Daniel 9:26
Daniel 9:2626Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and will have nothing. Then the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood, and until the end there will be war; desolations have been decreed.
JWs fit Daniel 9 into the broader Watchtower chronological system, typically dating the 69th week to AD 29 and stretching the 70th week to AD 36 (ending with the gospel going to the Gentiles via Cornelius). The "cutting off" of the Messiah is read as Jesus's death in AD 33 — agreed in the fact, disputed in the structure because the Watchtower's primary attention is Daniel 4 and 1914, not Daniel 9 and Messiah's first coming.
is the messianic timeline Daniel 4 is not. Read it: "And after the sixty-two weeks Messiah will be cut off, with nothing for himself. And the city and the holy place the people of a leader that is coming will bring to their ruin." The sequence is explicit and datable: Messiah comes, Messiah is cut off (violently killed), then the city and sanctuary are destroyed. The second temple was destroyed in AD 70. That is the hard deadline built into the prophecy — the Messiah had to arrive and die before AD 70. The candidate who fits is Jesus of Nazareth, crucified around AD 30-33. If Jesus is not the Messiah, no one is — because the temple that had to stand until the Messiah came is gone. Daniel 9 also lists six Messianic purposes in verse 24: finish transgression, end sin, atone for iniquity, bring everlasting righteousness, seal up vision and prophecy, and anoint the most holy place. All six are fulfilled in the cross and resurrection. None were accomplished by the Watchtower in 1914.