Bible Readings — Bible Questions Answered

The Hour of God’s Judgment

(The 2300 Days of Daniel 8, 9)

What startling message is given in Revelation 14:7? BR-ASI9 156.1

“Fear God, and give glory to Him; for the hour of His judgment is come: and worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” BR-ASI9 156.2

When is the hour of God’s judgment? BR-ASI9 156.3

“He said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” Daniel 8:14. BR-ASI9 156.4

Note.—By the study of the succeeding chapters on the sanctuary, it will be seen that the cleansing of the sanctuary is the work of judgment. The Jewish people understood it so. This 2300-day period, being 2300 literal years (Ezekiel 4:6), reaches down to the cleansing of the sanctuary in heaven, or, in other words, to the time when the investigative judgment begins, as described in Daniel 7:9, 10. BR-ASI9 156.5

Why was not this time period fully explained when the angel first appeared to Daniel? BR-ASI9 156.6

“I Daniel fainted, 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.” Daniel 8:27. BR-ASI9 156.7

Note.—The prophet had been given a vision of the great nations of his and succeeding days and the persecutions of God’s people, concluding with the time period pointing to the cleansing of the sanctuary. But the aged Daniel fainted and was sick certain days. Consequently, the interpretation was arrested, and was not completed until after the recovery of the prophet. The vision and its partial explanation were given in the third year of Belshazzar’s reign with his father Nabonidus; the interpretation of the time period was given following the fall of Babylon, in the first year of Darius. BR-ASI9 156.8

After Daniel recovered from his illness, to what did he turn his attention? BR-ASI9 156.9

“In the first year of Darius . . . I Daniel understood by 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 9:1, 2. BR-ASI9 156.10

Note.—Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem in the third year of Jehoiakim (Daniel 1:1), and Jeremiah announced the seventy-year captivity in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 25:1, 12). This means that the first deportation of the Jews to Babylon, when Daniel and his companions were carried away, was at that time. The seventy years of Jeremiah’s prophecy would expire in 536 B.C. Since the first year of the Persian Empire began in 538 B.C., the restoration period was therefore only two years distant from that time. BR-ASI9 156.11

What did this nearness of the time of restoration from captivity lead Daniel to do? BR-ASI9 157.1

“I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes.” Daniel 9:3. BR-ASI9 157.2

In what especially was the prophet interested? BR-ASI9 157.3

“Now therefore, O our God, hear the prayer of Thy servant, and his supplications, and cause Thy face to shine upon Thy sanctuary that is desolate, for the Lord’s sake.” Daniel 9:17. BR-ASI9 157.4