John Chrysostom

Next, in predicting the length of time these evils would last, Daniel’s angel said, “From the time of the changing of the continuity.” The daily sacrifice was called the continuity, for what is continuous is frequent and unceasing. And among the Jews it was customary to offer sacrifice to God in the evening and about dawn each day; this is why they called that daily sacrifice a continuity. But when Antiochus came, he completely did away with this practice.

The conflict lasted a month and a half, and in that time the victory became complete, as did also the deliverance of the Jews from the evils that weighed heavy on them. And when he said, “Blessed is the one who stands firm 1, days,” he revealed their deliverance. He did not simply say, “the one who attains,” but “the one who stands firm and attains.” The reason for this is that many of the unholy ones saw the change, but he does not call them happy; he calls blessed only those who gave witness during the time of troubles, who did not desert their religion and who then found abatement of their ills.

Ham receives the sentence so that he might come to his senses, and he is punished through his son, so that you would learn that even if one is old, the punishment will pass to the child. And this makes his life bitter and painful, knowing that even after his death his son will be punished for what he did. And that the son will be miserable from birth and all his descendants detestable and inclined to evil is what the Scripture says instead of pronouncing a curse: “Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.” And elsewhere it says scornfully, “offspring of Canaan and not of Judah.”