteleō," which literally means: to “carry out, accomplish, or bring to an end” [See R. Mahoney, "epiteleō," EDNT, 2:42], is in a true middle voice here [cf. Zodhiates, TCWS-NT, 250; Stevens, NT Greek, 121 (Deponents)], and thus represents the subject acting upon himself or herself. [See Brooks and Winbery, Syntax of the Greek NT, 111-113].

107.. Cf. Luke 4:18, 19.

108.. Cf. W. Popkes, "dei," EDNT, 1:279-280.

109. Cf. Ibid.

110.. See also other examples of the use of this word with this same extended meaning in: e.g., Matt 16:21; 17:10; 24:6; 26:54; Mark 8:31; 9:11; 13:10; Luke 2:49; 9:22; 11:42; 13:14; John 3:7, 30; 4:4, 24; 9:4; 20:9; etc.

111. This selective list of Jesus’s activities prior to His return to Jerusalem actually covered more than 13 days.

112. It also seemed here that after Jesus had indicated in verse 32 that the threats of Herod would not make Him leave Jerusalem, that He made this additional statement in verse 33 to point out to the scribes and the Pharisees and also the other people around Him that it was actually "God’s plan" that He would now journey outside of Jerusalem for the few upcoming days. He would have clearly indicated this so that they would not go on to say that He was now leaving Jerusalem out of fear of Herod. In other words, He was now leaving Jerusalem only because it was actually in God’s plan that He should, but He would indeed be back to take on the decreed fate. (cf. Luke 9:51).

113.. Cf. Matt 26:18; Luke 18:31.

114. See “About 30 Years of Age,” Ch. 5, pp.

115.. Cf. Luke 4:28-30; John 7:30, 8:20, 59; 10:39.

116.. KBL, 445.

117.. HCL, 406.

118.. CHAL, 160.

119.. BDB, 489.

120.. E.g., Gen 1:21; 7:14.

121.. E.g., Zech 8:23.

122.. E.g., Exod 19:4; Deut 32:1.

123.. Sirach 38:11 in R. H. Charles, The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 450.

124. Cf. NASB.

125. This is, interestingly enough,  the name of the book of Numbers in Hebrew: b^emidbar= "In the Wilderness" as this book focuses on the 40+-year sojourn of Israel in the wilderness.

126.See e.g., Exod. 23:29; Lev 26:34, 35, 43; Num 21:30; 2 Chr 36:21; Psa 69:25; 79:7; Isa 54:3; 61:4 (2x); 62:4; 64:10; Jer 4:27; 6:8; 9:10; 10:22, 25; 12:10, 11 (3x); 25:12; 32:43; 33:10; 34:22; 44:6; 49:2, 20, 33; 50:13, 45; 51:26, 62; Lam 5:18; Ezek. 6:14; 14:15, 16; 15:8; 25:3; 29:9, 10, 12; 30:7, 12, 14; 32:15; 33:28, 29; 35:9, 12 (2x), 14, 15 (2x); 36:3, 34, 35; Hos 2:12; Joel 2:3, 20; 3:19 (2x); Amos 3:19 (2x); Micah 1:17; 6:13; 7:13; Zeph 1:13; 2:4, 9, 13; Mal 1:3.

127. See e.g., Lev 26:22, 33; Isa 49:8, 19; Lam 1:4, 13; 4:5; Ezek 6:4; 12:19; 20:26;  Joel 1:17; Amos 7:19; Zeph 3:6; Zech 7:14. Some other functional or life giving agents that people are at times "desolated of" (i.e., deprived of) are e.g.: "understanding" (Psa 143:4; Eccl 7:16; Isa 42:14; Dan 4:19; 8:27); "joy" (Ezek. 4:16, 17; 7:27; 23:33; 32:10); "a husband" (2 Sam 13:20; Isa 54:1); "speech" (Ezra 9:3, 4); and "friends" (Job 16:7).

128.119. When the expression šōmēm is used in the non-causative Qal verbal stem and is applied to a person, it has the meaning of someone being “astonished” at the tragic fate of someone else, but the actual meaning is in this passages is also one of deprivation as the person that is “astonished” is usually an enemy of the one who has suffered loss, but instead of greatly rejoicing upon this fate of his enemy as he should, this person  actually becomes  "shocked" and "speechless." (See e.g., Lev 26:32; 1 Kgs 9:8; 2 Chr 7:21; Job 17:8; 18:20; 21:5; Psa 40:15 [HB 40:16]; Isa 52:14; 59:16; 63:5; Jer 2:12; 4:9; 18:16; 49:17; 50:13; Ezek 3:15; 26:16; 27:35; 28:19).

129. 1 Sam 5:6; Isa 1:7 (2x); 6:11; Ezek 12:20; 29:12; 30:7; 33:28; 35:3, 4, 7; 36:4, 35, 36.

130. E.g., Matt 3:1; 24:26; Mark 8:4; Luke 9:10; 15:4; John 3:14; Acts 8:26; 1 Cor 10:5; Heb 11:38; etc.

131. (Matt 12:25=Luke 11:17); (Matt 23:38= Luke 13:35); (Matt 24:15=Mark 13:14); Luke 21:20; Acts 1:20 (Quote of Psa 69:25 LXX ); Gal 4:27 (Quote of Isa 54:1 LXX); Rev 17:16; 18:17, 19.

132. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 90 [5.6a]

133.. A word referring to a person, place, or thing. (Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 87 [5.2h]).

134.. These examples were cited in Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 90 [5.6b]; Cf. GHK, 236.

135.. Owusu-Antwi, 329.

136.. Cf. The KJV; NASB; NEB; NKJV; NIV; REB; RSV who have seen this “instrument” as a person, thus ‘one who makes desolate.’

137.. JB; NJB; the Syriac in Peshitta; cf. Farris, 360.

138. Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 328, 329; Bevan, 161 who says that “neither šômēm nor m^ešômēm ever mean ‘desolator’.” Also Farris 360, 361.

139. Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 329; Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 348, 349 [20.2k]

140. Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 329.

141. Cf. Owusu-Antwi, 328, 329.

142. See above Ch. 7, pp.

143. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 216-218 [11.2.13a-g].

144. (1) Simple Locational-(‘upon/on/over’); (2) Contingent Locational- (‘at/beside/by’);(3) Comprehensive Locational-(‘around/about’); (4) Terminative-(‘on/to/onto’); (5) Metaphorically-[governs the object of (personal) interest]- (‘upon/to/for/over’); (6) Excessive-(‘on top of that’); (7) Accompaniment-(‘with/along with/together with’); (8) Addition-(‘in addition to, to’); (9) Multiplication-(‘over, above’); (10) Norm [basis]-(‘according to’); (11) Cause [reason]-(‘because of’); (12) Goal [end]-(‘for’); (13) Oppositional-(‘over against’); (14) Concessive-(‘although, despite, in spite of’); (15) ng1033 Separative-(‘from’); (16) With verbs of speaking-(‘about/concerning’); (17) Circumstance-(‘regarding/in connection with’).

145. Cf. Wigram, EHC-OT, 1289.

146. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 627 [37.6f].

147. Ibid.

148. Cf. C. L. Seow, A Grammar for Biblical Hebrew, 328.

149. See in: Preface, “Piel Stem,” (p. ).

150. Cf. explanation Note #119 and see e.g., Lev 26:32; 1 Kgs 9:8; 2 Chr 7:21; Job 17:8; Psa 40:15 (HB 40:16); Isa 52:14; Jer 2:12; 18:16; 49:17; 50:13; Ezek 26:16; 27:35; 28:19.

151. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 349 [20.2m].

152. Ibid., 400 [24.1h].

153. Ibid., 435 [27.1d].

154. See e.g, GKC, 152 [§ 55c].

155. Jesus did have to sacrificially die (which indicates an execution of some sort) in order to fully accomplish His redemptive mission, but no one was necessarily “predestined” to be the ones who would put Him to death. It was just a natural development based on fallen human nature. As Jesus had told his betrayer-disciple  Judas: “The son of Man is to go just as it has been written concerning Him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born.” (Matt 26:24=Mark 14:21=Luke 22:22].

156. The fact that this statement of Jesus to “Jerusalem” was indeed fulfilled is that although he made numerous appearances to over 517 of His followers (see Matt 28:8-10, 16ff; Luke 24:13ff; John 20:11ff; 26-30; 1 Cor 15:6, 7), for 40 days after his resurrection (Acts 1:3-except for his appearance to Paul (1 Cor 15:8)), but he never let the rebellious community of Jerusalem “behold” Him in His convincing, resurrected form.

157. Luke’s mention of this lament of Christ over Jerusalem in Luke 13 seems on the surface to contradict the fact that Matthew says that this statement of Christ was made during the last week of His ministry, at the conclusion of His last sermon (Comp. Matt 23:37-39 and Luke 13:34, 35), but it appears that Matthew is the one who is more accurate here and that Luke may have mentioned this momentous statement of Jesus here, outside of its original location, in order help explain to Theophilus what Jesus meant when He literally said: 'It was not acceptable that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.” (Luke 13:33). Since Jerusalem had the reputation of killing the prophets that were sent to it, as Luke 13:34 says, then it would not make sense that He, Jesus, the greatest Prophet of them all (cf. Deut 18:15) should perish outside of "Jerusalem." Having said this, it very likely may be that Jesus had made this decisive judgement statement twice, at two similar occasions.

158. Matt 27:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45.

159. Cf. NASB.

160. Cf. Zodhiates, "Present Indicative," TCWS-NT, 857.

161. (See also the chronological explanation for this statement in Ch. 8 Note #21). Also the fact that God Himself had to depart from the temple in order for it to be ‘desolate’ harmonize with the syntactical fact that in the Piel stem “the subject [the temple] is only indirectly involved in the bringing about of the action” and “it effects the resulting state through a person or instrument that may be named or only implied.” (Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 408 [24.3.2d]. So the prediction in Dan 9:27 had also implied that the Temple would be made desolate by God’s departure. So like Jesus had indicated to these same religious leaders very early in His ministry (John 2:18-22), the Temple structure was absolutely nothing without Him (i.e., without God’s presence).

162. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 215 [11.2.12b].

163.. See other similar uses of this expression in Neh 9:31; Isa 28:22; Nah 1:8, 9; etc.

164.. See other similar uses of this expression in Isa 10:23 and 28:22.

165. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 217 [11.2.13c].

166. Owens, Analytical Key OT, 4:744.

167. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 511 [31.6.2a].

168. Cf. Gerald Stevens, NT Greek, 365, 367.

169. See in this Chapter 6 pp. and in the section above pp.  for more.

170. The fact the prediction of Jesus concerning the destruction of Jerusalem is so accurately spelled out in Luke’s gospel could lead some to question if Jesus had predicted this event so specifically in advance, or if this was an elaboration of this prediction, after the event, by Luke. This question is quite easily settled by the actual date of the composition of the gospel of Luke since all signs do show that Luke’s gospel was written  at least a few years before the beginning of the War in 66 A.D. This is seen in the fact that both the books of Luke and Acts were actually letters by Luke to Theophilus, with the book of Acts being a sequel to the Gospel account (Comp Luke 1:1-4 and Acts 1:1, 2). So since the last recorded event in the book of Acts (the 2 year ministry of Paul in Rome, Acts 28:30, 31) occurred between 60-62 A.D., then the Gospel of Luke had to have been written sometime before this event of 62 A.D.

            Jesus may have based this more specific prediction of destruction on the typical way in which a rebellious Jerusalem was brought into judgement by God as revealed in the messages of other prophets who previously had to deliver this same message of national doom to this city (see Ezek 4:1-3; Isa 29:1-7ff; cf. fulfilment in Jer 39:1, 2 [52:4-6]). (The name “Ariel” that appears in Isa 29:1, 2 & 7 seems to have been, as many have concluded, a symbolic/coded theological surname for Jerusalem which meant “Lion of God.” It is probably used here with the symbolic meaning of “Kingdom of God” and calls to attention the exalted and powerful position that this about-to-be-sieged Jerusalem  has had before God.)

171. Cf. Paul’s similar masking in 2 Thess 2:3-7ff speaking of the then ruling Roman Empire that would be replaced by ecclesiastical (Papal) rulers = Dan. 7:17ff.

172. See e.g., Matt 12:25, 26; Acts 17:31; cf. Jos 5:13, 2 Sam 20:12; Isa 17:5, also Tobith 5:4 LXX, even “confirmed” (Matt 18:16)) among many more citable examples.

173. Cf. Stevens, NT Greek, 367.

174. It must be significantly understood that this warning of Jesus was part of an Apocalyptic Discourse that simultaneously dealt with (1) the destruction of Jerusalem (2) the signs of Christ coming and (3) the consummation of the age (i.e., this present Era of sin in the world) (Matt 24:3). So not every detail had to be literally fulfilled, or even fulfilled at all, at the time of  the “first wave,” which was the destruction of Jerusalem.

175. See Smith, "Epiphanius," DGRBM, 2:40, 41.

176. See the study of: C. R. Koester, "The Origin and Significance of the Flight to Pella Tradition." CBQ 51 (1989), 90-106; contra: Gerd Lüdemann "The Successors of Earliest Jerusalem Christianity: An Analysis of the Pella Tradition." In Opposition to Paul In Jewish Christianity. Translated by M. E. Boring (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1989), 203, 204.  

177. Historia Ecclesiastica,* 3:5.3.

178. De Ponderibus et Mensuris liber,* 15. This work of Epiphanius (whose title is translated into English as: Treatise on Weights and Measurements) is a dictionary of the Bible that also includes evaluations of various versions of the Bible.

179. Josephus mentions that at that time “many distinguished Jews abandoned the city as swimmers desert a sinking ship.” (Wars, 2:20.1 [#556])

180. Comp. Josephus, Wars, 4:6.3 [#377-379] and 4:7.3 [#410].

181. All references are from Josephus’s work: “War of the Jews.”

182. See the defense of this tradition in e.g., Koester, "The Origin and Significance of the Flight to Pella Tradition," 90-106; Sidney Sowers, "The Circumstances and Recollection of the Pella Flight." TZ 26 (1970), 305-320.

183. See Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica,* 3:5.3; Epiphanius, Panarium,* 29:7.7; 30:2.7; De Ponderibus et Mensuris liber,* 15. The Fligh-to-Pella tradition is also twice alluded to in a later passage of the early 5^th century known as the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions 1:37.2 & 1:39.3 (see ANF 8) in a context dealing with the destruction of Jerusalem as a result of the rejection of Jesus “the true prophet.” In 1:37.2 it says (based on the Syriac text): “And those who believed in Him [Jesus], in the Wisdom of God would be led to a secure place of the land [i.e., Pella] that they might survive and be preserved ... from the war, which came afterwards upon those who did not believe ...”[For a more detailed analysis on this passage and a comparison of its Syriac and Latin versions see Koester, "The Origin and Significance...," 97-103.

184. Josephus, War of the Jews, 6:6.1 [#316].

185. Cf. Philip Mauro, Seventy Weeks, 94.

186. Matthew, probably writing after Mark and using that gospel as a source, also may have further encrypted that plain statement of Christ by using a neuter singular (thus “it” instead of “them”) and then adding the phrase: (“let the reader understand”). He also may have used the nominative (neuter singular) case for the same syntactical reasons mentioned above.

187.. Boutflower, In and Around the Book of Daniel, 197-198.

188. The final limiting point in time.

189. The earliest limiting point in time.

190.. Auberlen, The Prophecies of Daniel... 140.

191.. Cf. Shea, Daniel and the Judgement, (unpublished 1980), 265;  Hasel, "Interpretations," 53; Auberlen, 140; Boutflower, 197-98.

192. For an excellent, word-for-word, dramatic presentation of Stephen’s brief ministry, his trial and his martyrdom see: “Acts”- The Visual Bible, Vol. 1 [6:8-8:3]. 

193. Some have implied that these striking parallels are actually the result of a literary fait exprès on the part of Luke [e.g., Alan Watson, The Trial of Stephen: The First Christian Martyr (Athens GA: The University of Georgia Press, 1996), 84-87] but there is no need to go to such extreme conclusions when God is in control of bringing about events in history. Furthermore when one also takes into consideration the great accuracy in the chronology of the prophecy so far, to the very season and the fact that, back in the 7^th month of 457 B.C.  it was actually the people in Israel who had requested that Ezra read the Law to them  at that time ([Neh] 8:1), it can further be seen that the Spirit of God was indeed in control of bring about the events of this prophecy in a timely so that it would indeed be fulfill accurately.  

194.. Compare John 2:11, 23; 3:2; 7:31; 11:47; 12:37 and pointedly Acts 2:22 with Acts 6:8.

195.. Compare Luke 20:26;cf. 11:54 with Acts 6:10; cf. Luke 21:15.

196.. Cf. Josephus, Antiquities, 18:4.3 [#95].

197. The prophet Daniel also had this similar experience once when he was being taken into vision. (See Dan 10:8).

198. This is the first (lexical) perfect form estota thus speaking merely of ‘physical posture’ vs. “being established” (= istanos).

199.. Cf. e.g., NBD, "Arestas," 79. King Arestas is also indirectly linked to a well-known Biblical episode [Mark 6:14-20] as his daughter was once married to King Herod [Antipas] until Herod left her because he fell in love with, and married a woman by the name of Herodias who was at the time, the wife of his brother Philip [cf. Josephus Antiquities 18:5.1 [#109, #110, #112-#114].

200.. NBD, "Arestas," 79.

201. Cf. Ibid.

202.. Cf. Robert Jewett, A Chronology of Paul’s Life, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979),  30, 121 notes 51-54.

203.. See Jewett, 30-33 (with the corrections of C. Saulnier, "Hérode Antipas et Jean Baptiste: Quelques remarques sur les confusions chronologiques de Flavius Josèphe," RB 91 [1984], 371-375. For convincing arguments that show that Arestas was in full control of the city of Damascus at the time of Paul's escape, see J. Taylor, "The Ethnarch of King Arestas at Damascus: A Note on 2 Cor 11:32, 33," RB 99 [1992], 719-728.

204.. Cf. Jewett, 32.

205. Dio Cassius, Roman History, 59:8.2; cf. 60:8.1.

206. These political allocations of Gaius are also mentioned in: William Smith, ed. Dictionary of the Bible, vol. 1. (London: Walter and Maberly, 1863), 61; Justin Taylor, "The Ethnarch of King Arestas at Damascus," RB 99 [1992], 726.

207. Dio Cassius, Roman History, 59:12.2.

208. Ibid.

209. Ibid.

210.. Ibid.

211. See Suetonius, Gaius Caligula, 4:15.4.

212.. Cf. Jewett, 32; Murphy-O’Connor, "Pauline Missions Before the Jerusalem Conference," RB 89 (1982), 74.

213.. See Josephus, Antiquities, 18:5.3 [#120-#126].

214.. Cf. Anthony A. Barrett, Caligua- The Corruption of Power  (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1990), 183;  J. P. V. D. Balston, The Emperor Gaius (Oxford: Clarendon, 1934), 197. This actual friendship is seen in historical passages like: Tacitus, Annals, 2:57 where Arestas is said to have shown honor to Germanicus by presenting him a gold crown.

215.. Cf. Jewett, 33; Manfred Lidner, ed. "Die Geschichte der Nabater," Petra und das Königreich der Nabater: Lebensraum, Geschichte und Kultur eines arabischen Volkes der Antike,*  2d ed.  (Munich: Delp, 1974), 130ff.

216. Some have claimed that since no Roman coins for Damascus have been found between the years 34 A.D. to 64 A.D. that this therefore indicated that the city was not under Roman control during that time and thus as early as A.D. 34, but as Justin Taylor has said: “one should be cautious about inferring too much from the gap in the coin record.” (Taylor, "The Ethnarch of King Arestas at Damascus." RB 99 [1992], 724).

217.. Jewett, 33; C. H. Turner, "Chronology of the New Testament," HDB 1, 416ff. Alphons Steinmann, Arestas IV, König der Nabater.  Eine historisch-exegetische Studie zu 2 Kor 11,32f.,* (Freiburg: Herder, 1909), 43.

218. Cf. Brooks and Winbery (Syntax of NT Greek, 11) for this literal translation.

219.. Cf. Jewett, 52-54.

220. In Acts 11:28-30 Luke alludes to a visit of Paul to Jerusalem for a famine relief mission but this event did not actually take place until after the founding of the Corinthian church (Acts 18); i.e., after  53 A.D. It appears that Luke parenthetically mentioned this event here in order to immediately show the fulfillment of Agabus’s prophecy of famine. (Cf. NASB for the accurate translation of the key part of this verse in 28b of: “And this [famine] took place in the reign of Claudius.”).

221. This text is from Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Acts of the Apostles. Anchor Bible. Vol. 31. (Garden City, NY Doubleday, 1998), 621, 622; cf. J. H. Oliver, "The epistle of Claudius which mentions the Proconsul Junius Gallio," Hesperia 40 (1971), 239. The bold print is used for the characters from the original text that are found in the remains of this inscription [see SIG³ #801 for this original text], while the non-bold characters are fill-in words that have almost unanimously been accepted as the reconstruction of the original text. It works out that approximately 1/3 of the text has remained. [See A. Brassac, "Une inscription de Delphes et la chronologie de Saint Paul,"* RB 10 (1913), 36-53, for a full discussion of the reconstructed text].

222. The reconstruction of these first two formal lines of greetings are based on other known inscriptions of Claudius. [See M. P. Charlesworth, Documents Illustrating the Reigns of Claudius & Nero (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1951), 11-14].

223. See Seneca, Epistulae Morales,* 104.1.

224. An imperial salutation was given to an Emperor following a victory in a war he was involved in or closely associated to. (See e.g., Flavius Titus’s Acclamation in: Josephus, War of the Jews, 6.6.1 [#316], following his conquest of Jerusalem.

225. See in Brassac, 42-44.

226. Ibid., 43.

227. See Ibid., 44. Claudius was said there to have had received his 12^th tribunician power and by this time, the tribunician was given to the Emperor on a yearly basis and thus coincided with his regnal years [cf. Fitzmyer, Acts, 622].

228. See G. Cousin and G. Deschamps, "Emplacement et ruines de la ville de KYC en Carie,"* BCH 11 (1887): 305-311, esp. 306-308; CIL 3.476, 6.1256; cf. Frontinus, De Aquis,* 1.13.

229. See e.g., 2 Sam 11:1. Through human history, when there was no technological way to deal with/fight against the weather elements, both warring sides mutually preferred to not engage in battles during the winter months. Even simple torrential rains could come to decide battles. Case in point, in the 19^th century, Napoleon losing at Waterloo, and also, in even the mid 20^th century, Hitler losing a key battle in Russia mainly because of the sever winters which literally froze his military machine in their tracks.

230. Cf. Brassac, 45; Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, "Paul and Gallio," JBL 112 (1993): 316; idem. St. Paul’s Corinth:Texts and Archaeology, GNS 6 (Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, 1983), 142-144. On the necessary connections between imperial salutations and military victory, see Dio Cassius, Roman History, 43:44.4-5; 46:38.1; 52:41.3-4; and Pauly-Wissowa, "Imperator," PW 9.1147-1150; cf. N.G.L. Hammond and H. H. Scullard, The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 2^nd ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), 542.

231. Cf. Brassac, 45.

232. In response to those who have claimed that Gallio began his rule in May or June, Murphy-O’Connor, ["Paul and Gallio," 316 note 3] has rightly pointed out that: “The ruling of Tiberius in 15 CE that provincial officeholders should leave Rome by June 1 (Dio Cassius, Roman History 57:14.5) implies that they took up their posts a month later. That time was allowed for travel is confirmed by the 42 CE legislation of Claudius, who moved the departure date back to 1 April only because officials tarried in Rome (Dio Cassius 60:11.3). This was too early for [safe] sea travel, and the following year he was forced to change the date back to 15 April (Dio Cassius 60:17.3). There is no evidence of any modification of the date of assumption of office.”

233. At very rare times proconsuls were appointed for a two-year term but this was rather an exception than the norm. So as W. M. Ramsay ["Luke’s Authorities in Acts I-XII," The Expositor (May 1909), 469] rightly pointed out: “The safe plan in chronological reasoning is to follow the general rule, and refuse to have recourse to exceptions without clear evidence in their favour.”

234. Seneca, Epistulae Morales,* 104.1.

235.. Murphy-O’Connor, "Paul and Gallio," 315 [i.e.s]. See also Pliny (Natural History 31:33.62) who confirms the report by Seneca of Gallio’s “fussy hypochondriac disposition,” as Murphy-O’Connor (ibid.) has diagnosed it. [A hypochondriac is a nervous malady, often arising from indigestion, that torments a patient with imaginary fears].

236.. Cf. Flavius Vegetius Renatus, Epitoma Rei Militaris,* 4:39.

237.. Cf. Murphy-O’Connor, "Paul and Gallio," 315, 316. The dangers of sailing the seas in these days during these adverse winter conditions is a well-documented fact of history. [Cf. Pliny, Natural History, 2:47.122; Tacitus, History, 4:81]. A report of Jewish historian Flavius Josephus further illustrates this as he says that even the great Roman General Flavius Titus did not dare sail the seas back to Rome in the wintertime after he had completed his conquests in Judea [See Josephus, Wars, 7:1.3 [#17-#20]; see also Ibid., 4:11.1 [#632] where Josephus says that a Roman general named Mucianus was also afraid to sail from Antioch to Italy “because it was the middle of the winter, and so he led his army on foot through Cappadocia and Phrygia”]. See also the Biblical episode in Acts 27 where the danger of sailing during this time of the year is seen in the account of Paul’s shipwreck on Malta while aboard a Roman ship. [The mention of the 'Fast' in verse 9 is a reference to the Fall feast of the “Yom Kippur” (Day of Atonement) [See J. Zmijewski, "nesteia," EDNT, e2:465. It was the only ‘Fast’ that was required by Law. (See Lev 16:29-34; 23:27-32; Num 29:7]. It also appears that the great danger in sailing the seas in the winter was only due to severe sea storms but as L. Casson, [Travel in the Ancient World, 271] points out : “It was even more a matter of visibility: during the winter a much greater incidence of cloudiness obscures the sun by day and the sky by night, making navigation difficult in an age that did not have the mariner’s compass...”and he adds that mists and fogs could mask various perils and render landmarks on familiar coastlines unrecognizable to the navigator. [Cf. Vegetius, Epitoma Rei Militaris, 4:39]. For an in depth discussion of this topic see Brian M. Rapske, "Acts, Travel and Shipwreck," The Book of Acts in its Graeco-Roman Setting. Edited by David W. J. Gill and Conrad Gempf (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1994), 2:22-47.

238. Cf. the reason in Note #221.

239. The presence of this phrase in this verse has been a controversial issue among NT scholars since it does not appear in some ancient manuscripts of the book of Acts and therefore it does not appear in all the English versions of the Bible. This phrase appears in the following manuscripts (coded as): Ψ 181 614 1175 Byz [L P] l 1178 it^{ar, dem,  gig, ph, w} vg^mss syr^{p, h} slav Chrysotom D* D²  it^d (cf. KJV, NKJV); but it does not appear in: P⁷⁴  A B E 33 36 307 453 610 945 1409 1678 1739 1891 2344 it^{c, e, p, ro}  vg cop^{sa, bo}  arm geo. [See Appendix C for the full names and/or dates of these manuscripts. For a brief history of these manuscripts see the work of: Barbara Aland and Kurt Aland, The Text of the New Testament, 2^nd ed. Translated by Erroll F. Rhodes (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1989)].

         After a study of this textual variance in this passage J. M. Ross [“The Extra Words in Acts 18:21" NovT  34.3 (1992), 247-249], has concluded that:“the balance of the probability is in favour of their having been inserted by Luke himself to explain why Paul was so anxious to make an early departure from Ephesus” and that they were later taken out of the text probably by “someone who thought Christians ought not to attend Jewish festivals, and [he therefore] removed the words so as not to give a Pauline example of such reprehensible conduct.” (248, 249). Based on the fact that this phrase does not appear in many modern English version of the Bible (see e.g., NAB, NASB; NEB, REB, NIV, JB, NJB, RSV, NRSV) it seems that this conclusion is still prevalent today, but it would seem more likely that these words were indeed originally in the text of Acts and that a Christian later removed them, than vice-versa; i.e., that a Christian added this statement into the NT manuscripts in later centuries. This is especially true in the light of the growing attitude of anti-semiticism  that became prevalent in the among some non-Jewish Christians living in Roman Empire, especially after the Jewish Revolt of 66-70 A.D.

            Paul himself did consider these feasts as a mere shadow of things to come, and thus felt that they did not need to be kept to the letter anymore, (see Col 2:16, 17) but here (and apparently also in Acts 20:16), he, for some reason, felt a need to observe them; probably ‘in order to save some [Jews]’ (see 1 Cor 9:19-22).  

            While these feast days do not have to be kept to-the-letter today by Christians, they still have a great spiritual significance in regards to the overall redemptive typological calender of God. A study of them could be beneficial and enriching to the overall Christian experience. For an excellent study on the significance of these feast days in, first of all, their First Covenant context and then in their possible Second Covenant context see the work of Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi, God’s Festivals in Scripture and History.  Part 1-The Spring Festivals, and  Part 2-The Fall Festivals (Berrien Springs, MI: Biblical Perspectives, 1995, 1996).

240. Paul also seemed to have had a similar time-constraint problem in Acts 20:16 when he wanted to sail to the 600 miles (22-day trip) from Miletus (just south of Ephesus- see Map#4) to Jerusalem in the 25 days* that were left before the Day of Pentecost.

    *This period of 25 days is arrived at by subtracting from the 50 days that were between the first day of the Feast of Unleaven Bread (Lev 25:15, 16; see Acts 20:6) and the Day of Pentecost (Acts 20:16): (1) the 7 days of the feast of Unleaven Bread (20:6); (2) the 5 days it took to sail to Troas; (3) the 7 days that were spent there;(4) the 1 day of the Euthychus incident (vss.7-12);(5) the 1 day trip from Assos to Troas (vss. 13, 14a); (6) the 1 day trip to Mitylene (vs. 14b); (7) the 1 day trip to Chios (vs.15a); (8) the 1 day trip to Samos (vs. 15b); and (8) the 1 day trip to Miletus (vs. 15b); which adds up to a total of 25 days. [See Map#4 for the location of these places].

241. Suetonius, Claudius, 5:25.4. 

242. This event described as an expulsion is not to be confused, as some commentators have done, with the time when, in about 41 A.D., Claudius had ordered the Jews in Rome “not to hold meetings,” but “decided not drive them out.” (Dio Cassius, Roman History, 60:6.6). Later on, when disturbances arose in Rome between apparently Jews and Christian, Claudius probably decided at that time to drive out anyone who he suspected was in anyway connected with Judaism.

243. J. A. Fitzmyer (619) points out that it seems here that Suetonius was not familiar with the Christian religion and therefore confused the Greek name for Christ- Christos- with the more commonly used name, Chrēstos, which he wrote in Latin as “Chrestus.” This is also the conclusion that many modern historian have arrived at. (See e.g. A. Momigliano, Claudius: The Emperor and His Achievement (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1961), 31-34; V. M. Scramuzza, The Emperor Claudius (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1940), 151; A. Piganiol, Histoire de Rome* (Clio; Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1949), 258).

244. See P. Orosius, Historia adversus paganos,* 7:6.15-16; CSEL, 5:451. He also mater-of-factly said that Josephus had also made mention of this expulsion but this reference has not been found in the [surviving?] writings of Josephus so no one really knows where Orosius got this information. This does not in anyway discredit the validity of Orosius’s date which is actually further validated by the fact that the date for Gallio’s proconsulship was not discovered until the early 20^th century, so Orosius really had not motive for the date that he said this expulsion of the Jews took place.

245. Support for this understood brief stay time of about only one week (seven days) could also find support from the statement in the a significant early Christian document known as the Didache (The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles) which is believed to (1) have been written in ca. 80-90 A.D., and (2) to be of either apostolic origin (written by the apostles themselves) or, more likely, of apostolic basis (based on the teachings and directives of the apostles), which says in chapter 11 verse 5 in regards to traveling apostles and prophets that they should stay for more than one day; two, only if need be and that if they remain for three days then they are a false prophet.

246. Based on the scaled distances in the Thomas Nelson Bible Maps.

247. Based on the accepted average rate of land travel being 15-20 miles per day (See “The Time of Christ’s Baptism,” Ch. 5, pp. Note #219) and the accepted average rate of sea travel being about 27 miles per day (which is supported by the fact that in Acts 20:6, Luke says that it took 5 days to sail from Philiippi to Troas which was a distance of about 135 miles.

248. Based on this reconstructed chronology of Paul’s first 17 years of ministry which harmonizes Luke’s chronological outline in Acts and Paul’s chronological statements in Gal. 1 and 2, then the popular theory among NT scholars that Luke’s chronology in Acts was out of sequence, should be abandoned. The only events that would seem to be out of place in Acts would be the famine relief mission of Paul and Silas (11:28-30) but as we stated earlier (see Note #205), this was a parenthetical allusion that Luke made in order to immediately indicate the fulfillment of Agabus’s prophecy.

249. This is particularly the case in the Qal verbal stem. See e.g., Gen 15:18, Exod 24:8; 34:27; Deut 4:23; 5:2; 1 Kgs 8:9, 21; 2 Kgs 17:15, 38; 1 Chr 16:16; 2 Chr 5:10; etc. In the other verbal stems (the Niphal, Pual (2 occurrences) and Hiphîl) krat is used in the sense of a punishment through e.g., “cutting down, destroying, or killing.” Cf. Wigram, EHC-OT, 618-620.   

250.. Cf. Waltke and O’Connor, IBHS, 652-653 [39.2.4a-c].

251.. Cf. Ibid., 653 [39.2.4c].

252. Cf. Caringola, Seventy Weeks, 101-117.

253. This right understanding for the Seventieth Week of Daniel also radically and forever severs the ‘head of this uncircumcised Philistine’ (the Futuristic interpretation/application of the 70^th Week), who, was marshaling his armies (Futurism/Dispensationalism, and thus pre-Second Advent “rapturists”) actually against the living God of (True) Israel and His “army” (i.e., Believers in His Messiah-Jesus Christ)!

254.. See Acts 2:41, 47; 4:4.

255.. Cf. Acts 13:46-48; Rom 1:16.

256. Cf. Daniel J-S Chae, Paul as Apostle to the Gentiles (Great Britain: Paternoster Press, 1997), 281.

257.. Samuele Bacchiocchi, Advent Hope For Human Hopelessness (Berrien Springs, MI: Biblical Perspectives, 1986), 211; cf. Chae, 271.

258. See Paul’s own great concern for the Jewish nation as he poignantly expressed in Rom 9:1-5.

259.. For an excellent exposition on the topic of the relationship between Israel and the Church see the chapters by Dr. Daniel J-S Chae entitled: "The Equality of Jews and Gentiles in the New Status" (206-214) which covers Romans 5-8 and "The Equality of Jews and Gentiles in the Plan of God" (215-288) which covers Romans 9-11.

260.. For an excellent, extensive study on this subject of the Old Testament prophecies concerning "Israel," and their present status/fulfillment, see Hans K. Larondelle, The Israel of God in Prophecy- Principles of Prophetic Interpretations (Berrien Springs, MI, Andrews University Press, 1983). For a more concise study see: Steven Wohlberg, Exploding the Israel Deception (Roseville, CA: Amazing Facts, 1998).