" Abomination of Desolation"
What is the abomination of desolation? Can the Bible provide us the meaning? Is this prophecy only for the people of Daniel's or Christ's day, or is it a warning for a time yet ahead of us?
The abomination in the book of Daniel
When Jesus spoke of this abomination of desolation, He was referring to Daniel 11:31 and 12:11. God revealed to Daniel that "there shall be a time of anguish, such as has never occurred since nations first came into existence" (Daniel 12:1, New Revised Standard Version). Then, in verse 12, Daniel learns that the abomination involves the cessation of daily sacrifices.
A key to understanding prophecy is the principle of duality-that some prophecies can have more than one fulfillment. This means a prophecy may be partially fulfilled but will not be completely fulfilled until a later time. To understand Christ's words we must look at three fulfillments-two historic and one future-of prophecies about the abomination of desolation.
When the Babylonian ruler Nebuchadnezzar invaded the kingdom of Judah in 606 B.C., he took many of the most intelligent of the Jewish youths to Babylon to serve in his court. Daniel, who wrote the book that bears his name around 535 B.C., was taken to Babylon with the first of the Jewish captives and trained to serve in Nebuchadnezzar's government.
Daniel 8 records a remarkably specific prophecy of events that would affect Jerusalem and Judea. Daniel saw a vision of a ram with power to stand against all other animals (verses 1-4). A goat with a "notable horn" would destroy the ram (verses 5-7). The goat's horn was to grow strong but would break off and be replaced by four horns (verse 8). Out of the four horns would come a small horn that would grow and invade the "Glorious Land," establishing the "transgression of desolation" (verses 9-14).
We then read that God sent the angel Gabriel to reveal to Daniel the meaning of this vision. We find that the ram represents the kingdom of Media and Persia and the goat the kingdom of Greece. The goat's large horn is the first Grecian king, who was to precede four more kings (verses 15-22).
Just as God had revealed to Daniel, the Greeks, under Alexander the Great, overthrew the Persian Empire in 331 B.C. When Alexander died in 323, his empire was divided among four of his generals:
� Ptolemy, who ruled Egypt, part of Syria and Judea.
� Seleucus, who ruled the other part of Syria, Babylon and the territory east to India.
� Lysimachus, who ruled Asia Minor.
Historians record that the four kingdoms rising out of Alexander's empire eventually coalesced into a northern kingdom ruled by the Seleucids and a southern kingdom ruled by the Ptolemies.
According to Daniel's vision, these four kings were to be followed by a "small horn." This horn was to take away the daily sacrifices of the temple (verse 11). Of course, at the time of Daniel's prophecy no temple existed in Jerusalem and no sacrifices were being offered; the temple had been destroyed in the Babylonian invasions several decades before Daniel recorded this prophecy.
However, shortly after Daniel wrote his book his fellow refugees from Judah were allowed to return to their homeland. There they rebuilt Jerusalem and the temple and renewed the temple sacrifices.
Daniel's vision now sweeps across time some 31/2 centuries into the future, to 167 B.C. At that time one of the Seleucid rulers, Antiochus IV (Antiochus Epiphanes), invaded Judah (Daniel 8:23-27).
The first partial fulfillment
The noncanonical but historical book of 1 Maccabees describes the actions of Antiochus Epiphanes. "The king then issued a proclamation to his whole kingdom that all were to become a single people, each nation renouncing its particular customs . . . The king also sent edicts by messenger to Jerusalem and the towns of Judah, directing them to adopt customs foreign to the country, banning burnt offerings, sacrifices and libations from the sanctuary, profaning Sabbaths and feasts, defiling the sanctuary and everything holy, building altars, shrines and temples for idols, . . . so that they should forget the Law and revoke all observance of it. Anyone not obeying the king's command was to be put to death" (1 Maccabees 1:41, 44-50, New Jerusalem Bible).
Punishment was swift and brutal. Women who had their sons circumcised were killed and their babies hung around their necks (verses 60-61). Anyone continuing in faithful obedience to God was executed (verses 62-64).
Not content merely to stop the sacrifices, Antiochus desecrated the temple. ". . . A bearded image of the pagan deity [Jupiter Olympus] . . . [was] set up upon the Temple altar. The Jews popularly spoke of this as �the abomination of desolation.' Greek soldiers and their paramours performed licentious heathen rites in the very Temple courts. Swine were sacrificed on the altar" (Charles Pfeiffer, Between the Testaments, 1974, p. 81).
Daniel (in Daniel 8:14) hears that these desecrations will continue for "two thousand three hundred days" or 2,300 "evenings and mornings" (NIV, NRSV, REB and other translations). The temple service included a morning and evening sacrifice. Twenty-three hundred morning and evening sacrifices amounted to 1,150 days. Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated the temple and halted sacrifices in 167 B.C. Judas Maccabeus resumed the sacrifices in 164 B.C. after cleansing and rededicating the temple. These events are commemorated in the Jewish community by the Feast of Hanukkah.
Antiochus's actions partially fulfilled this prophecy.
Notice, however, that Daniel's prophecy of the abomination of desolation also has a fulfillment at "the appointed time of the end" (verse 19, NRSV).
