Daniel's Prayer - Daniel 9:1-19
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Quick Recap, then read the text
In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans— in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.
Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against him. He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us, by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. Therefore the Lord has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us, for the Lord our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day, we have sinned, we have done wickedly.
“O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, and for your own sake, O Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”
Look, there is a lot we can learn from Daniel, but the first thing we should look at is the fact that Daniel is still reading and studying the scriptures.
This is an interesting passage from the start, for several reasons. But, as always, we have to set our timeline and context first.
Scholars disagree on the actual time that has passed, but it is somewhere between 10 and 15 years since Daniel’s last vision. We are in the first year of Darius the Mede, so this is happening right after the events of chapter 5, possibly after the lion’s den as well. Some scholars estimate that Daniel was at least 80 years old at this time.
With the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians happening roughly 60-70 years in the past, Daniel stumbles upon some interesting and hopeful information. He is reading from the prophet Jeremiah.
What is really interesting is how he classifies this document. He ascribes the text as scripture. We see Daniel canonically referring to Jeremiah as scripture. This is very rare. Jeremiah would have been preaching in the streets of Jerusalem just prior to Nebuchadnezzar conquering Israel and taking Daniel and the children of Israel to Babylon. It is one thing for New Testament writers to quote Old Testament scripture, as there was 400 years of silence between the two testaments. But for Daniel to be studying Jeremiah, who for historical purposes is a close contemporary, that is something else. This is Daniel acknowledging God’s holy word spoken by Jeremiah less than 100 years from event (Jeremiah 25:11-12) to interpretation (Daniel 9:2).
Daniel is studying the scriptures. He is perhaps still trying to make sense of the visions he has seen. And he comes across a passage that gives him hope. Jeremiah 25:11-12 states:
This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, declares the Lord, making the land an everlasting waste.
Now, there is a good deal of “ruin” and “waste” in this passage. But Daniel sees something else as well. He sees hope. He’s been in Babylon for close to 65-70 years at this point. The exile started around 605 BC, Darius defeats Belshazzar in 539 BC. So, when Daniel sees 70 years that the nations will serve Babylon, then the king of Babylon will be punished, Daniel sees hope for the end of the exile.
Because we see in Jeremiah 29:10:
“For thus says the Lord: When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place.
Now, I want to stress something here, because it will be very important next week: The numbers don’t add up.
If you go back 70 years from 539, you get to 609. That is before Nebuchadnezzar is on the scene. If you go forward from 605, you get 535, and by that time the Israelites had already returned to Jerusalem. There are other instances in scripture where numbers/lengths of time are rounded, and that could be the case, but I think there is a better reading here.
As we will see next week, the decree by Cyrus is not really the end of the exile. Yes, the Jews can go home, but they will not be independent of their Persian rulers.
I don’t think we really have to get too in the weeds on the numbers, or trying to make the calendar fit. This is really best understood as a symbolic period of time. The numbers 7 and 10 both represent completion. Multiplying them together tends to lend credence to the idea that after a period of complete judgement by God, He will remove His judgment from Israel.
So, Daniel sees that God is going to remove His judgement in the future, and he does what we should all do: he prays.
Daniel’s prayer here is a model penitential prayer. We see:
A. Invocation and confession - verses 4 - 10
Daniel not only realistically recognizes Israel’s sin and disobedience, but places himself alongside his ancestors in perpetuating the sin, even though we see that Daniel is a servant who is greatly loved by God (Daniel 9:22).
B. Deuteronomic theology - verse 11
Daniel is being informed the book of Deuteronomy here. Gordon Wenham (1985) has called Deuteronomy the linchpin of the Old Testament.
“It summarizes the Torah, then casts its long shadow on much of the Old Testament.” (Tremper Longman, BiblicalTraining.org)
In fact, this verse harkens back to 1 Kings 8:33-34, 1 Kings 8:46-51
“When your people Israel are defeated before the enemy because they have sinned against you, and if they turn again to you and acknowledge your name and pray and plead with you in this house, then hear in heaven and forgive the sin of your people Israel and bring them again to the land that you gave to their fathers.
“If they sin against you—for there is no one who does not sin—and you are angry with them and give them to an enemy, so that they are carried away captive to the land of the enemy, far off or near, yet if they turn their heart in the land to which they have been carried captive, and repent and plead with you in the land of their captors, saying, ‘We have sinned and have acted perversely and wickedly,’ if they repent with all their heart and with all their soul in the land of their enemies, who carried them captive, and pray to you toward their land, which you gave to their fathers, the city that you have chosen, and the house that I have built for your name, then hear in heaven your dwelling place their prayer and their plea, and maintain their cause and forgive your people who have sinned against you, and all their transgressions that they have committed against you, and grant them compassion in the sight of those who carried them captive, that they may have compassion on them (for they are your people, and your heritage, which you brought out of Egypt, from the midst of the iron furnace).
Which itself harkens back to Deuteronomy 28:64-68
“And the Lord will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known. And among these nations you shall find no respite, and there shall be no resting place for the sole of your foot, but the Lord will give you there a trembling heart and failing eyes and a languishing soul. Your life shall hang in doubt before you. Night and day you shall be in dread and have no assurance of your life. In the morning you shall say, ‘If only it were evening!’ and at evening you shall say, ‘If only it were morning!’ because of the dread that your heart shall feel, and the sights that your eyes shall see. And the Lord will bring you back in ships to Egypt, a journey that I promised that you should never make again; and there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer.”
God promised the people that if they sinned against Him and remained in that sin, they would be sent in exile. But, if they earnestly sought God, He would forgive them and restore them. This is the crux of what Daniel is talking about here in verse 11.
C. Statement about God's punishments - verse 12-14
This is a pretty succinct recap of what God has done to Israel for their disobedience. And remember, when we see Jerusalem mentioned in verse 12 that Jerusalem was vital to worship for Jews. “It symbolized the land God had given to His people, and the temple represented the presence of God amongst them. With the temple destroyed and the people scattered, Jerusalem was desolate at the time of Daniel’s writing.” (Tremper Longman III, ed., Daniel Thru Malachi, vol. 7, Layman’s Bible Commentary (Barbour Publishing, 2010), 41.) Daniel’s comment about Jerusalem is symbolic of what God is doing to all of His people.
And we see the true faithfulness of Daniel here, because of how he views God. If we were in his shoes, how many of us would question God? Or blame Him for the punishment? But Daniel acknowledges (Daniel 9:14) that God’s judgement on Israel proves His righteousness. He told His people what would happen if they disobeyed. They disobeyed anyway. If God does not follow through on His word, He would be a liar. But God is faithful and true, and does exactly what He promised.
D. Appeal for help - verse 15-19
Incidentally, since God is doing exactly what He promised, Daniel requests God to remember His people and hear their prayers. Daniel asks God to remain faithful and forgive. He references the exodus (verse 15), and there are some parallels to a second exodus (Messianic prophecies in Hosea and Isaiah in particular), but Daniel is seemingly more referencing the idea of God saving His people from Egypt and asking Him to do it again.
Daniel is also very clear about Israel’s sin. Jerusalem is a taunt, or a byword (a word of derision). The people have been wicked. They are not worthy of God’s forgiveness. We see in verse 18 that Daniel notes that this plea for God to restore Israel is not because of their righteousness (which Daniel has clearly shown to be nonexistent in his prayer), but because of God’s faithfulness, because of God’s mercy, and because God is the righteous one.
O Lord, hear. O Lord, forgive. O Lord, act. Do not delay. Even so, come quickly Lord Jesus.
