The Great Second Advent Movement: Its Rise and Progress

Reckoning of the 2300 Days

The basis of the time—1843—was the twenty-three hundred days of Daniel 8. It was claimed that as these “days” were connected with prophecies where beasts were chosen to represent kingdoms, “days” must be used symbolically to represent years, according to the Lord’s interpretation of symbolic time, as given in Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 4:5, 6; that the seventy weeks—490 days—of Daniel 9 were to be the first part of the twenty-three hundred days, and that the two periods began together. The event given in Daniel 9, which marked the beginning of the seventy weeks, was the “going forth of the commandment to restore and build Jerusalem.” That commandment went forth in the seventh year of Artaxerxes Longimanus, 457 B.C., as recorded in Ezra 7. GSAM 109.2

That this was the true date for the beginning of the seventy weeks was demonstrated by the fact that in just sixty-nine weeks—483 years—from 457 B.C., or in A.D. 27, Christ was baptized by John and entered upon his ministry, saying, “The time is fulfilled,” ³ etc. The opening of the ministry of Christ, A.D. 27, his crucifixion three and one-half years from that date, “in the midst [middle] of the [seventieth] week,” the close of the special work among the Jews, A.D. 34, and the speedy conversion of Saul, the apostle to the Gentiles, proved that the seventy weeks did terminate at that date, and therefore that they began B.C. 457. They figured the matter out thus: From 2300 take 457, and there remains 1843. And as the 457 years were before Christ, we are brought for the close of the 2300 days to the close of 1843. GSAM 110.1