Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 68:2 (Jun 2025)
Article: The Conceptualization Of Time In The Book Of Daniel
Author: Thomas John Finley

The Conceptualization Of Time In The Book Of Daniel

Thomas J. Finley

Thomas J. Finley is emeritus professor of Old Testament and Semitics at Biola University/Talbot School of Theology. He may be contacted at [email protected].

Abstract: Modern ways of thinking about time tend to be precise and clearly demarcated. Such precision was not necessarily true of the way biblical authors conceived of time, and this article will try to ferret out some differences in perspective through examining the focus on time in the book of Daniel. The article also offers a theology of time in the book of Daniel.

Key words: book of Daniel, theology of time, Daniel’s seventy weeks, measuring time, sabbatical year, Jubilee, Qumran scrolls, Melchizedek

References to time are frequent in the book of Daniel, and the interpreter needs to understand how the ancients measured and thought about time in contrast to the way moderns calculate and categorize it. A culture of watches and clocks that are set by atomic time from Colorado, adding an extra day to the calendar every four years, months with a fixed number of days in them, and a fixed calendar gauged according to the rotation of the earth around the sun—such a culture was foreign to the ancients.

In this study I survey terms for time in Daniel, along with related terms and concepts. Then I discuss how time was measured in the era in which Daniel lived, applying the results to the book’s references to periods of time. Finally, I examine the theology of time in Daniel—God’s relation to time and its calculation.

I. Terms For Time In Daniel

The concept of time is first encountered in the first chapter of the book of Daniel. Nebuchadnezzar’s invasion of Judah was in the third year of Jehoiakim’s reign. The young men who were brought to Babylon were to be tested for three years, and when Daniel and his companions balked at eating the king’s food, they went through a ten-day trial of eating only vegetables rather than the king’s food. In chapter 2 Nebuchadnezzar accused the wise men of “buying time” (עִדָּנָא ... זָבְנִין) in the hope that “the time” (עִדָּנָא) might be changed.1 Later in the chapter we read that Daniel requested “time” (זְמַן) to make the interpretation known to the king (v. 16). Thus, two different words for time are used, and the second term has the same

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