THE FIRST 69 WEEKS OF THE

THE FIRST 69 WEEKS OF THE

SEVENTY WEEKS OF DANIEL.

173,880 DAYS LAID OUT ACROSS

THE SOLAR AND LUNAR CYCLES

BETWEEN THE NISAN MOON OF

NEHEMIAH IN 445 B.C. AND THE

NISAN MOON OF PALM SUNDAY,

PASSION WEEK, IN 32 A.D..

A study by Gavin Finley MBBS

MEASURING THE TIMELINE OF

THE 69 ‘WEEKS’ OR 69 ‘SEVENS’

OF YEARS. JOB #1 IS TO

DETERMINE THE PRECISE

NUMBER

OF DAYS IN EACH ‘YEAR’OF THE

70 WEEKS OF DANIEL.

As we have seen in our previous discussions the seventy weeks, (or sevens), of Daniel are made up of seventy “sevens” of years or 490 years. These 490 ‘years’ are 490 parcels of time. Now for that all important question. How many days are in each of these ‘years’?Let us not immediately assume that these ‘years’ are earthly years of 365.2422 days. This is where many have gone wrong in their calculations of the 70 weeks of Daniel. Remember that these ‘seventy weeks (sevens) of years’ are issued to us from the throne of God.

Fortunately we are not left to guess or to argue about this. We have an authoritative scripturally well founded answer to that all important question. This is undoubtedly what Sir Robert Anderson noticed as he studied and read his Bible.

Tucked away in the book of Revelation there is a “Rosetta Stone” for biblical or prophetic time. It is given to us in the context of that very important prophecy of ‘the woman and the dragon’. This prophecy concerns of the final 3.5 years of this age. The length of this very important time period and also the purpose for this time period is given to us twice in Revelation chapter 12. This passage of scripture gives us the timespan of the exile and nurturing, (or feeding), of ‘the woman’. This wonderful information was brought to Daniel, (and us), by the angel of God’s Word, the angel Gabriel. In verse 6 the time period for the exile and nurturing of the woman, a picture of God’s Elect, is given to us in terms of days. And in verse 14 the very same time period is given to us in terms of ‘times’ or years. This is our ‘Rosetta stone’ for calibrating the biblical years of the 70 Weeks of Daniel in terms of days.

Revelation chapter 12 provides us with some very important information concerning the last half of the 70th week of Daniel. This is the final 3.5 years of this age. It involves the exile and spiritual nurturing of the people of God. The period of time is given as 1260 days and also as 3.5 years.

This is John’s vision of the dragon and the woman. The ‘woman’ here is a picture of God’s covenant people. John saw her being threatened by the Dragon. God gives her the wings of a great eagle. She is airlifted, possibly from some country, (or countries), with an eagle in their heraldry. ‘The woman’ then flies off to a place of safety where she is fed/nurtured/taken care of for 1260 days/3.5 years.

The timespan of the Great Tribulation has been given to us twice in precise units of time. This prophecy actually calibrates the last half of the 70th week. The time is dispensed to us in terms of days as well as in terms of years. Here in Revelation 12 we have in effect a “Rosetta Stone” for biblical time. So we can know for an absolute certainty just how many days are in each ‘year’ of all 70 of the 70 ‘weeks’ or 70 ‘sevens’ of Daniel. Here are the details.

The timespan for the final half of the 70th week is issued to us twice. In verse 6 the Holy Spirit tells us that the woman is nurtured/taken care of/fed for a period of 1260 days.

Now, let us look down 8 verses in the same chapter.
Lo and behold, what do we see?

Verse 14 is a restatement by the Holy Spirit of the very same reassuring information. But this time He issues the time to us using a different unit of time. A ‘time’ in scripture is a year. The Holy Spirit tells us that the woman is ‘nurtured’ or ‘taken care of’ for a “time, times, and half a time” or 3.5 years.This is some exceedingly helpful information! Now. If we divide these 1260 days by the 3.5 biblical years we get a biblical or prophetic year of precisely 360 days.

This is very important. It shows us without a shadow of a doubt that in that last ‘week’ or ‘seven years’ of the 70 weeks of Daniel God is issuing His holy biblical or prophetic ‘year’ as a ‘year’ made up of exactly 360 days. So much for the length of the biblical or prophetic year as we see it outlined in scripture for the last 3.5 years of the 70th week. Each year of the final seven years of this age is made up of 360 days. It is not the solar year we see down here in this damaged cosmos, the year of 365.2422 days. God’s word has spoken. So there should be no question about it.

DETERMINING THE FIRST 69 WEEKS

OF THE 70 WEEKS OF DANIEL

Now we can turn our attention to laying out the timeline of the 69 weeks. Since we have a God who does things in perfect order and beauty we can be absolutely certain that God is totally consistent in His reckoning of all of the 70 weeks/sevens of years. As we have seen, God measures out the 70th week in terms of years made up of of 360 days. So we can be absolutely certain that He has done precisely the same for the previous 69 years that unfolded in times past.So we can discount all the chronologies men have put forward for the 70 Week prophecy that are calculated on the basis of solar years of 365.2422 days. Every single one of them will be wrong. This is where Sir Isaac Newton was sidelined as he attempted to calculate the 70 weeks back in the late 1600′s.

God reckons time according to the ideal of a holy and perfect solar system. In susch a solar system the planet earth would orbit around the sun in perfect circle and each cycle would last 360.0000000 days. In this perfect ideal solar system the moon circles around the earth in perfect holy months of 30.0000000 days and finishes the 12 revolutions precisely as the earth finishes its revolution around the sun. Each of the four seasons would be 90.000000 days. So here is what we have established so far. Any reckoning of the 70 Weeks of Daniel which does not follow this perfect pattern and does not consider prophetic/biblical time as a year of 360 days made up of 12 perfect months of 30 days is not going to work. It will be flawed from the start.

MANY HAVE HAD PROBLEMS

WITH BIBLICAL TIME,

ESPECIALLY OF YEARS MADE UP

OF 360 DAYS.

But, some will say, this reckoning of 360 days to a year does not agree with the earthly things we see around us? We see a year of 365.2433 days. And we see a lunar month of 29.530589 days. These are people with an earthbound mindset.God has given us a timeline of 69 weeks or sevens of years. We have to lay it out in history across nearly five centuries. Here is where we must decide. Do we measure out our biblical timelines with years based on what we see in the damaged and imperfect cosmos as we measure it out today? Or do we go with the measuring stick for prophetic time God has given to us in scripture? In laying out our timeline for the 69 weeks do we use the solar year our own human eyes see? Or do we use the year God has shown us that He Himself is using for the latter half of that final 70th week? In short, do we insist on using terrestial time? Or do we use the sacred heavenly time God uses?

Presented in this way the answer for an evangelical would seem obvious. But it is surprising how many liberal scholars find this to be a stumblingblock. Their earthy scientifically correct view of the year seems to be all that they can see. The biblical reckoning of time, (a year = 360 days), a leap of faith. It is too much of a stretch for them. It is very hard for earhly minded people to make the jump. What is going on here?

This may in fact be what God planned all along. This may be just another instance of how God guards His Word. We are in a spiritual war. Like all wars it is an information war. This information on the 70 Weeks of Daniel involves the end-time. The saints will need this information in times to come. But the less the enemy and his agents know the better.

Think of it. God’s Word has been hidden for a long time now. But as we come towards the end-time this information will be unsealed. God will make His message available to His saints. He speaks to them in biblical and devotional code. These are messages that only consecrated believers can “get”. Daniel was told to “seal up the prophecy until the time of the end. For many shall run to and fro and knowledge will increase”. (Dan.12:9) He was also told that “the wise would understand.” (Dan.12:10) So there is a reason for this information to be “sealed up”. God is getting His message out to His people when they need it, and especially as they approach the end time. He is also preventing His Word from getting into the hands of the wrong people. As they come up to the threshold of the end time drama the prophecies in Daniel will be unsealed. The information will then be opened up to the saints. This is just as Daniel prophesied.

BEGINNING OUR CALCULATION

OF THE 69 WEEKS OR 69

‘SEVENS’ OF YEARS.

So once we have calibrated our time units for the ‘years’ of the latter half of the 70th week we can now readily and easily calculate the number of days for the timespan of the former 69 weeks (or sevens) of years. This is quite simple really. Here are our calculations.7 weeks + 62 weeks = 69 weeks or 69 sevens of years.

69 x 7 = 483 biblical/holy years.

As we have established, each year is 360 days.
This ends up being
483 x 360 = 173,880 days (inclusive)
This is a time interval of 173,879 days between the beginning day #1 and the final day #173,880.

173,880 days

This, then, is the number which Sir Robert Anderson arrived at for the 69 weeks as set forth in his celebrated book, ‘The Coming Prince’. This book was first published in 1894. It is still available in good Christian bookstores.

MEASURING OUT THE 69

WEEKS/173,880 DAYS ACROSS

OUR EARTHLY YEARS BY THE

CALENDAR AND ASTRONOMICAL

DATA RELATING TO THE SOLAR

CYCLES.

The next step is to lay out our 173,880 days across the solar passage of years and determine how many earthly years this spans. Sir Robert Anderson used our present Gregorian calendar and its treatment of leap years to make his calculations of the 69 weeks/173,880 days. He wrote to the Astronomer Royal at Greenwich to determine when the new moons came through for the Passover month of Nisan for 445 B.C. and for 32 A.D. From knowledge of when the Nisan moon came through in the year of Nehemiah and the year of the passion of Christ he was then able to place his 173,880 days into the Gregorian calendar to arrive at his startling conclusion.

This is the approach using the solar cycles of years. An additional approach, and one used by this author, is to use the astronomical data for the monthly lunar cycles as well. As we shall outline further down in this article this comes to 5,888 moons plus 8 days. It is then a straightforward matter to connect the beginning and ending days of those 476 solar years plus 25 days or 5,888 moons plus 8 days into the Hebrew calendar for the years in question. The timeline can then be seen to fit perfectly between the Edict of Nehemiah and Palm Sunday at the beginning of Passion Week.

As we have determined above, the 69 weeks is a timespan of 173,880 days inclusive. This is 173,879 days for the difference between the first and last days of the 173,880 days. The true solar year astronomically is 365.242199 or 365.2422 days. How many years then is in this interval of 69 “weeks”/sevens/173,879 days? Let us pull out our calculators and see.

173,879 days divided by 365.2422 days
= 476.0649 years.
So the 69 weeks/sevens = 476 years plus a small fraction of a year.
That small fraction is 0.06492 of a year.
0.06492 x 365.2422 days per year = 23.7 days or 24 days.

So an accurate tally of years for the 69 week interval, the interval between day #1 and day #173,880 is 476 solar years plus 24 days.

LAYING OUT THE 476 YEAR

TIMELINE BETWEEN TWO

AUSPICIOUS YEARS THAT MARK

THE START AND THE FINISH OF

THE 69 WEEKS THESE BEING AN

EDICT TO “RESTORE AND BUILD

JERUSALEM”, AND A TERMINUS

YEAR NOTEWORTHY AS

“MESSIAH THE PRINCE”. .

Let us now lay out our 476 years and 24 days as a timeline. It must start from the date of an edict giving authority to ‘restore and build Jerusalem’. It must then run on without pause to end at a termination date auspicious as the day of “Messiah the Prince”.

As we determined in our earlier discussion of the various edicts in chapter 3 it was only the edict of Artaxerxes in His 20th year and delivered to Nehemiah in 445 B.C. that met the criteria called for to initiate Daniel’s prophecy of the 70 weeks. The month of Nisan in 445 B.C. would begin a timespan that would reach forward 476 solar years and 24 days. Finally, on the 173,880th day, the timeline would terminate on that epic day and year when Jesus presented Himself to His people politically as “Messiah the Prince”.

As we saw in part 3 of this study, the 457 B.C. date, as given by Sir Isaac Newton and many others even now, would be too early. This earlier edict of Cyrus not only fails to meet the requirements of a political restoration but it fails to connect on any auspicious days. And as we saw, these earlier edicts did not authorize or give any permission whatsoever for the Jewish nation to restore the gates and walls and thus grant political sovereignty to Jerusalem to resume its history as a sovereign, independent city-state.

In reaching forward the 476 years and 24 days we are not vague or sloppy in making the connection to the life of Jesus. The angel Gabriel told told Daniel, and us, that the terminus of the 69 week timeline would be “unto Messiah the Prince”. There must be a day in holy history that fits this. Is there? Let us take a look and see.

First, let us make one thing abundantly clear. We are looking for a day answerable to the prophecy “Messiah the Prince”. So we are not looking for the date of His birth nor His baptism. Yes, Jesus was born a king, just as the wise men from the east had stated. But Jesus did not present Himself to His people as “Messiah”, the anointed King of the Jews and High Priest of Israel when He was a baby. Nor was the day in which we saw “Messiah the Prince” the day when Jesus went to the Jordan River to be baptized by John. There was one day, and one day only, in which Jesus presented Himself to His people as “Messiah the Prince”. On this auspicious day Jesus entered Jerusalem in a very public and political way. He came in through the Eastern Gate as Messiah should. He presented Himself before the crowds, lowly, and riding upon a donkey. This was precisely as prophesied. – Zech 9:9

So we have 2 very specific dates to consider as markers on a time line pegging out the first 69 weeks of the 70 weeks of Daniel. The likely starting day has been given to us in Nehemiah 2 as being “in the month of Nisan” and “in the 20th year of Artaxerxes”.

Here are the facts. Artaxerxes Longinus began his reign in February of 464 B.C. 19 years later his 20th year would have begun in February of 445 B.C. So the 20th year of Artaxerxes Longinus is well established historically as beginning in the winter month of February in 445 B.C. Nehemiah went to the king with his request a month or so later. According to Nehemiah this was in the springtime month of Nisan. Nehemiah does not give us a specific date in Nisan. But we have good reason to look at the new moon of Nisan 1 or Nisan 2 for our starting date. Because the time of the new moon was generally the time when kings made their edicts and pronouncements from the throne.

And when is our finishing day? As we shall see the 173,880 day time line comes to its terminus on a very auspicious day in the Passover month of Nisan in 32 A.D., specifically Nisan 10 of that year. As we shall discover, it was 5,888 moons and 8 days later.

Brothers and sisters, we must be very careful here. Two appropriate and auspicious dates in holy history have been given to us. We must now connect the timespan faithfully and accurately. And we must do it within the accuracy expected for the sighting of the new moons. We are talking here of an accuracy of one or two days across 476 solar years. That is a “hole in one” or a bullseye hit on a target at an extreme range. Can we do it? Let us see.

Remember, we are dealing here with holy things. If we cannot do this accurately and the time line does not fit and fit accurately then we are finished. We may as well then wrap up the study, admit we are defeated, and go home. Because we are dealing here with the holy things of God. And “mucking around” with the numbers is out of the question for us. That is occultic manipulative behavior. It will not do. It is falling short of God’s glory. It is sin. If we present wrong information we as teachers will be severely punished. False teachers commit the sin of Jeroboam, leading God’s covenant people ointo error. Bible teachers who dare to teach falsehood will suffer great shame and reproach before the courts of heaven.

We serve a holy God. His very Presence strikes fear into all who get crosswise of Him. Any person who teaches Bible prophecy should be very very careful. If we present or teach something relating to the Holy One of Israel then it had better be right. Our calling and our discipline as Christian believers is to be diligent in the holy scriptures, led by the Spirit of God, and obedient to our calling in God. God has promised us He will lead us into all truth. This is not ‘relative truth’ or ‘courtroom truth’ or ‘town hall truth’. In this matter of the 70 weeks of Daniel we must have total and absolute truth within the limits God has given us. When the time line is placed and then offered up for the saints it must be mathematically and astronomically correct!

Teachers of Biblical truth have an awesome responsibility here. God punishes severely all those who place incorrect markers on the pathway. As we walk on into the future then we as pilgrims need a correct map. So we had best be led by His Holy Spirit in what we present. No other ‘spirit’, be it profane or religious, has any right to worm its way into any teaching that involves the Holy Bible. These are days of great deception. The religious spirits among us are the worst of all. So we had best make sure that all our conclusions are in alignment with the Holy Scriptures.

If we are wrong in what we say then we are presenting disinformation. We are misleading God’s elect people and sending them off down the wrong path. This is a very serious matter. If we go along with disseminating wrong information then we as teachers have ‘turned’. We have become ‘double agents’ operating on the side of the enemy. We have wittingly or unwittingly become agents for the dark side.

Back to our study. The date of ascension of Artaxerxes Longinus is well established by secular sources. It was in February of 464 B.C. that his predecessor was assassinated. The 20th year of Artaxerxes would therefore have begun 19 years later on February of 445 B.C.. Since Nehemiah tells us that he received the edict from the king in the springtime month of Nisan which follows this February of 445 B.C. we can know with certainty that the 20th year of Artaxerxes was in the year of 445 B.C.. Thus begins our timeline of 173,880 days, or
5888 moons and 8 days, or
476 solar years and 24 days.

In counting the years between a B.C. date and an A.D. date it is important to remember to subtract a year since there is no year zero. 445 B.C. is therefore -444 A.D. Remember it was the Arab mathematicians who gave us the concept and the number zero. Their heyday did not come until centuries later in the 700′s A.D.

If we lay out 476 years and 25 days from the springtime of 445 B.C. we come to the springtime of 32 A.D.. Was this an auspicious year? It certainly was! Not only have we tagged the crucifixion year but we have intercepted it in the springtime. We have landed our 173,880 days right in the very time period of the Passover in the year of 32 A.D.! This looks very promising.

Now let us line up year 1 of our timespan, (which is 445 B.C.), with year 476 (32 A.D.) at their spring equinoxes. (See the chart above.) This will mark out 476 solar years exactly. Those extra 24 days over the 476 solar years will make up the days we use to reach out from the equinox points into the adjoining Nisan months of 445 B.C. and 32 A.D.. With those extra 24 days we shall measure out the days from the spring equinox points to reach out to those two auspicious dates, the decree of Artaxerxes to Nehemiah in 445 B.C. and the Palm Sunday entry into Jerusalem of Jesus at “Messiah the Prince” in 32 A.D.

We have just laid out our time-line of the 69 weeks in terms of the present Gregorian solar calendar. However, the beginning and ending points are given to us in terms of a Hebrew calendar. Nehemiah received the edict from King Artaxerxes “in the Hebrew month of Nisan”. – Neh. 2:1. And Jesus entered Jerusalem as “Messiah the Prince” during the Passover which was also during the month of Nisan. Since our present Gregorian calendar ignores the lunar passages we must connect our time-line to these Hebrew calendar dates by some other means.

THE WITNESS OF THE LUNAR CYCLES: PLACING THE 69 WEEKS INTO A TIMELINE BETWEEN THE THE “COMMANDMENT TO RESTORE AND BUILD JERUSALEM” AND “MESSIAH THE PRINCE”.

Our current solar calendar uses months that Julius Caesar shackled to the solar year. Our months no longer follow the passages of the moon. So we shall need to reconcile our current solar-only calendar to the solar/lunar Hebrew calendar in some way. We shall need the testimony of the moon as well as that of the sun. This is what God told us back at creation.

Our Creator was referring to the passages of the sun and moon.The best point to measure out the solar years and to connect into the Nisan moons of the Hebrew calendar is the spring equinox. The spring equinox on our Gregorian calendar occurs in March 21 or March 20th in a leap year. The first full moon that comes after the spring equinox is by definition the month of Nisan on the Hebrew calendar. So to measure out our timespan of the 69 weeks into the Hebrew calendar dates we shall need to lay out the Nisan moons alongside the spring equinoxes of the years in question. To do this we shall need the date and time those Nisan new moons occurred for the years 445 B.C. and 32 A.D.. This was the approach used by Sir Robert Anderson. Back in 1877 he obtained this information from the Astronomer Royal of Greenwich Observatory. Here is the letter he received back from the A.R.

The new moon, therefore, occurred at Jerusalem on the 13th March, B. C. 445 (444 Astronomical) at 7h. 9m. A. M.
One online resource that gives some lunar data is the U.S. Naval Observatory. Unfortunately it does not go back further than the year 1700. I have used Sir Robert Anderson’s new moon data for 445 B.C. and 32 A.D. for this study. Armed with this lunar information we can then construct a combined Gregorian/Hebrew calendar on which to lay out the 69 weeks.What was the date of the edict? Here Sir Robert Anderson began with a good assumption. Since the traditional times for kings to issue edicts was at the time of the new moon then he considered that Nehemiah would have received the king’s decree on the first day of Nisan. He therefore laid out his timespan from the 1st of Nisan, (March 14th), of 445 B.C..

When did the 69 weeks end? The 69 weeks/476 solar years and 23.7 days/173,879 day span reaches out from day #1 and comes to a terminus on day #173,880, the day of “Messiah the Prince”. This was on the tenth day of Nisan four days before the day the Passover lambs were killed on Nisan 14. (Lev.23:5, Num.28:16) Working from the calendar and adding the appropriate leap years and leap century adjustments Sir Robert Anderson had determined that Palm Sunday, the tenth of Nisan, was April 6th of 32 A.D.. But when we look at the new moon data for the Nisan moon of 32 A.D. Nisan 10 would appear to be closer to April 9th. (see section 5 down below)

All this notwithstanding, Sir Robert Anderson’s remarkably accurate and faithful work, perhaps set back in time by no more than 2-3 days is recorded in his book, now available online, “The Coming Prince”. It is a landmark piece of scholarship still being published today long after the first edition came out in 1894. His book should put to rest any historicist or preterist notions that 70 weeks or 69.5 weeks have already been completed.

THE TESTIMONY OF THE NISAN MOONS OF 445 B.C. AND 32 A.D. AS THEY NOT ONLY SUPERIMPOSE THE HEBREW CALENDAR DATES FOR NISAN ONTO OUR GREGORIAN CALENDAR BUT ALSO AS THE PASSAGE OF THESE 5,888 MOONS PROVIDE AN ACCURATE MEASURING ROD FOR THE 69 WEEKS/173,880 DAYS.

Let us now consider the lunar cycles in more detail. What information can the moon provide us with apart from providing the Hebrew calendar connection points to the Gregorian calendar years of Nehemiah’s edict and “Messiah the Prince”? Well once we have identified our connection years on the Gregorian calendar we can then use the lunar cycles alone to provide us with a direct and accurate measure of the entire 69 weeks. This neatly by-passes all concerns about calendars, leap years and such. As far as I know this article is the first time a straight lunar measurement of the 69 weeks has been published. It had been ready and waiting to be done since the astronomical data is well known. Indeed the new moon times for the Nisan months in question, accurate right down to the minute, are sitting right there in Anderson’s 19th century book on pages 102 and 124. As we shall see, the testimony of the lunar cycles provides a wonderful confirmation of the solar/calendar measurements of the 69 weeks.

Sir Robert Anderson had obtained the Nisan new moon times for 445 B.C., the month of Nehemiah’s edict, and 32 A.D., the Passover month of Palm Sunday/Passion week. Nisan is by definition the first full moon after the spring equinox. These new moon times are as follows.

We are now able to start our work of laying out the moons as a second timeline for the 69 weeks.With the date and time of the new moon of Nehemiah’s Nisan moon fixed and the date and time of the new moon of Messiah the Prince similarly fixed in time then a certain perfect number of moons will fit precisely into that new moon to new moon time period. But exactly how many lunar cycles will that timespan accommodate? It will, of course, be an exact number of moons. That is the next thing we shall determine.

Let us first take our 69 week time span which is 173,879 days and ask ourselves how many moon cycles this timespan saw back in the 445 B.C. to 32 A.D. period. We know what the lunar cycle is today. It is a month of 29.530587 days. But is this the same lunar cycle seen during the time period of the 69 weeks two thousand years ago? The answer is no. And why not? Because the moon is slowing down with time and slowly moving away from the earth The lunar cycles are slowing down by one second every 36 years. How then can we find out what the lunar cycle length was back in the time of the 69 weeks? Well if it is slowing by one second every 36 years then the average lunar month for the time period of the 69 weeks back over two millennia ago will be the lunar cycle seen half way through the 445 B.C. and 32 A.D. timespan. This middle year would be 206 B.C.
This is 2206 years ago.
How many seconds faster was the lunar cycle back then than it is today in the year 2000? Let us find out.

So the lunar cycle seen in the midst of the 69 weeks back in 206 B.C. was 0.000709 of a day faster than the lunar cycle as measured today.

So the average lunar cycle for the 69 weeks back during the years between 445 B.C. and 32 A.D was

This then is a pretty close calculation for determining the lunar cycle seen back in the time of the 69 weeks. With this pretty accurate figure for the lunar cycles back then we can plug it into our new moon to new moon interval between the Nisan moon of Nehemiah in 445 B.C. and the Nisan moon of Palm Sunday, 32 A.D. Then we can count the moons with full assurance that we are homing in to a very accurate figure.We do this by dividing our calculated lunar cycle into the time interval given to us by Sir Robert Anderson between the new moons listed above for Nisan of 445 B.C. (March 13 at 0709 hrs.) and Nisan of 32 A.D. (March 29 at 2257 hrs.). This new moon to new moon time interval is

Let us divide this accurate number of days (173,871.94) by our fairly accurate lunar cycle for the 69 weeks which we calculated above as close to 29.529878 days.

Aha! The answer comes to 5,888.0006 moons. This is very close. So we have now confirmed that 5,888 moons passed between the edict of Artaxerxes given to Nehemiah and the Passover of Palm Sunday. We can now be sure that if the Nisan moon of Nehemiah was moon #1 then the Nisan moon of “Messiah the Prince” was 5,888 moons later at Moon #5,889.

Now using our new moon to new moon span of 173,871.94 days we can fine-tune our calculated lunar cycle length for the 69 weeks. This will give us an exceedingly accurate lunar cycle for the 69 weeks. We do this by dividing the 173,871.94 days by this whole number 5,888 which is the exact number of moons for that new moon to new moon interval.

1. We now know the number of moons. There were 5,888 of them. 2. We now know with a high degree of accuracy what the lunar cycle was back in the time of the 69 weeks. It was 29.529881 days

With this accurate information we can now proceed to use the lunar cycles alone to measure out the 69 weeks/173,879 days between those two auspicious days reaching out and touching those Nisan moons 476 years apart.
Then we can lay it directly right onto the Hebrew calendar.

Let us now look again at the Nehemiah new moon to Messiah new moon timespan.
It is 173,871.94 days.
Let us now compare it to the 69 week timespan of 173,879 days.

So our 173,879 days for the 69 week interval is very close to 7 days over this new moon to new moon interval. So now, since our Nisan date for Nehemiah’s edict from Artaxerxes is 7 days earlier in the lunar cycle than the Palm Sunday lunar cycle then we can be fairly certain that the Hebrew calendar dates are also very close to 7 days apart. Since the Palm Sunday date was on the tenth of Nisan we can go back 5,888 moons and 7 days and say that Nehemiah probably got his edict from Artaxerxes on the 10 – 3 = 3rd day of the Nisan moon in 445 B.C. Which brings us to our next consideration.SETTING THE HEBREW CALENDAR
BY NEW MOON SIGHTINGS

As Sir Robert Anderson stated in the “Coming Prince” it cannot be assumed that the first day of the month was the day following the new moon. It is exceedingly difficult to see the thin sliver of the new moon with the unaided eye before it is 24 hours old. This is seen in the photos sent into the Islamic site moonsighting.com. The new moon may not have been sighted until it was over 36 hours old or even on the morning of the third day if the weather was overcast. This is why sightings of the new moon were reported in from widely separated parts of the country.

As we saw in section B the 69 weeks of years comprised 476 solar years plus 24 days.
So the Nisan date of the entry of “Messiah the Prince” into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday of 32 A.D was
476 years and 24 days further into the solar year than the Nisan date of Nehemiah when he received the edict of Artaxerxes in 445 B.C. This is a big stretch for a timespan connecting two Nisan moons. It would only have been possible if the terminus was allowed to move deeper into the year than usual such as happens in an embolismal year with a late Nisan moon or a late Passover. This is precisely what we saw in 32 A.D. Even with the early Nehemiah Nisan and a late Calvary Nisan the 476 years and 24 days only just manages to squeeze into the time-line. No other paired Nisan moons in the years before or after could come anywhere near accommodating these 173,880 days. This proves conclusively thatthe Passover of our Lord’s passion was 32 A.D. and not 33 A.D. as is commonly stated.

A.D. 32 was an embolismal year and saw a late Passover that year. An embolismal year has an extra month of Adar inserted early in the spring before the 1st month of the year, the month of Nisan. This puts the Passover later down the year. In the following years it drifts back 11.24 days each year until the next embolismal year. Why 11.24 days? Since the lunar cycles are very close to 29.5 days the Hebrews used a calendar of twelve lunar months of alternating 29 and 30 days. This made a calendar of 354 days. The solar/calendar year is 365.24 days or 11.24 days longer than the lunar calendar of 354 days of 12 lunar cycles. About every third year the month following the 12th month would fall short of the the spring equinox. Having failed to qualify as the Nisan moon it would then be inserted as a thirteenth month and considered a second month of Adar. This would be an embolismal year. Typically, in the springtime, and after the 12 months had passed the rabbis would determine whether the coming moon was going to fall short of the spring equinox as it came to its fullness.

This consideration of the embolismal year is very important. Those 24 extra days over and above the 476 years had to be crammed into the span of time that would connect two Nisan months 476 years apart. Not only that, the terminus was only going up ten days into the Nisan moon. So our investigations astronomically will lead us to the conclusion that no other nearby years, (not 31 A.D. and particularly 33 A.D.) could accommodate the 69 weeks. The time-line only fits in between an early Nisan moon at the start of the time-line, (which we saw in 445 B.C.), and a late Nisan moon for the terminus point, (which we saw in 32 A.D.). No other pair of Nisans spanning 476 years will accommodate those 173,879 days! This provides proof that 32 A.D. was in fact the year of the crucifixion. Only an extra-long Nisan to Nisan span will accommodate the 476 years and those 24 extra days.
32 A.D. was such a year! This makes for an amazing confirmation of the 69 week prophecy.

Now we are finally able to place our 69 ‘week’ span of 173,879 days. Messiah presented Himself as Messiah on just one day in history. This was Nisan 10, the so called “triumphant entry into Jerusalem”. Jesus entered the eastern gate passing on up into the city of shalom riding on a donkey. The crowds threw palm branches out be fore Him. Yet just 4 days later they would cry, “crucify him!”

Let us now consider this Nisan moon of 32 A.D. According to the Astronomer Royal of Greenwich in 1877 and the U.S. Naval Observatory today the new moon would have occurred on March 29 late at night. It occurred at 2257 hrs or 10:57 P.M.. There is no way the moon could have been seen on the following morning of March 30th when it was only 7 hours old and highly unlikely it was seen the following evening when it was only 19 hours old and before the new moon set with the sun. On the morning of March 31st, however, the new moon was over 30 hours old and was probably seen then thus marking March 31 as Nisan 1 on the Hebrew calendar. The Palm Sunday date of Nisan 10 would therefore have been nine days later on April 9th.

Sir Robert Anderson put the Nisan 10 date 3 days earlier than this. He put it at April 6. This author does not believe that this would have been possible in view of the new moon data we have just considered.

Be that as it may the difference is of no great consequence. Sir Robert showed us the length of the time-line 69 weeks of years, laid it out across 476 years of history and tagged and connected the Nisan moon of the Edict of Artaxerxes to Nehemiah with Palm Sunday on the tenth day of the Nisan moon of Calvary. God bless him for that! He showed us that the 69 week time-line fits the two events with amazing accuracy.

In looking at the placement of his 173,880 day time-line it seems that Sir Robert Anderson was insistent that the edict of Nehemiah must have been issued on Nisan 1. After assessing the lunar data this author favors the date Nisan 2 for the Edict. Traditionally the new moons were times when edicts were handed down by kings. This is not a big difference. With the vagaries of new moon sightings and Hebrew calendars our ability to lay out a time-line with an accuracy of 1-2 days is about as close as it is possible to get anyway.

Having established a well fixed terminus for the 173,880 days let us remember that this April 9 Palm Sunday date is 24 days further down the solar year than the day of Nehemiah’s edict 476 years and 24 days before. So if we back up 24 days from April 9 we shall get to our Gregorian calendar date in which Nehemiah went before the king and made his appeal to rebuild Jerusalem. April 9 minus 24 days = March 16 of 445 B.C.

The question we must ask ourselves now is what date on the Hebrew calendar is March 16? Well again we shall need to determine when the new moon for Nisan 445 B.C. came through. Sir Robert Anderson’s own data from the Astronomer Royal of Greenwich gives us a new moon time of 0709 hrs. or 7:09 a.m. on March 13. Nehemiah was at Susa in Persia and 700 miles to the east. This would give a new moon time for Susa about 45 minutes earlier than this Jerusalem time. Would the new moon have been seen the following morning when it was 24 hours old? It may well have been. Sir Robert Anderson tagged this March 14 date as Nisan 1. But it might well have been reckoned as Nisan 2. Again, this is not a big issue. A forty-eight hour window after a passage of 476 years is exceedingly good accuracy!

Sir Robert Anderson considered this first day of the month as the day of the edict. He considered Nisan 1 as the first day of the 70 weeks. But we are not compelled by scripture to link the edict to the very first day of the lunar month. Nehemiah merely states that it was “in the month of Nisan” that he set wine before the king. So the decree could have come a day or two later than Nisan 1 with no compromise to the scriptural requirement whatsoever. Anytime during those 29-30 days of Nisan would be just fine as a starting date for the 70 weeks of Daniel. All God was asking His people to do was tag the lunar cycles. He wanted them be watching for their Messiah on certain future moon which happened to be a certain future Passover.

The Pharisees were very intelligent and savvy men. They were scholars. They had a very good handle on the solar and lunar cycles. The metatonic cycle was discovered 400 years before by the Greeks in Athens. So it was well known. If the wise men from the east knew to look for the approximate time for the expected birth of Messiah over 30 years before why weren’t the Pharisees paying attention to the times as well? They surely must have known enough to calculate the date of the terminus of the 69 weeks. Were the Pharisees watching when Jesus came through the eastern Gate of Jerusalem in the Passover month of Nisan in 32 A.D.?
Apparently not.

THE TESTIMONY OF THE LUNAR CYCLES

Having made our connections to the solar calendar let us now see if the lunar cycles will give us a confirming measurement. They will provide a crosscheck in our endeavor to fix the beginning and ending days of the 69 weeks, i.e. day 1 and day 173,880.
As we have seen from our lunar calculations above, our 69 sevens of biblical 360 day years (or 173,879 days), equal 5,888 moons plus 7 days. Let us now lay them out on the Hebrew calendar. We soon find out that the 5,888 moons plus 7 days fits neatly between the Nisan moon of Nehemiah and the Nisan moon of Passion Week and the Palm Sunday entry of Jesus into Jerusalem as ‘Messiah the Prince’.

Sir Robert Anderson did not use the lunar cycles as a measuring stick. He did use the new moon dates to mark out the Hebrew months of Nisan to fix the dates for the edict of Artaxerxes given to Nehemiah and Palm Sunday.

This little exercise with the lunar cycles is well worthwhile. When we use the passages of the moon as a time measuring device it confirms the amazing accuracy of Sir Robert Anderson’s work.

Let us start with our Nisan 10, 32 A.D. date for Palm Sunday. As we have seen, this day, and this day alone, fulfills the prophecy and meets the criterion for the terminus day of the 69 weeks.

Now let us lay out our time-line from a terminus of Nisan 10, 32 A.D. and back up into history 5,888 moons and 7 days (or 173,879 days). (This is the number of moons in the interval between the beginning and ending days of the 69 weeks (173,880 days inclusive.) Backing up 5,888 moons we come to the 10th day of Nehemiah’s month of Nisan in 445 B.C. Now we back track those last 7 days and we get a date ofNisan 3, 445 B.C.

In the month of Nisan in 445 B.C. the true new moon was 7 a.m. on March 13. The thin crescent would have just become visible to the unaided eye the following morning, the morning of March 14. At that time the moon was 24 hours old. It is possible that the thin crescent of the new moon was not seen until the following day, March 15 in which case the date of Nehemiah’s receiving the edict (March 16) would have been considered Nisan 2 and not Nisan 3. Nisan 3 (or Nisan 2) would have been the Gregorian date of March 16 that year. March 16 is the date we had arrived at earlier for the edict of Artaxerxes to Nehemiah in 445 B.C. So here we see that both the solar cycles and the lunar cycles agree with each other to confirm the timespan for the 69 weeks.

SUMMARY OF RESULTS

This is an amazing solution to the prophecy of the 69 weeks.
Sir Robert Anderson’s timeline for the 69 weeks/173,879 days was

This author’s timeline, using the astronomical data of the solar and the lunar cycles, was very close to that of Sir Robert Anderson.

This variance between the timeline of Sir Robert Anderson and the timeline of this author only amounts to 2-3 days. It is of no great significance. The conclusion is the same.
69 weeks connect the Nisan moon of Nehemiah to the Nisan moon of Palm Sunday and the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ. No one has presented a timeline that fits the facts so well and with a timeline fitting the dates involved with such fine accuracy.

Dear saints, the 69 weeks have run their course!
And here, for all good men to take note of is one exceedingly important conclusion.
One ‘week’ of seven prophetic years remains to be fulfilled!!!

CONCLUSION #1: THE FIRST 69

WEEKS HAVE RUN THEIR

COURSE.

CONCLUSION #2: THE 70TH

WEEK IS YET FUTURE.

As we can see, the testimony of scripture (Dan.9:26) as well as the testimony of the sun and moon show us that these 69 weeks have run their course. But not the 70th week. No, not even the first half the 70th week! That fact is of critical importance. Today’s believers must make themselves aware of this. Preterist historicists and Partial preterists are everywhere. They, (and their religious arguments), are all over the religious landscape. Biblically sound doctrine, like truth, lies trampled in the street. Wisdom, as a woman, is lifting up her voice. (Prov.1) But few are listening. Even fewer are doing their homework and “proving all things” in the manner of good Bereans.A future 70th week, the final section of the Seventy Weeks of Daniel is up ahead. It will emerge into holy history in climactic fashion. This is exceedingly important. Future history will show that there are enormous devotional and church-state political and consequences to knowing, (or not knowing), that all of the 70th week is yet future.

A future 70th week is slated for our future. The witness of the saints is essential and will achieve a lot. The 5th seal is necessary before the 6th seal can be opened to reveal the sign of the Son of Man in the heavens. This may not be popular to the narcissistic Church in the west. But Chinese and Egyptian Christians over in places abroad understand it very well. It is Blood Covenant Christianity.

The facts of scripture are very clear. The Kingdom of God must be announced. The witness of Christ our Messiah must be given by His witnesses here on this earth. Holy history demands it. The angels are watching as the saints prepare for their final sprint to the finish line. – Heb.12:1 God has given us the signpost into the 70th week. It is the confirming of a seven year covenant with a coming global prince who is a false messiah. He will enter into covenant with many in the world, including Israel, the nations the established church. (Dan.9:27). Jesus Himself told us that this would happen. John 5:43

The signing of this earthy 7 year deal marks the beginnings of the apostasy, or ‘great falling away’ involving national Israel and the compromising world church. (2Thes.2:3) This is difficult for us to receive. But let no man or shady religious spirit lead the Body of Christ to believe otherwise.

This may all sound just too depressing. But it is not really. The trumpets will be sounding. And God’s people will trim the lamps of their spirit. They will procure the oil for the coming night They will make it their business to obtain a supply of spiritual energy from outside of themselves. This is the oil of anointing of the Holy Spirit. Even in the gathering gloom they will ‘rise and shine’. They will leave their places of ease to go out at midnight, even as a wedding party, to meet the Bridegroom. (Isa.60)

Here then, is the ‘rest of the story’. Our God is in control of holy history. He has determined and limited the time. And here is the good news. Messiah will come back personally to wrap up this evil age. (Isa.63) When those 70 weeks have run their course “the saints will possess the Kingdom”. (Dan 7:18 and 7:22) So we can be encouraged. As the 70th week opens up the true saints, as in times before, will cry out to God. And God will answer, as He always does. The saints will find the ancient paths. (Jer.6:16) This will bring in the Endtime Revival that Joel, Hosea, and Isaiah all saw. (Joel 2:28-32, Hos.6:2, Isa.60) God’s faithful elect, the ekklesia/congregation of God, are set to enter the most spellbinding days this world has ever seen. All of these awesome days of the future 70th week are up ahead of us and remain to be fulfilled.

As we have shown, the 69 weeks can be placed beautifully between the edict of Artaxerxes received by Nehemiah and the Palm Sunday entrance of Jesus as “Messiah the Prince”. No other timeline, (even if the author dared to present it astronomically), would even come close. None would achieve this amazing degree of accuracy. This is just one more of many instances where the Word of God has been proven proven infallible and true.

Grace and shalom to all who love His appearing.

On to Section 9:
THE 70 WEEKS PROPHECY AND THE EMERGING CHURCH-STATE POWER POLITICS IN THE RUSH FOR GLOBAL HUMANISTIC ECUMENICAL RELIGIOUS UNITY.Back to Section 7
ADDRESSING THE GAP BETWEEN THE 69 WEEKS
AND THE 70TH WEEK;
THE FIRST AND SECOND COMINGS OF MESSIAH.

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LETTERS WITH QUESTIONS:
AND MY RESPONSES.

Dear Gavin,

Thank you for your site. The 360 day solution does make the calculation work. However, I noticed something strange. On your chart, http://endtimepilgrim.org/69weeks.jpg you give April 9th as Psalm Sunday. However, April 9th, 32 was actually a Wednessday. The perpetual calenders I looked at say so. So, I want to ask, does that throw off your whole moon confirmation thing? I mean, as surely as the Bible is inerrent, Palm Sunday had to be a Sunday, right?

Also, you said that the moon loses a second every 36 years. Doesn’t that contradict the original 30 day plan idea?

Thank you,
Raymond

………………………………..

Dear Raymond,

Thanks for your email and interest. I will try to answer your questions as best I can with the facts I have and what I have been able to piece together.

Firstly, you asked regarding April 9th being Palm Sunday since the perpetual calendars give April 9th as being a Wednesday. The information I have received is that we cannot be sure what the weekly cadence was as held by the rabbis in Jerusalem at that time. Perhaps this is not so. Perhaps as part of the Roman Empire the city state of Jerusalem held to the Roman weekly cadence. And then again, perhaps they didn’t. I don’t know.

I can say this. 32 A.D. is the only year that will fit as a terminus for the 69 weeks. With those 173,880 days we need an extra 24 days over and above the 476 years and so we need a late Nisan Passover for our terminus for the 69 weeks. If what you are reporting is correct, and April 9th, Palm Sunday was a Wednesday, and I have received emails from others confirming this, then the Hebrew weekly cadence we see for passion week of 32 A.D. must have been different from the Roman one. The Hebrew weekly cadence would is out of synch with the Roman week by 3 days. Knowing the Jews and the Romans had problems working together this would not be at all surprising. I have received no emails with proof that this was not the case.

It is strange you should mention this because it got me thinking. Sir Robert Anderson gives April 6th as Palm Sunday. I had wondered why he did this since the lunar cycles clearly indicates that the 10th day of the Nisan moon must have been 3 days later on April 9th. But he too must have believed that the Jews held to the perpetual calendar and the Roman week. He must have believed that April 9th was a Wednesday. That is why he squeezed it back to April 6th. It was because according to this reckoning this earlier date would have been the Roman Sunday. He was homing in on a date that satisfied the Roman weekly cadence and putting that ahead of his reckoning of the lunar cycles.

As for why I gave April 9th as Nisan 10 you will have seen in my article above that the astronomical new moon for the month of Nisan in 32 A.D. occurred in Jerusalem at 10:57 p.m. on the night of March 29th. The thin sliver of the new moon is not discernable to the naked eye under the best of conditions until it is at least 24 hours old, see the Islamic website moonsighting.com. Accordingly there is no way the rabbis could have received their confirmed sightings of the new moon on March 30th. It would have to have been the following morning, March 31st at dawn that they would have seen the new moon as the thin crescent rising up in the eastern sky. This would have pegged the new moon and Nisan 1 as March 31st of the year 32. Nisan 10, or Palm Sunday, would therefore have come 9 days later. Thus Palm Sunday, Nisan 10, would have to have been April 9th. It couldn’t be any earlier than that.

As for how the weekly cadence from the Julian calendar is reckoned to be three days earlier than the Hebrew weekly cadence as evidenced by the scriptures and the lunar data I do not know. But since the book of Genesis states that God gave us the sun and moon for times and seasons I will put the dependable cycles of the heavenly bodies ahead of Roman time. It could very well have been that the Jews had there own weekly cadence.

Historical records of times and calendar dates can get fouled up. As late as the Crimean war two armies were supposed to meet at a certain date. But since the Eastern Orthodox calendar disagreed with the Roman Catholic calendar there was a failed rendezvous. So my question is this, and let me be like A&E or Discovery Channel here and inject doubt. They usually inject doubt about God’s Holy Scriptures. But today let’s put the boot on the other foot. Lets insinuate some doubt and questionings about man’s historical records. Just how sure are we that we know for certain just what the weekly cadence was back in Jerusalem as held by the city elders in 32 A.D.? Can we be absolutely sure that the historical records we have can give us a sure fix on the cadence back then in Jerusalem?

As for what the weekly cadence was in relation to Passion week itself and the Hebrew lunar calendar there is no question that resurrection morning the third day after the crucifixion, was a Sunday, the first day of the week by Hebrew reckoning. In Matthew 28:1 the scriptures clearly state that Mary came with spices to the tomb at dawn on the first day of the week, a Sunday. This was three days after the Nisan 14 Passover, two days after the Nisan 15 Feast of Unleavened Bread proper, a high sabbath or holy day, and one day after the regular weekly sabbath, a Saturday. Palm Sunday was Nisan 10 and thus 7 days before Resurrection Sunday which came on Nisan 17. This date, Nisan the 17th is an auspicious day on the Hebrew calendar. On this very same day, the 17th day of the 7th month of the Hebrew civil year the Ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat. This was the day God delivered His people up from the waters of the Abyss and from the jaws of death.

Regarding your second question about the moon slowing down by a second every 36 years and how could this jive with the perfect heavenly prophetic 30 day lunar cycle as relayed to us in scripture well this is an easy question to answer. It doesn’t. The lunar cycle in this fallen earthly realm is a long way from a perfect 30.00000 days. It is 29.530589 days. And the new moon to new moon interval is slowing down and drifting out from the earth in its orbit. So it is slowing and drawing further and further from the perfect number all the time.

Holy time is issued in the mathematical perfection of God. When the time of a certain prophecy is dispensed from the courts of God up in the third heaven it is dispensed in the heavenly currency of a perfect 30 day month and a perfect 360 day year. If the Bible speaks of years and months then we must translate it into earthly terms of days just as we do the exchange of money from one currency to another when we move from one kingdom to another. Certainly God’s Kingdom is different from the kingdom of earth here below. And so is His calendar.

Here is an example. We have this spelled out for us clearly in the case of the later half of the 70th week. In the books of Daniel and the Book of Revelation this time interval is variously given to us as a time, ‘times and half a time’ (or 3.5 years) and also ’42 months’ and ’1260 days’. So when the Bible speaks of a month it means 30 days. We also see this in Genesis when the Bible tells us in no uncertain terms that the ark was on the waters for 150 days and that these 150 days spanned the period between the 17th day of the 2nd month and the 17th day of the 7th month or five months exactly. These five Biblical, holy, perfect, prophetic months were months of 150 divided by 5 = 30 days.

I hope this helps somewhat.

Yours in Christ,

Gavin Finley

http://endtimepilgrim.org

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