What Does Daniel 9:17 Mean?
And now, O our God, hear the prayer of your servant and his pleas, and make your face shine upon your set-apart place that lies emptied, for the Lord's sake.
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
Now therefore, O our God, hear the prayer of thy servant, and his supplications, and cause thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is desolate, for the Lord’s sake.THE KEY
The request for God’s face to shine makes divine presence the first answer to desolation.
THE MEANING
Your desolate place is held in a prayer for God’s face to shine upon it. Its ruin does not close it off from favor; the request rests on the Lord’s own sake.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that a ruined place proves God has turned away: the prayer asks for God’s face to shine precisely upon what is desolate.
THE ROOT
הָאֵר
ha’er
GROWS FROM
אוֹר
ʾ-w-r
to be light, shine, give light
The Hebrew asks for God’s face to become light upon the sanctuary. “Shine” carries the sense of divine presence reaching the place that lies desolate.
ALSO GROWS
or: light
אוֹר
The root names light itself, so the shining face is more than an image of approval: it brings light into the sanctuary’s desolation.
ma’or: luminary, a source of light
מָאוֹר
This branch shows the root at work in something that gives light, deepening the picture of God’s face as light reaching the sanctuary.
תַּחֲנוּנִים
tachanunim
GROWS FROM
חנן
ḥ-n-n
to show favor, be gracious
“pleas” in this verse is tachanunim. “Supplications” grows from the root for showing favor. The prayer’s repeated appeals are shaped by the language of favor, not by a claim that the desolate place has earned a response.
ALSO GROWS
chen: favor
חֵן
This is the favor carried by the root; the supplications appeal for God’s favor toward the sanctuary.
chanun: gracious
חַנּוּן
This branch describes the one who shows favor, linking the appeal to the character of the one addressed.
מִקְדָּשׁ
miqdash
GROWS FROM
קדש
q-d-sh
to be set apart
“set-apart place” in this verse is miqdash. The place is called desolate, yet its name still carries the root of being set apart. Ruin describes its condition; it does not erase what the sanctuary is set apart for.
ALSO GROWS
qadosh: set apart
קָדוֹשׁ
The shared root keeps the sanctuary’s set-apart nature in view even as the verse names its desolation.
qodesh: set-apartness, sacredness
קֹדֶשׁ
This branch echoes the sanctuary’s identity as a place belonging to what is set apart.
THE PATTERN
God’s shining face marks divine presence turning toward what needs restoration.
The LORD make his face shine upon you, and bend toward you.Turn us again, O God, and cause your face to shine, and we will be delivered.For God, who said, Light shall shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts, to give the light of knowing the weight of God in the face of Jesus, the Anointed One.THE THREAD
The LORD make his face shine upon you, and bend toward you.Numbers uses the same root for “shine” as Daniel’s request, אור (or), meaning light. Its “be gracious” also comes from חנן (ḥ-n-n), the root behind Daniel’s “supplications,” so the two verses join shining presence with an appeal to favor.
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