Ezekiel’s Seventy Years,
Page 3
Seventy Year Prophecies
The Scriptures have several references to spans of seventy years. Perhaps the one with which most of us are familiar is the seventy-year captivity of Judah mentioned in Jeremiah 25:11-12: “This whole land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” [For the full Scriptural picture, also study Leviticus 26:34-35, 43; Isaiah 23:15-17; Zechariah 1:12-17; 7:5; Jeremiah 25:9-10; 29:10; Daniel 9:2.]
The Scriptures mention seventy years of rest for the land if the people have neglected Yehuveh’s Sabbatical and Jubilee Years: “To fulfil the word of Yehuveh by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept Sabbath, to fulfil threescore and ten years. Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of Yehuveh spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, Yehuveh stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia.” 2 Chronicles 36:21-22. [Repeated in Ezra 1:1-3.]
Note Wycliffe’s Commentary on this last verse: “In 538 B.C. Cyrus king of Persia overthrew Nabonidus and his son Belshazzar, the last native Babylonian rulers (Daniel 5).” Further, on Ezra 1:1-3: “Cyrus . . . finally conquered Babylon in October, 538 B.C. The word of Yehuveh by ... Jeremiah. It was in 605 B.C. that Jeremiah had prophesied the seventy-year captivity of Judah (Jeremiah 25:12; cf. 25:1). And it was this prophecy that caused Daniel to pray for the deliverance of his people in the year of Babylon’s fall (Daniel 9:2).” 23 October 538 B.C., tenth day of the Seventh Month, the Day of Restarting (Atonement) [see Leviticus 25], was Yehuveh’s appointed day for the release of all the people. Cyrus fulfilled this release as appointed!
As we complete another seventy-year prophecy, and as we approach another Jubilee--another deliverance!--this history offers us powerful assurances! [For fuller explanation, study the Jubilee Years and how they are anchored to 539-538 B.C.! We now approach the end of our current five-hundred year Mega-Jubilee cycle with the Jubilee Year of 2012-2013. The final announcement of release will be made on the Day of Restarting (Atonement) of the previous year, 7 October 2011. Before that time, “the acceptable year of Yehuveh”, 2008-2009, marks the finalization of Israel’s debt and their captivity is turned. As an aside: it is worthy of note that on 23 September 1942, the day the Hebrew’s fall festivals began seventy years before this Jubilee release, the German regime began experimenting with the gas chambers at Auschwitz prison camp. Indeed this marked a beginning of indignation, of a seventy-year span, but not of the one described by either Zechariah or Ezekiel.]
The seventy-year span described and dated in Ezekiel 1-33 must end with “the acceptable year of Yehuveh”, the spring of 2008 to the spring of 2009, for the remaining events of Ezekiel 34-39 to take their place in the six Years of Darius. Zephaniah 1:1-4 states that the land of Israel is to be emptied on “the day of vengeance of our Elohim”, following 19 September 2009, as the turning point in the grand but tragic finale to this timespan. Haggai’s and Zechariah’s prophecies also indicate that the rebuilding Jerusalem begins following the spring of 2009. Thus by two witnesses, this seventy-year-prophecy ends in the spring of 2009, and must therefore have begun in the spring of 1939. Evidence for these dates will be discussed in full in the sections which follow.
Gael Bataman
Originally Written: 7 June 2006
Latest Update: 18 December 2009
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