What Does Daniel 8:14 Mean?
And he said to me, "Until evening and morning, two thousand three hundred, and the set-apart place will be aligned."
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.THE KEY
The verse’s word for cleansing comes from the root of alignment, so the sanctuary’s restoration is a return to right order.
THE MEANING
For the reader now, the verse holds a measured span and an endpoint: the set-apart place is restored to alignment. Restoration is concrete here, a sacred place returning to right order.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse loosens the belief that what has been defiled can never return to right order; it names alignment as the sanctuary’s endpoint.
THE ROOT
וְנִצְדַּק
wenitsdaq
GROWS FROM
צ־ד־ק
ṣ-d-q
to be right, just, or aligned
The form carries the sense of being set right or vindicated; its root also names alignment and the one who is aligned. So the sanctuary’s cleansing carries the additional sense of restoration into right order.
ALSO GROWS
tsedeq: rightness, justice, alignment
צֶדֶק
The sanctuary’s cleansing belongs to the same family of rightness and alignment.
tsaddiq: a righteous or aligned person
צַדִּיק
This branch shows the root describing a state of alignment in a person as well as in the sanctuary.
קֹדֶשׁ
qodesh
GROWS FROM
ק־ד־שׁ
q-d-sh
to be set apart, sacred
The sanctuary is the set-apart place, named for its sacred distinction. Paired with the root of alignment, the verse pictures restoration as the set-apart place returning to right order.
ALSO GROWS
qadosh: set apart, sacred
קָדוֹשׁ
The sanctuary’s identity is expressed through the same root: it is a place set apart.
qiddesh: to set apart, consecrate
קִדֵּשׁ
This branch describes the act of establishing something as sacred, clarifying what is restored when the sanctuary is put right.
THE PATTERN
What is set apart can be restored after defilement through cleansing that returns it to sacred order.
He sprinkles some of the blood upon it with his finger seven times, and cleanses it, and sets it apart from the uncleanness of the children of Israel.Seven days they shall cover the altar and cleanse it, and they shall fill their hands.So the patterns of the things in the heavens are bound to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.THE THREAD
Seventy sevens are cut out for your people and for your set-apart city, to close off the rebellion, to use up the shortcomings, to cover the crookedness, to bring in the alignment of the ages, to seal up the vision and the prophet, and to anoint the most set apart.The word rendered “righteousness” in Daniel 9:24 comes from the same ṣ-d-q root as the sanctuary’s cleansing in this verse. The shared root opens the cleansing as a movement into alignment that extends beyond the sacred place.
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