The Messiah and Son of Man in Daniel

The vision of Daniel 7,
from Beatus of Santo Domingo de Silos

Daniel is the only book of the Old Testament to use "Messiah" as a personal name, without the definite article (much as we use "Christ" today), and is thus the only place where the word "Messiah" occurs in most English translations of the Old Testament. (Elsewhere, the word is rendered "anointed," which is what it means, and does not always refer to the prophesied figure who would later come to be known as the Messiah.)

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Daniel 9:24-27

If Daniel is unusually clear in calling the Messiah the Messiah, that is unfortunately just about the only thing that is clear about his Messianic prophecy (which he presents as something that Gabriel told him). Here it is.

[24] Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy. [25] Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.

[26] And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined. [27] And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.

Prophecies such as these are a happy hunting ground for chronology cranks, the most illustrious of whom was Sir Isaac Newton. By Newton's reckoning, it was in 458 BC that Artaxerxes I gave the decree to rebuild Jerusalem, and it was exactly 70 "weeks of years" (i.e., 490 years) later, in AD 33, that Jesus was crucified and resurrected. (Of course Daniel also says the Messiah shall be "cut off" in what would in Newton's system be 24 BC, before Jesus was born.) The Internet is full of would-be Newtons with their own refinements of or alternatives to his chronology, but I shall resist the temptation to wade into that fray myself. I simply don't believe that precisely dated prophecies of the distant future are possible, and at any rate chronology is secondary. The questions at hand are: (1) what did Daniel say the Messiah would do? and (2) did Jesus do that?

At first glance, "to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness" sounds like an acceptable description of Jesus' mission -- but Daniel (or Gabriel) actually presents this as a list of things that the people of Israel must do, and the last item on the list is "to anoint the most Holy" -- that is, to acknowledge and "crown" the Messiah, anointing being the cultural equivalent of coronation. These are not things the Messiah is going to do, but things the people must do in order to be worthy of the Messiah. Except for this passage, the rest of the prophecy deals with the destruction of Jerusalem and desecration of the temple (presumably with allusion to the outrages of Antiochus Epiphanes) and the subsequent restoration and rebuilding. Some may see in "he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease" a reference to how Jesus' final sacrifice would put an end to the cult of animal sacrifice, but in context the cessation of sacrifice is temporary, and is a result of "the overspreading of abominations."

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Daniel 7

While Daniel 7 is not an explicitly Messianic prophecy per se, it is relevant because it provides the prophetic context in which Jesus' contemporaries would have understood his references to himself as the "son of man."

[2] Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, . . . [3] And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another. [4] The first was like a lion, . . . [5] . . . a second, like to a bear, . . . [6] . . . another, like a leopard, . . . [7] . . . and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: . . .

[9] I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. [10] A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him: thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened. [11] . . . I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. [12] As concerning the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives were prolonged for a season and time.

[13] I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. [14] And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

Rashi's interpretation of this is that the four beasts are respectively Babylon, the Medes and Persians, Alexander's Hellenistic empire, and Rome -- four subsequent conquerors of the Jews -- that the Ancient of Days is God, and that the Son of Man is Messiah. Most Christians read it the same way, understanding the Messiah to be Jesus at his Second Coming. (Mormons differ slightly from others in understanding the Ancient of Days to be Adam rather than God.)

(Incidentally, the great beast of Revelation, with its seven heads and ten horns, is an amalgamation of Daniel's four beasts, which have among them a total of seven heads and ten horns.)

"Son of man" simply means "man" -- cf. the plural "children of men," or the way "son of Adam" is used in the Narnia stories. In contrast to the four great beasts that have preceded it, this latest apparition is of a human being. Elsewhere in the Bible, particularly in the Book of Ezekiel, "son of man" is used in the sense of "mortal man," as contrasted with God. Jesus' use of the title "son of man" would have been understood as alluding to Daniel (Mark and Matthew even have him refer to the son of man coming "with the clouds of heaven," making the allusion unmistakable) while at the same time maintaining plausible deniability; no one could accuse him of blasphemy for calling himself a son of Adam, a mere mortal.

What did Daniel himself understand his vision to mean? Well, it so happens that he asked for, and received, an interpretation from "one of them that stood by" (presumably an angel).

[15] I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and the visions of my head troubled me. [16] I came near unto one of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all this. So he told me, and made me know the interpretation of the things. 

[17] These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth. [18] But the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever. . . . 

[21] I beheld, and [one of the horns of the fourth beast] made war with the saints, and prevailed against them; [22] Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom. . . . [27] And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.

This certainly sounds as if the Son of Man represents "the saints of the Most High" collectively, rather than a single individual, the Messiah. After the successive dominance of the four heathen kingdoms represented by the beasts, God will intervene and give dominion over the world to Israel, a holy and therefore fully human kingdom. This kingdom will presumably have a king, who is the Messiah, but that is not emphasized in this prophecy.