Daniel

Daniel Chapter 12

9. And he said: Go Daniel, for shut and sealed are these things until the time of the Keitz.

10. Many shall be purified, whitened, and refined; the wicked shall do wickedly, and all of the wicked shall not understand, but the wise will understand.

11. And from the time of the ceasing of the eternal, and to giving of the desolate abomination, one thousand, two hundred and ninety days.

12. Happy is the one who waits, and arrives; to days - a thousand, three hundred, and thirty five.

13. And you, go to the Keitz, and rest and rise for your fate, at Keitz HaYamin.

These verses have intrigued over the ages as they seem to point to the final Keitz. So let us ask a few questions:

• The eternal, this is the word used for the daily offering in the Beit HaMikdash. This may be referring to the cessation of the bringing of the Tamid offering.
• If so, the first or the second Beit HaMikdash?
• The Tamid offering, according to certain opinions, did not cease 3 weeks before the destruction on the 17th of Tamuz, but rather some years prior (in the month of Tamuz for both Batei Mikdash). See Rashi on Daniel for example.
• The second item mentioned, the abominate desolation, is most likely related to the same essence as the Tamid mentioned.
• There are two numbers given, 1290 and 1335 days. Are these days or years? Ibn Ezra, for example, takes them to be days, whereas Ramban takes them to be years.
• If days are really years, why didn't the angel just say years?
• There seem to be 3 options regarding these two numbers:

1. They are two independent counts. This seems not to be true since the 1290 is given a starting point, 1335 is not.
2. The 1290 and the 1335 have the same starting point, where there is only 45 days/years extra to achieve the "happy is the one who waits" result.
3. The 1290 and the 1335 are two consecutive periods of time.

דניאל יב:ג- והמסכלים יזהרו כזהר הרקיע, ומצדיקי הרבים ככוכבים לעולם ועד