Words in italic type have been added for clarity. They are not found in the original Hebrew or Aramaic.

Daniel 9

• Darius’ father (verse 1) is Ahasuerus, aka Artaxerxes.

Daniel’s Prayer for his People, the Jews and God’s holy city, Jerusalem.

Daniel 9:¹ In the first year of Darius (522 BC) (See chart below) the son of Ahasuerus (Artaxerxes), of the lineage of the Medes, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans—

• Jeremiah 29:10 For thus says the Lord: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place.
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Daniel 9:² in the first year of his (Darius’) reign – I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the Lord (Yᵊhōvâ) through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolation of Jerusalem.

• Jeremiah’s prophecies somehow fell into Daniel’s hands. Someone from the captivity had to have had these writings for Daniel to receive them. Jeremiah was in Jerusalem while Daniel was in Babylon.

• Jeremiah 25:1 Seventy Years of Desolation: The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah (which was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon),
  
• Jeremiah 25:11-12 And this whole land shall be a desolation and an astonishment, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. ‘Then it will come to pass, when seventy years are completed, that I will punish the king of Babylon (Belshazzar) and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans (Babylon), for their iniquity,’ says the Lord; ‘and I will make it a perpetual desolation. (Defeated by Cyrus in Daniel Chapter 5)

• After Babylon was conquered by Cyrus, King of the Medes and the Persians, Babylon continued to deteriorate until it’s walls were used for a zoo housing animals and then deteriorated almost completely. (See photo above).

Daniel 9:³ Then I set my face toward the Lord God (‘ăḏōnāy ‘ĕlōhîm) to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.

• Fasting is a lack of that which goes into the body, sackcloth is that which covers the outside of the body, and ashes take the place of oil which anoints the head; all of which signifies a humble recognition of one’s desolate (empty) condition in prayer.

Fasting	Repentance for the inside of the body
Sackcloth	Repentance for the outside of the body
Ashes	Takes the place of the anointing of the head

• Below Daniel records his prayer concerning HIS people, the Jews. A prayer the nations need today.

Daniel 9:⁴ And I prayed to the Lord my God (Yᵊhōvâ ‘ĕlōhîm), and made confession, and said, “O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), great and awesome God (‘ēl), who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments,

Daniel 9:⁵ we have sinned and committed iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments.

Daniel 9:6 Neither have we heeded Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings and our princes, to our fathers and all the people of the land.

Daniel 9:⁷ O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), righteousness belongs to You, but to us shame of face, as it is this day—to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all Israel, those near and those far off in all the countries to which You have driven them, because of the unfaithfulness which they have committed against You.

• Concerning Daniel’s comment on “driven them”, The fate of the captives were this: 1) Jeremiah and others who had been left in Jerusalem after Nebuchadnezzar conquered Jerusalem went to Egypt probably after the governor of Jerusalem was murdered. 2) Some were probably left in Babylon while Daniel and others were moved to Susa. 3) By the time of Esther, the Jews are strung all across the Persian empire of 127 Providences from India to Ethiopia.

Daniel 9:⁸ “O Lord (Yᵊhōvâ), to us belongs shame of face, to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, because we have sinned against You.

Daniel 9:⁹ To the Lord our God (‘ăḏōnāy ‘ĕlōhîm) belong mercy and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against Him. ¹⁰ We have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God (Yᵊhōvâ ‘ĕlōhîm), to walk in His laws, which He set before us by His servants the prophets.

Daniel 9:¹¹ Yes, all Israel has transgressed Your law, and has departed so as not to obey Your voice; therefore the curse and the oath written in the Law of Moses the servant of God (‘ĕlōhîm) have been poured out on us, because we have sinned against Him.

Daniel 9:¹² And He has confirmed His words, which He spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing upon us a great disaster; for under the whole heaven such has never been done as what has been done to Jerusalem.

Daniel 9:¹³ “As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us; yet we have not made our prayer before the Lord our God (Yᵊhōvâ ‘ĕlōhîm), that we might turn from our iniquities and understand Your truth.

• The Law of Moses:
  
  (God is speaking) Leviticus 26:14-39 14 ‘But if you (the Jews) do not obey Me, and do not observe all these commandments, 15 and if you despise My statutes, or if your soul abhors My judgments, so that you do not perform all My commandments, but break My covenant, 16 I also will do this to you: I will even appoint terror over you, wasting disease and fever which shall consume the eyes and cause sorrow of heart. And you shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. 17 I will set My face against you, and you shall be defeated by your enemies. Those who hate you shall reign over you, and you shall flee when no one pursues you.
  
  Leviticus 26:18 ‘And after all this, if you do not obey Me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins. 19 I will break the pride of your power; I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze. 20 And your strength shall be spent in vain; for your land shall not yield its produce, nor shall the trees of the land yield their fruit.
  
  Leviticus 26:21 ‘Then, if you walk contrary to Me, and are not willing to obey Me, I will bring on you seven times more plagues, according to your sins. 22 I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number; and your highways shall be desolate.
  
  Leviticus 26:23 ‘And if by these things you are not reformed by Me, but walk contrary to Me, 24 then I also will walk contrary to you, and I will punish you yet seven times for your sins. 25 And I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant; when you are gathered together within your cities I will send pestilence among you; and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy. 26 When I have cut off your supply of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall bring back your bread by weight, and you shall eat and not be satisfied. 27 ‘And after all this, if you do not obey Me, but walk contrary to Me,
  
  Leviticus 26:28 then I also will walk contrary to you in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins. 29 You shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters. 30 I will destroy your high places, cut down your incense altars, and cast your carcasses on the lifeless forms of your idols; and My soul shall abhor you. 31 I will lay your cities waste and bring your sanctuaries to desolation, and I will not smell the fragrance of your sweet aromas. 32 I will bring the land to desolation, and your enemies who dwell in it shall be astonished at it.
  
  Leviticus 26:33 I will scatter you among the nations and draw out a sword after you; your land shall be desolate and your cities waste.
  
  Leviticus 26:34 Then the land shall enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and you are in your enemies’ land; then the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbaths. 35 As long as it lies desolate it shall rest—for the time it did not rest on your sabbaths when you dwelt in it. 36 ‘And as for those of you who are left, I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; the sound of a shaken leaf shall cause them to flee; they shall flee as though fleeing from a sword, and they shall fall when no one pursues. 37 They shall stumble over one another, as it were before a sword, when no one pursues; and you shall have no power to stand before your enemies. 38 You shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. 39 And those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your enemies’ lands; also in their fathers’ iniquities, which are with them, they shall waste away.

Daniel 9:¹⁴ Therefore the Lord (Yᵊhōvâ) has kept the disaster in mind, and brought it upon us; for the Lord our God (Yᵊhōvâ ‘ĕlōhîm) is righteous in all the works which He does, though we have not obeyed His voice.

Daniel 9:¹⁵ And now, O Lord our God (‘ăḏōnāy ‘ĕlōhîm), who brought Your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and made Yourself a name, as it is this day—we have sinned, we have done wickedly!

Daniel 9:¹⁶ “O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), according to all Your righteousness, I pray, let Your anger and Your fury be turned away from Your city Jerusalem, Your holy mountain; because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people are a reproach to all those around us.

Daniel 9:¹⁷ Now therefore, our God (‘ĕlōhîm), hear the prayer of Your servant, and his supplications, and for the Lord’s (‘ăḏōnāy) sake cause Your face to shine (Be gracious) on Your sanctuary (The temple), which is desolate.

Daniel 9:¹⁸ O my God (‘ĕlōhîm), incline Your ear and hear; open Your eyes and see our desolations (emptiness), and the city which is called by Your name; for we do not present our supplications before You because of our righteous deeds, but because of Your great mercies.

Daniel 9:¹⁹ O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), hear! O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), forgive! O Lord (‘ăḏōnāy), listen and act! Do not delay for Your own sake, my God (‘ĕlōhîm), for Your city and Your people are called by Your name.”

The Seventy-Weeks Prophecy See {2 of 2} Daniel 9 – Seventy Weeks Prophecy

Daniel 9:²⁰ Now while I was speaking, praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the Lord my God (Yᵊhōvâ ‘ĕlōhîm) for the holy mountain of my God (‘ĕlōhîm),

Daniel 9:²¹ yes, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly (Or: being weary with weariness), reached me about the time of the evening offering.

Daniel 9:²² And he informed me, and talked with me, and said, “O Daniel, I have now come forth to give you skill to understand.

For your people (the Hebrews) and for your holy city (Jerusalem),

Daniel 9:²⁵ “Know therefore and understand,
That from the going forth of the command
To restore and build Jerusalem
Until Messiah the Prince,
There shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks (seven sevens and sixty-two sevens or sixty-nine sevens);

The street (Or open square) shall be built again, and the wall (Or moat), even in troublesome times.

Daniel 9:²⁶ “And after (at the end of) the sixty-two weeks Messiah shall be cut off (Suffer the death penalty), but not for Himself; (For the sins of all the people of the world from the time of Adam to time ending.)

And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city (Jerusalem) and the sanctuary.
The end of it shall be with a flood (army),
And till the end of the war, desolations are determined.

Daniel 9:²⁷ Then he (the coming Antichrist) shall confirm a covenant (treaty) with many for one week;

But in the middle of the week (after 3-1/2 years) he shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing (edge) of abominations shall be one who makes desolate, Even until the consummation (end), which is determined, Is poured out on the desolate (Or desolator).”

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