8.20–25 Gabriel’s explanation spells out the meaning of the vision in vv. 5–12; it reflects what is known of the historical period from the time of the Medes and Persians to the reign of Antiochus IV.
8.22 The four kingdoms (horns) mentioned in v. 8 are here said to lack Alexander’s power.
8.23–25 Brief rhythmic phrases spell out the acts of the tyrant Antiochus; both form and content are reminiscent of Isa 14.4–21. See vv. 9–11; 11.21–45.
8.25 Prince of princes, a title for God; see v. 11. Not by human hands, divine intervention in the defeat of Antiochus; see 2.34; 7.26.
8.26 Seal up. Daniel is to keep the vision secret until later, since it is supposedly being given in the middle of the sixth century BCE (v. 1) but in fact is only written down in the second.
8.27 King’s, Belshazzar’s (8.1). Did not understand. Daniel’s lack of understanding after the explanation of vv. 19–26 may be a literary artifice pointing ahead to the detailed presentation in ch. 11.
DANIEL 9
Daniel’s Prayer for the People
1In the first year of Darius son of Ahasuerus, by birth a Mede, who became king over the realm of the Chaldeans—2in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the LORD to the prophet Jeremiah, must be fulfilled for the devastation of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.
3Then I turned to the Lord God, to seek an answer by prayer and supplication with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying,
“Ah, Lord, great and awesome God, keeping covenant and steadfast love with those who love you and keep your commandments, 5we have sinned and done wrong, acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and ordinances. 6We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our ancestors, and to all the people of the land.
7“Righteousness is on your side, O Lord, but open shame, as at this day, falls on us, the people of Judah, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. 8Open shame, O LORD, falls on us, our kings, our officials, and our ancestors, because we have sinned against you. 9To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him, 10and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God by following his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets.
11“All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. So the curse and the oath written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against you. 12He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers, by bringing upon us a calamity so great that what has been done against Jerusalem has never before been done under the whole heaven. 13Just as it is written in the law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us. We did not entreat the favor of the LORD our God, turning from our iniquities and reflecting on hisa fidelity. 14So the LORD kept watch over this calamity until he brought it upon us. Indeed, the LORD our God is right in all that he has done; for we have disobeyed his voice.
15“And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and made your name renowned even to this day—we have sinned, we have done wickedly. 16O Lord, in view of all your righteous acts, let your anger and wrath, we pray, turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy mountain; because of our sins and the iniquities of our ancestors, Jerusalem and your people have become a disgrace among all our neighbors. 17Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his supplication, and for your own sake, Lord,b let your face shine upon your desolated sanctuary. 18Incline your ear, O my God, and hear. Open your eyes and look at our desolation and the city that bears your name. We do not present our supplication before you on the ground of our righteousness, but on the ground of your great mercies. 19O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, listen and act and do not delay! For your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people bear your name!”
The Seventy Weeks
20While I was speaking, and was praying and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the LORD my God on behalf of the holy mountain of my God—21while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen before in a vision, came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice. 22He camec and said to me, “Daniel, I have now come out to give you wisdom and understanding. 23At the beginning of your supplications a word went out, and I have come to declare it, for you are greatly beloved. So consider the word and understand the vision:
24“Seventy weeks are decreed for your people and your holy city: to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place.d 25Know therefore and understand: from the time that the word went out to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the time of an anointed prince, there shall be seven weeks; and for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with streets and moat, but in a troubled time. 26After the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing, and the troops of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Itse end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. 27He shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall make sacrifice and offering cease; and in their placef shall be an abomination that desolates, until the decreed end is poured out upon the desolator.”
next chapter
* * *
a Heb your
b Theodotion Vg Compare Syr: Heb for the Lord’s sake
c Gk Syr: Heb He made to understand
d Or thing or one
e Or His
f Cn: Meaning of Heb uncertain
9.1–27 A reinterpretation of Jeremiah’s prophecy of a seventy-year exile; it now extends to the time of Antiochus Epiphanes but will soon end.
9.1 Darius. See note on 5.31. Ahasuerus, Hebrew for Xerxes. Both Darius and Xerxes were names of later Persian, not Median, kings. Who became king over the…Chaldeans, a reminder of the fall of the Babylonian Empire in 539 BCE.
9.2 Seventy years (Jer 25.11, 12; 29.10), a round number indicating a long exile, lasting a lifetime; see Ps 90.10; Isa 23.15. 2 Chr 36.22–23 considers this prophecy fulfilled by Cyrus’s decree in 539 BCE, but the persecution by Antiochus and the continued devastation of Jerusalem would have called this fulfillment into question. As a sixth-century BCE character, Daniel would have been disturbed about the Babylonian devastation of Jerusalem, but in the second century BCE, the actual time of composition, the ravages of Antiochus are the underlying and central concern of the book. This double perspective must be kept in mind in reading the prayer in vv. 4–19.
9.3 Supplication. See v. 17, 18, 20, 23. Sackcloth and ashes, traditional signs of mourning; see 10.2–3; Neh 9.1; Esth 4.1–3; Jer 4.8;6.26; 49.3; Joel 1.13–14.
9.4–19 A communal confession of sin and petition for mercy. The quality of the Hebrew is superior to that in surrounding verses; hence it is sometimes considered a later addition. More likely it is a traditional prayer reminiscent in language and theology of the Deuteronomistic corpus in Deuteronomy through 2 Kings; see 1 Kings 8.23–53; Ezra 9.6–15; Neh 1.5–11; 9.6–37. The prayer assumes that the people’s troubles are not the result of a predetermined divine plan, as the visions suggest, but are due to sin.
9.4 Great and awesome God. See Deut 7.21; Neh 1.5; 9.32. Covenant and steadfast love. See Deut 7.9, 12. Keep your commandments. See Ex 20.6; Deut 7.9; 1 Kings 8.23; Neh 1.5.
9.5 See 1 Kings 8.47; Ps 106.6.
9.6 Not listened to…prophets. See 9.10; Jer 7.25–26; 29.19. Kings…land. See Jer 44.21.
9.7–8 See Lev 26.40; 1 Kings 8.46–50; Ezra 9.7.
9.9–
10 See Neh 9.17; Ps 130.4.
9.11 See Lev 26.14–45; Deut 28.15–68;29.10–29.
9.12–14 A shift from second to third person; the text now addresses the people instead of God. A calamity…Jerusalem, the sixth-century BCE destruction and the second-century BCE desecration; the latter would be uppermost in the mind of the author.
9.14 Kept watch. Here God keeps watch to punish disobedience; see Jer 1.11–12; 31.28; 44.27.
9.15 See Deut 6.21; Neh 9.10; Jer 32.20–21.
9.16 Your holy mountain. See 9.20. Disgrace, language typical of exilic and post-exilic laments; see Ps 44.13–16.
9.17 See Num 6.25; 1 Kings 8.28–30. Desolated. See vv. 18, 27; the language of the prayer resonates in the other verses of ch. 9; see also 8.11–13.
9.21 Gabriel. See 8.15–18. Evening sacrifice. See Ex 29.38–42.
9.23 A word went out. See Isa 55.11. Greatly beloved becomes an epithet for the prophet in 10.11, 19.
9.24 Seventy weeks are decreed. The seventy years of v. 2 are interpreted as seventy weeks of years, perhaps because Israel merited such a sevenfold punishment (Lev 26.18). 2 Chr 36.21 also connects Jeremiah’s prophecy with the sabbatical years of Lev 26.34–35. Contrary to the assumption of Daniel’s prayer, the period of punishment is decreed and is not affected by human actions. To seal both vision and prophet, either as their ratification, or their termination as they are no longer necessary. Most holy place, the sanctuary.
9.25 The final week is the author’s main focus. The remaining sixty-nine weeks are then divided into seven and sixty-two weeks. Anointed prince, either Zerubbabel or the high priest Joshua; see Ezra 2.2; 3.2; Hag 1.1–14; Zech 6.9–14. Sixty-two weeks, a round number to describe the period down to Antiochus. Troubled time could refer to the struggle for control of the country between the Seleucid and Ptolemaic dynasties; see 2.41, 43; 11.4–20.
9.26 Anointed one, Onias III, the deposed high priest murdered in 171 BCE (2 Macc 4.32–34). The prince, Antiochus IV.
9.27 With many, with hellenizing Jews; see 1 Macc 1.11–15. Half of the week, the second half of the last week; see 7.25; see 8.13–14 for these three and a half years from 167 to 164 BCE. Abomination that desolates. See 8.11–13; 1 Macc 1.54. Decreed end. See 7.26–27.
DANIEL 10
Conflict of Nations and Heavenly Powers
1In the third year of King Cyrus of Persia a word was revealed to Daniel, who was named Belteshazzar. The word was true, and it concerned a great conflict. He understood the word, having received understanding in the vision.
2At that time I, Daniel, had been mourning for three weeks. 3I had eaten no rich food, no meat or wine had entered my mouth, and I had not anointed myself at all, for the full three weeks. 4On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river (that is, the Tigris), 5I looked up and saw a man clothed in linen, with a belt of gold from Uphaz around his waist. 6His body was like beryl, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and the sound of his words like the roar of a multitude. 7I, Daniel, alone saw the vision; the people who were with me did not see the vision, though a great trembling fell upon them, and they fled and hid themselves. 8So I was left alone to see this great vision. My strength left me, and my complexion grew deathly pale, and I retained no strength. 9Then I heard the sound of his words; and when I heard the sound of his words, I fell into a trance, face to the ground.
10But then a hand touched me and roused me to my hands and knees. 11He said to me, “Daniel, greatly beloved, pay attention to the words that I am going to speak to you. Stand on your feet, for I have now been sent to you.” So while he was speaking this word to me, I stood up trembling. 12He said to me, “Do not fear, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words. 13But the prince of the kingdom of Persia opposed me twenty-one days. So Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, and I left him there with the prince of the kingdom of Persia,a 14and have come to help you understand what is to happen to your people at the end of days. For there is a further vision for those days.”
15While he was speaking these words to me, I turned my face toward the ground and was speechless. 16Then one in human form touched my lips, and I opened my mouth to speak, and said to the one who stood before me, “My lord, because of the vision such pains have come upon me that I retain no strength. 17How can my lord’s servant talk with my lord? For I am shaking,b no strength remains in me, and no breath is left in me.”
18Again one in human form touched me and strengthened me. 19He said, “Do not fear, greatly beloved, you are safe. Be strong and courageous!” When he spoke to me, I was strengthened and said, “Let my lord speak, for you have strengthened me.” 20Then he said, “Do you know why I have come to you? Now I must return to fight against the prince of Persia, and when I am through with him, the prince of Greece will come. 21But I am to tell you what is inscribed in the book of truth. There is no one with me who contends against these princes except Michael, your prince.
next chapter
* * *
a Gk Theodotion: Heb I was left there with the kings of Persia
b Gk: Heb from now
10.1–12.4 Chs. 10–12 comprise a single vision: a long preparation in 10.1–11.1 and then in 11.2–12.4 another survey of the future. The survey contains brief references to the Persian Empire and the conquests and demise of Alexander, then lengthy descriptions of the conflict between Ptolemies and Seleucids with its effects on Judea; everything leads up to the rise and fall of Antiochus IV. All this takes place against the backdrop of a heavenly struggle and culminates in the deliverance of the elect, especially the wise, in a resurrection from the dead.
10.1 Third year of…Cyrus, 536 BCE, seventy years after the date given in 1.1. Belteshazzar. See 1.7. Conflict, the wars of 11.5–45 and the heavenly struggle of 10.13, 20.
10.2 Mourning. See 9.3;10.12.
10.3 See 9.3; 10.12.
10.4 River. See 8.2.
10.5–6 See Ezekiel, esp. chs. 1, 9–11, for the imagery. A man, an angel in human form, probably Gabriel; see 8.15–17. Uphaz, an unknown place.
10.7 The cause of the trembling is not stated; see v. 11. The scene enhances Daniel’s position.
10.8–9 Both the vision and the sound of the words are overpowering; see 8.17–18;10.15–17.
10.10–11 See 8.18; Ezek 1.28–2.2. Superhuman support is needed; see also vv. 16, 18. Greatly beloved. See 9.23; 10.19.
10.13 Prince, the patron angel of a people. The idea of struggles between angelic princes is an adaptation of the common mythology of the ancient Near East. With a god over every nation, if nations battled, the more significant battle was waged between their gods; see Isa 36.18–20. Twenty-one days, the duration of the fast in vv. 2–3. Michael, protector of the Jewish people; see v. 21; 12.1.
10.14 End of days. The events foretold in 11.40–12.4 are construed as the end of history. A further vision, supplementing chs. 7–9.
10.20–21 Do you know…to you? The answer is that Gabriel is to reveal the contents of the book of truth, and he begins to do so in 11.2: the future is under divine control. Return to fight, in the heavenly struggle; Michael will be the only support for Gabriel in the successive conflicts with the angelic patrons of Persia and Greece.
DANIEL 11
1As for me, in the first year of Darius the Mede, I stood up to support and strengthen him.
2“Now I will announce the truth to you. Three more kings shall arise in Persia. The fourth shall be far richer than all of them, and when he has become strong through his riches, he shall stir up all against the kingdom of Greece. 3Then a warrior king shall arise, who shall rule with great dominion and take action as he pleases. 4And while still rising in power, his kingdom shall be broken and divided toward the four winds of heaven, but not to his posterity, nor according to the dominion
with which he ruled; for his kingdom shall be uprooted and go to others besides these.
5“Then the king of the south shall grow strong, but one of his officers shall grow stronger than he and shall rule a realm greater than his own realm. 6After some years they shall make an alliance, and the daughter of the king of the south shall come to the king of the north to ratify the agreement. But she shall not retain her power, and his offspring shall not endure. She shall be given up, she and her attendants and her child and the one who supported her.
“In those times 7a branch from her roots shall rise up in his place. He shall come against the army and enter the fortress of the king of the north, and he shall take action against them and prevail. 8Even their gods, with their idols and with their precious vessels of silver and gold, he shall carry off to Egypt as spoils of war. For some years he shall refrain from attacking the king of the north; 9then the latter shall invade the realm of the king of the south, but will return to his own land.
10“His sons shall wage war and assemble a multitude of great forces, which shall advance like a flood and pass through, and again shall carry the war as far as his fortress. 11Moved with rage, the king of the south shall go out and do battle against the king of the north, who shall muster a great multitude, which shall, however, be defeated by his enemy. 12When the multitude has been carried off, his heart shall be exalted, and he shall overthrow tens of thousands, but he shall not prevail. 13For the king of the north shall again raise a multitude, larger than the former, and after some yearsa he shall advance with a great army and abundant supplies.
14“In those times many shall rise against the king of the south. The lawless among your own people shall lift themselves up in order to fulfill the vision, but they shall fail. 15Then the king of the north shall come and throw up siegeworks, and take a well-fortified city. And the forces of the south shall not stand, not even his picked troops, for there shall be no strength to resist. 16But he who comes against him shall take the actions he pleases, and no one shall withstand him. He shall take a position in the beautiful land, and all of it shall be in his power. 17He shall set his mind to come with the strength of his whole kingdom, and he shall bring terms of peaceb and perform them. In order to destroy the kingdom,c he shall give him a woman in marriage; but it shall not succeed or be to his advantage. 18Afterward he shall turn to the coastlands, and shall capture many. But a commander shall put an end to his insolence; indeed,d he shall turn his insolence back upon him. 19Then he shall turn back toward the fortresses of his own land, but he shall stumble and fall, and shall not be found.
HarperCollins Study Bible Page 321