Time, Times & a Half

THE FALSE PROPHET MUHAMMAD | home

that I have chosen to set my name there.

SO far, we have only studied prophetic days. In every instance we found

them to be years. But day=years are not the only duration of prophetic

time in the Bible. Twice in Daniel, and once in Revelation, there is the

expression “time, times, and half a time.” So how long is a time? Look

Dan 7:25 And he shall speak great words against the most High,

and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change

times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time

Dan 12:7 And I heard the man clothed in linen, which was upon

the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left

hand unto heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever that it shall

be for a time, times, and an half; and when he shall have

accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people, all these

Is a time a year like the day=years? One thing for sure, a time is not a

year. Here is how we know. The Hebrew word for day is yom. The

Hebrew and High Syriac words for time (as used in Dan 7:25 and 12:7)

are iddan and moadah.1 Surely, the Creator of the universe knows the

difference between iddan, moadah and yom. Of course, and He gave us

a yom for a year, not an iddan or a moadah for a year. So iddan (time),

and moadah (time), must mean something else. Lets call them time

And what about the cryptic way in which those words were used,

“time, times, and the dividing of a time?” How many “times” do we

have there? As is true of English, Hebrew is full of idiomatic language.

For instance, the Hebrew idiom “cut off” means to kill. “Ate the pieces

of” means to bring malicious accusations against, and so on. Is “time,

times, and the dividing of a time” also an idiom? Let’s see if there is

Job 33:14 For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth

Job 40:5 Once have I spoken; but I will not answer: yea, twice; but

Psa 62:11 God hath spoken once; twice have I heard this; that

In the above, once is one, and twice is only one more, for a total of

two: 1+1=2. A singular one followed by a plural twice is only two. In the

same way, a singular time followed by a plural times might be only two.

Only two! The words are different, but the idiomatic form is the same.

If the Lord had said, “time, yea times” we might have seen it instantly.

Now let’s employ the same idiomatic language to interpret time,

times, and half a time. Time = one; times = one more, for a total of two

times. Add a half a time and we have two and a half times, or

1+1+1/2=2-1/2. 2 That is pretty simple, isn’t it? So why have people been

saying that “time, times, and half a time” are three and a half years?

Who knows? Probably because it fits the Seven-Year tribulation scheme.

1 DAY= H3117. yowm, yome: from an unused root mean. to be hot; a day (as the warm

hours), whether lit. (from sunrise to sunset, or from one sunset to the next. TIME= H5732.

‘iddan, (Chaldean), id-dawn’: from a root corresponding. to that of H5708; a set time.

TIME= H4150. mow’ed, mo-ade’; or mo’ed mo-ade’; or (feminine) mow’adah (H2

Chron. 8 :13), mo-aw-daw’: from H3259; prop. an appointment, i.e. a fixed time or

2 Sorry about this 1+1 stuff. I know I am getting down on the kindergarten level, but it

seemed the easiest way to explain the concept.

However, Hebrew scholars have told me their grammar does not support

3-1/2 times as the correct translation for that idiom.

All right, so “time, times, and half a time” are two and a half times.

But if a time isn’t a year, how long is it? Daniel understood day=years,

but he didn’t understand time. Why? Because day= years were defined

for him in Old Testament scriptures while time was not. In fact, time was

not defined until late in the New Testament epistles:

2Pe 3:8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one

day [Greek word, hemera] is with the Lord as a thousand years,

On the surface that sure doesn’t look like much of a definition for

time, does it? It certainly doesn’t work in English. But something is

wrong here. God has already given us the definition for day. He gave us

a day for a year. Is the Lord changing His definition of prophetic days

here? Not at all. We can prove that the correct interpretation for

prophetic days is still years by the 42 months and 1260 days of

What we have here is an “X with the Lord is as a thousand years,

and a thousand years is as an X.” So how do we solve for “X”? By doing

a word study in Greek, which was the original language of the New

Testament. The Greek word translated “day” in 2Pe 3:8 is hemera,

(Þì¦ñá).1 Hemera is an ambiguous word sometimes translated: period,

moment, season, year, and, guess what ... Time. So what is the correct

translation here? In Greek, context often determines translation, but in

the above verse, the correct translation cannot be established with

certainty because context does not suggest the correct concept.

Understandably, translators went with “day,” which is the most common

usage, but that may not be correct. Hemera is translated time in four

verses in the KJV, and twelve verses in the NASB. So time is a very

acceptable translation. Is it possible that duration “X” is a thousand

1 Strong’s No. G2520. hemera, hay-mer’-ah: feminine. (with G5610 implied) of a der. of

hemai (to sit; akin to the base of G1476) several days were usually reckoned by the Jews

as inclusive of the parts of both extremes; fig. a period (always defined more or less

clearly by the context): age, + always, forever, judgment, (day) time, while, years.

If time is a thousand years, and we have 2-1/2 of them, then “time,

times, and half times” could be 2500 years. Thus far, we have only a

supposition. But that is all we had for day=years until we started

plugging them into history. Let’s see if there is an exact 2500 year

historic fit that fulfills the Bible’s description of these times right to the

After Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon died in 562BC, each of his three

sons ruled for a couple of years.1 The kingdom was very unstable.

Though the archives don’t tell us a lot about it, reading about those

Middle Eastern empires from secular sources gives us a picture of what

must have been going on there. King Labashi-Marduk was murdered as

a mere child. Daniel must have been walking on eggs to avoid the plots

and political intrigue in the Babylonian court. Many of his fellow rulers

in Babylon hated him and some even plotted his death (Dan 6:4-13).

However, the Lord protected Daniel in that harrowing environment.

Then in 555BC, a nephew of Nebuchadnezzar named Nabonidus

seized the throne. He proved to be a very able ruler. However, he

couldn’t stomach the Babylonian court life, so three years later, in 552,

he chose a close relative, Belshazzar, to rule the empire for him. Then

Nabonidus spent the rest of his life wandering around Arabia, doing

archeological digs and writing lots of poetry.2

During these turbulent times, the Lord gave Daniel the vision of four

great beasts coming up out of the sea.3 Scripture tells us when this was,

right to the year, “In the 1st year of Belshazzar” (Dan 7:1). In pictorial

language, the vision then describes the four great kingdoms that were to

1 Nebuchadnezzar was succeeded by his eldest son Awel-Marduk – the Evil- Merodach

of 2 Kings 25:27-30 (561-560BC). Awel-Marduk was followed by Neriglissar (560-558

BC), who was succeeded by Labashi-Marduk (557BC).

2 To date, there is no direct archeological evidence for 552BC being the 1st year of the

Belshazzar’s regency. However, that date can be supported by correlating evidence about

the reign of Nabonidus. John Walvoord, The Key to Prophetic Revelation (Chicago,

Moody Press, 1971) p. 115 accepts a 553BC Belshazzar dating, and most authorities

recognize a one to three year ambiguity in Old Testament dating.

3 The sea is the peoples of the Earth (Rev 17:15): “The waters which thou sawest ... are

peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.”

rule in the Holy Land during the time of the Gentiles. At the end of that

prophecy, the Lord tells Daniel about times:

Dan 7:25 And he shall speak great words against the Most High

and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change

times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time

Sometimes our doctrines get messed up because we don’t think

about who the Lord is speaking to, or when. In this instance, the Lord is

So in Daniel’s day, who spoke out against God? Then, as now,

Satan speaks out against God. Who were the saints in Daniel’s time?

The Jews, of course. So from 552BC, when this prophecy was given, the

Lord is telling Daniel that the Jews would be under satanically

controlled Gentile powers for two and a half times, or possibly 2500

years. That the Holy Land would be ruled by Gentile strangers far into

the future. Now let’s run that up and down the framework of history and

see what it fits. Since the definition for time was given in the New

Testament, we don’t even need to convert from Hebrew to solar years to

fit our calendar. A simple subtraction will do just fine:

Just a lucky hit? If that is not the correct interpretation, then it has

to be one of the most remarkable coincidences in all of recorded history.

It fits Scripture and history, right to the year. But remarkable as that

fulfillment of prophecy may be, we would still have only a theory if this

was the only 2500 year time period that fit antiquity.

God is so kind. When He takes the blinders off, He gives enough proof

for us to know for sure that we are headed in the right direction. At the

end of Daniel’s prophetic ministry, God gave him another vision

containing times. This prophecy also includes the 1290 days which led

us to understand that the Dome of the Rock is the Abomination that

makes Desolate. This vision may be dated to the third year of Cyrus the

Dan 10:1 In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia a thing was

revealed unto Daniel, whose name was called Belteshazzar.

Daniel was now a very old man. He knew he was going to be with

the Lord soon. The temple mount had been abandoned and sacrifices

abolished during his own lifetime. He knew that an Abomination of

Desolation was going to stand on that beloved temple mount in less than

1300 years. Would the Jews ever control Jerusalem again? Of course.

Many Old Testament Scriptures told him so including Isa 11:11. But

when? The Lord told him that as well, right to the year, but then hid it

so that no one would know when that time would be, until it happened:

Dan 12:7 And I heard the man clothed in linen, which was upon

the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left

hand unto heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever that it shall

be for a time, times, and half; and when he shall have accomplished

to scatter the power of the holy people, all these things shall be

Three years earlier, Cyrus had given a decree that would permit the Jews

to return to their homeland. They had begun their trek back to the Holy

land, and soon they would begin to build the 2nd temple. That temple

stood until 70AD, when the Jews were driven from the land again. But

God knew the end of this second dispersion, too. He knew that at the end

of it, the Jews would return to the Holy Land one more time and again

control Jerusalem. When was the vision given? In 533BC, the third year

of Cyrus. So this “time, times, and half a time” should begin in the third

The Lord even worded the last phrase of that prophecy in such a

way that it would be difficult to miss His intent: “... and when he shall

have accomplished to scatter [or shatter, NASB] the power of the holy

people, all these things shall be finished.” As of 1967AD, His holy

people, the Jews, were no longer scattered among the Gentiles. They

have their nation again, and their power is shattered no longer.

There is a third time in Daniel that proves a prophetic “time” to be

a thousand years. The four beasts of Daniel 7 are understood to be the

great Gentile empires that would rule in the Holy Land during the time

of the Gentiles. The first three beasts were Babylon, Medo-Persia and

Greece. The fourth beast, Rome, fell in 476AD (more on these empires

in a later chapter). The Moslems came on the scene soon after Rome

fell, but the Moslems were not granted world dominion like the empires

that came before them; however, the Lord did permit the Islamic states

to rule in the Holy Land for a “season and a time”:

Dan 7:11-12 I beheld even till the [4th] beast [Rome] was slain,

and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. As

concerning the rest of the beasts [the Islamic nations of the Middle

East], they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives [in the

holy Land] were prolonged for a season and time.

If time is 1000 years and there are four seasons, then a season

would be 1/4th of a time, or 250 years. 1000+250=1250. Remembering

that a season is not an exact number and could fluctuate a week or two

either way, this “season and time” fits history well, indeed.

New Israel became a nation a “Season and Time,”

(1260 years) after the Dome of the Rock was built.

We have seen three examples, from Daniel alone, of time fitting

history, when time is understood to be a thousand years. Consequently,

it is unrealistic to hold that prophetic times mean anything else.

Brethren, I’ll accept time = 1000 years as a coincidence once, but not

three times. These solutions span thousands of years, from historic

events that took place in antiquity to historic events that have taken

place in our own lifetimes. That is a statistical impossibility, so we no

longer have just a theory; we have a sound biblical and historically

In times and day=years, we have a solid empirical argument, a prophetic

jigsaw puzzle in which all the pieces interlock with each other. We can

argue about the placement, color, or shape of any one piece, but when

the whole puzzle is put together, we can stand back and view a

completed picture. It’s not so easy to discredit a prophetic picture in

which all the elements fit perfectly. If it is not of God, it will crumble

back into its original pieces on its own; however, if it is of God, it will

remain and flourish, no matter who comes against it (Act 5:35-39).

These day=year and time prophecies are truly remarkable. They

show the sovereignty of a timeless God over the affairs of men in a way

that is difficult to dispute, and they do so over eons of time. Despite the

best efforts of the enemy and the complexity of 2500 years of history,

God not only foreknew what was going to happen in the Holy Land, but

He managed history in such a way that what the Bible prophesied did

take place, right to the year, at His chosen location, in His chosen time.