The king answered and said, "{Certainly} I know that {you are trying to gain time} {because} you have seen {that this matter is firmly decreed by me},

Seventy weeks are decreedabout your people and your holy city—to bring the rebellion to an end,to put a stop to sin,to wipe away iniquity,to bring in everlasting righteousness,to seal up vision and prophecy,and to anoint the most holy place.

After those 62 weeksthe Messiah will be cut offand will have nothing.The people of the coming princewill destroy the city and the sanctuary.The end will come with a flood,and until the end there will be war;desolations are decreed.

He will make a firm covenantwith many for one week,but in the middle of the weekhe will put a stop to sacrifice and offering.And the abomination of desolationwill be on a wing of the templeuntil the decreed destructionis poured out on the desolator.”

In a time of tranquility, [without warning] he will enter the most productive and richest parts of the kingdom [of Egypt], and he will accomplish that which his fathers never did, nor his fathers’ fathers; he will distribute plunder, spoil and goods among them. He will devise plans against strongholds, but only for a time [decreed by God].

“Then the king will do whatever he wants. He will exalt and magnify himself above every god, and he will say outrageous things against the God of gods. He will be successful until the time of wrath is completed, because what has been decreed will be accomplished.