Daniel 9:4

2 in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the Lord through ^aJeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.

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

4 And I prayed to the Lord my God, and made confession, and said, “O ^aLord, great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and mercy with those who love Him, and with those who keep His commandments,

5 ^awe have sinned and committed iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments.

6 ^aNeither have we heeded Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings and our princes, to our fathers and all the people of the land.

7 O Lord, ^arighteousness belongs to You, but to us shame of face, as it is this day—to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all Israel, those near and those far off in all the countries to which You have driven them, because of the unfaithfulness which they have committed against You.

8 “O Lord, to us belongs shame of face, to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, because we have sinned against You.

9 ^aTo the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against Him.

10 We have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in His laws, which He set before us by His servants the prophets.

11 Yes, ^aall Israel has transgressed Your law, and has departed so as not to obey Your voice; therefore the curse and the oath written in the ^bLaw of Moses the servant of God have been poured out on us, because we have sinned against Him.

12 And He has ^aconfirmed His words, which He spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing upon us a great disaster; ^bfor under the whole heaven such has never been done as what has been done to Jerusalem.

13 ^a“As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us; ^byet we have not made our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities and understand Your truth.

14 Therefore the Lord has ^akept the disaster in mind, and brought it upon us; for ^bthe Lord our God is righteous in all the works which He does, though we have not obeyed His voice.

Commentaries:

Forerunner Commentary
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What Does Daniel 9:4 Mean?

Daniel 9:1-4

When Daniel prayed this, Judah had been scattered for about 70 years, and they were just about ready to go back to the Promised Land. God was just about ready to release them. Daniel was concerned due to what he saw in Babylon; it discomforted him. He likely saw some of the same conditions existing in Babylon that had caused the Jews to go into captivity in the first place almost 70 years before. His fears were justified because, when Ezra and Nehemiah went back to rebuild the Temple and then the wall around Jerusalem, very few Jews went back. In fact, it was such a small number by Ezra's count that he called a fast about it. He wanted to make sure that the people would be hidden on the way so that nobody would see them making the trip back to Judea and consider them "easy pickings."

When the church was finally begun in AD 31, Peter went to preach in Babylon because there was still such a large colony of Jews there. Indeed, they stayed in the world—in Babylon—and continued to multiply.

We can read between the lines of Daniel's prayer and understand that he was anxious over their return. Quite a number of commentators feel that this cannot be all Daniel prayed. Really, all that we have here is an outline of what he said, the high points. After praying it, Daniel went back to his office or to his home and jotted these things down so that they would be remembered. God undoubtedly inspired that. So we are actually seeing only the essence of what he said. He certainly went into a great deal more detail with God.

When we pray for repentance, we go into detail about things that we personally know about—especially those things that happen in our lives and perhaps those things that happen within God's work, of which we were aware. We do nothing about them then, but we certainly can ask God to forgive them.

Daniel begins by establishing between him and God that he, Daniel, understood that God is faithful. He keeps His covenant. He stands by Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. When something goes out of God's mouth, it does not come back to Him empty (Isaiah 55:11). There are no "hollow threats" with God! Do we understand that? His faithfulness is one of the things that makes Him God. He can always be depended upon. He is Jesus Christ—the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). "For I am the Lord, I do not change" (Malachi 3:6).

John W. Ritenbaugh
Avoiding Superficiality

Other Forerunner Commentary entries containing Daniel 9:4:

Jeremiah 11:14
Jeremiah 14:11-12
Jeremiah 15:1
Daniel 9:24-27
Luke 2:25
Luke 2:30-32
Luke 2:36-38
1 Corinthians 11:28

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What Does Daniel 9:4 Mean?

A Verse and a Thought,Every Morning

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