Daniel prays for his people
1Darius was from the land of Media and he became king after Ahasuerus. In the first year after Darius had become king of Babylon, 2I, Daniel, read in the books of the prophets that the Lord spoke to the prophet Jeremiah. The Lord told him that the enemies would destroy Jerusalem and for 70 years there would be only heaps of stones where Jerusalem had been before. 3I prayed to the Lord my God and I fasted and mourned.
4I prayed to the Lord my God and I confessed my sins and the sins of my people. I said: ‘Lord, You are the Great God. Everyone must fear You and honour You. You keep the covenant with the people who love You and do what You say, because You love them. 5We have sinned. We have done wrong. We did not listen to You, and we didn't do what You told us to do. 6We did not listen to the prophets. They were your servants. They told your message to our kings, to our officials, to our forefathers and to all the people in the land.
7You have done right but we have done wrong and we are ashamed. We, the people of Judah and Jerusalem, all the Israelites, are ashamed. We have been unfaithful to You and You chased us away to other lands, near and far. 8We are ashamed, Lord, because we have sinned_against You. Our kings, our princes and our forefathers have sinned_against You. 9We did not listen to You, but You, Lord our God, are gracious. You forgive our sins.
10You are the Lord our God, but we did not listen to You. You sent the prophets, your servants, to us. They gave us your laws but we have not lived as your laws say.
11All the Israelites disobeyed You, and they did not listen to what You said. That is why You did what You said You would do. You said You would punish us if we sinned_against You. That is what Moses, your servant, wrote in the laws. 12You did what You had told us and our kings. You made the people of Jerusalem suffer badly. You punished them more than You did anywhere else in the world. 13Moses wrote all of this in his laws and we suffered a lot, but we continued to do wrong and we forgot that You are always right. We did not ask You to be good to us again. We did not turn to You, the Lord our God. 14And You, Lord our God, always do what is right. You do what You have said. We did not listen to You and we have suffered a lot.
15O Lord our God, You saved your people from Egypt long ago when You did those miracles. That is why all the people know your name today. But now we have sinned. We have done wrong. 16Lord, You saved your people long ago. Please save us now. Stop being angry with your city, Jerusalem, and your holy_mountain. We and our forefathers have sinned. We have done wrong and that is why all the nations around us are laughing at Jerusalem and at us, your people.
17And now, God, please listen to me. I am your servant and I pray: Please be good to your temple that was destroyed. Do it because you are God. 18My God, please listen. Look at us and at Jerusalem, your city. No one lives there. We pray that You will be good to us again, not because we have done something good, but because You care a lot for us. 19Lord, please listen. Lord, please forgive us. Lord, please do it, and don't wait. My God, please do it because You are God, and because this city and this nation belong to You.’
The 70 years
20I prayed and talked to the Lord. I confessed my sins and the sins of my people, the Israelites. I prayed to the Lord my God, I prayed for the holy_mountain of my God. 21I was praying, when Gabriel came flying to me. Gabriel is the angel that I had seen at the Ulai River. He came to me late that afternoon. 22He talked to me and he helped me to understand the things that I had seen. He said: ‘Daniel, I have come to explain to you what you have seen. 23God loves you and when you started to pray, He did what you asked. I have come to tell you what God said. You must listen and understand what you have seen.
24God has decided that your people and the people of the Holy City must suffer for 70 weeks because they did not want to listen to God. In these 70 weeks God will punish them and then He will forgive their sin. Then they will always do what is right to each other. The things that the prophets saw, and what they said, will happen. The people will build the temple again and they will consecrate it to God.
25Daniel, you must understand this: God said his people must come back to Jerusalem and build it again, and after 70 weeks the anointed man will come to be king. The people will build the city, the streets and channels around the city to stop the enemies. The walls of the city will stand for 62 weeks, but everyone will suffer in that time. 26After 62 weeks someone will kill the anointed one and then there will be no king.
Another king and his men will come and they will destroy the city and the temple. They will run over the city like water that flows over it. The war will continue until the enemies have destroyed everything. This is what God has planned to happen. 27The new king will make an agreement with a lot of people. This agreement will be for 7 weeks, but after 3 and a half days, he will tell the priests to stop sacrificing and stop bringing gifts to the temple. He will put something wicked in the temple that will make God very angry, something that will destroy everything. But God has decided that He will punish that king very badly when the time is right.’
