The 70th Jubilee and Daniel’s 70th week may have started in 2017. If so, the Great Tribulation will start at Passover in March 2021 and God’s kingdom on earth will begin on the Day of Atonement in October 2024.
The remainder of this post details and explains these things.
What is the Jubilee?
The Biblical Jubilee year happens once every 49 years. It starts on a Day of Atonement–the holiest day on God’s calendar–when the High Priest entered God’s presence to ‘cover’ the sins of the whole nation.
Old Covenant Jubilee
Under the Old Covenant, Jubilee was the year when all debts were completely erased and all properties in Israel were restored to their original owners.
New Covenant Jubilee
For New Covenant disciples, I believe Jubilee is the time when we’ll receive fantastic spiritual blessings, including complete deliverance from our sinful nature, glorification, immortality, and our eternal, heavenly inheritance in God’s kingdom.
God’s Pattern and Sequence of Events is Revealed in God’s ‘Appointed Times’
God established these 7 ‘appointed times’ for His people in Leviticus chapter 23:
- Passover
- Unleavened Bread
- Firstfruits
- Pentecost
- Trumpets
- Atonement
- Tabernacles
Jesus literally fulfilled the first 4 (Passover, Unleavened Bread, Firstfruits, and Pentecost) on the exact days and times while the Jews were celebrating them.
Therefore, it’s reasonable to assume God will fulfill the remaining 3 (Trumpets, Atonement, and Tabernacles) in like manner, exactly on their annual anniversaries in our future.
The Biblical Jubilee
“And you shall count off seven sabbaths of years—seven times seven years—so that the seven sabbaths of years amount to forty-nine years. Then you are to sound the trumpet far and wide on the tenth day of the seventh month, on the Day of Atonement. You shall sound it throughout your land. So you are to consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty in the land for all its inhabitants. It shall be your Jubilee, when each of you is to return to his property and to his clan.” (Leviticus 25:8-10)
The year of Jubilee starts every 49th anniversary of the Day of Atonement.
The 50th year is the same as (overlaps) the first year in the next 49-year cycle. If this is confusing, please watch the video below.
When is the next Jubilee year?
If you do a Google search on this topic you’ll see there’s a lot of ignorance, disagreement, and confusion about this question. It’s a mystery.
According to Leviticus 25:1, the Biblical Jubilee cycle started when Israel entered the Promised Land.
I discovered a BibleArchaeology.org article which convincingly proves that Joshua led Israel to enter the Promised Land in 1406BC.
2024
Based on this 1406BC start date and a 49-year Jubilee cycle, the next Jubilee will be in the year 2024, and it will be the 70th Jubilee.
Here are my calculations:
2024AD + 1406BC = 3430 years.
3430/49=70
The pattern and dates fit exactly, just as they would if they matched God’s plan.
There is debate about whether the Jubilee cycle is 49 or 50 years. For a compelling presentation why the 49-year Jubilee cycle is correct, see Jubilee Year Cycle (49 or 50?)
2017 and a 50-Year Cycle
Important events happened for the nation of Israel 50-years apart, in 1917 and 1967, making people wonder if something big would happen in 2017, 50 years after 1967 and 100 years after 1917.
Now that 2017 is past, I don’t know of anything ‘big’ that happened; at least not on the same level as the 1917 Balfour Declaration or the 1967 Six-Day War. But that doesn’t mean nothing happened; it only means that we don’t know.
People compare this 50-year cycle with Leviticus 25:11, which says, “You shall have the fiftieth year as a Jubilee” and assume the Jubilee cycle is every 50 years, and so 1917 and 1967 must be Jubilee years because of the historical events that occurred in these years.
As I’ll show in the 49-Year Jubilee Cycle section below, I don’t believe a 50-year Jubilee cycle is correct, but I do believe there is a 50-year cycle in God’s plan, and that it’s significant.
The apostle Peter wrote,
“Beloved, do not let this one thing escape your notice: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.” (2 Peter 3:8)
6000 years is therefore six days, and this reminds us of the 6 days of creation before God rested on the 7th day.
Most Bible teachers believe this means mankind will have 6000 years before the ‘7th-day’ millennial reign of Christ begins. 6000 is evenly divisible by 50, resulting in 120. 6000/50 = 120
The number 120 will immediately remind Bible readers of what God said in Genesis 6:3, after 200 angels cohabited and produced the nephilim with human women, resulting in the judgement of Noah’s flood:
“My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days shall be 120 years.” (Genesis 6:3)
Many Bible teachers believe 120 years is symbolic of 120 50-year cycles, totaling 6000 years…the 6 days Peter referred to.
120 x 50 = 6000, or 6 days.
For all these reasons I believe a 50-year cycle is both real and significant in God’s plan, but it’s not the same as the Jubilee cycle.
Regardless, it’s very interesting that the 50-year 1917/1967/2017 cycle happens to coincide with the possible beginning of Daniel’s 70th week and fulfillment of the 70th Jubilee in 2024 when using the 49-year cycle.
The 49-year Jubilee Cycle
I’m convinced the 49-year cycle is the correct view, with each 50th year overlapping the 1st year of the next 49-year cycle. There’s a detailed explanation of this rationale in Dr. Gavin Finley’s Jubilee Cycles chart and video below.
70 Weeks and Jubilee Cycles Video
Please click this link to watch Dr. Gavin Finley’s video: 70 Weeks Prophecy – Jubilee Cycles and the 70 Weeks
So, does the year 2017 have any significance? It might…If Jubilee starts on the Day of Atonement in October 2024, that’ll be exactly 7 (lunar) years after the Day of Atonement on September 30, 2017.
If so, we’ll know Daniel’s 70th week started during the Day of Atonement on 9/30/2017.
When Does Daniel’s 70th Week Start?
Daniel 9:27 famously states, “And he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week“. Most people believe “he” refers to the Antichrist, who will make a ‘covenant with many’ for 7 years. They teach the ‘covenant with many’ is a 7-year peace treaty.
But, others believe “he” refers to Jesus, who confirmed the New Covenant in His own blood, poured out for many.
This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. (Matthew 26:28, also Mark 14:24)
If the New Covenant in Jesus’ blood is the ‘covenant with many’ prophesied in Daniel 9:27, we probably won’t know when God starts Daniel’s 70th week time-clock until 3 and 1/2 years later, when the Antichrist publicly commits “the abomination of desolation.”
But if my calculations are correct and the 70th Jubilee is in 2024, and if this Jubilee is the promised fulfillment of the Year of Jubilee, then Daniel’s 70th week (the final 7 years of this age) started on the Day of Atonement on 9/30/2017.
There is one final piece in the puzzle to consider. As you can see in the chart below, the span of 7 years in Daniel’s 70th week must have 86 moons, not 87. The 7 year span from 2017-2024 does meet this criteria.
Click the link under the chart for the details about this 86-month requirement.
The Abomination of Desolation Starts the Great Tribulation
Finally, while it’s extremely interesting to study these things, we can’t be sure of the timing until we see the abomination of desolation, midway through Daniel’s 70th week.
So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination of desolation,’ described by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let no one on the housetop come down to retrieve anything from his house. And let no one in the field return for his cloak.
How miserable those days will be for pregnant and nursing mothers! Pray that your flight will not occur in the winter or on the Sabbath. For at that time there will be great tribulation, unmatched from the beginning of the world until now, and never to be seen again. If those days had not been cut short, nobody would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, those days will be shortened. (Matthew 24:15-22)
The Greater Exodus
The abomination of desolation will be our signal to escape in the Greater Exodus. More than 2500 years ago the prophet Jeremiah wrote that our future exodus will totally eclipse the famous exodus under Moses. God will bring His children home from every nation worldwide.
“Yet behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when men will no longer say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought the Israelites up out of the land of Egypt.’ Instead they will say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought the Israelites up out of the land of the north and all the other lands to which He had banished them.’ For I will return them to their land that I gave to their ancestors.” (Jeremiah 16:14-15)
Conclusion
God’s end-time dates are a mystery. If the Great Tribulation starts in 2021 we’ll know Daniel’s 70th Week started in 2017.
There are many other events I believe will happen before the abomination of desolation, so when we start seeing these other events you shouldn’t be surprised.
Finally, we are certainly living at the end of the age, and troubles are already increasing for everyone on earth.
The good news is that God shall defeat all His enemies and God’s people have nothing to worry about.
“When these things begin to happen, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Luke 21:28)
There is nothing man can do to us if we are in Christ.
“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
“For Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35-39)
My advice is to be watchful. Abide in God’s Spirit continuously, listening and obeying His voice, and striving to make yourself ready for the Lord’s imminent appearing.