Daniel's Clock Series

Daniel’s Clock, Pastor Les Tarlton, BA. Th.M., 3/24/2007 The contents of this sermon are other than the scripture is copyrighted. ©

I love the old Charlie Brown and Snoopy Cartoon; "Has It Ever Occurred to You That You Might Be Wrong?" August 9, 1976

That is what occurred to me when I realized my rationalization of the number in Daniel 12 was wrong. It is in light of this question I approach all my hard and fast, conservative, evangelical theological beliefs. Given, that I am human I could be wrong. Or I wish I was.

My purpose for attending one of the foremost Theological Seminaries was a mix of God’s sovereign will and my desire for being able to understand the scriptures in their original language and intent. I read the Bible with a view to understand every verse with the greatest of care, but I hold all my theology with suspect, since much of it in the beginning was through other people’s training. The men who taught me, were some of the greatest theologians alive. Yet, they also learned their theology, to some extent, from others. For me, it is imperative to find the original meaning of each verse, the first cause. That is true, especially, for those things where the Lord has placed an uncomfortable feeling in my heart, when I read a text. Those verses, where when I read, the current theology leaves me uneasy.

One of those areas has been some of our conservative, end time theology and the numbers game we play with the Hebrew terms that are so rich in various possible meanings. The Hebrew phrase we translate “Time, Times, & a Division of Time” is one of those that I have felt for years that I need a more sure understanding on. Our conservative theological interpretation is that “time” means one year and times, two years, therefore three and a half years. Time = 1st year, Times = 2 years, and a division of time = ½ year. But is this correct? Personally, I do not know who came up with this interpretation, but the lack of clarity here bothers me. I do not see this in the rest of Daniel. So what does it infer? Undefined periods? Days? Weeks? Years? Or does Daniel given us the answer in the context of his Writing?

Daniel is so very accurate when it come to predicting the first release of the children of Israel from captivity, the nations that would emerge, and the coming of Messiah and yet did not leave for us a well defined season for the second coming of Christ. It seems a bit odd.

It is with these questions and uneasiness placed in my heart by God that I approached this area of theology, realizing that there are many men out there much more capable than I in Hebrew and theology, but perhaps not the God stirred drive to uncover the truth here. I would have been just as happy had I proved our current end time theology correct. I am a person who just has to know the first cause of things. Accepting status quo only works for me if the status quo is meticulously clear and non contrived. Since my training in Hebrew and theology I have never had that peace.

I am afraid what we have done is accept an understanding of Daniel’s use of numbers that is neither correct or healthy for theology and the cause of Christ. Humbly, understanding I could be wrong, but not believing that to be the case, I present my case to my brother Hebrew and Aramaic scholars to drive out any error I might have unintentionally induced. My intent here is to right what I think is a glaring mistake in theology. However, due to the outcome of the research, and its impact, not only on our theology, but on our culture, as a whole, I believe, though some may believe me to be correct, few will stand beside me. These findings will petrify many and yet motivate others. I pray the “motivated others” may be those with good intentions. These finding could be used, wrongly, to insight movements for the harm of others. That is not my intent, yet I do not think truth should be stifled.

Please read with an understanding for gaining truth and delivering souls from the Hell to quickly come. You answer these questions and the clock of Daniel can be accurately examined for a detailed understanding of the “time of the end.”

Understanding the Clock

There are four issues at the heart of understanding Daniels intent:

• What does “Time, Times, & a Division of Time “ mean?

• How is the term יוֹם “Yowm” to be interpreted? Translated in most in English Bibles either; “day, time, or year”.