What Does Daniel 9:26 Mean?
And after the sixty-two sevens, the anointed one shall be cut off, but not for himself. And the people of the one who goes before, who is coming, shall ruin the city and the set-apart place. And its end shall come in an overflow, and until the end of war, emptied places are cut out.
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 after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.THE KEY
The Hebrew verb for the anointed one being cut off also appears in the phrase for cutting a covenant, so the verse’s severing carries an echo of a bond broken open.
THE MEANING
The verse names the anointed one as cut off, “but not for himself,” then names a people who destroy the city and sanctuary. Flood and war carry that rupture across the landscape, with desolation marking the war’s determined end. The anointed one’s severing and the sanctuary’s devastation remain in the same frame.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that anointed status or sacred space makes a person or place invulnerable to violence.
THE ROOT
יִכָּרֵת
yikkaret
GROWS FROM
כרת
k-r-t
to cut, sever, or cut off
יִכָּרֵת is a passive form of כרת. The same root appears in the phrase “cut a covenant” and in כְּרִיתוּת (keritut, a certificate of divorce), so English “cut off” leaves a relational resonance of a bond being severed just beneath the surface.
ALSO GROWS
karat berit: literally, “cut a covenant”; the Hebrew idiom for making a covenant
כָּרַת בְּרִית
The verb translated “cut off” also participates in covenant language, giving the verse’s severance an echo of binding commitment.
keritut: a certificate of divorce; formal separation
כְּרִיתוּת
This derivative names a severed relationship, bringing the sense of a broken bond into the root’s range.
מָשִׁיחַ
mashiach
GROWS FROM
משח
m-sh-ḥ
to smear or apply oil; to anoint
מָשִׁיחַ means “the anointed one,” an identity formed from the verb for anointing. The verse places that marked identity directly beside יִכָּרֵת (yikkaret, “shall be cut off”), holding designation and severing in one line.
ALSO GROWS
mashach: to anoint, apply oil
מָשַׁח
The title “the anointed one” grows directly from this action.
mishchah: anointing; consecration with oil
מִשְׁחָה
This noun names the act or state that gives the anointed one the title used in the verse.
יַשְׁחִית
yashchit
GROWS FROM
שחת
sh-ḥ-t
to ruin, destroy, or corrupt
The verb for destroying belongs to a root that also names ruin and a pit. The language holds devastation and collapse together as the people’s violence reaches both city and sanctuary.
ALSO GROWS
shachat: pit; destruction
שַׁחַת
The root can name both ruin and the place of collapse, deepening the force of the city’s destruction.
mashchit: destroyer; one who brings ruin
מַשְׁחִית
This branch names the agent of the destruction, echoing the verse’s people who devastate the city and sanctuary.
THE PATTERN
Scripture’s covenant language can speak of binding commitment through a cutting act, while the same Hebrew root also names severance.
On that day the LORD cut a covenant with Abram, saying, To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.And I will give the men who have crossed over my covenant, who did not make the words of the covenant stand that they cut before me, when they cut the calf in two and passed between its pieces.Likewise also the cup after the meal, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood, poured out for you.THE THREAD
For the evildoers will be cut off, and those stretched toward the LORD will inherit the land.Psalm 37:9 uses the same root, כרת (karat, “cut off”), and sets that severing beside the promise of inheriting the earth. The shared verb gives Daniel’s “cut off” a land-and-future resonance, which Daniel’s verse makes concrete in the city and sanctuary.
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