Daily Devotionals
Day by Day Devotional - Year 5 of 5
Devotional: May 16th

Daniel 11:29-45

"No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation" (2 Peter 1:20). From v. 36 onwards, as the Lord’s own words confirm, the events described are still future; intermediate events serve as a kind of preview and introduction to what is still to take place. Thus Antiochus Epiphanes, obviously referred to in v. 31, the king of Syria who, to avenge himself against the Jews, erected an idol-altar to Zeus in the Temple and then sacrificed a sow on it, is mainly a type of the future king of the North, or the Assyrian. To this prophetic personage vv. 40-45 are applicable, whilst vv. 36-39 concern the Anti-Christ, "the king", who in this same time of the end will cause himself to be worshipped at Jerusalem. He will be the awaited super-man, reuniting and fulfilling in his person, under Satan’s domination, all the perverse, proud tendencies of the human heart. He will "do according to his will" (in absolute contrast to Christ – Hebrews 10:7); he will utter the worst blasphemies against God, scorn His Christ, raise himself above all other by trade, violence and lies. Such is the spirit of Anti-Christ which it is not difficult to identify already in the world around us.