re-establishment of such a people for 490 years in their own promised inheritance; cut out, (for such is the signification of the word translated determined) (8) cut out from their long period of dispersion, for the very purpose of bringing in the Messiah through the tribe of Judah; which tribe alone it must be remembered has as yet been restored from captivity, though the captivity of Israel has existed from the time of Shalmaneser.

I have now stated the outline of the interpretation which I have to propose, and shall leave it to the reader to determine whether it tends to simplify the solution of the prophecy. The importance of the subject to every Christian, and the still existing disagreement regarding it, amongst the most pious commentators, are perhaps sufficient apology for an attempt, however feeble, to explain it. We are satisfied from independent sources, that the events predicted have long since come to pass, and the application of his

tory to the prophecy is now the only difficulty. If I shall have failed in convincing the reader of the propriety of my mode of application, it will still be some satisfaction to have thrown out one or two new suggestions upon this much canvassed subject, which possibly in more powerful hands may be turned to some account : and waiting in anxious expectation of the time when the subject shall no longer be left a matter of uncertainty, I will merely observe that, in the mean time, to the true Christian, there is no ground whatever for doubt or apprehension arising from the delay; the vagueness and obscurity of the history from which the explanation must be drawn, most entirely accounting for the difficulties experienced in attempting to interpret it.

CHAPTER II.

DANIEL ix. 24-27.

"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 make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy.

"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 threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.

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(And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.)

"And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week; and in the midst of the week 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."

To attempt to give an account of all the different modes of interpreting this prophecy, which at various times have been proposed, from the days of the early fathers to the present, would be an undertaking far beyond the power of the author, and only wearisome to the reader : nor could it be accomplished under many volumes. But as, perhaps, it may not be generally known how much labour and ingenuity have been bestowed upon it, before we enter upon the consideration of the arrangement I am about to offer, we will examine some of the principal schemes which have met with support, and which have hitherto been considered the most satisfactory on the subject.

These may generally be classed under four heads, according to the four decrees

found in Scripture relating to the rebuilding either of the city or temple of Jerusalem, from one of which the prophecy is usually supposed to take its date.

The first class of writers have dated the commencement of the seventy weeks, or four hundred and ninety prophetic years, from the decree to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem, issued by Cyrus in the first year of his reign*, an opinion anciently advanced by Eusebius and Clemens Alexandrinus. From this date, however, to the birth of Christ, according to the vulgar æra, is five hundred and thirty-six years. To obviate this difficulty, Dr. Blayney has proposed a translation, made up from three different manuscripts, by which he brings out a period of seventy and seven weeks, and threescore and two years,

* Ezra i. 1.

For the arrangement of Eusebius and Clemens Alexandrinus, which are objectionable in every point of view, see Petavius de Doctrina Temporum, 1. xii. c. 30.