Gabriel’s Prophecy of the Seventy Weeks

As Daniel continues speaking, praying, confessing his sin and the sin of Israel, and presenting his petition concerning God's holy mountain, Gabriel arrives in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. Gabriel says he has come to give Daniel insight and understanding, explaining that the answer went out at the beginning of Daniel's petitions because he is highly precious. The response from heaven is thus immediate and personal, linking fervent prayer to divinely granted understanding.

W²⁰hile I was speaking, praying, confessing my sin and that of my people Israel, and presenting my petition before the LORD my God concerning His holy mountain— ²¹while I was still praying, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. ²²He instructed me and spoke with me, saying: “O Daniel, I have come now to give you insight and understanding. ²³At the beginning of your petitions, an answer went out, and I have come to tell you, for you are highly precious. So consider the message and understand the vision:

Gabriel declares that seventy weeks are decreed for Daniel's people and holy city to restrain transgression, end sin, atone for iniquity, bring in everlasting righteousness, seal vision and prophecy, and anoint the Most Holy. He then tells Daniel to understand the sequence from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince, through periods of rebuilding accomplished in distress. The prophecy broadens Daniel's concern from the seventy years of desolation to a much larger redemptive timetable ordered toward righteousness and fulfillment.

²⁴Seventy weeks are decreed for your people and your holy city to stop their transgression, to put an end to sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy Place. ²⁵Know and understand this: From the issuance of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Messiah, the Prince, there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of distress.

Gabriel says that after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing, and that the people of a coming prince will destroy the city and the sanctuary amid war and decreed desolations. He speaks of a covenant confirmed for one week, the ending of sacrifice and offering in the middle of that week, and the coming of the abomination that causes desolation until decreed destruction is poured out on the desolator. The prophecy therefore binds together anointed hope, violent interruption, sanctuary devastation, and the certainty that even desolation itself ends only under God's decree.

²⁶Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and will have nothing. ²⁷Then the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood, and until the end there will be war; desolations have been decreed. And he will confirm a covenant with many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of the temple will come the abomination that causes desolation, until the decreed destruction is poured out upon him. ”