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Bible Question: My
question is about the seventy weeks mentioned in Daniel 9:25-27. Please
detail why this prophecy is so vital to understanding the purpose
of the tribulation period, the future of Israel and God's prophetic
time clock. Thank you for your help.
Bible Answer: The
book of Daniel is very important to understanding the book of Revelation
since Daniel outlines the rest of history as it relates to the nation
of Israel - not the rest of the world. Daniel contains many prophecies
but the major ones about the future occur in Daniel 2, 7, and 9. The
picture below shows the connection between Daniel's prophecies.
Literal
Fulfillment. The first important fact to notice is that the prophecies
in Daniel 2 literally came true. In Daniel 2, the prophet explains
a dream of Nebuchadnezzar. In the dream the king saw a statue with
a gold head, bronze chest, silver waist, legs of iron, and toes of
iron and clay. Then a stone, not made with hands, crushed the statue
and a mountain appeared (Dan. 2;31-35). So Daniel explains the dream
to the king (Dan. 2:36-45). The gold head is the first kingdom which
is the Kingdom of Babylon. The second kingdom is Media-Persia (Dan.
5:25-31; 8:20), the third is Greece (Dan. 8:21), and the fourth one
is Rome. The ten toes, the stone, and the mountain are explained later
in Daniel 7.
We know from history that Babylon was
conquered by Media-Persia, which was conquered by Greece, which was
conquered by Rome. Now we should expect the prophecies about the stone
and the mountain to be literal too! This is a very important truth
about the book of Daniel - its literal interpretation. |
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