The Fast and Prayer of Daniel (17th Tammuz and 9th Av)

Rev Colin Chow

21-07-2018

Daniel 9:3 New King James Version (NKJV)

³ Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.

Daniel was among the first captives taken to Babylon. He was member of the nobility. He was related to the King.

The fast of Daniel begins on the 17th day of Tammuz.

The three week of fasting and prayer climaxes on the 9th Av.

Bein ha-Metzarim (Days in straits):

The three weeks between 17th of Tammuz and 9th of Av.

Commemorates the tragic process of the destruction of the Holy Temples in Jerusalem.

A period of mourning.

Lamentations 1:3 New King James Version (NKJV)

³ Judah has gone into captivity,
Under affliction and hard servitude;
She dwells among the ^[a]nations,
She finds no rest;
All her persecutors overtake her in dire straits.

We do not need to be in dire straits because God is our present help in trouble.

But the Jews are still in bondages.

Because they do not know Jesus, their prayers cannot reach the ears of God.

Because they do not pray in the name of Jesus.

It is for you and me to love them and pray for them.

Yet they were first chosen by God.

Daniel 10:2-3 New King James Version (NKJV)

² In those days I, Daniel, was mourning three full weeks. ³ I ate no ^[a]pleasant food, no meat or wine came into my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, till three whole weeks were fulfilled.

Daniel is 600 years before Jesus.

God is prophetic. God gave him the vision.

Daniel 9:3 New King James Version (NKJV)

³ Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.

Why did Daniel fast and pray in sackcloth?

Daniel knew that it was the historical period of time of fasting, grief and mourning of the Jewish nation.

Zechariah 7:4-5 New King James Version (NKJV)

⁴ Then the word of the Lord of hosts came to me, saying, ⁵ “Say to all the people of the land, and to the priests: ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months during those seventy years, did you really fast for Me—for Me?

Zechariah 8:19 New King James Version (NKJV)

¹⁹ “Thus says the Lord of hosts:

‘The fast of the fourth month,
The fast of the fifth,
The fast of the seventh,
And the fast of the tenth,
Shall be joy and gladness and cheerful feasts
For the house of Judah.
Therefore love truth and peace.’

Historical events that happened on the 17th of Tammuz:

1) Moses breaks the tablets of the Law.

From Pentecost to 17th Tammuz is exactly 40 days during which Moses was on Mount Sinai.

2) The Babylonians broke through the walls of Jerusalem and caused the daily sacrifice to cease (586BC).

3) The Roman army forces the cessation of the daily sacrifice (70CE).

Historical events that happened on the 9th of Av:

1) The twelve spies return with their report. The people rebel.

2) The destruction of Solomon's temple.

Jeremiah 36:30-31 New King James Version (NKJV)

³⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: “He shall have no one to sit on the throne of David, and his dead body shall be cast out to the heat of the day and the frost of the night. ³¹ I will punish him, his ^[a]family, and his servants for their iniquity; and I will bring on them, on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and on the men of Judah all the doom that I have pronounced against them; but they did not heed.” ’ ”

Jesus is a descendant of David and Jehoiakim.

He inherited the throne of David through His mother's side through Nathan.

This explains the mystery of the virgin birth.

3) The destruction of Solomon's Temple by the Babylonians.

Lamentations 2:7 New King James Version (NKJV)

⁷ The Lord has spurned His altar,
He has abandoned His sanctuary;
He has ^[a]given up the walls of her palaces
Into the hand of the enemy.
They have made a noise in the house of the Lord
As on the day of a set feast.

4) The destruction of the second temple by the Romans.

Arch of Titus

Prophecy of Daniel:

Daniel 9:26 New King James Version (NKJV)

²⁶ “And after the sixty-two weeks
Messiah shall ^[a]be cut off, but not for Himself;
And the people of the prince who is to come
Shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.
The end of it shall be with a flood,
And till the end of the war desolations are determined.

Prophecy of Jesus:

Luke 19:43-44 New King James Version (NKJV)

⁴³ For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close you in on every side,⁴⁴ and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”

Fulfilled in the destruction of the temple by the Romans in AD70.

Prophecy 1: By Daniel

Daniel's curious prophecy revealed two facts:

i) The people of the "prince" i.e. the Roman Soldiers would be responsible for the destruction, not their leader "the prince" Titus.

ii) "The prince who is to come" When Titus initially began the Jewish war, he was not of royal blood. However, his father General Vespasian became emperor in AD69. When the final siege took place in AD70, Titus his son become "the prince", perfectly fulfilling this ancient prophecy.

Prophecy 2: By the Lord Jesus

They will not leave you one stone upon another.

The tremendous heat from the fire melted the gold that covered the temple.

The molten gold ran down into every crack between the foundation stones.

The Roman soldiers, greedy for gold, used wedges and crowbars to overturn every stone to search for this gold, fulfilling Jesus' prophecy.

5) England expelled all Jews in AD1290.

6) Spain expelled all Jews in AD1492.

During the Second World War, massive deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto to the extermination camps took place on the 9th Av, 1942.

Related:

Mystery of the "Promised Land"

Mystery of the Priesthood