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Yes there was a timetable for the Kingdom of God to appear. Yes there was a timetable for "the Messiah" to appear. Daniel chapter 9 teaches us that. But what most are not aware of is that this timetable is "conditional" on other factors that must be present for the fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies. This is terribly important to understand when one views "would-be Messiahs" and even Jesus for that matter.
Well there you have it; I just let the "cat" out of the bag. There were reasons why the Messianic prophecies were not fulfilled by Yeshua. There were reasons why Yeshua could not become the Messiah which the Jews waited for. But lets look at the book of Daniel again.
The part of the book of Daniel in which the prophecy of the Seventy Weeks occurs (chapter 9) has been dated about 164 B.C. The author of this portion of the book of Daniel is assuming the name of a man supposed to be living near the end of the sixth century B.C. The historical Daniel did not write it! But such Pseudepigrapha writing was very common by the Jewish in that day. Many wrote in the name of other "famous" men of the faith. Nothing new here.
This writer of Daniel 9 appears to have expected that the Era of Righteousness would come not very long after his actual time. Some thought it had come in the reign of John Hyrcanus I John Hyrcanus I died in 104 B.C.E. He was the son and successor of Simon, and ruled from 134 to 104 B.C.E. We do not know much about earlier calculations, and the one to which we have referred was worked out later when the hopes entertained of the Hasmoneans had been grievously disappointed. It is after 100 B.C. that the literature we have reveals a mounting interest in the Last Times and in the advent of messianic personalities. By the first century of our era it had become quite feverish, and had engendered a state of near hysteria among the people. You must grasp the situation at hand to properly understand the events which were to quickly unfold. It was wholly in keeping with the circumstances that a figure like John the Baptist should now appear proclaiming that the Kingdom of God was at hand, and calling upon the people to repent and save themselves from the Wrath to Come. Without wholesale repentance by the nation of Israel the prophecies would not be realized and King Messiah would not be revealed!
Answer for yourself: Why the emphasis placed upon "repentance" before the Kingdom was to come? More later but don't forget this very, very important issue because it will play an integral role in why the Kingdom did not appear and why Yeshua did not fulfill the expected Messianic prophecies.
It was no less appropriate that a man like Jesus should be convinced he was the Messiah and announce that 'the Time is fulfilled'. Yeshua taught repentance and it was the core of all that he embodied. The calculations of pious scribes confirmed the time, and if that was not enough, the conditions of the time reinforced the calculations. The time was ripe for a Divine intervention. The time was ripe for Israel to repent and turn her heart back to the "fathers" of the faith. Would she?
Messianism was a product of the Jewish spirit. It was inspired by the Hebrew reading of the riddle of the creation and destiny of mankind. Though some of its features did not originate with the Hebrews, they absorbed them and brought them into relationship with a great vision of the ultimate Brotherhood of Man under the rule of the One God and Father of all men. The vision was not simply a cherished ideal: it was associated with a plan for its realization. Israel's role in the implementation of the Kingdom of God is crucial! Israel's role in preparing a place for Messiah to rule and reign is crucial! Israel's failure in this role would jeopardize the whole of the prophetic timetable as you will quickly come to see. Her failure would postpone the revelation of "the Messiah"!
If you have ever listened to anything….then listen and understand this. According to God's plan for the realization of the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth, God had chosen and set apart one nation among the nations of the world, neither numerous nor powerful, to be the recipient of his laws, and by observing them to offer a universal example. The Theocracy of Israel would be the persuasive illustration of a World Theocracy: it would be "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" witnessing to all nations with a "King" at its head. Exod 19:6 teaches us that from the very moment a group of ex-slaves became a nation they by default incurred an eternal responsibility before God: "And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel." One of the purposes of Israel's deliverance from Egypt was that they, as a holy nation and a royal priesthood before God, was to be a "light to the nations" in bringing the non-Jewish nations to God. That is what a priest does; he serves as an intermediary between man and God. Such is Israel's function then and now although you would not know it from the conditions that exist in Israel today. Needless to say often Israel failed her calling. And God would judge the nation because of it.
Now what is said next is of major importance in our understanding of the concept of Messiah and any possibility of connecting such a concept to Yeshua in the first century. Manifestly, according to this view, the redemption of humanity, and the appearance of the Kingdom of Heaven with it's Messianic King, waited upon the attainment by Israel of a state of perfect obedience to the will of God and His Commandments. By so much as Israel failed to meet the Divine requirements, by so much was the peace and well-being of mankind retarded and the appearance of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth retarded. This also meant that the appearance of King Messiah was to be hindered as well as the postponement of the fulfillment of the Jewish Messianic Prophecies in the Tanakh! The Messiah, if he were here and ready to begin his reign, would not be allowed to set upon the seat of the throne of David not would the many Prophetic passages be fulfilled in the Jewish Tanakh.
This concept has major implications for our understanding of Yeshua and the failure of the fulfillment of the Jewish Scriptures by him in the first century. Basically, Israel would either "merit" the Kingdom within the timetable according to the prophetic Scriptures of Daniel and by default her King, or else Israel would forestall such from happening. God would be the judge if Israel was worthy of the Kingdom and her King. If not, then her King would not appear. The Messiah, although present within this timetable would not be unveiled in the advent of Israel's spiritual failure as a priesthood to the world. This means the potential "would-be" Messiah, although alive in this time, would not be allowed to rule and reign. In the advent of Israel's failure in this regard the hundreds of true Jewish prophetic passages would not be fulfilled within the time period prophesied by Daniel.
The history of Israel, seen in this light, was a prolonged schooling in preparation for this glorious time. The national disposition to go astray occasionally was continually corrected by God through His infliction of appropriate punishments, conquest and oppression by foreigners, pestilence and famine, exile. Internally much depended on the guidance of rulers, priests and kings. These too were judged by whether they 'did right in the sight of the Lord'. Their failures called for an additional activity by messengers of God in a succession of prophets. If you just look at your Old Testaments you can easily see how God continually through Moses, the Judges, and then finally through the prophets to both Houses of Israel did God bring the message of "repentance" to His people. God was continually trying to prepare His nation for their highest calling: Priests to the nations. A priest is called to a higher holiness than regular people and the requirements for such an office are very stringent. Repentance was necessary for this nation of Priests. Repentance was necessary before the blessing of the Kingdom of God could be manifested along with all of its promised blessings. We must remember also that according to the "time table" of Daniel that no later than 70 C.E. the Kingdom was to appear along with King Messiah.
Given that Yeshua died just prior to the year 30 A.D. he is recorded by all three writers of the Gospels saying:
Mark 13:30
30 Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done.
Matt 24:34
34 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.
Luke 21:32
32 Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled.
According to the above texts the Gospel writers share with us that evidently Yeshua understood and interpreted Daniel chapter 9 the way the traditional Rabbis did in his day! Jesus was not a Dispensational theologian as most Christian teachers are today. This should be very troublesome to you when you realize that Jesus believed entirely different from the way you have been taught in your Christian churches. We have the testimony of Jesus that the Kingdom had to come prior to 70 A.D. as determined by the Daniel 9 prophecy. Along with that one needs to have an understanding that a generation was understood to be 40 years. Given that he died in and around the year 30 A.D. then we easily see Yeshua's agreement with the then current and prevalent understanding of Daniel 9 as held by both Rabbis and the vast populace. This goes without saying but Yeshua never intended nor saw the Kingdom being postponed some 2000 years as Dispensationalist Christians maintain today. If you study you will find that such a "theology" as espoused by Christians today had its origin in the middle 1800's. You also need to understand that by altering the accepted oral traditions about Daniel 9 as well as altering the Jewish texts by adjusting the punctuation of the appointed verses in Christian Bibles and translations, these Christian redactors created a "new timetable" to explain away the failure of the prophecies to be fulfilled. This was done to protect the image of Yeshua because otherwise one who lacks understanding shared in these articles might come to the conclusion that Yeshua was wrong in his understanding; and we cannot have that. These same Gentile theologians who made Jesus literally "God" would not have this God-man be wrong about the Scriptures (Selah)! Little do they realize that Yeshua came to a point in his ministry when he knew his efforts would fail to bring wholesale repentance to Israel and that the messianic prophecies would remain unfulfilled and the Kingdom of God would not appear. There would come a point in Yeshua's ministry that he knew that his ministry would fail!
Now listen up; the failure does not lie with Yeshua but with Israel as they did not merit the Kingdom nor the Messiah as I will quickly show. The repentance and the turning of Israel's heart back to the fathers (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) would not happen in his day. There was only one recourse for a failed messianic reformer….he had to die. More to follow.