Day 27 – Friday -- The Book of Daniel

Day 27 – Friday

The Book of Daniel

The writing is on the wall. Because we have reached the Book of Daniel.

This book has two sections: Six hero stories (chs. 1-6); and four visions (chs 8.-12). The six stories are personal. The four visions are cosmic.

The story is written as if the writer is living during the Exile (586-536 BCE). . But scholars say that there are definite signs in the book that it was written later during the reign of the Syrian tyrant, Antiochus IV (also known as Antiochus Epiphanes). This dates the book around 165 BCE. To understand the context of Daniel you would do well to read 1st and 2nd Maccabees from a Bible with the Apocrypha in it. (Some Protestant editions include the Apocrypha; all Catholic Bibles have these books.)

The situation is one of persecution. How do you survive in a hostile environment? If your religion is not accepted in your society, how do you honor God and keep your faith? The author tells six stories about Daniel and his three friends, and how they kept the faith and endured persecution.

Chapter three is about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego being thrown into the fiery furnace because they wouldn’t bow down and worship a golden image. Miraculously, they survive.

Chapter six is the story of Daniel in the lion’s den. Another miraculous deliverance.

These four aren’t exactly presented as Super Heroes, since the deliverance comes from God (or angels); but they are to be imitated as heroes of faith. They trusted God for deliverance. So should you. That’s the message.

The “hand writing on the wall” is in chapter five. It’s sort of like the Twilight Zone. A hand (without a body) writes some strange words on the wall during a banquet with King Belshazzar. Daniel is called in to interpret the weird words—MENE, MENE, TEKEL, PARSIN. Fortunately his decoding ring had arrived in the mail, and he was able to discern the meaning. This is where a well-known phrase is used: You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting (5.27). Daniel tells the king that his kingdom is about to be taken over by the Medes and the Persians. Daniel is rewarded for telling the truth.


The four visions of Daniel remind us of Ezekiel’s visions. There are four animals that stand for four world powers. There is a lion, a bear, a leopard, and a creature with iron teeth. This creature has ten horns (which represent the kings of the Greek empire). Suddenly a little horn grows and destroys three horns. (The little horn is Antiochus Epiphanes.) Then God holds court and the little horn is killed. And the other beasts/creatures have their power taken away.

Remember how Ezekiel was referred to as “a son of man”? Well, here is another reference. The author of Daniel sees in his vision/dream “one like a son of man” going in the clouds to the throne of God (who has been called “The Ancient of Days”). This “son of man” ascends to God and is given authority over everything. The term “son of man” in Daniel is debated among scholars. Some think it refers to a divine being; others believe it is simply mean a human being. When Jesus refers to himself (always in the third person) as the Son of Man, what does he mean?

Well, even with the strange cartoon-like pictures the author paints in these visions, the meaning is clear. Various human kingdoms come and go. But in the end it is God’s Kingdom that triumphs. Of course Christians interpret the “son of man” to be Christ.

We do not need a decoder ring to read Daniel. We simply have to recognize the historical context, understand what was going on at the time, and read the cryptic language in light of history. In the second century BCE the Jewish people were being persecuted. But they fought a guerilla-type war and won. The Maccabee brothers were the real heroes. The Jewish Festival of Hanukkah (Nov/Dec) commemorates the courage of the Maccabees.

Like the Book of Ezekiel, Daniel is fertile ground for end-time prophecies for a certain branch of Evangelicalism. They especially like chapter nine which talks about the “seventy weeks of years.” From certain Christian outlets you can buy charts that go into great detail explaining how to calculate the end-times that have to do with the “seventy weeks of years.” William Miller was a Bible teacher in the early 1800s. He made a calculation based on Daniel’s “prophecies,” and told people that Jesus would return on October 22, 1843. No show. And many times since, the date has been set by “students of prophecy.” It’s been embarrassing to many leaders and followers. But there will always be those who will latch on to someone who has the secret answer.

Don’t worry yourself over the “seventy weeks of years.” This is apocalyptic language referring to the present time of the author, the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes. These things have already happened. Don’t become obsessed with them. Get busy helping the poor and loving your family and your enemies.

One unique thing appears in Daniel—the only specific reference to resurrection in the Hebrew Scriptures. (Yes, you may draw out one in Job and one in Isaiah, etc. But this one is non-debatable.) In Daniel 12 we read:

Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt (12.2).  

And,

But you, go your way, and rest; you shall rise for your reward at the end of the days (12.13).

In case you want to know—about half of Daniel was written in Hebrew and half in Aramaic, the language of the Babylonian and Persian empires. And in some Bibles there are two more chapters. In Protestant Bibles with the Apocrypha, you can find in a separate section “Additions to the Book of Daniel.” This will include three additions: (1) The Prayer of Azariah and the Song of the Three Jews; (2) Susanna; (3) Bel and the Dragon. In a Catholic Bible there will be an Appendix following chapter 12. In includes Chapter 13: Susanna; and Chapter 14: Bel and the Dragon. The other piece, The Prayer of Azariah, is inserted after Daniel 3.23.


My favorite passage in Daniel is in chapter three. Nebuchadnezzar commands the three friends of Daniel to bow down to the golden image. Here is their response:

If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king, let him deliver us. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods and we will not worship the golden statue that you have set up.

But if not…

When Jesus tells disciples to take up their cross and follow him, he is challenging them/us to say, but if not…


Do you find it easy or difficult to live by the values and Spirit of Christ in our culture? Do you feel like you have to swim against the stream? Or not?

Finish this: The time I felt like I was in the lion’s den was…