Chapter 159

¹ When these things had been spoken, Daniel says: “And I looked, and behold, two other men stood, one on this bank of the river and one on that bank of the river. And they spoke to the man clothed in linen who stood above the water of the river, and said to him: ‘How long until the end of the wonderful things of which you have spoken?’ And I heard the man clothed in the linen, who was above the water of the river, and he raised his right hand and his left hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever, that it would be for a time and times and half a time; when the scattering is accomplished, they shall know all these things.”

² Who, then, were the two men standing beside the bank of the river but the Law and the Prophets?

³ And who was the one standing above the water but this very one concerning whom they themselves proclaimed of old, who was destined in the last times to be openly attested by the Father at the Jordan and to be shown plainly to the people by John—he who wears the writer’s case about his loins and is clothed in the linen, the many-colored tunic?

⁴ These inquire of him, knowing that to him was given all rule and authority, in order to learn from him precisely when he is about to bring judgment upon the world and when the things spoken by him shall be fulfilled.

⁵ And he, wishing to persuade them in every way, raised his right hand and his left hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever.

⁶ Who swore, and by whom? The Son by the Father, saying that the Father lives forever: “Truly, for a time and times and half a time; when the scattering is accomplished, they shall know all these things.”

⁷ Now his stretching out his two hands—by this he displayed the passion;

⁸ but his saying “for a time and times and half a time” signified the three and a half years of the Antichrist. For by “a time” he means a year, by “times” two years, and by “half a time” half a year; these are the thousand two hundred and ninety days which Daniel foretold.