Daniel 8:26 Commentary and Bible Study

‘And the vision of the evening and the morning which was told is true.’ The KJV has chosen to translate as ‘evening and morning’, although it is the same words in the Hebrew as in verse 14 where it translates it as ‘days’. This is what is being referred to: the two thousand three hundred evenings and mornings revealed earlier, which probably allude to the evening and morning sacrifices of that time of oppression when the Jews will be unable to use the temple. Calvin says, ‘Again it is asserted, that the vision is certain, because God had computed day by day the time of the profanation of the temple until the period of its cleansing.’ We learn from Josephus, and from the non-canonical Book of Maccabees, that the temple was cleansed at the end of this period by Judas Maccabeus. The Jews celebrated this cleansing, and as Barnes reminds us, ‘this is the festival which is called “the feast of dedication” in the New Testament (John x. 22), and which our Saviour honoured with his presence.’‘Wherefore shut up the vision.’ That does not mean that Daniel is to keep it secret – he is told to write it down and preserve it in a book (Daniel 12:4). Nor does it mean that it would be impossible to understand until its fulfilment – the angel has given him the interpretation. What it means (as in Daniel 12:4) is that the prophecies related to things in the distant future, and after Daniel has departed from this world, and would therefore not witness them personally. The fulfilment would be in many days’ time, centuries into the future, but it would certainly come to pass. Daniel is therefore to write it down and preserve it; it will be sorely needed at those times.‘And I, Daniel fainted’ - he swooned and was sick [many] days. Daniel prays a great prayer which we will come to in the next chapter, and as a result he is given even more information, information so exciting, information which specifically includes the Messiah, and extends these things to the gospel age, the New Testament age. But even here in this eighth chapter, this vision in the third year of Belshazzar, you get a glimpse of the last days, and a final period – maybe it won't be all that long, but we seem to be moving towards it now. We have never seen such anti-Christian aggression as we are seeing today. This destruction of the church of God, this attempt on the part of antichrist to project himself into the church and draw the church down to worldliness and false doctrine and unbelief. The 2 Thessalonians antichrist enters the temple of God, as though he is God, supplants all religion, makes scientific humanism, or something like it, the religion of the day. We are seeing all these things as never before, and the last antichrist is here. But it is the word of God that is going to be used to destroy antichrist. Christ will come again and appear, and in the meantime will destroy him by the word. Individual souls that are delivered from his darkness and clutches; it is by the word of God. There will be periods of retrenchment when we have far fewer souls. The people of God, the church of Christ, must work through these last days, and the ultimate victory will be ours. A final period, Satan's little season, will come at the end of time. Then it will be all over, and Christ will come and destroy him with the brightness of his coming. But this chapter 8 moves towards chapter 9, where we see more about the one who symbolises the last antichrist. ‘And I Daniel fainted,’ – this was overwhelming – ‘and was sick certain days; afterward I rose up, and did the king's business;’ – Belshazzar's administration – ‘and I was astonished at the vision, but none understood it.’ Gabriel had said to Daniel, ‘Understand, O son of man’, but he did not altogether. He evidently shared it with his fellow Jews, but they too did not really understand it. But Daniel understood enough to know how terrible these times would be, and he wrote and shared with God’s people what he was shown. It would be centuries before these events came to pass. The temple would be desecrated and the Jews would be unable to use it, but then it would be brought back into use. In the next chapter there will be the seventy-year prophecy, and all will appear to go wrong again. It all seems very dismal. Daniel is a tender-hearted man and he is deeply affected by these revelations. It is a solemn vision, but it tells us that God will be with us. For us, when the final time of trouble comes, it may not even be six years. The man of sin will appear, and he will be destroyed by the return of Christ. What stops the Lord coming? Only one further prophecy needs to be accomplished: the appearance of the man of sin. Wonderful things will happen at the end.