Prophecy and History in Calvin’s Lectures on Daniel

In his lectures on Daniel (published in 1561), John Calvin saw clear analogies between the situations facing Daniel during the Babylonian exile and sixteenth-century Reformed Christians. However, he relates these two in a surprising and unprecedented way that evidences a strong sense of historical anachronism. He limits the scope of Daniel’s prophecies to Christ’s first advent—that is, to historically past events. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he did not view the book of Daniel as an eschatological handbook for the end times, and he has been credited with inaugurating a critical shift in the interpretive history of this biblical book. Calvin relates the prophecies of the four empires and the seventy weeks to the time leading up to the first century CE and does not find reference to the Antichrist. Analogies to later times are possible not because they are inherent in the prophet’s original message, but because of the connectedness of historical events under divine providence.