During the Exodus from Egypt, God gave the Israelites the Ten Commandments and many statutes and ordinances. One such rule (actually a command) was the Sabbath of the seventh year, otherwise known as the Shemitah or Shmita year. “When you come into the land which I give you, then the land shall keep a sabbath to the LORD. Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather its fruit; but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a sabbath to the LORD. You shall neither sow your field nor prune your vineyard” (Leviticus 25:1-4).
If the people did not obey God’s commandments (including observing the Sabbath year), God would scatter them among the nations, and their land would become desolate. God had warned them several times about the consequences of disobeying Him, including Leviticus 26. I wrote about this in my last article, Antichrist & the 7-Year Anniversary of October 7, 2023 :: By Randy Nettles – Rapture Ready.
God explained the Jubilee year to Moses in Leviticus 25. “When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the Lord. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the Lord: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard (Leviticus 25:2-4).
“And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you” (Leviticus 25:9-10).
After seven Shemitah cycles (49 years), in the 50th year, starting on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), the Israelites were commanded to observe a year of Jubilee, which included the forgiveness of debts, the restoration of lands, and the release of slaves. After the seventh Sabbath year had been completed, the Jubilee year (the 50th year) would commence. It was also reckoned as the first year of the next Shemitah cycle (or week).
THE 70 WEEKS (OR SEVENS) OF DANIEL 9:24-27
Daniel’s prayer for Jerusalem and his people in Daniel 9 takes place several years before Jeremiah’s prophecy of 70 years of ‘desolations’ for the Jews was to expire. The same year Daniel made his prayer of supplication to the LORD in 539 BC, Cyrus II of Persia conquered Babylon. In 537 BC, more than 40,000 Jewish exiles returned to their homeland. The next year, 536 BC, reconstruction of the Temple began. It was finally finished in 516 BC.
Daniel 9:2 and 9:24 are prophetically connected. Daniel 9:2 references Jeremiah’s prophecy of 70 years of desolations brought about by Israel’s failure to observe the Sabbath (or Shemitah) year, as commanded by God in Leviticus 25:4. The Israelites had evidently failed to keep 70 Sabbath years, out of 490 years, since entering the Promised Land.
2 Chronicles 36:20-21 confirms the primary reason for Israel’s exile. “And them that had escaped from the sword carried he away to Babylon, where they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia: To fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfill threescore and ten years.“The ‘sabbath’ in verse 21 is the seventh year of a designated seven-year cycle (or week). Israel would be kept out of the land of Israel for 70 years (for each missed Sabbath year) until “the land had enjoyed her sabbaths.”
In Daniel 9:24-27, the angel Gabriel gave Daniel a prophetic word from the LORD regarding the future of Jerusalem and the Jewish people. This prophecy outlined a timeline, based not on years but on heptads of years (the Shemitah cycles and years), of when the kingdom of God would begin. This ‘kingdom’ is evidenced by the wording of Daniel 9:24: “Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.”
These six objectives for the Jewish people will only be fulfilled in the Millennium Kingdom, when God will make a new covenant with His people and fill them with His Holy Spirit. “But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:33).
The timeline for Daniel 9:24 is for 70 ‘sevens’ or ‘weeks.’ Most scholars believe the sevens (or weeks) refer to Shemitah cycles of seven years, totaling 490 years (70 x 7). However, I have a different take on this, which we will examine below.
The event that marks the beginning of the 70 sevens is recorded in Daniel 9:25. “Know and understand this: From the time the word goes out to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven ‘sevens,’ and sixty-two ‘sevens.’ It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble.” (NIV)
Daniel 9:25 explains that there would be 69 weeks between the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem and the coming of the Jewish Messiah. That would be 483 years (69 x 7) between these two events, according to traditional scholarly reckoning.
To Daniel’s amazement, Gabriel then informs him that sometime after the Messiah comes to his people, he will be killed and Jerusalem and the Second Temple will be destroyed. “After the sixty-two ‘sevens,’ the Anointed One will be put to death and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed”(Daniel 9:26 – NIV). These catastrophic events will take place sometime between the 69th and 70th ‘seven.’
The Second Temple hadn’t even been built yet when Daniel was praying and petitioning the LORD, and now Gabriel is informing him that it will be destroyed, as the First Temple had been. Also, their long-awaited Messiah would be killed! What a shocker!
The 70th ‘week’ is described in Daniel 9:27. “And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the seven 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 desolater” (KJV). The “he” in verse 27 refers to a future ruler (like the one who destroys the Second Temple), who when he comes, will stop the daily sacrifices and desecrate yet another temple that will be built.
Paul confirms the existence of a future Third Temple in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4. “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he, as God, sits in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.”
The prince or ruler of Daniel 9:26-27 is the same as “the man of sin” (and the son of perdition) in 2 Thessalonians 2:3. He will confirm a seven-year covenant with Israel and other nations at the beginning of Daniel’s 70th week. This 70th week is also known as “the Day of the LORD,” “Jacob’s Trouble,” or “the Tribulation.”
What no one understood at the time of Daniel’s writing, and beyond, was that there would be a large gap of time between the 69th and 70th seven. That is why Gabriel told Daniel, “Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end” (Daniel 12:9).
The Kingdom of God (the Millennium), in which the six conditions or objectives of Daniel 9:24 are outlined, will begin after Daniel’s 70th week is fulfilled.
THE TIMELINE OF DANIEL 9:25
I believe the most likely timeline for the 69 sevens (or weeks) of Daniel 9:25 was from 444 BC to 33 AD, as the Bible scholar Harold Hoehner argued, rather than 445 BC to 32 AD, as Sir Robert Anderson argued. The starting point was the year 444 BC, when King Artaxerxes Longimanus of Persia issued a decree allowing the Jews to rebuild the city of Jerusalem.
The end point of the 69 sevens was when Jesus Christ entered Jerusalem on Nisan 10, 33 AD, as the King of the Jews, but was rejected as such. Four days later, on Nisan 14, Jesus was crucified on the Passover. The Julian date was Thursday, April 2, 33 AD (IMO).
There are two interpretations regarding the wording of Daniel 9:25. One interpretation says there are 69 ‘weeks‘ (paraphrasing) between the two events, and the other interpretation says there are 69 ‘sevens.’ I believe this distinction is very important in determining the exact duration of this timeline, as I believe weeks refer to Shemitah cycles and sevens refer to Shemitah years.
Most scholars accept the interpretation of weeks as representing Shemitah cycles. This would amount to 483 years. However, there are only 476 calendar years (either Julian, Gregorian, or Jewish) between 444 BC and 33 AD.
The only calendar that can accommodate 483 years (69 x 7) between these dates is the one Sir Robert Anderson developed (or made popular), called the “360-day prophetic calendar.” I explained the details of this calendar in In The Midst of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks Prophecy :: By Randy Nettles – Rapture Ready.
The only problem with Anderson’s prophetic calendar is that the Hebrews never used a 360-day calendar, especially one without an intercalary month added periodically. They used (and still do) a lunar calendar (353-355 days) for their harvest seasons and religious convocations, with an extra month of 30 days added every two to three years to keep it aligned with the solar calendar (365/366 days). It is considered a lunisolar calendar.
If the Jews ever used a 360-day calendar to keep abreast of certain prophecies, it would have to be in addition to their lunisolar calendar, as that was the calendar they used for their yearly Feast of the Lord observances. The Jews already had a mechanism in place for keeping up with large swaths of time – the Jubilee calendar of 49 years (+ 1). With a 360-day calendar, the Jews would have had to count days for 483 years (approximately 173,880 days). It is incompatible with a lunar or solar calendar.
Upon Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem on Nisan 10, 33 AD (Palm Sunday), he told the religious leaders of Jerusalem, “If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes” (Luke 19:42). This appears to me like they should have known when their Messiah would come, possibly by reckoning the timeline of the prophecy of Daniel 9:25. There is no way they could have done this using a 360-day calendar that didn’t align with their harvest times and Feasts of the Lord convocations.
The starting year of Daniel 9:25 was 444 BC. It was the first seven or Shemitah year of Daniel’s prophecy. 33 AD was the 69th seven. Daniel was not counting years (483 years), days (173,880 days), or even weeks or cycles (69 cycles), but only the Shemitah years.
However, if one were to count the years between the two events in Daniel 9:25, the total is 477 years (inclusive reckoning). Daniel 9:25 never mentions 483 years, only 69 sevens. By wording the prophecy this way, Gabriel (actually God) left a clear clue that the start and end dates were Shemitah years.
SEVENS OR WEEKS?
The following is from an article I wrote last year, The 70 Sevens of Daniel 9:24 – Pete’s Rev310 Substack, regarding which English translation is better for the Hebrew words in Daniel 9:24-27 referencing sevens or weeks. The first two Hebrew words in Daniel 9:24 are שבעים שבעים. They have the exact same spelling. This Hebrew word is most often translated as seventy (or a compound number of seventy) or as threescore and ten.
Even though these two words have the same spelling, they are translated into English as two different words. As I said, most of the time this Hebrew word is translated as seventy; however, there are seven instances in the O.T. where שבעים is translated as weeks in most versions. I think it’s fairly obvious that Daniel was not referring to “seventy seventy.”
Most English translations of the Hebrew Tanakh render the second Hebrew word שבעים in Daniel 9:24 (and three times in verses 25-26) as weeks. However, several others translate it as sevens. This could make a difference, as I believe weeks could refer to Shemitah cycles, and sevens could refer to Shemitah years (the seventh year of a Shemitah cycle). I believe sevens is the better translation.
The Hebrew word for ‘week‘ (singular) is’שָׁבוּעַ and the plural word, ‘weeks,‘ is שבעת (or שָׁבוּעוֹת). If Daniel had wanted to write “seventy weeks,” he could have written it as “שבעת שבעים.” Instead, he wrote it as “שבעים שבעים.” When you add the suffix ים to שבע (the Hebrew word for seven), the word שבעים (sevens) is formed. This is why sevens should be the correct translation for this Hebrew word in Daniel 9:24-26, not weeks or seventy.
I believe 444 BC was the last year of a Shemitah cycle, so if one were counting cycles (weeks), then you would not count that cycle, as it was not a complete seven-year cycle. The same thing goes if 33 AD was not the last year of a Shemitah cycle. Daniel was counting Sabbath years. There were 69 of them, including 444 BC and 33 AD. If you were to count the total years between them, and including them, there are 477 years.
However, when you get to Daniel 9:27, the Hebrew word שבוע is used. “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.”
The correct translation for שבוע is week (singular). In this verse, Daniel refers to a Shemitah cycle (or week) of seven years, which corresponds to the seven-year Tribulation. Of course, the last year within this seven-year cycle is the 70th ‘seven‘ (Shemitah year) of Daniel’s prophecy.
70 JUBILEES
One of the most important factors in understanding the 69 sevens of Daniel’s prophecy (in Daniel 9:25-26) is determining when the first Shemitah cycle (week) for Israel began. There are many different opinions on this subject. Did the first Shemitah cycle start in 1406 BC when the children of Israel first entered the Promised Land? Many Jewish and Christian scholars from different eras believe the first Shemitah cycle didn’t begin until five or seven years later, when the land rested from war for a brief period (as mentioned in Joshua 11:23), and the Israelites had planted their own crops.
Others believe it didn’t start until even later, when Joshua divided some of the lands to nine tribes (and the half-tribe of Manasseh) of Israel, as mentioned in Joshua 13:8-14. I’ve even seen some reckonings from 15 years after Israel entered the Promised Land to the beginning of the first Shemitah cycle.
Another point of contention is whether the Shemitah cycles stopped when the Jews were deported from the land and then resumed once they were back in the land, or if the cycles were continuous regardless of whether the Jews were in the land or not. I believe in the latter reckoning, according to my understanding of Leviticus 26:34-35 and other scriptures. Once the children of Israel entered the Promised Land, the Sabbath of the seventh year was set in stone, so to speak (no pun intended). The land would have its Sabbath rest, regardless.
I believe the answer to when the first Shemitah cycle (and thus the first Shemitah year) occurred is found in a little-known passage in Leviticus 19. “When you come into the land and have planted all kinds of trees for food, then you shall count their fruit as uncircumcised. For three years, it shall be as uncircumcised to you. It shall not be eaten. But in the fourth year, all its fruit shall be holy, a praise to the Lord. And in the fifth year, you may eat its fruit, that it may yield to you its increase: I am the LORD your God” (Leviticus 19:23-25).
In the fourth year, all crops were considered “circumcised,” which was a sign of the covenant between the LORD and Israel. Thus, the first Shemitah seven-year cycle began in the fourth year after entering the Promised Land (IMO).
The children of Israel crossed the Jordan River and entered the Promised Land on Nisan 10 (according to Joshua 4:19) in the year 1406 BC. I believe the first year of the first Shemitah cycle began in the fourth full year of Israel’s entrance to the land of Canaan. The first three-and-a-half years of Nisan 1406-Tishri 1406 BC, Tishri 1406-Tishri 1405 BC, Tishri 1405-Tishri 1404 BC, and Tishri 1404-Tishri 1403 BC were spent fighting the inhabitants of Canaan, so there wasn’t any sowing and reaping of the Israelites’ own crops. They confiscated the enemies’ crops.
These three-and-a-half years are not included in the first Shemitah and Jubilee cycles. The fourth (full) year would have been 1403-1402 BC. That, in my opinion, is the first year of the first Shemitah cycle. In my 2023 article, Sevens :: By Randy Nettles – Rapture Ready, I showcased a chart of the Shemitah/Sabbath cycles and ‘sevens’ from 1403-1402 BC to 2041-2042 AD.
In this chart, 445-444 BC is reckoned as Israel’s 137th Sabbath year. Ironically or not, the English word ‘sabbath‘ appears 137 times in the KJV. This is a very interesting number, as I wrote about in 137 – The Number of God in Scripture and Science (a three-part article). As mentioned earlier, 445-444 BC is the first seven in the 69 sevens of Daniel 9:25. 32-33 AD is reckoned as Israel’s 205th Sabbath year and is the 69th seven in Daniel’s prophecy.
With this reckoning, Israel’s 490th Shemitah year is 2027-2028. That would make Tishri 2028-Tishri 2029 Israel’s 70th Jubilee. It could also mean 2028-2035 is Daniel’s long-delayed 70th week, otherwise known as the seven-year Tribulation.
A POTENTIAL TIMELINE FOR DANIEL’S 70TH WEEK
Could Daniel’s 70th week (aka the Tribulation) begin in 2028? If so, 2030 (the 1960th year from 70 AD) could see either the start or the finish of the construction of the Third Temple in Jerusalem.
Let’s examine 2028-2035 as a potential timeline for the Tribulation. We will use the criteria found in Reckoning Daniel’s 70th Week From the Gregorian Calendar to reckon the start, middle, and end dates of the seven-year Tribulation.
In this article, I wrote, “The Antichrist will not confirm or strengthen a seven-year covenant with Israel and the ‘many’ reckoned from the Jewish calendar or a hypothetical 360-day ‘prophetic’ calendar, but will do so based on the Gregorian calendar, either 2556 or 2557 days (depending on how many leap days are added in those seven years). So, whatever Gregorian calendar day the Tribulation begins on, it will ‘officially’ end seven years later on the same monthly date (either 2556 or 2557 days later).
This is not to say the Jewish lunisolar calendar isn’t in play, because it is the flip side of the Gregorian calendar. Whatever Gregorian day the beginning, middle, and end of the Tribulation fall on (or whatever event transpires on a particular day), there will be a corresponding Jewish calendar day, which holds the greater prophetic significance, as some of these timeframes mentioned in Daniel and Revelation (1260, 1290, and 1335 days) will land on important Jewish days or religious Feasts of the Lord (as described in Leviticus 23).”
Note: This is the third seven-year cycle I have researched as a possible candidate for Daniel’s 70th week, aka the Tribulation. The other two, 2026-2033 and 2030-2037, can be found in my previous articles. These are all speculative examples of how the timing of the Tribulation could unfold in the coming years and heptads. We know it’s getting close; we just don’t know how close.
2028-2035 (2556 Gregorian calendar days – 2540 Jewish calendar days)
Start: Sept. 29, 2028 (Tishri 10 – Yom Kippur)
1260 Days From the Start: March 12, 2032 (Nisan 1)
Middle (1278.5 Days From the Start): March 30, 2032 (Nisan 19 – 5th day of Unleavened Bread)
1251 Days From the Middle: Sept. 2, 2035 (Tishri 1 – Rosh Hashanah)
1260 Days From the Middle: Sept. 11, 2035 (Tishri 10 – Yom Kippur)
End (1278.5 Days From the Middle and 2557 Days From the Start): Sept. 29, 2035 (Tishri 27)
Post Trib. (1290 Days From the Middle): Oct. 11, 2035 (Heshvan 10)
Post Trib. (1335 Days From the Middle): Nov. 25, 2035 (Kislev 25 – 1st day of Hanukkah)
Note: 2035 is one of those years that is not reckoned correctly by the fixed, mathematically determined Jewish calendar in use today. It is a month off due to the addition of an intercalary year when one was not needed.
Will the Antichrist confirm a seven-year covenant with “the many” on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), on Tishri 10, 2028; and is this the Jewish date for the start of Israel’s 70th Jubilee? That would be crazy! Time will tell, and there’s not much of it left.
See Sevens :: By Randy Nettles – Rapture Ready for Shemitah cycles chart.
Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
Randy Nettles
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