Daniel 12.10-The Events of the Tribulation Period Will Manifest the Godly Character of Wise Jews and the Wicked Character of the Unwise Jews
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Wednesday September 17, 2014
Daniel: Daniel 12:10-The Events of the Last Three and a Half Years of the Seventieth Week Will Manifest the Godly Character of Wise Jews and the Wicked Character of the Unwise Jews
Lesson # 383
Please turn in your Bibles to Daniel 12:10.
Daniel 12:10 Many will be purged, purified and refined, but the wicked will act wickedly; and none of the wicked will understand, but those who have insight will understand.” (NASB95)
In Daniel 12:10, we have the figure of “asyndeton” in order to solemnly emphasize the prophetic statement to follow that many Israelites will be purged, purified and refined by the Antichrist’s persecution of the nation of Israel but on the other hand, the wicked will act wickedly.
“Many” refers to faithful Jewish believers living during the seventieth week under the persecution of the Antichrist.
“Will be purged” is the verb bā·rǎr (בָּרַר) (baw-rar´), which means “to show or demonstrate oneself as pure, to make oneself pure” since it pertains to freeing from guilt or moral or ceremonial blemish or defilement.
Here the word indicates that many Jewish believers in Israel living during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week under the persecution of the Antichrist will cause themselves to enter the state of being pure in the sense of experiencing their sanctification.
“Purified” is the verb lā·ḇǎn (לָבַן) (law-ban´), which means “to show oneself spotless or in a morally pure state, to make oneself white.”
Here it refers to many wise faithful Jewish believers living during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week under the Antichrist’s persecution making themselves white or in other words morally pure.
“And refined” is a temporal clause indicating that many Jewish believers living during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week under the persecution of Israel by Antichrist will purify themselves, yes make themselves white “while” being tested.
“Refined” is the verb ṣā·rǎp̄ (צָרַף) (tsaw-raf´), which means “to test” since it pertains to examining formally, refining for the purpose of demonstrating an individual’s faith in the God of Israel under extreme suffering.
“The wicked will act wickedly” refers to certain unregenerate Jews living during the seventieth week acting wickedly and denotes that they will violate God’s holy standards by disobeying His laws which reflect these holy standards so that they were chargeable with a crime and deserving of punishment from God.
“And none of the wicked will understand” presents the reason for the previous prophetic statement that the wicked in Israel will manifest they are wicked.
“But those who have insight will understand” is used in relation to faithful regenerate Jews who will living the during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
Daniel 12:10 “Many will make themselves pure, yes they will make themselves white while being tested but the wicked will manifest they are wicked because each and every one of the wicked will by no means have the ability to understand. However, those who are wise will be able to understand.” (Author’s translation)
In Daniel 12:10, the preincarnate Christ solemnly issues four prophetic statements with regards to the Jewish people during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
The first prophetic statement reveals that many Jews living during the last three and half years of the seventieth week will make themselves pure, yes they will make themselves white while being tested.
When the Lord says that many of these Jews will make themselves pure it indicates that they will cause themselves to enter the state of being pure in the sense of experiencing their sanctification.
The means by which they will demonstrate themselves to be pure is by being wise as a result of understanding and applying the gospel of Jesus Christ as well as the revelation that Daniel received regarding the reign of the Antichrist during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
When the Lord says that these Jews will make themselves white it indicates that they will demonstrate themselves to the world to be spotless or in other words morally pure.
Many Jewish believers living during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week will have their faith in the God of Israel tested by the persecution of Antichrist.
The purpose of such testing is to develop their godly character and to demonstrate to both men and angels they are loyal to the God of Israel who the New Testament identifies as God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit.
The events of the Tribulation will cause many Jews to exercise faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and will also cause many Jews to trust in the Bible, both Old and New Testaments and this will result in these Jews experiencing sanctification.
They will experience sanctification by enduring undeserved suffering which will produce Christ-like character in them.
The concept that God refines the character of His people through adversity and undeserved suffering is taught in other passages of Scripture (Psalm 17:3; 66:10; Isaiah 1:25; 48:10; Daniel 11:35).
Zechariah 13:8-9 teaches that during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week, one third of the citizens of Israel will be killed and the remaining third will be purified through the events of the tribulation and will exercise faith in the Lord who will deliver them from their enemies.
Revelation 7 also prophesies about these Jews who will be refined from the events of the Tribulation and teaches that 144,000 Jews, 12,000 from each of the twelve tribes of Israel will delivered from the wrath of God during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
In contrast to these faithful Jews, the Lord reveals in Daniel 12:10 that wicked Jews will manifest the fact that they are wicked.
These Jews are wicked in the sense that they will be guilty because they will be disobedient to God’s law which reflects His holy standards.
Specifically, they will be disobedient to the gospel of Jesus Christ and disobedient to the revelation given to Daniel regarding the seventieth week.
Consequently, they will be justly chargeable with a crime or responsible for a crime and deserving of punishment.
They will have absolutely no ability to understand because they will not exercise faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and the revelation given to Daniel regarding the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
Consequently they will be disobedient to God.
But in contrast to these wicked Jews, those Jews who are wise will be able to understand because they will exercise faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and the revelation given to Daniel regarding the seventieth week.
They will possess wisdom with regards to the will of God for mankind through knowledge from the gospel as well as the revelation given to Daniel regarding the Antichrist and the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
They will apply this understanding or knowledge from the Word of God in order to govern their lives and will communicate this knowledge to others, thus, they will be wise because of the application of this knowledge.
So some Jews living during the persecution of the last three and a half years of the seventieth week will not repent meaning that they will not change their attitude toward Jesus Christ and trust in Him as their Savior.
The adversity of the tribulation period of the seventieth week will not produce any change in their spiritually dead condition and thus they will be under the wrath of God meaning they will face eternal condemnation in the eternal lake of fire.
In contrast to these Jews, many Jews will be wise because they obeyed the gospel and the revelation given to Daniel regarding the Antichrist and the last three and a half years of the seventieth week and they communicated it to others.
These Jews will consider thoughtfully the gospel and wisely value it enough to seek to understand it and respond appropriately so that it will effectively govern their lives and will value it enough to share it with others.
These Jews who are mentioned in Daniel 12:3 will be wise because they will exercise faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and receive the imputation of divine righteousness which results in the Father declaring them justified and are the 144,000 Jews mentioned in Revelation 7.
They will also be wise because they will lead others to faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ or in other words, they are wise because they communicated the gospel to the unsaved who in turn responded in faith to the gospel so as to receive the gift of righteousness.
This is indicated in Daniel 12:3 by the explicative clause “those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever.”
They will also be wise because they communicate to the unsaved the revelation Daniel received regarding the Antichrist and the persecution under this wicked ruler during the last three and a half years of the seventieth week.
Those Jews who will be wise will be rewarded for their faithfulness to the revelation God gave them and as a result will reign with Jesus Christ for a thousand years and on into the eternal state (Daniel 11:33, 35; Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:11-27; Revelation 20:4).
Now, as we noted in our study of Daniel 12:2, there will be two judgments conducted by the Lord Jesus Christ immediately after His Second Advent and just prior to His millennial reign.
Those Israelites and Gentiles who reject Jesus Christ as Savior are removed from the earth whereas those who trust in Him as Savior will enter the millennium.
The judgment of those Israelites who survive the Tribulation is referred to in Ezekiel 20:33-37 and Malachi 3:2-6 whereas Matthew 25:31-46 speaks of the judgment of those Gentiles who survive the Tribulation.
Therefore, the wicked Jews of the Tribulation will be removed from the earth while those faithful Jews will enter the millennial kingdom.