Cap. 12, 1. At the same time the great prince Michael will arise, who stands for the children of your people. For there shall be such a time of trouble, as it hath not been since men were, until this time.
1 Although Michael is an angel's name, we understand here, as also Revelation 12:7, the Lord Christ Himself, who on earth with His angels, that is, preachers, fights against the devil through the gospel. For he calls him "the great prince". He has now risen up and stands for the Christians, comforting them with the word of grace. For until then, the most horrible time has been on earth, as Christ also says in Matth. 24, 22: "And if these days had not been shortened" and ended, "no man would have been saved," not even the Edomites, Moabites and Ammonites. For it has already begun in Welschland, Rome and other places, that epicurians have made a mockery of the faith and no longer baptize their children. Thus, both tariffs, sacrament and word, everything would have ended, and no man would have been saved.
(2) For he does not mean here bodily tribulations, which were much greater in the destruction of Jerusalem, Rome, and many other countries and cities, but of souls, or spiritual tribulations of the church, through Christ's suffering. For bodily afflictions are temporal, ceasing with the body. But here it applies that the church perishes or remains, which the devil had attacked through the end-Christ in two ways; on the one hand through epicuric contempt of the sacraments and word of God; On the other hand, through fear and despair of conscience, since no real consolation of grace, but rather vain miserable torments through their own sufficiency and works afflicted the Christians (of which the Epicureans and pagans know nothing), so that here it was time for Michael to wake up, and not let Christianity perish in the last stages, but to comfort and gather it again through his salvific word of grace. Follows:
V. 2. 3. and many who sleep in the earth will awake, some to eternal life, some to eternal shame and disgrace. But the teachers shall shine as the brightness of heaven, and they that teach righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.
The angel hastens to the last day; therefore, though he has more to say about Michael's ministry, he goes out to the end of the world and speaks of the resurrection of the dead. But soon he returns again, and says of the teachers and preachers how they should shine like the brightness of the sky and stars, and convert many before the dead rise. As in Dan. 9, 26, he tells how the city should be destroyed before he describes the last week, which had to happen before. But some understand this shining of the teachers in that life, like 1 Cor. 15, 41. This is also true, but we take it here for the need and service of the afflicted church.
Much (he speaks) will wake up.
4 For at the last day we shall not all rise again, as St. Paul says 1 Cor. 15:51: For they that are found alive in the day shall neither die nor rise again, but shall be changed in a moment, and taken up into the air to meet Christ. But much, that is, the greatest multitude will be of the dead or sleeping. So that Christ is (as faith says) judge of the living and the dead. And here we see that after this time, as the pope reveals, there is nothing to hope for nor to wait for but the end of the world and the resurrection of the dead. Here the scripture is finished, and all prophecy has an end.
V. 4. And you, Daniel, hide this speech and seal this book until the last time. Many will come over it and find great understanding.
5 Here the angel clearly says that this book of Daniel shall remain sealed, yet not forever, but until the last time, when it shall be opened, and great understanding shall be taken out of it.
We are working on it now, as said above [Cap. 11, ยง 25), that the prophecies cannot be understood thoroughly until they are completed. After that, when it is done, they testify to the work, just as Christ, Luc. 24, 27, after his death, first opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And before that he said, "These things I say unto you, that, when it is done, ye may believe" 2c.
V. 5 And I Daniel looked, and behold, there stood two others, one on this bank of the water, and the other on that bank.
(6) Of these two he says nothing more about what they are, speak or do, unless they are "others," that is, not the angel who speaks with him. Perhaps it is the two angels, one of the Persians, the other the prince of the Greeks, of which he says above Cap. 10, 13, who hinder the people of Israel with the kings. They stand and remain such hinderers with the kings until the end of the world; one toward the morning, the other toward the evening, so that God's word and His church do not have vain happiness, but as He Himself subsequently interprets and speaks:
V. 10. Many will be purified, cleansed and proved, and the ungodly will lead ungodly lives, and no ungodly person will respect it. But the wise will respect it.
7 For however bright and mighty the gospel goes, and however strong the church is, yet there must be heretics and false teachers practicing it, that the approved may be made manifest; and these same heretics gladly take hold of kings and great lords. So heretics remain until the end.
V. 6. 1) And he said to the man clothed in linen standing on the water, "When will there be an end to abominations?
8. the man in linen clothes is the angel (Gabriel) who has spoken until now, as above Cap. 10, 1. but who speaks to him: "When will it" 2c. is not mentioned. But there is a voice and lamentation in the person of the
1) Erlanger: "it" (namely the voice in the person of the church), which seems to us to be the correct reading. In other editions: "he". From the Latin this cannot be decided.
Church that says: Help God! Is it not enough that the end-Christ has corrupted the church so horribly and almost to the ground? Now that it has hardly been revived by Michael, the heretics, red spirits, Sacramentans, and Anabaptists are coming, and they are also committing abominations; when will it ever stop? Moreover, avarice and mammon are so entrenched that it is to be feared that the gospel will be starved out and respected as Lot respected Sodom and Noah before the flood. For in the world now, both upper and lower men will neither hear nor see anything but avarice, usury and their own will, that the time has come, of which Lyra and others all say that after the end of Christ's fall, the world will live freely and say: there is no more God.
(9) Here the angel makes an oath, and speaks with great earnestness, that we should not be terrified nor become stupid before the heretics and the priests, saying:
V. 7: It shall be for a time, two times, and half a time, and when the dispersion of the holy people is ended, all these things shall be done.
(10) Daniel hears this and does not understand it; he asks for understanding. But he is told, "It shall remain sealed until the last time, when he shall stand in his part, that is, his book shall serve the church according to his gift. But he shall rest, and his book shall remain uncomprehended.
(11) When this time, two times, half a time will be over, and when the heretics will stop scattering and dividing the church, we cannot know, but we will see how the church, a poor little group, remains united in the word, and the heretics with the world all become full, weary and epicurious, so that no one accepts the Scriptures anymore. It seems as if they do not value the Scriptures and God's Word, so that they should become heretics or Christians. Thus it ends, as Christ says [Luc. 18, 8]: "When the Son of Man comes, do you think that he will also find faith on earth? So the church must still become small, and everything must become vain avarice, usury, belly, food and flesh, as before the flood of sin.
V.11. 12. And from the time that the daily sacrifice is finished, and an abomination of desolation is made, find a thousand two hundred and ninety days. Blessed is he that waiteth, and reacheth a thousand three hundred and thirty and five days.
If these were human, ordinary days, the angel spoke of the last week, in which means the daily sacrifice ceases by the apostle Concilium, Apost. 15, 6. and the emperor Caligula puts his abomination in the temple. Thus the 1290 days make almost the remaining half of the last week, namely four and a half years. After the same, the gospel also went to the Gentiles through St. Paul and Barnabam, Apost. 13, 46. 13, 46. And so the angel would make a lid over his speech with these words, and entangle it, so that he would run back again into the time of the seventh week, after he had spoken of the future time, until the end of the world.
But if they are angelic days, that is, a day is a year, as above Cap. 9, 24, then the 1290 days run until the fourteenth year of the Emperor Louis, who was banished by the Pope, and the 1335 days until the twenty-third year of Caroli IV, almost seven years before the schism of the three popes, or forty-two years before the Costnitz Concilio.
14 But I would gladly interpret the daily sacrifice in a spiritual way, that it is the holy gospel, which must remain until the end of the world, together with the faith and the church. But nevertheless it can happen that the world will become so epicuric that in all the world there will be no public preaching stand, and the public speech will be full of epicuric abominations, and the gospel will be heard only in houses through the house fathers; and this will be the time between the words of Christ on the cross: 1) Consummatum est, unb: Pater, in manus tuas commendo spiritum meum. For just as Christ lived a little after such a consummatum, so also the church can remain a little after the public silence of the gospel. And just as the daily sacrifice of the Jews was completed in the seventh week by the Apostles' Concilium, and still
1) Freder has also set ku.it here.
The gospel that remained until the destruction of Jerusalem was also kept by the apostles themselves where they wanted (but without need), so the gospel can also lie publicly and be silent on the preaching platform, and yet be preserved by devout Christians in homes.
15) But such affliction shall not last longer than 1290 days, that is, four and a half years; for without public preaching faith cannot stand long, because at this time also in one year the world becomes more evil. The last 1335 days will even finally be 2) evil, so that even in houses there will be little faith. Therefore he says: Blessed is he who endures until that day. As if he should say, as Christ says [Luc. 18, 8.]: "When the Son of Man comes, do you think he will find faith on earth?"
16) Almost all teachers have spoken of these four and a half years, and all books are full of them, without pointing to the reign of the end of Christ, which, according to the order of the text, Daniel does not suffer, who continues to prophesy what will happen after the fall of the end of Christ, and sets these four and a half years after Michael, and after the oath of the angel on the water.
17 And although this interpretation seems as if one should be sure of the last day, which day or year it should come, which Christ is denying to know, Apost. 1, 7. and in the Gospel [Marc. 13, 32.], it is far from the truth. First of all, if the sacrifice of the gospel is publicly performed, no one will be able to remember the year or the day when it begins, since all sacrifices cannot stop on one day. On the other hand, even if one already knows when it should begin, the 1335 days are set above the 1290, which no one would notice in all the world. And summa, I think that these 1335 days will not be understood publicly in general, they are then fulfilled on the last day. Unless God were to raise up a Noah, for example, who could reckon up these same days and certainly meet them.
18 But I, for my part, am content that the last day must be at the door, for the signs which Christ proclaims
2) "even finite" - to the highest. Freder: sum msli.
940- Eri. 4i, [Li-323. interpretation of the prophet Daniel, Cap. 12, 11. 12. W. vi, i4ss-i4S2. 941
and the apostles Peter and Paul, are now almost all done, and the trees shoot forth, and the Scriptures green and blossom. Whether we cannot know the day so evenly is not in it; another make it better; it is certainly all in the end.
19. 1) From this we see what an excellent, great man Daniel was, both before God and the world. First of all, before God, that he had such a special prophecy, above all other prophets, namely, that he not only prophesied about Christ, like the others, but also counted the time and years, agreed on them and made them certain, and that the kingdoms, up to that appointed time of Christ, sat in order, with their commerce and change, in such a fine and even way that the future of Christ could not be lacking, if one wanted to do it deliberately, like the Jews; and henceforth, until the last day, the state and nature of the Roman Empire and the course of the world will also be properly represented, so that even the last day will not be lacking or have to fall unawares, let it be done willfully, as our Epicureans are doing now.
20 Therefore methinks. St. Peter especially meant Daniel, when he says 1 Petr. 1, 11: "The prophets have searched to which and what time the Spirit of Christ points" 2c. "Which" means that he certainly reckons the time, and agrees how long and how many years should be there. "Which" means that he depicts how things should go and stand in the world at that time, who should have the supreme rule, or where the empire should be, so that he proclaims not only the time, but also the change, form, and nature of that time. This greatly strengthens our Christian faith and makes us secure and firm in our conscience, because we can see that which he has so long before described and presented to us in his book clearly and correctly. For Daniel prophesies freely and clearly that Christ's future and the beginning of his kingdom (which is his baptism and preaching ministry) shall take place after the king
1) Everything that now follows is also the conclusion of the preface from 1530 (Erlangen edition).
Cores at five hundred and ten years, Dan. 9, 25, and the empire of the Persians and Greeks should be over in the world, and the Roman empire should go on its way, Dan. 7, 25. 9, 27, so that Christ must surely come at the time of the Roman empire, when it was at its best, which should also destroy Jerusalem and the temple, because after the same empire there should come no more, but the end of the world should follow it; as Daniel Cap. 2, 44. and Cap. 7, 9. clearly proclaims.
(21) Before the world he was also an excellent, great man, for we see here that he rules the first two kingdoms as the chief. As if God should say: I must give people to these kingdoms, and should I let my Jerusalem and my people be disturbed about it. And even though he was not a king, nor did he have any great good or honor from it, he still had the royal works, business and offices and carried them out; as it is the way of the world that those who work the most at court have the least, and those who do nothing get almost the most, according to the evangelical saying: "Another sows, another reaps", John 4, 37. 4:37. Yes, which is worse, he must still have hatred, envy, driving and persecution to pay for it, as the world is wont to pay for all service and good deeds with such wages.
(22) But it does not harm Daniel; he prefers God, who rewards him the more abundantly, and considers Daniel a king in Babylon and Persia. For he reckons and judges by deed and fruit, not by person and name. Therefore Daniel is the right king of Babylon and Persia, even though he does not have a royal person or name, and has not much good, but misfortune and all kinds of evil. Behold, God is able to comfort and honor His captive Jews by making a son of a citizen of ruined Jerusalem a two-faced emperor of Babylon and Persia. Summa, among all the children of Abraham, none is so highly exalted in the world as Daniel. Joseph was great in Egypt with King Pharaoh; David and Solomon were great in Israel; but they are all lowly kings and lords, compared to the kings of Babylon and Persia, of whom Daniel was the chief ruler, whom he also
miraculously converted to God, and no doubt produced great fruit in both empires among many people who came to the knowledge of God through him and were saved, as the letters and commandments of the same emperor that one should honor Daniel's God in all lands well indicate, Dan. 2, 47. and 6, 26.
23 We now command this Daniel to be read by all devout Christians, for whom it is comforting and useful in these miserable last days. But it is of no use to the ungodly, as he himself says at the end: "The ungodly" remain ungodly and "do not respect it. For such prophecies of Daniel and the like are not written for the sole purpose of knowing the history and future afflictions, and to atone for the foreknowledge, as with a new newspaper, but that the pious may comfort themselves with them and make themselves joyful, and strengthen their faith and hope in patience, as they see and hear that their afflictions have come to an end, and they are delivered from sins, death, the devil, and all evil (after which they groan), in
to come to Christ in heaven, to his blessed, eternal kingdom. Just as Christ also comforts His own through the terrible visions and says: "When you see these things, look up and lift up your heads, for your redemption is near" 2c. Therefore we also see here that Daniel always ends all visions and dreams, however horrible they are, with joy, namely, with Christ's kingdom and future, for the sake of which future, as for the noblest, final main part, such visions and dreams are formed, interpreted and written.
(24) Whoever then wishes to read them usefully should not cling to history and remain there, but should feed and comfort his heart in the promised and certain future of our Savior Jesus Christ, as in the blessed and joyful redemption from this pitiful valley and misery. To this end may our dear Lord and Savior, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, help us, vowed forever and ever, amen.