Daniel ix, 20.  “Whilst I was praying with all my heart, and confessing my sin and the sin of all my people, and prostrating myself before my God, even Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, came to me and touched me about the time of the evening oblation, and he informed me and said, O Daniel, I am now come forth to give thee the knowledge of things.  At the beginning of thy supplications I came to shew that which thou didst desire, for thou are greatly beloved:  therefore understand the matter, and consider the vision.  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 abolish iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness; to accomplish the vision and the prophecies, and to anoint the Most Holy. (After which this people shall be no more thy people, nor this city the holy city.  The times of wrath shall be passed, and the years of grace shall come for ever.)

“Know therefore, and understand, that, from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince, shall be seven weeks, and three score and two weeks.” (The Hebrews were accustomed to divide numbers, and to place the small first.  Thus, 7 and 62 make 69.  Of this 70 there will then remain the 70th, that is to say, the 7 last years of which he will speak next.)

“The street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.  And after three score and two weeks,” (which have followed the first seven.  Christ will then be killed after the sixty-nine weeks, that is to say, in the last week), “the Christ shall be cut off, and a people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary, and overwhelm all, and the end of that war shall accomplish the desolation.”

“Now one week,” (which is the seventieth, which remains), “shall confirm the covenant with many, and in the midst of the week,” (that is to say, the last three and a half years), “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.”

Daniel xi.  “The angel said to Daniel:  There shall stand up yet,” (after Cyrus, under whom this still is), “three kings in Persia,” (Cambyses, Smerdis, Darius); “and the fourth who shall then come,” (Xerxes) “shall be far richer than they all, and far stronger, and shall stir up all his people against the Greeks.

“But a mighty king shall stand up,” (Alexander), “that shall rule with great dominion, and do according to his will.  And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken, and shall be divided in four parts toward the four winds of heaven,” (as he had said above, vii, 6; viii, 8), “but not his posterity; and his successors shall not equal his power, for his kingdom shall be plucked up, even for others besides these,” (his four chief successors).