Stephen
Terry, Director
From Dust to Stars
Commentary
for the March 28, 2020 Sabbath School Lesson
" The
man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, lifted his right
hand and his left hand toward heaven, and I heard him swear by him who
lives forever, saying, 'It will be for a time, times and half a
time. When the power of the holy people has been finally broken, all
these things will be completed.'" Daniel
12:7, NIV
We
come now to the final chapter of Daniel as we know it from our Protestant
Bibles. Two other chapters remain from other sources, but we will confine
ourselves to the Protestant perspective for the purposes of our study. There
appear to be three possible ways of approaching chapter 12. We can look at it
as metaphor. We can look at it as literal within its historical context. Or we
can look at it as literal within a future, apocalyptic context. However, the
latter, by definition, must employ a certain degree of symbolism with the
proper mixture of symbolism and literalism often being determined by the agenda
of those using that method. The latter method is the one advanced by the Seventh-day
Adventist denomination for reasons that will become apparent later, but please
bear in mind that the purpose of this commentary is not to be an apologetic for
any denomination, but simply to explore various perspectives free from dogmatic
inculcation in order to release various possible understandings that are not
necessarily immediately apparent.
If
we bear in mind the historical context of the Maccabean Revolt for the Hebrew
portion of Daniel (chapters 8-12), then a metaphorical understanding of this
chapter might be simply that in spite of ongoing struggle, no matter how
apocalyptic it might seem, the faithful, chosen people will overcome because
God will not desert them. When all seems to be going to pieces, it is only an
illusion, for the victory is assured and endurance will prove the truth of
God's care for us. One could see how this might be a vital message when the
revolt was facing opposition from the powerful Seleucid Empire, and the
inhabitants of Palestine were trapped in the middle of ongoing conflicts
between the Ptolemies and Seleucids. When setbacks
occurred in the struggle, the need to be able to continue to inspire those
seeking to throw off the yoke that the Syrians, Assyrians, Babylonians and now
the Seleucids sought to fasten upon the Jews was necessary to keep the rebel
armies from melting away in despair. "Keep fighting because God has
already won this fight for us if we only stick together and prove
faithful." The angels Daniel spoke with assured them that God had not
forgotten them, no matter how things might appear in reality. This same
metaphor is often appealed to by modern Christians as well, who believe that
God has already won the war through Christ's death on the cross, and we only
need to remain faithful, not become discouraged in the face of opposition, and
our reward is sure at the Parousia. Whether this is true for the millions who
have died for their faith believing this, and in spite
of believing in an imminent second advent of Christ that has somehow already
taken two millennia without realization is not the intent of this commentary to
prove or disprove. We only note the near universal application of this tenet
among Christian denominations, derived metaphorically from passages such as the
current chapter.
When
we look at this chapter literally within its historical context, we are drawn
to the timelines revealed to Daniel. The most significant perhaps of these
being the one in our opening verse regarding time, times, and half a time. If
we take the common understanding that this refers to three and a half years,[i]
this fits very closely to the period of time between the desecration of the sanctuary
in Jerusalem and its ultimate cleansing, an event commemorated annually by many
Jews in December each year with the festival of Hanukkah. This argues strongly
for the addition of this prophesy to the earlier Aramaic text of Daniel having
been done after the fact in order to provide a prophetic endorsement of events
brought about by the Maccabees. By doing so, it would make it very difficult
for any sort of priestly opposition to the revolt to gain any footing, even
though the Maccabees had determined that waging war on Sabbath was permissible,
something the priests might be deeply troubled by. Some might try to argue the
inviolability of the Sabbath, but faced with the obvious military success of
the Maccabees, and this apparent prophetic endorsement of those successes, such
an argument might find it hard to gain ground with the people. The success of
this line of justification may actually have eventually fueled the reactionary
response that plagued Jesus during his ministry when the Pharisees continually
accused him of desecrating the Sabbath. The Hasmonean Maccabees having died out
through means both natural and foul, the Edomite Herodians
came to power, and any prophetic endorsement of Maccabean policies, including
their perspective on the Sabbath and warfare became moot, and very detailed,
literal and conservative applications of Sabbath observance were able to
reassert themselves. Jesus' emphasis on grace and need as determinants for
religious praxis would perhaps have been better received by the Hasmoneans than
by the Pharisees under the Herodians. Herodian
contempt for attempting any sort of religious justification for their reign may
be seen in their response to John the Baptist's condemnation of their life
style choices. This may actually have fueled the welcoming response to Jesus by
those who saw religion as the only appropriate response to the excesses of the Herodians and their Roman sponsors. If it had worked for
the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucids, why wouldn't it work for revolting
against the Herodians and Rome? Jesus may have been
tapping into that sentiment when he referred to Daniel and the abominations
predicted there. Without the ability to see the future, his followers may have
more clearly seen such references in the light of the revolt against the
Seleucids and the miraculous Hanukkah endorsement of that earlier uprising. The
miracles his disciples recorded in the Gospels may have been seen in a similar
light as manifested in the desire of the people to crown him king at the head
of their revolt.[ii]
The
third method of looking at this chapter and the book of Daniel, where a good
portion of the literalism and symbolism is projected into a future apocalyptic
scenario, a position favored by the Seventh-day Adventists, while not necessarily
wrong on its face, derives most of its foundation from a need to justify the
theology of William Miller, an early 19th century evangelist who is
famous for date setting for the return of Jesus. Several denominations arose
from the Great Disappointment of that date setting fiasco, with the Seventh-day
Adventists being the largest and most successful. Unlike others, they developed
an alternative rationale for the date set by William Miller, and this provided
them with an apologetic in the face of ridicule by others for succumbing to the
date setting of Miller. Miller, though, never recovered from his failure, nor
did he accept the Adventist defense. The Seventh-day Adventists took the
calculations done by Miller, using a principle where each day is equal to a
year, and then applied the date arrived at to an invisible event taking place
in heaven, an event known doctrinally as the Investigative Judgment. Since it
is a hidden process, it is incapable of proof or disproof. But questioning its
veracity has been grounds for disfellowshipping and
even defrocking as seen in the case of theologian Desmond Ford, following a
modern inquisition in 1980.
Why
is this so important to Seventh-day Adventists? The date setting by William
Miller brings with it the implication that God's people are now in the End
Times referred to by Daniel. Daniel tells us that what is contained in his book
will be understood by God's people at the time of the end. Seventh-day
Adventists believe they are those people based on the final verse of
Revelation, chapter 12, a remnant who are observing the commandments and having
the spirit of prophecy. The former being defined as the Decalogue and the
latter being defined as a belief in Ellen White as a latter day prophetess.
While there have been many challenges to those assumptions through the years,
that is not the focus of this commentary. Instead it
is the Seventh-day Adventist insistence on the infallibility of William Miller.
In a sense, they have painted themselves into a corner on this. For if he is in
any way in error then the entire theological edifice of the Seventh-day
Adventist Church crumbles into dust. It is therefore this infallibility and not
things like the Investigative Judgment that hang upon it that is the keystone. Miller's use of the year-day principle was
based not upon Daniel but upon the account for the Exodus where the spies of
Israel spied out Canaan for 40 days so God said the Jews would wander for 40
years in the wilderness. There is no basis in Daniel for insisting that this
principle must be applied to Daniel's timelines. However, Miller felt it worked
to predict the Parousia. Except it didn't, and Miller eventually recognized it
didn't. But the belief that the End Time remnant is the Seventh-day Adventist
Church, and the people of the End Time are purported to fully understand
Daniel, precludes any retreat, even slightly, from the theological matrix built
upon Miller's computations and even demands that those computations be
infallible as a matter of denominational self-preservation. This of course
becomes problematic when dealing with chapter 11, where much uncertainty
continues to reside. That in itself brings such assumptions about the book of
Daniel being now unsealed under question. It is the "elephant in the
room" as it were that silently but surely challenges all the rest with its
opaqueness. Silently, it asks us, is it possible that the remnant has nothing
to do with denominational boundaries and date-setting timelines? If so, where
does that leave us?
