What Matthew 24:36 says, and why every date-setter has to explain it away

Matthew 24:36 is the sentence that every date-setter in this timeline has had to deal with. In the King James Version it reads:

"But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only."

The verse in context

The verse closes a long answer in Matthew 24 to a question from the disciples about the destruction of the temple and the end of the age. Jesus describes signs, wars, famines, false messiahs and the fall of Jerusalem. He then says that the day and the hour are not known.

The statement is repeated in other places. Mark 13:32 includes the clause "neither the Son, but the Father", which some manuscripts of Matthew 24:36 also carry. In Acts 1:7, when the disciples ask whether Christ will now restore the kingdom, he says: "It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power."

What the verse is, and is not, claiming

Reading the verse closely matters, because both sides have overstated it.

• It says that the day and hour are unknown to humans, and to angels. It does not say that Christians should ignore the signs. The same chapter tells readers to learn from the fig tree.
• It does not on its own address whether a year or season can be calculated. This is the gap that date-setters have used.
• It has been read as a warning against setting any date. It has also been read as a promise that the end will be a surprise, which is a reason to be ready at all times (Matthew 24:42, "Watch therefore").

How date-setters have handled it

The entries in this timeline show several recurring responses. They are described here as arguments historians have recorded, not as verdicts on anyone's motives.

Day versus year. William Miller argued that he was reading a year from the prophecy of Daniel, not claiming to know the day. The Millerite entry records that critics cited Matthew 24:36 against him. As the date drew closer, Samuel Snow's argument narrowed the date to a single day, which removed that distinction (see October 22, 1844).

The verse applied to a past audience. Harold Camping argued that the verse described what was true when Christ spoke and not for later generations. This argument is described in the 2011 entry. Most Christian traditions reject it, since Matthew 24:36 is written in the present tense and the same idea appears in Acts 1:7, after the resurrection.

The sign-based approach. Hal Lindsey and others focused on the signs of Matthew 24:32 to 34 instead of the day. The Lindsey entry shows that this approach can produce a date range without naming a day.

A private revelation. More recent claims often rest on a dream, a vision or a message, as in the 2025 entry. These claims do not rely on calculation, so they do not engage with the verse at all.

What the record suggests

The pattern in this timeline is that no dated prediction has been confirmed by events, and several of the authors, including Miller and Camping, publicly said afterward that they had been wrong. That is a historical observation. This site does not use it to predict anything.

What the verse says about the present is simpler. If no one knows the day or the hour, the hour is not a reason to postpone the things that already matter. That is the point of the reflection page.