A Prophetic Period
But according to the word of the angel to Daniel, there was to be a period during which, in a special sense, the Papacy was to hold supremacy over the saints and the times and the laws of the Most High.
"They shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time." In the Scriptures the word "time," used in this manner, means a year: "at the end of times, even years." Dan. 11:13, margin. Therefore a time (one year) and times (two years) and the dividing of time (half a year) means three years and a half. The same period is mentioned twice in the twelfth chapter of Revelation, once (verse 14) as "a time, and times, and half a time," and again (verse 6) as "a thousand two hundred and threescore days."
But in the symbolic representations of time in prophecy, a day stands for a year (see Eze. 4:5, 6, and other scriptures). Thus the prophecy foretold a long period of 1260 years during which papal supremacy would continue.
Now we may ask, When was this supremacy to begin? what would mark the rise of the Papacy to acknowledged supremacy? and what events mark the ending of the 1260 years?