And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince who standeth for the children of thy people; and there shall be a time of distress, such as never was since there was a nation until that time. And at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that is found written in the book.
Daniel's last chapter opens with three things at once. A prince stands up, the worst trouble in history breaks out, and a people is rescued. So who is Michael, whose "people" are these, and what is this book?
The phrase "at that time" points back to the events at the close of chapter 11. One writer follows the clauses to fix the moment:
The words, "At that time shall arise Michael," point to the period of the events described in Daniel 11:36-45. They are followed by the statement that "there shall be a time of trouble" — the time of unspeakable sorrow for the Jews in the land before Christ appears. Then it says, "at that time your people shall be delivered." As we know from other scriptures, this is at the close of the tribulation, and so after the destruction of both Antichrist and the Assyrian.
Defending this people was already Michael's regular work. What changes here is how he acts:
Up to now there has been only providential control — Michael resisting this prince or that. Now he will stand up for them, taking up their case and putting down their enemies for good; but even then, not without a terrible struggle. Defending them was his regular task.
Scripture names only one archangel. One writer will not go past what the text says, and points to how God governs now:
He appears to be the prince of the angels, or the archangel. People are used to speaking of archangels, but the word of God mentions only one, the chief of the angels. I say nothing about who he is, because Scripture says nothing; but whatever the answer, God is stepping in here through an angel, in His providence.… Right now God's providence is a hidden government; but later Christ will rule openly and publicly, when everything will be seen — a government direct from God.
One writer reads Michael's action alongside Revelation 12. There Michael and his angels throw Satan out of heaven, and the trouble on earth follows:
Michael, helped by his angels, will throw out the great dragon, the devil, and his angels. They will be forced down to the earth. Once Satan and his angels are thrown out, the great tribulation begins (Rev. 12:12). Michael will then stand up in another sense and take a definite part in delivering Daniel's people.
Yet Satan is not the only one at work. The same suffering has a second cause:
Satan is the prime mover of all the sorrow that Daniel's people will have to pass through. But remember that God uses it as His rod of judgment. He is punishing His people for their crowning sin: the rejection of their Messiah.
How bad is this trouble? The verse measures it against all of history:
The trouble will be not only "great." None before it was so great, and none after it will ever be so great again. Clearly there can be only one such time. This is important. An hour is coming that goes beyond everything the earth has passed through, and no later hour can equal it.
Apply that test to history. Israel has suffered crushing blows, but one thing never followed them:
Yet it is well known that since the captivity in Babylon, whatever trouble has come upon them — and how many and varied their trials have been! — they have never been rescued. Nebuchadnezzar's blows were heavy, and in the end he carried them off into captivity. It was worse still when Titus the Roman destroyed the city and the temple… Can any believer doubt that Daniel reveals a deliverance that has never yet happened?
Not everyone in the nation comes through. The book decides who does, and the rescue reaches deeper than the nation:
Whether they are in the land, or come out of the dust of the earth, or come from among the other nations, none will be delivered except those who are the objects of God's purposes, that is, those "found written in the book."… For the rest, this is not a merely national deliverance, but much more. Those who are delivered will be born of God. Their rise will have a spiritual character as well as a national one.
- Timing. "At that time" ties the verse to the end of Daniel 11 — the last stretch of sorrow before Christ appears.
- Cause. Satan is thrown down from heaven and drives the fury. God uses the same trouble as His rod on a people who rejected their Messiah.
- Defender. Michael has long guarded them quietly in God's providence. Now he stands up and takes their case in hand.
- Scale. Nothing before this trouble matched it, and nothing after it will. So no past disaster fits — not Nebuchadnezzar's, not Titus's.
- Result. Deliverance comes, but only to those written in the book — a rescue national in form and spiritual at its root.
And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame, to everlasting contempt.
Daniel's last vision ends with an awakening. Many who have been sleeping in the dust rise, but not all to the same end. Do these words describe bodies leaving graves, or a nation coming back from the death of exile? And why does one awakening lead to two opposite outcomes?
This verse belongs with verse 1, which promises deliverance for Daniel's own nation.
The angel, as it appears to me, speaks here of the deliverance of the people brought back from among the nations. "Many of them," and so on; it is only a question of the people of Daniel. No doubt judgments will fall on the nations. But the angel is speaking of those God is most directly occupied with, as the object of His thoughts — and that means only the people of Daniel. Remember Daniel 10:14: "Now I have come to make you understand what is to happen to your people in the latter days." "Many of those who sleep" means a multitude of Jews in general, but not all. They will appear on the scene.
"Sleep" and "dust" say where these people have been: out of sight, and away from their nation's troubles.
Deliverance will come not only for the Jews in the Holy Land, who have seen all the conflicts between Antichrist and the king of the north. It will come for many that sleep as well — that is, many who had not yet come forward. They had been apart from the troubles of their nation, in total obscurity, as it were sleeping in the dust of the earth. … The passage has no direct reference to a bodily resurrection. That resurrection simply supplies a figure for the national revival of Israel. Israel is described as sleeping in the dust, to express how deep their degradation is.
Some read the verse as everyone rising together for one judgment. Its own wording resists that in three ways.
This is not a general resurrection — and no other passage of Scripture speaks of one. If it were, the words would not be "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth." However many the "many" are, they cannot be all the dead. It is not the first resurrection either, for some awake "to shame and everlasting contempt." And it is not the resurrection of judgment, because others awake "to everlasting life."
Reading "awake" as a picture is not a way of dodging the text. The prophets used it that way, and Ezekiel explained his own vision.
The Old Testament keeps using the figure of "awaking" in a moral sense (see Isaiah 51:17, Isaiah 52:1, and so on). The New Testament uses it in a striking way too. The apostle, for example, writes to the Ephesians, "Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you" (Ephesians 5:14). No one could doubt the figurative sense there. Second, the prophet Ezekiel uses the figure of resurrection clearly to mean a national revival. We say "clearly" because Ezekiel's own application of his vision shows beyond question what he meant (see Ezekiel 37:1-14).
A revival is not a blessing to everyone in it. The same awakening ends two very different ways.
It is a figurative resurrection of the people, buried as a nation among the nations. In this revival it is said of those who rise, "some to shame and everlasting contempt." This is what will happen to the Jews. Of those brought out from among the nations, some will enjoy eternal life. Others will face shame and everlasting contempt; Isaiah 66:24.
The phrase "everlasting life" sets Daniel's picture beside a later and fuller one.
Eternal life is mentioned only twice in the Old Testament: "life forevermore" (Psalm 133:3) and "everlasting life" (Daniel 12:2). Both times Messiah's day, which is "the last time," is in view. Daniel 12 speaks of a national resurrection for Israel, and of how they will rise up from among the dust of the nations. But in John's account we have people in view one by one, and the resurrection is not figurative but living and real.
- Whose — The awakening belongs to Daniel's own nation, at the time of their deliverance. It is not all mankind at once.
- Where from — They sleep "in the dust": hidden away in obscurity and degradation among the nations. Ezekiel pictured the same revival.
- How many — "Many," never "all"; the word itself rules out a single general resurrection of every human being.
- Which way — One awakening, two ends: some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting contempt. So it is not the resurrection of the just only, and not the resurrection of the wicked only.
- How long — "Everlasting life" appears only twice in the whole Old Testament. Both times it looks ahead to Messiah's day.
And they that are wise shall shine as the brightness of the expanse; and they that turn the many to righteousness as the stars, for ever and ever.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And thou, Daniel, close the words, and seal the book, till the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.
The last words spoken to Daniel are not more prophecy. They are an instruction about the prophecy: close it, seal it, leave it until the time of the end. Two questions follow. Why would God hide His own revelation? And what does the closing line about running to and fro and growing knowledge describe?
The issue was not the message but the timing:
Daniel is told here that what he had seen and heard certainly came from God. Even so, none of it was for use at that time. All was to be a sealed book until a distant day; in a word, until the time of the end.
The seal is the mark of secrecy, and it puts this book alongside others in Scripture that are shut:
Once more, the seal was the sign of secrecy. A book sealed could not be opened and its contents read — as in Revelation 5:1-2; Revelation 10:4; Daniel 12:4, 9.
Commentators read this verse alongside the last chapter of Revelation, where John receives the opposite command. That contrast explains why we can read what was shut to Daniel:
In contrast with this instruction to Daniel, John is told at the close of the book of Revelation not to seal "the words of the prophecy of this book." The reason given is that "the time is near" (Rev. 22:10)... How, then, do we have the means to understand what was to be sealed "to the time of the end"? The answer is that this period has arrived for Christians. The death of Christ, which took place "at the end of the ages," began the time of the end. So for Christians, who have the Holy Spirit, nothing is hidden. The time of the end has come, and through the Spirit of God Daniel's book is unsealed.
The reason lies in the calling the church stands in:
The whole calling of the church is at the time of the end. From the day that the church began its actual existence here below, it was the time of the end... She is above times and seasons, though she knows them; she has nothing to do with dates, or signs, or outward events.
So the question moves from the book to the reader:
This shows us clearly that understanding the words of God is a spiritual thing, and not a matter of mere intellect. If it were, the wicked might understand as much as the righteous... All the learning in the world can never make a man understand the Bible. But if a soul is born of God, he can understand anything God reveals. He only needs someone to lead him on and teach him more fully.
The fault, then, can lie with the reader:
If we fail to grasp what God told Daniel, it is either because we are not in the state of soul that gives an open ear and full subjection to His word, or because we have not given serious attention to what He has revealed.
Commentators differ on the last clause. Some see it in the travel and knowledge of the modern world, and warn that the gain is smaller than it looks:
Both these things mark our age in a striking way. Our powers of movement have increased beyond the dreams of our ancestors — on land and sea, and in the air. But it is all to and fro. We fly there, and then back we come to our starting point, and end where we began. The increase of knowledge also is enormous... Knowledge — yes: but wisdom — no. Man is just the same sinful creature as of old — deceived by the adversary.
Others take both the running and the knowledge as spiritual, tied to a coming crisis:
When the crisis comes, as another prophet tells us, many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase. That knowledge is surely spiritual and higher than knowledge of the stars or the fossils, of chemistry or of electricity. The need of it is certainly as great as it is all-important.
So how should believers live in such an age?
We live in a time of much running "to and fro," and of great increase of knowledge, as mentioned in Daniel 12:4. But our part is to "Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for Him" (older translations: "Rest in the LORD"). This will deliver us from the restlessness of men's futile ambitions.
- Sealed — Daniel's final revelation came from God, yet God closed it and set it aside for a later day.
- Unsealed — John receives the opposite command. For Christians the time of the end has come, so what was shut to Daniel is open now.
- Spiritual — the book opens to the wise, not the learned. Understanding God's words is not a matter of intellect.
- Disputed — commentators differ over "run to and fro." Some see modern travel and science. Others see spiritual knowledge spreading as the crisis nears.
- Restful — in an age of movement and information, our part is to be still and wait patiently for the Lord.