Daniel 9:1-19--Daniel's Prayer for His People

Daniel 9:1-19
English Standard Version

Daniel's Prayer for His People
9 In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans— 2 in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.

3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. 7 To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. 8 To us, O LORD , belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. 9 To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him 10 and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. 11 All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against him. 12 He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us, by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. 13 As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favor of the LORD our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. 14 Therefore the LORD has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us, for the LORD our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. 15 And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day, we have sinned, we have done wickedly.

16 “O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. 17 Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, and for your own sake, O Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. 18 O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. 19 O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”

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You may not have been paying attention to this like i have, but this is the first time that the covenant name of God (The LORD, YHWH, or I AM) is used in the book of Daniel.  I've actually been looking for it, because it is strange to not see it in the prophets.  My best guess is that the portions written in Aramaic did not use it because it is a strictly Hebrew word (the Aramaic section just ended in Chapter 7, verse 28).  It appears Daniel was reading the book of Jeremiah while he was in exile (probably trying to see if the LORD told additional details to other prophets that could fill in some of the holes he had in his understanding of his visions, because God often tells the same things in different ways to different Old Testament prophets).  In the course of reading Jeremiah, Daniel came across the passage that prophesied that the people would be in exile for 70 years in direct relationship to the amount of time they had failed to observe the Sabbath year.

Daniel realizes that in many ways, the people have not learned anything from being sent into exile, and Daniel fears that the nation will either not return home after the 70 years, because they have continued in their sin, or, they will again be exiled or otherwise cut off from the Land.  Daniel will then intercede for the people of God--though he was of the tribe of Judah and not from the tribe of Levi, he will mediate and intercede as a priest would for the people.  We will see the same in Jesus, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, years later as He intercedes, mediates, and actually is able to atone for the sins of the people in a way that no Levitical priest ever could because He is our Great High Priest.

Daniel confesses his personal sin and the corporate sin of Israel as he fasted and put on sackcloth (a sign of mourning).  It then becomes obvious why He is using the name of the LORD.  He is praying to the LORD remembering His steadfast, covenant love for His people, and that He does not desire to destroy them--He wants to save them, not just from the enemy nations that surround them, but from the sin that is within them (Jeremiah also speaks of the new covenant and the new heart that the LORD would give His people).  Daniel clearly sees now that the LORD was good in sending the prophets to the people to warn them, but that the people ignored their warning and continued in sin and forced the LORD to deal justly with them so that a remnant might be preserved.  Daniel is ashamed of how he and the others of his nation have acted, and Daniel says it is right for them to feel that shame because they have acted shamefully.  However, the LORD doesn't just take away our sin, he also takes away our guilt and our shame when He forgives us.  That doesn't sound as wonderful to us as it should, but Eastern cultures like this are "shame cultures" in where the worst thing that you can do is to bring shame on yourself, your family and your people, and they will go so far as to shun or exile you as a visible representation of the shame you have caused.  Daniel realizes that is exactly what is going on with the Exile, and yet, the people in general still feel no shame for what they have done.  It should be so ingrained in them that they realize they are being shunned/exiled that they desire forgiveness and reconciliation, but they just threw up their hands and said, "Oh well, I guess God doesn't love us anymore.  I guess we just keep on sinning and acting like all the other nations of the world now now." (not a direct quote, but they could have said something much like this give what Daniel says about how they feel they are positionally before God and how they continue to break the Law).

The people have realized they have broken the Old Covenant and that they will never be able to keep it and that it can only end in separation from God.  They need a new and better covenant, and they seem to have missed the promise in Jeremiah that the LORD would restore His people and return them to the Land as a visible representation of the spiritual healing that would happen in them as He would make a new covenant with them that would give them a new heart and give them a new spirit--He would put His Spirit within them that would internalize their desire to obey His commandments.  No longer would they be laws written on stone that were an exterior force, but there would be an inside-out change in their lives that was proceeded by a changed heart and changed mind--a work that only God can do.

​Daniel sees that the people have despised the way in which the LORD has been saving them since they were slaves in Egypt and He saved them through the Passover.  He led them out and completely defeated the Egyptian army at the Red Sea, led them through the Wilderness where He gave them His Covenant and the Tabernacle, and all they have done is do the things that will bring the curses of the covenant upon them.  They will never do the things that will earn the blessings of the covenant.  They can never be good enough to be holy as He is holy.  All Daniel can do as He realizes that God is not just gracious but holy and just is to plead with the LORD to turn away from the wrath and anger that He must feel in this moment. 

No longer does the name of the LORD or the name of His people Israel or the name of His Holy City Jerusalem hold a special place of beauty and reverence in the hearts and minds of the peoples of the world,.  Instead, these have come to be bywords that make people want to cleanse their mouths when they say them or they try to avoid saying them altogether.  The people of God have brought dishonor upon their name and the name of the LORD where they are supposed to bring glory to Him that will in turn cause them to be exalted as they humble themselves as His servants.  Daniel considers then what would bring the LORD more glory and restore His name among His people and among the nations.  Would it be for Him to deal harshly and justly with the people of Israel who deserve to be destroyed just like all the other nations, or would it be restore them, allow them to rebuild the Temple, rebuild Jerusalem and show them that He loves those who are unlovely and are undeserving of His love (because that is exactly the same situation the Gentiles are in, and it would speak volumes to them that if the LORD can forgive His people who have sinned so greatly against Him, perhaps there is a chance they too can be forgiven by Him).  Daniel asks that the timeline of the restoration of Israel not change and the LORD bring His promises to pass, not because His people deserve it, but for the sake of His great Name so that the nations would not accuse Him of making promises that He did not intend to keep and giving His people hope only to destroy them.  That is what they deserved, but God has something much greater in view where the history of the nation of Israel and their restoration is intertwined with the coming of Messiah and the gospel going forth to the nations.  Daniel doesn't completely understand this, but he's seen enough to know that God is concerned about His Name not just among Israel, but among the nations and that there is more at play here than the comfort of the people of Israel and Judah, though it all starts with them returning to the Land and rebuilding the Temple and Jerusalem.

Now, I skipped something on purpose, but we learn a little more about who Darius is at the beginning of this chapter.  He is the son (descendant) of Ahasuerus.  Does that name sound familiar to you?  If not, go back and read the book of Esther.  He is the king that took Esther to be his wife and Esther's uncle Mordechai was his closest advisor, and the feast of Purim was instituted because of the salvation that the LORD brought to the people when Haman desired to annihilate all of them (a kind of antichrist figure).  God preserved His people and brought the curses they deserved on the heads of those who wished to do evil to them.  I think Darius is making the connection that Daniel's God that saves him is the same God that saved Esther and her people, and it appears that the next king we'll read about in chapter 10 should make our ears perk up as we should know that name from somewhere else (and we've talked about it from the very first chapter of the book of Daniel).  We have a couple more sections to get through before we get there though, including one of the most important prophecies in the entire book of Daniel--Daniel's Seventy Weeks.