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Prophets and Kings
spake, How long shall be the vision?”
Daniel 8:13
. The answer that
was given, “Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the
sanctuary be cleansed” (
verse 14
), filled him with perplexity. Earnestly
he sought for the meaning of the vision. He could not understand the
relation sustained by the seventy years’ captivity, as foretold through
Jeremiah, to the twenty-three hundred years that in vision he heard the
heavenly visitant declare should elapse before the cleansing of God’s
sanctuary. The angel Gabriel gave him a partial interpretation; yet
when the prophet heard the words, “The vision ... shall be for many
days,” he fainted away. “I Daniel fainted,” he records of his experience,
“and was sick certain days; afterward I rose up, and did the king’s
business; and I was astonished at the vision, but none understood it.”
Verses 26, 27
.
Still burdened in behalf of Israel, Daniel studied anew the prophe-
cies of Jeremiah. They were very plain—so plain that he understood by
these testimonies recorded in books “the number of the years, whereof
the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that He would
accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.”
Daniel 9:2
.
With faith founded on the sure word of prophecy, Daniel pleaded
with the Lord for the speedy fulfillment of these promises. He pleaded
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for the honor of God to be preserved. In his petition he identified
himself fully with those who had fallen short of the divine purpose,
confessing their sins as his own.
“I set my face unto the Lord God,” the prophet declared, “to seek
by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes:
and I prayed unto the Lord my God, and made my confession.”
Verses
3, 4
. Though Daniel had long been in the service of God, and had
been spoken of by heaven as “greatly beloved,” yet he now appeared
before God as a sinner, urging the great need of the people he loved.
His prayer was eloquent in its simplicity, and intensely earnest. Hear
him pleading:
“O Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping the covenant and
mercy to them that love Him, and to them that keep His command-
ments; we have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have done
wickedly, and have rebelled, even by departing from Thy precepts and
from Thy judgments; neither have we hearkened unto Thy servants
the prophets, which spake in Thy name to our kings, our princes, and
our fathers, and to all the people of the land.