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[First posted in 2013. As Christians/Messianics, we—Sinaites—must have studied the book of Daniel no less than a dozen times, because it had been drummed into our clueless minds that the only way we could and would and should understand the last prophetic NT book of Revelation is by understanding the OT book of Daniel, for the imagery of both are interconnected. Well, after attending endless updated teaching seminars and conferences on both books, we were still left clueless and we figured, as we have also been taught, that whatever we do not understand on this side of eternity, we will understand if we make it to heaven on the other side. The easiest fallback when one doesn’t want to give in and simply admit to oneself and others— “I don’t get it”—is to relegate it to the category of “mystery” . . . where you file such question marks as the Trinity, the human-divine nature of Jesus Christ, and the whole of the Old Testament which Christians hardly ever get to, since they’re told it is passe, obsolete, only for the Jews, etc.
Then, just before we left the fold of Christ-centered believers, we were deep into listening to yet another mind-boggling study, this time with book and CD making the rounds, titled “Daniel’s Timeline.” As far as we know, our Messianic friends bought into that teaching so much so that some had seriously started preparing for the ‘end times’.
Well, guess what? As Sinaites, we were dismayed to discover that Daniel did not even belong to the category of “Prophets” because Daniel was not a prophet but an interpreter of dreams just like Joseph was gifted by YHWH for purposes we learn from the story. You will discover that the literary approach to the book of Daniel makes EVEN MORE SENSE and you will simply have to read through this whole post to discover why you should no longer waste any more time figuring out all the question marks that never were resolved for you by the best of Christian teachers who were approaching it as prophecy!
Again, credit is due the compilers of our resource book: A LITERARY APPROACH TO THE BIBLE, recommended all over our posts as MUST READ/MUST OWN. Enjoy your study and leave a message if you feel differently from what we have predicted here. Reformatting and highlights added.—Admin1.]
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Daniel
Shemaryahu Talmon
The linguistic and literary diversity of Daniel reveals a composite structure.
The opening and concluding parts (1:1—2:4a and 8-12), in Hebrew, frame a portion in Aramaic which is itself a composite (2:4b—6:28 and 7:1-28). A smooth transition from the opening Hebrew section to the Aramaic part is deftly achieved by the introduction in Hebrew (2:4b), of some Chaldean soothsayers who speak Aramaic: “Then spake the Chaldeans to the king in Syriak [Aramaic].” This linguistic structure resembles that Ezra; there, too, a composite Aramaic passage (Ezra 4:7—6:18 and 7:1-26) is sandwiched between two pieces of Hebrew narrative (Ezra 1:1-4:6 and 7:27-10:44). This combination may indicate the writers’ decision to use both languages spoken by Jews in the post-Exilic period.
It remains a matter of debate whether or not the entire book was originally written in one language (Aramaic or Hebrew), with parts subsequently translated into the other. Likewise it cannot be determined whether a translator into the vernacular Aramaic was addressing himself to a wider reading public or whether the translation into Hebrew was intended for a scholarly audience. In any event, the very fact that parts of the book were translated appears to indicate an increasing interest in apocalyptic speculations and literature among Jews before the turn of the era.
The first half of the book (chaps. 1-6) uses a narrative style. It is composed of a series of six court tales about—-
- Daniel and his three friends
- Hananiah,
- Mishael,
- and Azariah.
The tales are linked by common motifs and literary imagery and by an apparent concentration on human affairs.
- All four men are introduced as young Judean nobles who were exiled by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzae when he conquered Jerusalem in the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah.
- Because of their beauty, wisdom, and righteousness (chap. 3), they are chosen to serve at Nebuchadnezzar’s court.
- When Daniel successfully interprets the king’s enigmatic dream, he is elevated to a position of exceeding prominence (2:48), and at his request his three friends are also given high offices in the imperial administration (2:49).
- Daniel’s position is further strengthened when he interprets another dream of Nebuchadnezzar’s (chap. 4).
- Later, in the reign of Belshazzar, he explains a cryptic inscription which appears on a wall in the palace during a banquet given by the king (chap. 5; a vivid scene described by Xenophon in his Cyropaedia and captured by Rembrandt in his famous “Belshazzar’s Feast”).
Although these tales are obviously intended to be read as historical reports, their fictitious character is revealed by several flaws in the historical references:
- Belshazzar, for example, was not the son of Nebuchadnezzar, as stated in 5:2,
- but rather of Nabonidus, the last Babylonian king.
- No evidence is available to support the affirmation thatJerusalem was taken by the Babylonians in the third year of Jehoiakim’s reign (1:1). Nor is there a historical record of a King Darius the Mede, son of Ahasuerus, mentioned in 9:1,
- This datum was probably extrapolated from the report in 2 Chronicles 36:6 of the undated deportation of Jehoiakim by Nebuchadnezzar.
- or a Median empire between the fall of Babylon under Nabonidus
- and the rise of the Persian Empire under Cyrus the Great (chaps. 6 and 9).
Quite different in style and outlook from the pseudo-historical narrative is the second part of the book (chaps. 7-12). It consists of four units of dreams and visions in which future world events are revealed to Daniel, leading up to the persecution of the Jews in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes (second century B.C.E.) and their ultimate salvation (12:1).
- The first unit speaks of Daniel in the third person, These units, too, are conjoined by recurring motifs and expressions and by their apocalyptic character.
- whereas in the remaining three, Daniel himself is the narrator.
Both halves of the book contain poetic passages of varying length 4:23-26, 12:1-3 (Hebrew); 2:20-23; 4:10-12, 14-18; 6:27-28; 7:9-14; 8:23-26 (Aramaic).
These common elements indicate that notwithstanding the internal linguistic, stylistic, and literary diversity, which has led some scholars to suggest that the book was written and made public in serial fashion, Daniel has conceptual unity.
The writer presents a religious philosophy of history which links the past with the future—a future which is in fact the writer’s own present.
With trust in God, he assures us, and obedience to his commandments, the Jewish people will overcome all setbacks in the present age, as in the past, and pave the way for the ultimate triumph of God and Israel in history. Or, as Philo of Alexandria would have phrased it (Life of Moses 2.278), the fulfillment of promises in the past guarantees their realization in the future.
The quite different character of the two halves of Daniel seems to have caused the different positioning of the book in the Hebrew and the Greek canons.
- In the latter, which became the Bible of the Church, Daniel is regarded as a prophet, and his book follows that of Ezekiel, the last of the great prophets.
- This tradition shows in a florilegium of biblical passages from Qumran (4Q 174),
- in the New Testament texts (Matt. 24:15, Mark13:14),
- and in Josephus (The Antiquities of the Jews 10.11-12), all of which refer to “Daniel the Prophet.” This inclusion of Daniel among the prophets was suggested by the visionary character of chapters 7-10.
- The Jewish Sages expressly rejected the designation of Daniel as a prophet, declaring:
- “they [Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi] are prophets,
- while he [Daniel] is not a prophet” (Babylonian Talmud: Sanhendrin 93b-94a).
- Accordingly, in the Hebrew canon Daniel comes after Esther and before Ezra-Nehemiah, that is, between books which are considered historiographies.
- Maimonides, the most prominent Jewish authority in the Middle Ages, confirmed the correctness of this order: “the entire nation is agreed that the Book of Daniel should be placed among the Writings and not among the Prophets” (The Guide of the Perplexed 2.45).
- In this instance it was obviously the narrative character of chapters 1-6 which caused the book to be placed among the post-Exilic historiographies.
Historicity
Daniel is said to have lived through the days of the last Babylonian kings Nebuchadnezzar (chaps. 1-4) and Belshazzar (chaps. 5, 7-8), into the reigns of the Persian kings Cyrus (chap. 10) and Darius I Hystaspes (if indeed this is the ruler referred to in 11:1 as Darius the Mede; but see 9:1), that is, from about 600 to about 520 B.C.E.
However, its historical inaccuracies support other indications that the book should be dated much later. The writer,
- who presumably lived in the second century B.C.E.,
- wove his tales and visionary dreams around a legendary figure,
- in a literary fashion popular in his time.
- He was probably acquainted with traditions to which the prophet Ezekiel alludes, about a Daniel unequaled in wisdom (Ezek. 28:3) and righteous like Noah and Job (Ezek. 14:13-14, 19-20).
These allusions are possibly the immediate cause for the replacement of Daniel after Ezekiel in the Greek canon. Further, the caves of Qumran have yielded not only fragments of the biblical Book of Daniel but also a fragment of a composition entitled by its editor “Prayer of Nabonidus.” The latter bears a telling resemblance to a central theme in Daniel 4 (which there, however, focuses on Nebuchadnezzar): King Nabonidus, plagued by maladies and exiled to the oasis of Taima, is exhorted by a Jewish sage to relinquish his “idols of gold, silver [bronze, iron], wood, stone, and clay” and embrace the faith in the once true God, so that he will he healed and reinstated to his royal office.
- The biblical Daniel may also be linked with the figure Dnil/Dnel known from the Ugaritic epic Aqht (not later than the fourteenth century B.C.E.).
- While no definite connection between the Ugaritic Dnil/Dnel and the biblical Daniel can be established, the combined evidence from the Book of Ezekiel, the “Prayer of Nabonidus,” and the epic Aqht makes it seem likely that the author of the biblical Book of Daniel knew of traditions concerning an antediluvian “wise and just Dnil/Dnel.”
- He shifted that figure from its original Mesopotamian or Phoenician-Canaanite setting into Palestine-Judea and made him the kingpin of his own literary creation.
- Such shifts in period and location are common in comparable specimens of apocryphal and pseudo-epigraphical literature,
- including the Book of Jubilees, in which Noah is the central dramatis persona;
- the Book of Enoch, ascribed to the godfearing ancient known from a tradition in Genesis 5:18;
- the “testaments” allegedly composed by the twelve sons the patriarch Jacob;
- and the Book of Baruch, said to have been composed by the ascribe of the prophet Jeremiah (Jer. 45).
By a similar literary maneuver,
- King Solomon was made the author of the apocryphal Book of Wisdom
- and of a collection of “psalms,”
- possibly in emulation of the ascription to him of Proverbs (Prov. 1:1; cf. 25:1),
- the Song of Songs (Song 1:1),
- and Ecclesiastes,
- said to have been written by “Koheleth the son of David, king in Jerusalem” (Eccles. 1:1).
- Likewise, rabbinic tradition saw King David as the author of the Book of Psalms.
It appears that in this respect as in others (discussed below), Daniel represents both the earliest and the most accomplished example of a genre which achieved wide currency in the Judeo-Christian literature of the Hellenistic-Roman (or intertestamental) period. This genre, which could be designated “inverted plagiarism,” was emulated by much later writers: an author bent on attaining public acclaim of his writings would willingly suppress his own name, ascribing his creations to a worthy figure of old whose name alone would suffice to assure them of general acceptance.
Style and Imagery
The author of Daniel incorporates motifs, imagery, and phraseology from biblical, and to some degree also from nonbiblical, literature. The text is shot through with literary allusions, paraphrastic quotations, and borrowed phrases which were presumably current when the book was made public.
Daniel, especially in its Hebrew sections, contains original phraseology which demonstrates considerable stylistic innovation. Some of this novel phraseology is echoed in the writings of the Covenanters of the Judean desert, the Qumran scrolls. But the book is also replete with imagery and turns of phrase which appear to be lifted from a variety of canonical Hebrew writings, as even a small selection of examples illustrates:
- The expression kalah weneheratsah, “utter desolation” (9:27 [AT]), occurs only once elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, in Isaiah 10:23.
- In Daniel 11:7, 10, and 36 we find still more expressions from Isaiah (11:1, 8:8, 10:25).
- Daniel10:14 is seemingly made up of phrases taken from Genesis 49:1 and Habakkuk 2:3.
- The opening paragraph in 11:30 is adapted from Balaam’s oracle in Numbers 24:24.
- “Daniel sat in the gate of the king” (2:49) echoes “Mordecai sat in the king’s gate” (Esther 2:21).
- Daniel and his fellow ministers are appointed to ensure proper taxation, so that “the king[‘s treasure] should have no damage” (6:2).
- Likewise, the Persian officials warn the king of the exiles who have returned to Judah lest their activities “damage the revenue of the kings” (Ezra 4:13).
- And Esther would acquiesce in anything but the destruction of her people, so as not to “cause damage to the king[‘s interest]” (Esther 7:4; compare 3:8-9).
- The humanlike figure that touches Daniel’s lips (10:16) is described in imagery that appears to be derived from the inauguration visions of Jeremiah (Jer. 1:9)), Ezekiel (Ezek. 1, esp. v. 26), and possibly Isaiah (Isa. 6:6-7).
- Folklore furnishes numerous parallels for a (world-) tree which provides nourishment to all beings and shelter to beast and fowl, such as that seen by Nebuchadnezzar in his dream (4:10-14).
- The image also shares striking details with the portrayal of the primeval Behemoth in Job 40:15-24.
Patterns and Motifs
Daniel shares with other biblical writings a predilection for the ascending numerical pattern 3 + 1, observable in other ancient Near Eastern literatures. Whatever the roots of this pattern, it signifies a basic “complete” unit of three, topped by a fourth of special standing and importance.
- The tale of Daniel and his three friends immediately brings to mind the parallel tradition concerning Job and his three Friends. In both instances, the names of all four dramatis personae are carefully recorded (Dan. 1:6; Job 2:11, 42:9).
- This is also the case in one strand of tradition which records David as the youngest of his father’s sons, who, despite his youth, outranks his three oldest brothers:
“the three eldest sons of Jesse went and followed Saul to the battle: and the names of his three sons that went to the battle were Eliab the firstborn, and next unto him Abinadab, and the third Shamma. And David was the youngest” (1 Sam. 17:13-14a).
- Solomon is the fourth of David’s sons who were born to him in Jerusalem(2 Sam. 5:14). Solomon vies for the succession to the throne and prevails over his three older brothers, Amnon, Absalom, and Adonijah.
- Again, after two of the four sons of Aaron the high priest, Nadab and Abihu, are consumed by a fire from heaven (Lev. 10:1-2), and Ebiathar, a descendant of the third, Ithamar, is banished to Anatoth (1 Kings 2:26-27; cf. 1 Chron. 24:1-5), the priestly office at the Temple in Jerusalem reverts to the fourth son, Eleazar, and his descendants.
- The 3 + 1 pattern also underlies the episode of Daniel’s appointment by Darius as the first of “three presidents” whom the king put in charge of 120 princes who oversaw the affairs of his kingdom (6:2). We are specifically told that “Daniel was preferred above the presidents and princes, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king thought to set him over the whole realm” (6:3).
The stereotyped wording makes it seem likely that the original version of this tale spoke of 120 governors of the empire, superintended by three ministers, with Daniel controlling the entire administrative hierarchy, second only to the king himself.
Understood thus, this administrative scheme would be an exact replica of the one ascribed to Nebuchadnezzar in 2:48-49:
“the kind made Daniel … ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors … of Babylon … and he set Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, over the affairs of the province of Babylon: but Daniel sat in the gate of the king” (cf. Esther2:21).
The 3 + 1 pattern is well represented in biblical Wisdom literature. An entire series occurs in Proverbs 30:15-31. Some of the “topped triads”—“three things … yea, four”—derived from the animal world, exemplified by the smallest creatures (Prov. 30:24-28) or larger beasts (Prov. 30:29-31).
Another proverb starts out with an enumeration of three inscrutable facts in the animal and the inanimate world, leading up to an even more unfathomable fourth phenomenon in human life:
“There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock, the way of a ship [better: a fish] in the midst of the ocean; and the way of a man with a maid” (Prov. 30:18-19).
An additional series is set altogether in human experience. Three things are unbearable: a slave who becomes king, an evildoer who prospers, a hated wife who conceives (and therefore triumphs), but worst of all, “an handmaid that is heir to her mistress (Prov. 30:21-23).
The same model recurs also in visionary or prophetic literature. Balaam the seer blesses the people Israel three times instead of cursing them as the Moabite king Balak had commissioned him to do (Num. 24:10), and then adds a fourth blessing which surpasses the previous ones (Num. 24:15-24). Likewise, on the journey from Pethor, Balaam’s ass sees three times “the angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand, and … turned aside” to avoid him (Num. 22:23-30), until the seer’s eyes are opened, and the fourth time he perceives the angel who threatens his life (Num. 22:31-33).
The pattern 3 + 1 finds a most salient expression in Amos’s oracles against foreign nations (Amos 1:3-2:3) and against Judah and Israel (Amos 2:4-16). The phrase “for three transgressions … and for four,” which recurs in every instance, shows the fourth to be more damnable than the preceding ones: “Thus saith the Lord … I will not turn away the punishment thereof” (Amos 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 13; 2:1, 4, 6). In this as in many other instances, the quintessence of the pattern is to be sought in the “fourth” item in which the series culminates, and which is intrinsically different from the preceding unit of “three” which serves as its antithesis.
Therefore, the component “three” cannot be interpreted as referring to a precise number, but rather should be viewed as a schematic literary figure.
Such an understanding would remove a difficulty in the explanation of Daniel’s visions of “four kingdoms” that shall arise (chap. 11; cf. 8:18-26), likened to “four beast” (7:1-8; cf. Prov. 30:29-30) and culminating in the fourth, the Greek Empire (8:21, 10:20, 11:2). While the immediately preceding third kingdom is obviously Persia and the first is Babylon, the exact definition of the second has been subject to speculations since antiquity. But these speculations may be unnecessary. If we view these visions of Daniel as further examples of the 3 + 1 pattern, their thrust and the clue to their meaning would lie in the fourth, the Greek Empire, with the preceding unit of “three” supplying the indispensable foil required by the traditional schema.
Similarly, the puzzling mention of an otherwise undocumented Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, which opens the book (1:1) may reflect another literary convention.
It cannot go unnoticed that the book dates two of Daniel’s visions in the third regnal year of a king: one in the third year of Belshazzar (8:1) and one in the third year of Cyrus (10:1). Likewise, Ahasuerus gave his banquet, which was to become of crucial importance in Esther’s life history (compare Belshazzar’s feast in chap. 5 and Pharaoh’s in Gen. 40:20), in the third year of his reign (Esther 1:3). Although the possible exactitude of this date cannot be categorically ruled out in this or the other case, its recurrence in visions and tales in Daniel and Esther appears to reveal a predilection for this literary convention among post-Exilic writers (see further 2 Chron. 17:7).
Use of Traditions
The author of Daniel adopts and develops certain biblical traditions, moving from the genre of prophecy to that of apocalypticism.
- Building on Jeremiah’s divinely inspired assurance that Israel would experience a restoration of its fortunes seventy years after the destruction of the Temple(Jer. 25:11-12; 29:10; cf. Zech. 1:12, 7:5; Ezra 1:2; 2 Chron. 36:21-23),
- he foresees a new redemption of his people after seven times seventy years (9:2, 25-26).
- But his pronouncements are intentionally veiled, as if to prevent his readers from fully fathoming the apocalyptic visions.
- In this he appears to imitate Ezekiel’s equally mystifying description of his vision of the heavenly chariot (Ezek. 1).
- He takes from Ezekiel 3:1-2 and Zechariah 5:1-4 the motif of a celestial scroll in which are spelled out divinatory matters that the prophet is commanded to assimilate or even to ingest, though with an interesting and significant variation.
- Ezekiel digests the contents of the scroll by physically eating it.
- To the post-Exilic prophet Zechariah, the content of the scroll he sees is explained by a heavenly interpreter (Zech. 5:1-4), probably identical with the angel who interprets for him the ensuing visions (Zech. 5:5-6:8) as in Zechariah 1-4.
- Daniel, too, is enlightened by a heavenly messenger:
- the angel Gabriel explains the meaning of what he has read in “books” of an obviously revelatory nature (chap. 9) and later interprets a vision of Daniel’s (chap. 10).
- But revealed matters of ultimate significance must remain unintelligible to Daniel (12:8) and to other men, securely hidden away in sealed books until the appointed time of revelation (12:4, 9).
This mystification seems to indicate a theological trend, the roots of which are discernible in late biblical writings but which comes into full bloom in apocryphal, Qumran, and early rabbinic literature: the unbridgeable chasm which increasingly separates man from the divine sphere.
- In the biblical past, a prophet could bring God’s word to man.
- Now, the seer requires a celestial interpreter to explain his visions to him.
- Mediator upon mediator intervenes between man and God.
- And even then the meaning of the revelation may remain hidden.
The Type-Plot of “The Successful Exile”
Scholars have accurately recognized traits in the Daniel story which it shares with other biblical tales of a destitute (fatherless) young Judean or Israelite exile who rises to an unprecedented height at a foreign court. Some focal events and circumstances in the progress of —
- Joseph in Egypt,
- of Esther and Mordecai,
- and of Nehemiah and Ezra at the Persian court
- are unmistakably reflected in the alleged life history of Daniel and his friends. the expatriate Daniel wins the goodwill of the Babylonian courtiers charged with his education (1:3-18).
- Like Joseph, who was “stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews” (Gen. 40:15) and found favor with his master, an Egyptian official (Gen. 39:1-4),
- and the orphaned Esther (Esther 2:7), who gained the support of the overseer of Ahasuerus’ harem (Esther 2:9),
- Because of their good looks, intelligence (cf. Ezra 7:25), and modesty (Gen. 39:2-12; Esther 2:8-10, 15-16; Dan. 1:4; cf. Neh. 2:5-8), all three attract the attention of those in authority and ultimately of the ruler of the foreign land into which they have been abducted (Gen. 41:37-39; Esther 2:17; Dan. 1:6-7, 19-20).
- They soon attain the highest positions in the realm: Likewise, Nebuchadnezzar elevates Daniel to the rank of “ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon” (2:48); and Belshazzar makes “a proclamation concerning him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom” (5:29).
- Joseph becomes viceroy of Egypt (Gen. 41:40-44);
- Esther is made queen of the realm (Esther 2:17);
- Mordecai (Esther 2:21-23, 6:3, 10:2),
- Ezra (Ezra 7:6, 11-26), and Nehemiah (Neh. 1:1, 2:1-9) are given important appointments at court.
The elevation to such exalted office is marked by an installation ceremony which in all three instances is described in almost identical terms:
- “Then commanded Belshazzar, and they clothed Daniel with scarlet, and put a chain of gold about his neck” (5:29);
- “Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See I have set three over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon Joseph’s hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck; And he made him to ride in the viceroy’s chariot [AR]; and they cried before him,
- Haman to conduct the ceremony exactly as the latter has specified, erroneously assuming that he himself is to receive these honors:
“For the man whom the king delighteth to honour, Let the royal apparel be brought which the king useth to wear, and the horse that the king rideth upon, and the crown royal which is set upon his head … Then took Haman the apparel and the horse, and arrayed Mordecai, and brought him on horseback through the street of the city, and proclaimed before him, Thus shall it be done unto the man whom the king delighteth to honour” (Esther 6:7-11; cf. Esther 8:15).
- Joseph starts out as a dreamer (Gen. 37:5-11) to become a successful interpreter of dreams (Gen. 40). Thanks to this faculty he achieves highest distinction in the Egyptian kingdom (Gen. 41).
- Likewise, Daniel makes his way to the top in Babylon by convincingly explaining the dreams of Nebuchadnezzar (chaps. 2, 4) and the mysterious writing which appears on the wall during Belshazzar’s feast (chap. 5). But in contrast to the story of Joseph, he starts out as an interpreter of dreams and only later becomes a dreamer and a visionary (chaps. 7, 8, 10-12).
- Both Joseph and Daniel succeed where all Egyptian and Chaldean wise men fail. (cf. Gen. 41:8 with Dan. 2:1-13; 4:1-4, 15).
- Similarly, in the final event, Mordecai and Esther prove to be wiser than the scheming Haman (Esther 6:13, 9:24-25).
The full integration of the foreigner in the very hub of his new milieu requires one additional adjustment: the change of his Hebrew name to an appellation which conforms with local usage. (The renaming may also be considered a status symbol, comparable to a throne name sometimes adopted by kings at the beginning of their reign.)
- The Judean Hadassah takes on the pagan name Esther (Esther 2:7);
- Pharaoh confers upon Joseph the Hebrew (Gen. 40:15) the meaningful appellation Zaphenath-paneah, interpreted by tradition to mean “Riddle Solver” (Gen. 41:45);
- and a high-ranking official at Nebuchadnezzar’s court renames Daniel and his friends Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego (1:7).
The rise of the exile at the foreign court does not proceed altogether smoothly. The type-plot setting requires that on his way to the top, the stranger will have to overcome obstacles placed in his path by envious adversaries. Being unable to attack him openly because of his excellent reputation and good standing, his enemies conspire to bring about his fall and temporarily succeed in their aim. This turn of plot is variously manifested in the stories of–
- Joseph,
- Mordecai,
- and Nehemiah.
Like Ahasuerus (Esther 3), Nebuchadnezzar is easily persuaded by his advisers and has Daniel’s three friends thrown into the blazing furnace (3:19-23). They are saved, however, by divine intervention (3:24-27), while their tormentors are consumed by the flames that leap out of the furnace (3:22).
The motif “from pit to pinnacle” is enacted once more in an episode of court intrigue against Daniel, set in the reign of King Darius the Mede (chap. 6). Unable to find any malpractice in Daniel’s administration of the kingdom, his adversaries scheme to devise a charge involving his religion, Knowing that Daniel prays three times a day to his God, they induce the malleable ruler to proclaim himself the only divinity to whom the citizens of the realm may present a petition for the next thirty days. They catch Daniel making supplication to his God and report him to the king. Unable to act against his own ordinance, Darius reluctantly gives orders to have Daniel thrown into the lion’s pit, comforting himself and the victim with the thought that Daniel’s God will surely save him. And indeed, when the sealing stone is removed from the mouth of the pit the next morning, Daniel answers Darius’ anxious call with a declaration of his loyalty to him (6:22) and emerges unscathed from the pit. Overwhelmed by the greatness of this miracle, Darius offers homage to Daniel’s God and decrees that all men in his royal domain shall revere him (6:25-27). Applying retributive justice, he orders Daniel’s accusers to be thrown into the lion’s pit with their wives and children (cf. Esther 9:6-10, Num. 16:32). They are immediately set upon and consumed by the wild beasts (6:24).
As a symbol of mortal danger, lions play an important role in Hebrew Scriptures.
- Shepherds tremble before the lion’s roar (for example, Isa. 31:4; Amos 3:4, 8; Zech. 11:3; Ps. 22:13; Job 4:10),
- which is compared to the noise made by armies on the march (Isa. 5:29-30)
- and to the tempest which manifests God’s intervention in nature and history (for example, Jer. 25:30, Hos. 11:10, Joel 3:16, Amos 1:2, Job 37:4).
- Lions mete out divine punishment, ravaging transgressors and recalcitrants (1 Kings 13:24-28,20:36; 2 Kings 17:24-26; Jer. 50:17).
- Only exceptional men can vanquish a lion (2 Sam. 23:20), like the divinely inspired Samson (Judges 14:5-9) and David (1 Sam. 17:34-37).
But the lions of the Daniel tradition are a different breed. They are the only specimens of their kind in biblical narrative which are turned from ferocious beasts into docile animals.
- They recall Isaiah’s visionary lion that in a future ideal age “shall eat straw like the ox” and forage together with calves, a little child leading them to the pasture (Isa. 11:6-9, 65:25). The depiction of that era of universal peace is enfolded by means of ring composition between two sections of a complementary vision of the future ruler of the appeased world, “a rod out of stem of Jesse” (Isa. 11:1-5, 10) on the other hand, and on the other the restitution of Israel’s fortune and its victory over its historical enemies (Isa. 11:11-16).
- The thematic similarity with Isaiah spells out the “message” contained in the episode of Daniel in the lion’s den. At the same time, it links the narrative part of the book, which centers on the person of Daniel (chaps. 1-6), with the series of dreams and visions (chaps. 7-12) which center on world history and, in this framework, on the fate of the people of Israel and their ultimate redemption (12:1-3). It is because of this message that the two tales of Daniel’s and his friends’ rescue from the blazing furnace and the ferocious lions became paradigms of divine deliverance in the repertoire of Western literature and visual art inspired by the Hebrew Scriptures.
A Diaspora Novel
The Exilic setting of the type-plot and the motifs which Daniel shares with the stories of Esther, Joseph, and, to a degree, with Ezra-Nehemiah—as well as with some features of the Moses-in-Egypt tradition—have given rise to the attractive supposition that there narratives are representative examples of a distinct biblical genre—the Diaspora Novel.
However, despite the persuasive commonality, there are some telling differences among these narratives.
- The Book of Esther in particular is, in certain respects, quite unlike the other specimens of the presumed genre in that it is almost totally devoid of specifically Israelite historical reminiscences and religious-cultic traditions.
- Esther is the only book of the Hebrew Bible in which the name of God is not evoked even once. God is, in fact, altogether absent from the scene on which the drama is acted out by human antagonists to the best of their skill and cunning.
- There is no mention of prayers, which one would have expected Esther, Mordecai, and the Jews of Persia to have uttered in times of mortal distress. Such prayers were, not unexpectedly, supplied by the author of the additions to the Greek translation of the Hebrew book. Mordecai, Esther, and probably also some of their compatriots revel at the king’s table, seemingly without paying attention to the dietary prescriptions which regulate the consumption of food in Jewish tradition.
- In view of the post-Exilic date of the book, when Israel certainly abided by a particular religious-cultic code, the silence on such matters is highly significant. It may be explained by the Wisdom coloring of the Esther tale, which accentuates the human and the general rather than the religious and the particular.
- The Joseph story similarly exhibits conspicuous Wisdom traits.
- But in this instance the “Land of the Hebrew” serves throughout as a visible backdrop of scene,
- and the God of Israel determines the progress of events in the unfolding drama.
- This presence is fully explicated by Joseph when he reveals to his brothers the hidden propitious significance of their evil deed:
“Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life” (Gen. 45:5; see also Gen. 45:6-8; 50:19-20; 41:16, 32).
The absence of any mention of the observance of food taboos or any other cultic prescriptions by Joseph or, for the matter, by Moses while at Pharaoh’s court, is in keeping with the setting of these traditions in the pre-Sinai (revelation) period, that is before the issuance of the laws, beginning with Exodus 20, which pertain to these matters.
How different, predominantly from the Esther tale, is the atmosphere which prevails in the other Diaspora Novels.
- Ezra-Nehemiah is pervaded by
- an awareness of Jewish history,
- a wholly Jewish religious outlook,
- and an unrelenting endeavor to make tradition the mainstay of the reconstituted community’s public and private life.
- The civic and cultic leaders offer prayers of confession and thanksgiving to Israel’s God (Ezra 9:3—10:1; Neh. 2:4, 9:4-37).
- Life is regulated by the ordinances of “the Law” (for example, Ezra 10:4-44; Neh. 8:1-3, 10:1-39, 12:44-47).
- There is no mistaking the Jewish character of the book and of the community whose history it portrays.
The “Jewishness” of the chronicle of Daniel and his friends comes even more to the fore because of its biographical character, which makes for a more graphic presentation of the religious way of life.
- The divine immanence, the young men’s reliance on Israel’s God, and their trust in his efficacy pervade the narrative.
- The young men meticulously observe the food taboos, subsist—even flourish—on a diet of seeds and water rather than partake of the king’s provision of unclean meat and wine (1:5-16).
- Daniel prays three times a day, “his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem” (6:10), and makes supplication for his people (9:3-19), like Ezra (Ezra 9:6-15) and the Levites or the entire community (Neh. 9:4-37).
[The pronounced Jewish piety which permeates the Book of Daniel invites a comparison with the similarly oriented apocryphal Book of Judith, also set in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, although there he is presented as king of Assyria, not of Babylonia (Judith 1:1). Judith, a beautiful and wealthy widow, meticulously observes all ritual rites incumbent on her. She prevails upon her compatriots not to lose faith in God, who will surely have mercy on his people. Like Daniel and his friends, Ezra and Nehemiah, and unlike Esther, Mordecai, and the Jews of Susa, Judith and her compatriots profusely offer prayers to the God of Israel. Like Esther, Judith uses her beauty and her cunning to save her people. She tricks Holofernes into believing that, spurred by a prophetic revelation, she fled from Betuliah to lead him and his army victoriously into the city of Jerusalem. But whereas Esther feasts at Ahasuerus’ table, Judith refuses to partake of the Assyrians’ food and drink. She brings with her, her own ritually clean provisions, just as Daniel and his friends avoid defilement by eating the king’s meat and drinking his wine, and subsist on “pulse and water” (1:12). Ultimately, Judith accomplishes her mission by killing the lusting Holofernes (Judith 12:16-13:8) rather than by becoming the consort of a Gentile as Esther does.]
The Abundant Evidence of literary and intellectual dependence on earlier biblical writings and the religious-conceptual affinity with apocryphal literature confirm the late date of Daniel, arrived at on the strength of other (for example, historical) indices. The range of quotations, allusions, and paraphrases demonstrates the writer’s familiarity with the Hebrew Scriptures. Since it may be assumed that his audience was also familiar with the biblical texts, the very makeup of the book may reflect on the learning of the ancient audience, and may help explain the book’s attainment of popularity.
Daniel must be classified as a fictional tale rather than as a historical narrative; but a comparison with Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah, which together with Daniel constitute the closing triad of the Hebrew canon, shows that it is also a distinctive variant of late biblical historiography.
- Whereas the Chronicler’s outlook is altogether retrospective, and the compiler of Ezra-Nehemiah records contemporaneous events, the author of Daniel professes to be concerned with “prospective” history.
- It is presumably this visionary perspective that made the motifs, imagery, and episodes of Daniel a source of inspiration to writers and artists of much later generations.
- The apocalyptic, utopian—that is, nonhistorical—character of the visions facilitates their use as prototypes.
- By applying, in essence, the same technique so well known from the Qumran pesher writings, the ad hoc interpretation of prophetic pronouncements which the author of Daniel had himself practiced, later readers could discern their own situations prefigured in the ancient tales and visions of Daniel.