When I was an undergraduate, I was being told by my secular Religious Studies Professor that Daniel could only be reconciled with a liberal date after the time of Antiochus Ephiphanes because clearly there were references to him (he was not impressed with supernatural ability to predict prophecy). He also used the other standard arguments to argue for a late date. I pointed out the Dead Sea Scrolls to him and how the book of Daniel was amongst them, and he argued that if one accepted one of the dates in later ranges, then the Scolls date to about 100 CE. He argued that there was enough time for the Scrolls to be accepted in the Essean community consistent with a date after Antiochus. So then I tried to used Daniel to show what I felt was a compelling argument for the inspiration of Scripture. My argument was that 483 years from the decree in Nehemiah 2:8, led to the historical date of Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem. I was a dispensational at the time and had heard no arguments against it. He had probably heard where I was coming for before, because he smiled, and showed me that there were 70 weeks in Daniel, not 69. When I told him the last 7 were for a tribulation, he asked me why (obviously knowing that I would have to cite the very passage). I was stumped, went home, researched and realized that my premise for a 7 year tribulation was based on Daniel 9, and supported nowhere else. Needless to say, circular reasoning is not a compelling argument for the predictive prophecy of Scripture. Since then, I have heard that there were three decrees of King Artaxerxes to rebuild (i have also heard elswhere there were others from other kings, but cannot validate this).

My question is, what are the dates of the decrees, and how to they pan out by adding 490 years to them? Or adding 487, assuming that the middle of the 7 is Messiah being cut off? What are the start dates, and how do we verify these (i.e. secular history, biblical history)? Does Ezra mention a start date that would go 487 years to the crucifixtion? I would appreciate if you could show me how the dates work. If they do indeed pan out accurately, why isn't this an amazingly compelling verification of prophecy which testifies to the veracity of Scripture? Perhaps my Professor would've actually been impressed/convinced if I was applying the dates correctly (or non-dispensationally!). Thanks.

A:
The calculations associated with the 70 weeks of Daniel have been very wide-ranging and speculative. Almost like "the Bible Code" or "the number of the beast," it seems that there are explanations to accommodate every theory that one wants to promote. Three different decrees have been identified, variously, by different teachers.

1. Cyrus' decree, shortly after the conquest of Babylon, is usually dated about 538 or 539 BC. At first glance, it does not seem to work for the calculations of the 70 weeks, since, whether you look for 490 years (70 weeks), 487 years (69 1/2 weeks), or 483 years (69 weeks), you seem to fall way short (between 56 and 49 BC) of the time of Christ. Therefore, few evangelicals wish to begin with this date.

2. Ther first decree of Artaxerxes was about 457 or 458 BC. It was the occasion of Ezra's returning to Jerusalem under a royal sponsorship. "Haley's Bible Handbook" and the original "Treasury of Scripture Knowledge" both favor this date for the beginning of the 70 weeks, calculating their fulfillment in 33 AD. If the Messiah was to come at the end of the 69th week, that would be 26 or 27 AD...which is when Jesus' ministry, according to modern opinion, began. By this reckoning, Jesus was "cut off" and put an end to the sacrificial system in the midst of the 70th week (3 1/2 years after His ministry began). The final 1/2 of the 70th week is explained variously.

3. Dispensationalists tend to choose the second decree of Artaxerxes, in 444 or 445 BC as their starting point for the period. Following the classic work by Sir Robert Anderson ("The Coming Prince"), they say that the years must be calulated as lunar years. This makes the years more like 360 days long and about 5 days shorter than our solar year. With the passing of centuries, these 5 days per years add up to a discrepancy of several years. This has the 69th week ending on the very date that Sir Robert Anderson thought the triumphal entry of Christ, on Palm Sunday, occurred.

The dispensationalists claim that Christ was rejected that day and the "prophetic clock" (counting-off the 70 weeks) came to a grinding halt, causing the 70th week to be completely postponed until the end of the world. They believe that the rapture of the church will start the clock running again, and the seven year tribulation that they think will follow the rapture is the tribulation period. Thus they postulate a gap of almost 2000 years between the closing of the 69th week and the commencement of the 70th.

It seems that the second date works best for non-dispensationalists, and the third date works best for dispensationalists. However, as Philip Mauro has cogently argued ("The Wonders of Bible Chronology"), there is no excellent reason biblically to choose the second or the third dates, because the Bible itself, in many ways, points to Cyrus' decree as the one that allowed Jerusalem to be built and restored (see Isa.44:28; 45:13/ Haggai 1:2-4). He, along with Old Testament scholar Edward J. Young, suggest that this earliest date is the best candidate biblically, without reference to date calculations to bolster a theory.

Mauro argues that the traditional dates of events in the Persian Empire need to be reconsidered. In saying that Cyrus conquered Babylon in 538 BC, we are depending upon the dating chronology of the pagan scientist Ptolemy, who lived at least a hundred years after Christ, and claimed that the Persian Empire had 10 kings. Josephus, who wrote almost a century earlier than Ptolemy, put the number of Persian kings at six, not ten, and the book of Daniel seems to put the total number at four (Dan.11:2).

Mauro considers that Daniel (and even Josephus) would be more authoritative to speak on this matter than was the later Ptolemy, and thinks that Ptolemy (whose calculated dates are in our history books) wrongly extends the length of the Persian Empire by 80 or so years. If this is true, it would be more accurate to say that Cyrus conquered Babylon in 458 BC (rather than the traditional 538 BC). This calculation would have the end of the 69th week, and the beginning of Christ's ministry in the year 27 AD. This expedient would, of course, require a reworking of all of Ptolemy's dates for everything after 458 BC, but it could be correct.

So who's right? I don't know. However, it is clear that the only Messiah who could be the authentic predicted One must have come sometime in the early first century AD, about the time that Jesus came. The ability to do the calculations perfectly may not long be certain, but our interpretation of Daniel's weeks should be derived from our exegesis of the text itself, not from the speculations and calculations of pagan men.