Welcome back to my study/review of The Book of Daniel. If you missed the previous parts of this study, you can find them HERE.
Daniel 2:14-19
14 Then Daniel replied with prudence and discretion to Arioch, the captain of the king’s guard, who had gone out to kill the wise men of Babylon. 15 He declared to Arioch, the king’s captain, “Why is the decree of the king so urgent?” Then Arioch made the matter known to Daniel. 16 And Daniel went in and requested the king to appoint him a time, that he might show the interpretation to the king.
17 Then Daniel went to his house and made the matter known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, 18 and told them to seek mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his companions might not be destroyed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon. 19 Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
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The thing that jumps out to me most in this section is that Daniel sets up the appointment to reveal the dream to the King before the mystery of it was revealed to him later that night. Daniel was so confident in God’s mercy and provision that he acted with that as his assumption (though it can be argued that death was the result of failure, either way, so it made reasonable sense to buy time in any event.) Looking more deeply at the verses, starting in The Pulpit Commentaries and verse 14:
Then Daniel answered with counsel and wisdom to Arioch the captain of the king’s guard, which was gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon. The text here does not seem to have differed much from the Egyptian recension, the translation of which we have in the Septuagint Version. “Then Daniel spake with the counsel and knowledge which were his to Arioch the chief executioner [ἀρχὶ μαγείρῳ, ‘chief butcher,’ used by Plutarch for ‘chief cook’] of the king, to whom it was appointed to lead out the wise men (σοφιστὰς) of Babylonia.” The text before the Septuagint translators seems to have had דילֵה (deelēh), “which to him,” equivalent to “which he had.” The LXX. text had פקד instead of נפק. Something may be said for this reading, as the לof the succeeding word may have occasioned the disappearance of the ,ד which might be regarded as a לdefectively written. Theodotion agrees perfectly with the Massoretic text. The Peshitta is somewhat of a paraphrase in regard to the first clause, “Then Daniel pacified and consulted, and said to Arioch the chief of the king’s guard, who had gone out to slay the wise men of Babylon.” It would seem as if there had been some confusion of the words here, though the meaning is not far from that of the other version. The Vulgate Version differs, “Then Daniel asked about the law and sentence (sentientia) at Arioch, who had gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon.” The slate of matters implied here reveals to us the fact that several links of the story are awanting. There seems to have been absolute secrecy as to what had taken place in the royal council-chamber, and how absolute had been the failure of the Chaldean wise men to satisfy the demands of the king. We could imagine the strange turmoil that this would have caused in the college of young cadets of the various guilds of soothsayers and augurs, had it been announced that these great heads of their various orders had failed. News may have come of the wrath of the king, and close behind the angry sentence of extirpation, passed not only on those who had been the immediate occasions of the king’s wrath, but on all the gull, is of wise men in Babylon. This must have filled those who belonged to the various guilds implicated, not only with terror, but with amazement. It was next brought to them that they, though only in the lower stages of these famous guilds, were doomed to a common destruction with the past masters of the craft. That this was allowed to reach these subalterns proves that popular opinion had not gone with the fiery edict of the king. Above all, Arioch, captain “of the guard”—”of the cut-throats,” as the Spanish translators have rendered it; “chief butcher,” as both Theodotion and the Septuagint render his title—acts as if he is not in favour of it. lie is compelled to do the king’s bidding; but he is evidently bent on going about the realtor in such a leisurely fashion that the great body of the condemned may escape. We may stay to notice that the name Arioch is a genuine Babylonian name, Eri Aku, “Servant of the moon-god.” Professor Bevan declares it is borrowed from Genesis 14:1, as his title is from Genesis 37:36. It is singular that when the author’s acquaintance with the earlier Scriptures was so full and accurate, he should drop into the blunders he is accused of. In Genesis the executioner does not execute anybody; in Daniel he is represented as engaged in organizing the massacre. Daniel seems not to have waited till the terrible band of guardsmen-executioners arrived at the college where he and his friends were living, he goes direct to the chief of the band. The fact that he is not cut down immediately on his approach seems to argue that even the common guardsmen shrank from the duty imposed on them. Their horror and shrinking were perfectly natural. Let us suppose a company in a regiment of Irish Roman Catholics ordered to shoot down their own priests, and we may have some idea of the feelings of these soldiers. These augurs and soothsayers, these astrologers and magicians, had been their counsellors; they had been their intercessors with their deities. If they were all slaughtered, would not the sheer blank in their own lives be immense? There would be no one now to tell them, however falsely, of the future: no one to tell them what to do to propitiate the gods. But more, the gods might well be supposed to be enraged by the slaughter of so many of their special servants, and might be expected to pour down vengeance on the whole nation as well as on the king who had commanded it, but most of all on those who, under whatever compulsion, raised their sacrilegious hands against the priests of the holy gods. It is even not improbable that, once the immediate paroxysm of his fury had passed, Nebuchadnezzar would be appalled at what he had himself ordered, and would connive at delay, in the hope that, though late, these wise men might come to reason and tell him what he wished. Daniel seems to find no difficulty in gaining access to the presence of Arioch. There are men who have a magnetic power over their fellows, and bend every one to their way, and still gain their affection. And Daniel seems pre-eminently to have been a man of this type. Personal good looks and suave manners had their own share, but something more was needed to carry a condemned man through the ranks of guards right into the presence of their chief. This is made all the more striking when we bear in mind that preparations were being made for the great massacre.
The note reminds us of the parallels between the events here and those described in Genesis with Joseph and Pharaoh. It also points out something I failed to notice initially upon my own read, namely that Daniel’s inquiry indicates that the King’s order to his magicians, sorcerers, and Chaldeans was not mentioned to anyone outside of those involved. The silence was taken seriously enough that even though Daniel appears to have been in training to join their ranks, even he was left in the dark. Continuing on to the next verses, in Ellicott’s Bible Commentary:
(15) So hasty.—Literally, why is this severe decree of the king? By this question Daniel wished Arioch to understand that after all the matter was not impossible, as the wise men had stated it to be.
(16) Daniel went in.—Two characteristics of the prophet strike us, which distinguish the one who trusts in God’s help from those who relied entirely upon their secular wisdom. (1) The courage of Daniel, which led him to venture into the king’s presence upon a humane errand. (2) His humility, in asking the king to give him time. The wise men regarded the whole matter as an impossibility, and treated it as such, not even asking for any extension of time. But the faith of Daniel inspired him with this courageous humility, and was amply rewarded.
We are not told in so many words that this extension of time was granted, or that Daniel undertook to show more than the interpretation of the dream. A true account of what happened can only be gathered by reading Daniel 2:18; Daniel 2:28 by the side of this verse. It should be remembered that many narratives of scripture are related in a very condensed form, fuller details being added afterwards. (See Daniel 2:24, Note.)
The note here indicates that we should read Daniel’s question to mean that the King’s request is possible, rather than meaning it is a question about why the King’s punishment for failure is so severe. I think it’s fair to interpret the question both as a statement of implied ability and as an inquiry about why the punishment is so severe.
so hasty / so urgent = חֲצַף chătsaph, khats-af’; (Aramaic) a primitive root; properly, to shear or cut close; figuratively, to be severe:—hasty, be urgent.
Continuing on in Ellicott, Daniel informs his friends of the situation and God hears their prayers and answers them through Daniel:
(18) The God of heaven.—We meet with this title of Almighty God for the first time in Genesis 24:7. After the Captivity, it frequently designates the true God as contrasted with the heathen gods. (See Ezra 1:2, Nehemiah 1:5, Psalms 136:26.) It is used by Daniel in this sense in this verse.
the God = אֱלָהּ ʼĕlâhh, el-aw’; (Aramaic) corresponding to H433; God:—God, god.
of Heaven = שָׁמַיִן shâmayin, shaw-mah’-yin; (Aramaic) corresponding to H8064:—heaven.
Concluding the section with a note from TPC at verse 19:
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. The Septuagint adds that the secret was revealed “that very night (ἐν αὐτῇ τῇ νυκτι).“ This may be held to be implied in the Aramaic, but it is here explicitly stated. Further, the Septuagint speaks of the secret as “the, mystery of the king.” At the end of the clause the LXX. adds the word εὐσήμως, “evidently.” All these alterations imply additions to the text made by the translator. Theodotion, the Peshitta, and Jerome agree with the Massoretic text There has been considerable discussion as to whether this revelation was made to Daniel by a dream. Hitzig assumes that the night-vision to Daniel was a repetition of that which had appeared to Nebuchadnezzar, and then proceeds to brand this as a psychological impossibility. Keil, Kliefoth, Kraniehfeld, and Zöckler all declare against the identification of a night-vision with a dream. Keil and Kliefoth say in the same words, “A vision of the night is simply a vision which any one receives during the night whilst he is awake.” And Kranichfeld says, “Of a dream of Daniel, in our present case there is not one word.” Zöckler says, “Not a dream-vision, but an appearance (Gesicht) vision, which appeared during the night.” They maintain that, though all “dreams“ may be called “night-visions,” all “night-visions” are not “dreams.“ It would be difficult to prove that this is the usage of Scripture. It is quite true that the distinction between a dream and a vision is that in the former the subject is asleep, while in the latter he is awake. It may, however, be doubted whether this distinction is always maintained by the Hebrew and Aramaic writers, even in regard to “visions” and “dreams” generally; and it seems to us impossible to prove it in regard to “visions of the night” and “dreams.” In verse 28 of the chapter before us, there seems no doubt that Daniel uses these words as equivalent to each other; “Thy dream, and the visions of thy head upon thy bed, are these.” While we agree with Hitzig that the revelation was to Daniel in a dream, we do not admit the psychological impossibility, save only in the pedantic sense in which it is said that no two people, however close they may stand to each other, see the same rainbow Dreams are very generally the product of what the subject has experienced during his waking hours. Surely Hitzig never meant to assert that it was a psychological impossibility for two individuals to witness the same event. Certainly the improbability is very great that the sight of the same physical event should meet the eyes of two people in similar states of body, and produce on them precisely the some sort and degree of impression. That, however, is akin to the Hegelian pedantic statement, which asserts that we cannot go twice down the same street. Though it might even be admitted to be an impossibility in the only sense in which it can at all be admitted, yet still it is not self-contradictory. The self-contradictory is the only impossibility we can assert in the presence of the miraculous. Hitzig’s objection to this is really that it was a miracle, and all the parade of giving the statement a new face by calling it, not a miracle, but a psychological impossibility, is only throwing dust in the eyes of others, perhaps of himself. Ewald does not see any psychological impossibility, and declares that the author meant to represent this at all events. Up, then, before the mind of Daniel rose the gigantic statue of the monarch’s vision, and with the vision came also the divinely given certainty that this was what the king had seen. He needs, however, more than the vision: the interpretation of the vision is vouchsafed to him also. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven. The LXX. rendering here joins the first clause of verse 20 to this, “Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven, and having cried aloud, said.” Theodotion, the Peshitta, and Jerome agree with the Massoretic text. As we have said above, Daniel returned thanks to God for his great goodness to him and his friends. Our blessing God does not increase Divine felicity, but it expresses our sense of this felicity, and we recognize it all the more readily when, as in the case of these Jews, it is exhibited in making us partakers of it. Hence blessing God and giving God thanks become in such cases one and the mine thing.
It might seem like a small thing, but it always struck me as important that Daniel remembers to express gratitude for his salvation. It would be easy to be so caught up in the magnitude of the gift that you might forget to express thanks first.
As the note indicates, there is some debate over whether a dream and a night-vision are one and the same. The Masoretic Text translates more directly to “night vision” however, the Septuagint (the Greek translation of Daniel which is actually and counter-intuitively many hundred years older than the Hebrew MT) can be rendered “dream.”
If the distinction is important to you, I recommend looking into the Dead Sea Scrolls to verify the original Hebrew usage (the Commentaries above both pre-date the discoveries at Qumran.) For our purposes here though, it is sufficient that Daniel received an answer from God in the form of a vision at nighttime.
Now with the set-up complete, the Book of Daniel will begin to unfurl its apocalyptic visions. Daniel will in turn follow the same path of his ancestor Joseph and become a powerful person within the place where he is a captive.
