Davy
Well-Known Member
Let's look at it like this, for example. Being hypothetical here of course. Christ's baptism happened but His death and resurrection didn't. Per this scenario is His baptism alone enough to save sinners? Obviously not. Therefore, though both events are significant, Christ's baptism would be pointless unless He also dies and rises. Which He did of course. But that is beside the point since we are being hypothetical here.
We also have to think about this from the perspective of unbelieving Jews as well. If something was going to convince them that the Messiah meant in Daniel 9 is meaning Jesus, what is more likely to convince them that Jesus is the Messiah meant? Someone that is baptized at the end of 483 years? Or someone that dies at the end of 483 years? As to the former, baptizing is not a ritual Jews practiced before Christ came along, but sacrificing would be. Not meaning the sacrificing of humans of course.
Still coming from the perspective of unbelieving Jews. If we then say Daniel 9:27 and this part should convince an unbelieving Jew that the Messiah is meaning Jesus---and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease--how so? From their perspective no one caused animal sacrificing to cease 487.5 years later the fact animal sacrificing continued for another 40 years post Christ having died on the cross.
On a different note, this 454 BC timeline proposed by @Davy via what Bullinger concluded might not even be valid to begin with. And I'm surprised someone hasn't pointed it out by now. I came across the following article below earlier which I apparently did not not already know but others posting in this thread likely already know. I'm familiar with the 444 BC scenario but I guess it went over my head at the time that it is meaning a decree was not made in 454 BC after all, it was made 10 years later instead.
So , unless 454 BC is a valid starting point regardless what the article below concludes, that pretty much settles it then, 483 years later can't be meaning when Christ dies but must be meaning when Jesus is baptized instead, regardless of my hypothetical above and what I argued pertaining to the perspective of unbelieving Jews. . That only matters if 454 BC is indeed a valid starting point. Therefore, if 483 years later is meaning His baptism, in that case, surely Christ is meant in verse 27 pertaining to the covenant and the midst of the week. Per my view I'm still where I was. All of verse 27 involves the 70th week, therefore, the gap is not after the 69th week, it is after the middle of the 70th week.
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A major problem scholars see with Futurism is in fitting the dates to modern archaeological findings. The Futurist view was conceived a century ago, when archaeology was not as far advanced, and therefore Scofield stated at that time, “In the present state of biblical chronology the date of the [second] decree of Artaxerxes cannot be unanswerably fixed farther than to say that it was issued between 454 to 444 BC.” (Note to Dan. 9:25). Some holding the Futurist position, however, have assumed a date of 455 BC for Artaxerxes’ second decree, because this would carry the first 69 weeks to the (supposed) date of the death of Messiah (dated incorrectly as 29 AD), leaving the 70th week to roam free after a parenthesis of unknown duration. But scholarship has now proven the date of the second decree to be ten years later, in 445 B.C. A leading Futurist scholar, John Walvoord states, “Most scholars, whether conservative or liberal, accordingly, accept the 445 B.C. date for Nehemiah’s [second] decree.” (Daniel, Key to Prophetic Revelation, p. 227) Adding on 69 weeks (483 years) to this corrected date would place the death of Christ in 39 AD, an obvious impossibility!
Sounds like you have reverted back to your old belief, which wrongly tries to place Christ's Ministry after the 483 years.
If you'll notice, there is NO additional period mentioned in Dan.9:26 after Jesus was "cut off".
Dan 9:26-27
26 And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.
27 And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.
KJV
- Jesus made no temporary covenant with the Jews at His 1st coming. Jesus instead offered The New Covenant, Him as the Perfect Sacrifice.
- Jesus did NOT end the Jew's daily sacrifice during His Ministry. Sacrifices in Jerusalem by the Jews continued until the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the temple in 70 A.D.
- Jesus NEVER placed an abomination IDOL inside the temple at Jerusalem.
- That determined poured upon the 'desolator' (the actual meaning), has still NOT YET HAPPENED TO THIS DAY.
Thus it is very easy to 'know', beyond all doubt, that the events of Daniel 9:27 cannot... be about Jesus' Ministry at His 1st coming, but instead is about the coming Antichrist/false-Messiah for the future "great tribulation" time.
