Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

As, then, the scene of the vision stands in intimate relation to its contents, so also the time at which the revelation was made to Daniel. With the third year of Belshazzar the dynasty of Nebuchadnezzar, the founder of the Babylonian world-kingdom, was extinguished. In this year Belshazzar, the son and successor of Nebuchadnezzar, died, and the sovereignty was transferred to a

1 There is little probability in the supposition that Choaspes is the modern Kerr ah or Kerkha, the Eulaus the modern Dizful, as Susa lay between these two rivers (Ker Porter, Winer, Ruetschi in Herz.'s Realen. xv. 246), and receives no sufficient support from the bas-relief of Kojundshik discovered by Layard, which represents the siege of a town lying between two rivers, since the identification of this town with Susa is a mere conjecture.

collateral branch, and finally to an intruder, under whom that world-kingdom, once so powerful, in a few years fell to pieces. Shortly before the death of Belshazzar the end of the Babylonian monarchy was thus to be seen, and the point of time, not very remote, which must end the Exile with the fall of Babylon. This point of time was altogether fitted to reveal.to the prophet in a vision what would happen after the overthrow of Babylon, and after the termination of the Exile.

Vers. 3-14. The vision. — Ver. 3. Daniel first sees one ram, ^ standing by the river. The ^n^ (one) does not here stand for the indefinite article, but is a numeral, in contradistinction to the two horns which the one ram has. The two horns of the ram were high, but the one was higher than the other, the higher coming up later, rinxn does not mean the first, but the one, and)"P3$n the other; for the higher grew up last. This is not to be understood as if Daniel first saw the ram without horns, and then saw the horns grow up, and at length the one horn become higher than the other (v. Leng., Hitzig); but that from the first Daniel saw the ram with two horns, but afterwards saw the one horn grow higher than the other (Kliefoth). The angel (ver. 20) explains the ram with two horns of the kings of Media and Persia. This does not mean that the two horns are to be understood (with Theodoret) of the twro dynasties of Cyrus and of Darius Hystaspes; but since the ram represents the one kingdom of the Medes and Persians, so the two horns represent the people of the Medes and Persians, from the union of which the Medo- Persian kingdom grew up. Both nations were the horns, i.e. the power of the monarchy; therefore are they both high. The one horn, which afterwards grew up higher than the other, represents the Persians, who raised themselves above the Medians. A ram and goat, as emblems of kings, princes, chiefs, often occur; cf. Isa. xiv. 9; Ezek. xxxiv. 17, xxxix. 18; Jer. 1. 8; Zech. x. 3. In Bundehesch the guardian spirit of the Persian kingdom appears under the form of a ram with clean feet and sharp-pointed horns, and, according to Amm. Marcell. xix. 1, the Persian king, when he stood at the head of his army, bore, instead of the diadem, the head of a ram (cf. Ha v.). The point of resemblance of this symbol is to be sought, not in the richness (the wool) and in the aggressive nature (the horns) of the ram (Theod., Venema), but the ram and the he-goat form, as Hofmann has justly remarked, a contrast to dull firmness and nimble lightness, as the bear and the panther.

The ram stands by the river and pushes toward the west, north, and south, but not toward the east. The river is thus not the one flowing on the east of Susa, for, standing there, the ram pushing toward the west from Susa would push against the capital of his kingdom, but the one flowing on the west; and the ram is to be conceived of as standing on the western bank of this river, from whence he pushed down with his horns all beasts before him, i<e. subdued all nations and kingdoms to his power in three regions of the earth. In the west he pushed against Babylon, Syria, and Asia Minor; in the south, Egypt; in the north, the Armenian and Scythian nations. These he subdued and incorporated in the Persian kingdom. He did not push toward the east — not because he could only push forwards and against that which was nearer, but not, without changing his position, backwards (Hitzig); nor because the Medo- Persians themselves came from the east (v. Leng., Kran.); nor yet because the conquests of the Persians did not stretch toward the east (Htiv.), for Cyrus and Darius subdued nations to the east of Persia even as far as to the Indus; but because, for the unfolding of the Medo-Persian monarchy as a world-power, its conquests in the east were subordinate, and therefore are not mentioned. The pushing toward the three world-regions corresponds to the three ribs in the mouth of the bear, ch. vii. 5, and intimates that the Medo-Persian world-kingdom, in spite of the irresistibility of its arms, did not, however, extend its power into all the regions of the world, rttj, to push, of beast, Ex. xxi. 28, in the Piel figuratively is used of nations, Deut. xxxiii. 17, Ps. xliv. 6. W) is potentialis: could not stand. The masculine is here used, because ni5n (beasts) represents kingdoms and nations, ^¥"D n&V, did according to his will, expresses arbitrary conduct, a despotic behaviour. 7HJH, became great. The word does not mean to become haughty, for tox^ in his heart, is not added here as it is in ver. 25, but to magnify the action. It is equivalent to T\wyb 7*$} in Joel ii. 20 (hath done great things), and Ps. cxxvi. 2, 3, in the sense of to become great, poiverful; cf. ver. 8.

Vers. 5-7. After Daniel had for a while contemplated the conduct of the ram, he saw a he-goat come from the west over the earth, run with furious might against the two-horned ram, and throw it to the ground and tread upon it. The he-goat, according to the interpretation of the angel, ver. 21, represents the king of Javan (Greece and Macedonia) — notthe person of the king (Gesen.), but the kingship of Javan; for, according to ver. 21, the great horn of the goat symbolizes the first king, and thus the goat itself cannot represent a separate king. The goat comes from the west; for Macedonia lay to the west of Susa or Persia. Its coming over the earth is more definitely denoted by the expression H.5*? J??3 PWj and he ivas not touching the earth, i.e. as he hastened over it in his flight. This remark corresponds with the four wings of the leopard, ch. vii. 6. The goat had between its eyes rntn p£; i.e. not a horn of vision, a horn such as a goat naturally has, but here only in vision (Hofm., Klief.). This interpretation would render rmn an altogether useless addition, since the goat itself, only seen in vision, is described as it appeared in the vision. For the right explanation of the expression reference must be made to ver. 8, where, instead of horn of vision, there is used the expression Hainan T}$} (the great horn). Accordingly rwn has the meaning of n *?"]£, in the Keri »1K"}0 WW, 2 Sam. xxiii. 21, a man of countenance or sight (cf. Targ. Esth. ii. 2): a horn of sight, consideration, of considerable greatness; icepa<$ Qeopr\Tov (LXX., Theodot.), which Theodoret explains by eirla^ixov koX irepifiXeirTov.

The horn was between the eyes, i.e. in the middle of the forehead, the centre of its whole strength, and represents, according to ver. 21, the first king, i.e. the founder of the Javanic worldkingdom, or the dynasty of this kingdom represented by him. The he-goat ran up against the ram, the possessor of the two horns, i.e. the two-horned ram by the river Ulai, in the fire of his anger, i.e. in the glowing anger which gave him his strength, and with the greatest fury threw him down. The prophet adds, " And I saw him come close unto the ram," as giving prominence to the chief matter, and then further describes its complete destruction. It broke in pieces both of the horns, which the ram still had, i.e. the power of the Medes and Persians, the two component elements of the Persian world-kingdom. This representation proves itself to be genuine prophecy, whilst an author writing ex eventu would have spoken of the horn representing the power of the Medes as assailed and overthrown earlier by that other horn (see under ch. vii. 8, 20). The pushing and trampling down by the Ulai is explained from the idea of the prophecy, according to which the power of the ram is destroyed at the central seat of its might, without reference to the historical course of the victories by which Alexander the Great completed the subjugation of the Persian monarchy. In the concluding passage, ver. 7, the complete destruction is described in the words of the fourth verse, to express the idea of righteous retribution. As the Medo-Persian had crushed the other kingdoms, so now it also was itself destroyed.

Ver. 8. The transformation of the Javanic kingdom. — By the kingdom of the ram the he-goat became very great, powerful (7*WI as in ver. 4). But the great horn was broken at the height of his strength, and four similar horns grew up in its stead, toward the four regions of heaven. rviTn is here used adverbially, conspicuously: there came forth conspicuously four in its place. This statement does not contradict ver. 22 and ch. xi. 4, according to which the four kingdoms have not the power of the one great horn; for the thought is only this: they represent in themselves a considerable power, without, however, gaining the power of the one undivided kingdom. The breaking of the great horn indicates the breaking up of the monarchy of Alexander by his death. The four horns which grow up in the place of the one great horn are, according to ver. 22, four kingdoms. These are the dynasties of the Diadochs, of whom there were indeed five: Antigonus, Ptolemy, Cassander, and Lysimachus laid claim to the title of king; but for the first time after the overthrow of Antigonus at the battle of Ipsus, 301 B.C., and thus twenty-two years after the death of Alexander (323 B.C.), they became in reality four kings, and so divided the kingdom among themselves, that Lysimachus had Thrace and Bithynia, — Cassander, Macedonia and Greece, — Seleucus, Syria, Babylonia, and the Eastern countries as far as India, — and Ptolemy, Egypt, Palestine, and Arabia Petrea. But from the fact that this first happened after all the descendants of the royal family had been extirpated, wre are not to conclude, with Havernick, that the breaking of the great horn did not denote the death of Alexander, but the extinction of his race or house; a conclusion which derives no valid support from these words of Justin: " All of them abstained from the use of the insignia of this (royal) dignity while the sons of their king survived. So great was their veneration, that although they had royal wealth and resources, they cared not for the name of kings so long as there existed a legitimate heir to Alexander" (Hist. xv. 2. 13). If the breaking of the horn is placed at the point of time when the horn was powerful, here as well as at ch. xi. 4, the reference of the words to the sudden death of Alexander in the prime of his days, and when in the very height of his victorious career, cannot be disputed; and by the breaking of the horn we can only understand Alexander's death, and the breaking up of the kingdom founded by him, although it was still held together in a considerable degree for two decenniums by his generals, till the most imperious and the most powerful amongst them usurped the rank of kings, and then, after the conquest of Antigonus, a formal division of the kingdom into the four considerable kingdoms here named raised them to royal dignity.

The prophetic representation is not a prediction of historical details, but it gives only the fundamental traces of the development of the world-kingdoms, and that not in the form of a historiographical prophecy, but only so that it sketches the ground-thoughts of the divinely ordained unfolding of these world-kingdoms. This ideal fundamental thought of the prophecy has so wrought itself out in actual history, that from the one great kingdom, after the death of the founder, in the course of time four considerable kingdoms arise. The number four in the prophetic contemplation comes into view only according to its symbolical idea as the number of the world in its extension toward the four regions of heaven, so that thereby only the thought is declared, that a kingdom embracing the world will fall to ruins in a plurality of kingdoms toward all the regions of heaven (Kliefoth). This has been so historically realized, that out of the wars of the Diadochs for the supremacy four kingdoms arose toward the four regions of the earth into longer duration, — that of Cassander (Macedonia) toward the west, that of Seleucus (Babylonia, etc.) toward the east, that of Lysimachus (Thracia and Bithynia) toward the north, and finally that of Ptolemy (Egypt) toward the south.1

Vers. 9-12. The interpretation of the vision.

Ver. 9. Without following the development of the four horns further, the prophecy passes over to the little horn, which grew up out of one of the four horns, and gained great significance in relation to the history of the people of God. The masculine forms Eno and N£- (out of them came) are to be explained as a constructs ad sensum. rins (one) after HP (horn) is as little super-

1 When, on the other hand, Hitzig seeks to explain the prophetic representation, here as well as at ch. xi. 4, that with or immediately after the death of Alexander his kingdom was divided, by reference to 1 Mace. i. G, according to which Alexander himself, shortly before his death, divided the kingdom among his generals, he thereby not only misapprehends the ideal character of the prophecy, but does not in the least degree clear up the matter itself. For the pas- Bage in 1 Mace. i. 6, which not only Arabic and Persian authors repeat, but also Moses v. Chorcne, and even later Greek and Latin historiographers, as Ammian Marcell., has been explained by Curtius (x. 10. 5) as afama vana, and is proved fluous as is the P in ffyjHftp. nntf is a numeral, one horn, not several; \Q is either comparative, less than little, ue, very little (Ewald), or, as less than insignificance, wretchedness, i.e. in an altogether miserable way (Hiiv.). The one explanation is more forced than the other, and the idea of wretchedness is altogether untenable. Yet the \o serves as a circumlocution for the superlative = perpaucus (Gesen., Win., Aub.), while verbal analogies for it are wanting. \0 signifies from, oat of; but it is not to be united with HP: one horn of smallness (v. Leng.), in which case \ti would be superfluous, but with the verb NVJ: it came up out of littleness, a parvoj i.e. a parvis initiis (Maur., Hofm., Kran., Klief.). Thus it corresponds with rijjpp nygj, ch. vii. 8. In the words " it arose out of littleness " there lies the idea that it grew to great power from a small beginning; for it became very great, i.e. powerful, toward the south, toward the east, and toward the VW? (the splendour, glory), i.e. toward the glorious land. "QSfn = "Darn pK, ch. xi. 16, 41. This designation of the land of Israel is framed after Jer. hi. 19 and Ezek. xx. 6, 15, where this land is called "a heritage of the greatest glory of nations " (a goodly heritage of the host of nations, E. V.), " a glory of all lands," i.e. the most glorious land which a people can possess. The expression is synonymous with irnpn pjR ("pleasant land"), Jer. hi. 19, Zech. vii. 14, Ps. cvi. 24. Canaan was so designated on account of its great fruitfulness as a land flowing with milk and honey; cf. Ezek. xx. 6.

The one of the four horns from which the little horn grew up is the Syrian monarchy, and the horn growing up out of it is the king Antiochus Epiphanes, as Josephus (Ant. x. 11. 7) and all interpreters acknowledge, on the ground of 1 Mace. i. 10. The south, against which he became great, is Egypt (cf. ch. xi. 5 and 1 Mace. i. 16 ff.). The east is not Asia (Kranichfeld), but Babylon, and particularly Elymais and Armenia, 1 Mace. i. 31, 37, iii. 31, 37, vi. 1-4, according to which he subdued Elymais and by Wernsdorf (de Fide Librr. Mace. p. 40 sq.) and Droysen (das Test. Alex. 3te Beilage, zu Gesch. des Hellen. i.) to be without foundation (cf. Grimm, K. ex. Hdb. zu 1 Mace. i. 6). This may have been originally put intc circulation by the partisans of the Hellenic kings, in order to legitimatize their sovereignty in the eyes of the people, as Grimm conjectures; yet the confirmation which the book of Daniel appears to give to it contributed to its wide diffusion by Oriental and Byzantine authors, and the author of the first book of the Maccabees had without doubt the book of Daniel before his eyes in the representation he gives.

overcame Artaxias, king of Armenia (App. Syr. c. 45, 46; Polyb. xxxi. 11). Besides the south and the east, Canaan, the holy land, as lying between, is named as the third land, as in Isa. xix. 23 ff. it is named as third, between Egypt and Assyria; but?Kl *25?n ("and toward the glorious land") is not, with Kranichfeld, to be regarded as an exegetical addition to nntan?jo (a and toward the east"). Palestine lay neither to the east of Daniel, nor geographically to the east of the kingdom denoted by the little horn, because the text gives no support to the identifying of this kingdom with the Javanic, the horn operating from the west.

Ver. 10. As this horn became great in extent toward the south and toward the east, so also it grew up in height even unto the host of heaven, and some of them it cast down, i.e. some of the stars, to the earth. The host of heaven is here, as in Jer. xxxiii. 22, the whole body of the stars of heaven, the constellations, and of the stars is epexegetical of of the host. Daniel in the vision sees the horn grow so great in height, that it reaches even to the heavens, can reach the heavenly bodies with the hand, and throws some of the stars (jp is partitive) down to the earth and tramples upon them, destroys them with scorn. The words of the angel, ver. 24, show that by the stars we are to understand the people of the saints, the people of God. The stars cast down to the earth are, according to this, neither the Levites (Grotius), nor the viri illustres in Israel (Glass.), nor the chief rulers of the Jews in church and state (Dathe). If the people of the saints generally are compared to the host of heaven, the stars, then the separate stars cannot be the ecclesiastical or civil chiefs, but the members of this nation in common. But by "the people of the saints" is to be understood (since the little horn denotes Antiochus Epiphanes) the people of God in the Old Covenant, the people of Israel. They are named the people of the saints by virtue of their being called to be an holy nation (Ex. xix. G), because " they had the revelation of God and God Himself dwelling amon£ them, altogether irrespective of the subjective degrees of sanctification in individuals" (Kliefoth). But the comparing of them with the host of the stars does not arise from Jewish national pride, nor does it mean that Daniel thought only of the truly faithful in Israel (Theod., Hav.), or that the pseudo-Daniel thought that with the death of Antiochus the Messiah would appear, and that then Israel, after the extermination of the godless, would become a people of pure holiness. The comparison rather has its root in this, that God, the King of Israel, is called the God of hosts, ami by the nisnv (hosts) are generally to be understood the stars or the angels; but the tribes of Israel also, who were led by God out of Egypt, are called u the hosts of Jehovah " (Ex. vii. 4, xii. 41). As in heaven the angels and stars, so on earth the sons of Israel form the host of God; and as the angels on account of the glory of their nature are called D^'J'Hp (holy ones), so the Israelites by virtue of their being chosen to be the holy nation of God, forming the kingdom of heaven in this world. As God, the King of this people, has His throne in heaven, so there also Israel have their true home, and are in the eyes of God regarded as like unto the stars. This comparison serves, then, to characterize the insolence of Antiochus as a wickedness against Heaven and the heavenly order of things.1 Cf. 2 Mace. ix. 10.

Ver. 11. This horn raised its might even to the Prince of the host. N3SH ■fe>, the Prince of the host of heaven, is obviously not the high priest Onias (Grotius), but the God of heaven and the King of Israel, the Prince of princes, as He is called in ver. 25. ly 7*ljff\ (he magnified himself to) is repeated in ver. 25 by?V IIDjH (he shall stand up against). Wherein this rising up against God consisted, the second half of the verse indicates in the statement that the "PDA (daily sacrifice) was taken away, and the building of His sanctuary was destroyed. This verse does not record a part of the vision, but is a further development of that which was seen in prophetic wrords. Hence we may not, with Ebrard, refer its contents to heavenly events, to a putting away of the sacrifice from before the throne of God and a destruction of the heavenly sanctuary. On the contrary, Kliefoth has well remarked that it is u without example in Scripture that men penetrate into heaven to insult God; what men do against God is done on the

1 The deep practical explanation of Calvin deserves attention: — " Although the church often lies prostrate in the world and is trodden under foot, yet is it always precious before God. Hence the prophet adorns the church with, this remarkable praise, not to obtain for it great dignity in the sight of men, but because God has separated it from the world and provided for it a sure inheritance in heaven. Although the sons of God are pilgrims on the earth, and have scarcely any place in it, because they are as castaways, yet they are nevertheless citizens of heaven. Hence we derive this useful lesson, that we should bear it patiently when we are thrown prostrate on the ground, and are despised by tyrants and contemners of God. In the meantime our seat is laid up in heaven, and God numbers us among the stars, although, as Paul says, we are as dung and as the offscourings of all things." — Calv. in loc.

earth." T»nn is everything in the worship of God which is not used merely temporarily, but is permanent, as the daily sacrifice, the setting forth of the shew-bread, and the like. The limitation of it to the daily morning and evening service in the writings of the Rabbis is unknown in the O. T. The word much rather comprehends all that is of permanent use in the holy services of divine worship (Hgst., Hav., Hofm., Kran., Klief.). Thus interpreted, the prophetic announcement corresponds with history; for, according to 1 Mace. i. 45, Antiochus gave orders that they should " forbid burnt-offerings, and sacrifice, and drink-offerings in the temple; and that they should profane the Sabbath and festival days."

The horn also overthrew the place of the sanctuary of Jehovah. ^1 c^j to cast away, to cast forth, — used of buildings, to lay waste; cf. Jer. ix. 18. P30, properly, that which is set up, erected; here, as frequently, of the dwelling-place of God, the temple: so also *jrDB> pD» (a settled place for thee to dwell in), Ex. xv. 17, 1 Kings viii. 13. It is used also of the heavenly dwelling-place of God, 1 Kings viii. 39, 43; here, of the temple in Jerusalem. With regard to the historical fulfilment, cf. the expressions, u her (Jerusalem's) sanctuary was laid waste like a wilderness," and " pollute the sanctuary," 1 Mace. i. 39, 46; and " the sanctuary was trodden down," 1 Mace. iii. 45.

Ver. 12. The actions of the little horn are definitively comprehended in this verse, as may be seen from this, that in the first hemistich N3¥ and TEA are mentioned together. But this hemistich has been very variously interpreted. We must altogether reject the interpretation of the Vulgate, u Robur antem datum est contra juge sacrificium propter peccata" which is reproduced in Luther's translation, u There was given to him such strength against the daily sacrifice on account of sin; " or Calvin's, u Et tempus datum est super jugi sacrificio in scelere" whereby, after Raschi's example, N3? *s interpreted of the statio militaris, and thence the interpretation tempus or intervallum is derived. For N3V means neither robur, nor tempus, nor statio militarise but only military service, and perhaps military forces. Add to this that N^> both in vers. 10 and 13 means host. If we maintain this, with the majority of interpreters, only two explanations are admissible, according as we understand N3V of the host of heaven, i.e. of Israel, or of some other host. The latter interpretation is apparently supported partly by the absence of the article in M¥, and partly by the construction of the word as fern. (jflW), Accordingly,

Ilitzig says that a Hebrew reader could not understand the words otherwise than as meaning, " and a warlike expedition was made or conducted against the daily sacrifice with wickedness " (i.e. the impure service of idols); while others translate, " and a host placed against the daily sacrifice on account of sin" (Syr., Grot., Harenb., J. D. Michaelis); or, " a host is given against the daily sacrifice in wickedness " (Wieseler); or, " given against that which was continual with the service of idols," i.e. so that, in the place of the " continual," wickedness, the worship of idols, is appointed (Hofmann); or, u the power of an army is given to it (the horn) against the daily sacrifice through wickedness," i.e. by the evil higher demons (Ebrard). But the latter interpretation is to be rejected on account of the arbitrary insertion of)h (to it); and against all the others it is to be remarked, that there is no proof either from ver. 13, or from Ezek. xxxii. 23 or xxvi. 8, that 1H3 means to lead out, to bring forward, to give contrary to or against.

In ver. 13 run (to give) is more closely defined by DEiD (something trodden under foot); but in these passages in Ezek. above referred to, it [the verb |ru] is connected with an actual object. Construed with the accus. pers. and?V, |nj means " to place one over anything." This conception in its different shades is not so much derived from the words of the text as from a reference to the history; for it is supposed (cf. Grotius, Wies.) that because the matter spoken of is the wickedness of Antiochus, the entrance of the Syrian army into Jerusalem and its "proceedings (1 Mace, i. 29 ff.) must be set forth. N^V? notwithstanding the want of the article, and notwithstanding the feminine construction, cannot properly be otherwise understood in ver. 12 than in vers. 10 and 13, not of the host of the Syrians, but only of the people of Israel. The article is wanting also in ver. 13, where yet, because of its being taken in connection with Vhpj it can only refer to Israel. Besides this passage, the fem. construction is found also only in Isa. xl. 2, where it signifies the service of war or vassalage. But this meaning here, where weighty reasons oppose it, this construction does not require us co adopt, for such a construction is not infrequent. It is found not merely with names of nations and races, so far as land and people are nearly related ideas, but also with other words, such as even DJJ, people, fem., Ex. v. 16, 1 Kings xviii. 7, Jer. viii. 5; Jton, a multitude, Job xxxi. 34; JHJ, seed, i.e. descendants, Deut. xxxi. 21; cf. Ewald's Lehr. § 174. But the want of the article in N2? in ver. 12 and in 13 has its reason in this, that that which is said does not concern the whole host, but only one part of it, since, according to ver. 10, the hostile horn will cast only some N^'? \0 (of the host) to the earth. If, therefore, there is no sufficient ground for rejecting the application of the N*9V t° the people of Israel, it follows that this interpretation is decidedly required not only by the connection, chiefly by ver. 13, but also by that which is said of N3¥ in ver. 12a.

" Since in ver. 13 the inquirer resumes the contents of vers. 10-12, and along with the sanctuary names also the * host' as the object of the ' treading down,' it is not credible that this l host ' should be different from that mentioned in ver. 12 " (Klief.). Moreover, lH3n can have in this passage only the meaning of to be given up. ^OAfl 'V can then only be translated because of the permanent sacrifice, if V&tt {by reason of transgression) is united as object with in^n in the sense: " was delivered up in transgression." But apart from this, that |HJ in the sense of to give up is construed with T3, and there are wanting certain parallels for its construction with 3 merely, this interpretation, " the host ( = Israel) is given up in wickedness on account of the continual sacrifice," presents an idea not to be tolerated. We agree, therefore, in general with the interpretation of Ch. B. Michaelis, Havernick, v. Lengerke, Maurer, Kranichfeld, and Kliefoth, and explain the words thus: " and (an) host shall be given up together with the daily sacrifice, because of transgression." N3¥, an host, i.e. a great company of the host, the people of Israel. 3 before V&& (transgression) in the meaning of 3 pretii, on account of (um), or because of cf. Gen. xviii. 28. W% is the apostasy of the Israelites from God, the wickedness proceeding from the D'JWte (transgressors), ver. 23. The objection that this interpretation is not appropriate, because JRPB is repeated in ver. 13 in union with DEE* (desolation), and therefore a wickedness devoted to destruction is characterized (Klief.), avails nothing, because it in no way follows from this that the " transgression " must be wickedness seating itself in the place of the a daily sacrifice," idolatrous worship supplanting the true worship. But tt the transgression " cannot be that which sets itself in the place of the " daily sacrifice," because TDRfl is not the subject of the sentence, but is only co-ordinated to the subject. If 3 in PPB? is regarded as the 3 pretii, then y£>D can only be that which would be put in the place of the K3¥. The preposition?V before TWJJ means thereon, after that, also at the same time, or together with, as in Am. iii. 15, Hos. x. 14, etc. TD1J, as in ver. 11, is not merely the daily sacrifice, but all that had continuance in the Mosaic worship. Finally, the jussive forms jrijn and "H^ri (to be trodden) are to be observed, since, according to the just observation of Kran., they are not simply identical with the future, as Ewald (§ 343) thinks, but here, as in ch. xi. 4, 10, 16, modify the conception of time by the presentation of the divine pre-determination or the decree, and thus express a should, may, or a faculty, a being able, in consequence of the divine counsel. To the verbs of the second half of the verse T)$ (horn) is easily supplied from the foregoing context as the subject; and the passage closes with the thought: thus must the horn throw the truth to the ground, and he shall succeed in this.1 npx, the objective truth, the word of God, so far as it is embodied in the worship. As to this matter cf. 1 Mace. i. 43-52, 56, 60.

Vers. 13 and 14. In addition to what has been already seen and communicated in the vision, a further vision unfolds itself, by which there is conveyed to the prophet disclosures regarding the duration of the oppression of the people of God by the little horn. Daniel hears a holy one, i.e. an angel (see under ch. iv. 10), talking. What he said is not recorded. But while he is talking, another angel interrupts him with the question as to the duration of the affliction, and this is done that Daniel may hear the answer. Therefore the first angel immediately turns himself to Daniel, and, addressing him, makes known to him the information that was desired.

The vK (to me), ver. 14, is not, according to the old versions, to be changed into IvK (to him). What Hitzig says in justification of IvK is of no weight; cf. Kran. The angel that talked is designated by ^i^S, qiddain, nescio quis, as not being more particularly definable. The question condenses the contents of vers. 10-12: u Till how long is the vision, etc.?" fitnn is not the action, but the contents of the vision, the thing seen. The contents of the vision are arranged in the form of appositions: that which is continual and the desolating wickedness, for: the vision of that which is continual and of the desolation. The meaning of this apposition is more particularly defined by the further passage following asyndetos: to give up the sanctuary as well as the host to destruction. D£$ after

1 " Successus Antiochi potuit pios omnes turbare, acsi tyrannus ille esset Deo superior. Ergo oportuit etiam hoc prsedici, ne quid novum vel inopinatum contingent Jidelibus." — Calvin.

the definite noun without the article, which is sometimes wanting (Jer. ii. 21; Ezek. xxxix. 27; cf. Ew. § 293), does not mean being benumbed, confounded, but laid waste, fallen into ruin; thus the wickedness which consists in laying waste. DOB* cannot be understood transitively, since D£6? and DE>b>D are placed over against each other in ch. ix. 27.

In the answer, *W is to be interpreted as in the question: till 2300 evening-mornings have been, or have passed, thus: 2300 evening-mornings long, so (=then) the sanctuary is brought into its right state. P1V primarily means to be just, whence the meaning is derived to justify, which is not here suitable, for it must be followed by, from the defilement of the desolation. The restoration of the temple to its right condition is, it is true, at the same time a justification of it from its desolation, and it includes in it the restoration of the permanent worship.

The interpretation of the period of time, 2300 evening-mornings, named by the angel is beset with difficulty. And first the verbal import of ">53 3T|| is doubtful. Among recent interpreters, Berth., Hiiv., v. Leng., Maur., and Hofm. (Weiss, u. Erf. p. 295) understand by it days consisting of morning and evening (twentyfour hours); others, as Bleek, Kirmss, Ewald, Hitzig, Wieseler (who, however, in his treatise, Die 70 Wochen, u.s.w\, p. 115 ff., defends the first explanation), Kran., and Delitzsch, are of opinion that evening -morning is particularly reckoned with reference to the offering of a morning and an evening sacrifice each day, so that 2300 evening-mornings make only 1150 whole days. But there is no exeo-etical foundation for this latter opinion. It is derived only from a comparison, or rather an identification, of this passage with Dan. vii. 25, xii. 11 f., and ix. 27; and therewith it is proved that, according to 1 Mace. i. 54, 59, cf. iv. 52, the desolation of the sanctuary by the worship of idols under Antiochus Epiphanes lasted not longer than three years and ten days, and that from Dan. xii. 11 it extends only to 1290 days. But these arguments rest on assertions which must first be justified. The passages Dan. vii. 25 and ix. 27 cannot be here taken into account, because they do not speak of Antiochus Epiphanes, and the 1290 days (1335 days, ch. xii. 11 f.) do not give 2300 evening-mornings, that we can and may at once identify these statements with this before us. In ch. xii. 11 the terminus a quo of the 1290 days is unquestionably the putting away or the removal of the TOTI (daily sacrifice)) and the giving (placing, raising up) of the abomination that maketh desolate (i.e. the altar of idol-worship); but in this verse (ch. viii. 14), on the contrary, the continuance not only of the taking away of the TDR, but also of the delivering up of the saints and the people to be trodden under foot, is fixed to 2300 evening -mornings. This oppression continued longer than the removal of the appointed daily sacrifice. According to 1 Mace. i. 10 £f., the violent assaults of Antiochus against the temple and the Jews who remained faithful to the law began in the 143d year of the era of the Seleucidas, but the abomination that maketh desolate, i.e. the idol-altar, was first erected on Jehovah's altar of burnt-offering, according to 1 Mace. i. 54, in the 145th year of the Seleucidse, and the purification of the temple from this abomination, and its re-consecration, took place on the 25th day of Kisleu (9th month) of the year of the Seleucidse 148. According to this, from the beginning of the desecration of the temple by the plundering of its vessels and its golden ornaments (1 Mace. i. 20 if.) to its restoration to its right condition, more than five years passed. The fulfilment, or the historical reference, of this prophecy accordingly affords, as is sufficiently manifest, no proper means of ascertaining the import of the " evening-morning." This must rather be exegetically decided. It occurs only here, and corresponds to vv^Orjuepovj 2 Cor. xi. 25. But the choice of so unusual a measure of time, derived from the two chief parts of the day, instead of the simple measure of time by days, probably originates with reference to the morning and evening sacrifice, by which the day was to be consecrated to the Lord, after Gen. i. 5, 8, 13, etc., where the days of the creation week are named and reckoned according to the succession of evening and morning. This separation of the expression into evening and morning, so that to number them separately and add them together would make 2300 evening-mornings = 1150 days, is shown to be inadmissible, both by the asyndeton eveningmorning and the usages of the Hebrew language. That in ver. 26 l|Etf?: 3"j$;n (the evening and the morning) stands for it, does not prove that the evening and morning are reckoned separately, but only that evening-morning is a period of time consisting of evening and morning. When the Hebrews wish to express separately day and night, the component parts of a day of a week, then the number of both is expressed. They say, e.g., forty days and forty nights (Gen. vii. 4, 12; Ex. xxiv. 18; 1 Kings xix. 8), and three days and three nights (Jonah ii. 1; Matt. xii. 40), but not eighty or six days-and-nights, when they wish to speak of forty or three full days. A Hebrew reader could not possibly understand the period of time 2300 evening-mornings of 2300 half days or 1150 whole days, because evening and morning at the creation constituted not the half but the whole day. Still less, in the designation of time, " till 2300 evening-mornings," could " evening-mornings " be understood of the evening and morning sacrifices, and the words be regarded as meaning, that till 1150 evening sacrifices and 1150 mornin^ sacrifices are discontinued. We must therefore take the words as they are, i.e. understand them of 2300 whole days.

This exe<retical resolution of the matter is not made doubtful by the remark, that an increasing of the period of oppression to 2300 days, over against the duration of the oppression limited in ch. vii. 25 to only three and a half times, or to 1290 (or 1335 days, ch. xii. 11, 12), is very unlikely, since there is in no respect any reason for this increase over against these statements (Kran. p. 298). This remark can only be valid as proof if, on the one side, the three and a half times in ch. vii. 25 are equal to three and a half civil years, for which the proof fails, and, on the other side, if the 1290 or the 1335 days in ch. xii. 11 f. indicate the whole duration of the oppression of Israel by Antiochus. But if these periods, on the contrary, refer only to the time of the greatest oppression, the erection of the idol-altar in the temple, this time cannot be made the measure for the duration of the whole period of tribulation.

The objection also, that it is more difficult to prove historically an oppression of the people of God for 2300 days by Antiochus than the 1150 days' duration of this oppression, need not move us to depart from the exegetically ascertained meaning of the words. The opponents of this view are indeed at one in this, that the consecration of the temple after its purification, and after the altar of Jehovah was restored, on the 25th Kisleu of the 148th year of the Seleucidse, formed the termination of the period named, but they are at variance as to the commencement of the period. Delitzsch reckons from the erection of the idol-altar in the temple on 15th Kisleu in the 145th year of the Set, and thus makes it only three years and ten days, or 1090 to 1105 days. Hitzig reckons from the taking away of the daily sacrifice, which would take place somewhat earlier than the setting up of the idol-altar, but has not furnished proof that this happened two months earlier. Bleek and Kirmss reckon from the taking of Jerusalem by Apollonius in the year of the Set. 145 (1 Mace. i. 30 ff.; 2 Mace. v. 24 ff.), misplacing this in the first month of the year named, but without having any other proof for it than the agreement of the reckoning.

To this is to be added, that the adoption of the consecration of the temple as the terminus ad quern is not so well grounded as is supposed. The words of the text, Vhp PTO31 (" thus is the sanctuary placed in the right state"), comprehend more than the purification and re-consecration of the temple. In ver. 11, also ch. ix. 17 and xi. 31, Daniel uses the word B*J£& for temple, while on the other hand K^P means all that is holy. Was, then, the sanctuary, in this comprehensive meaning of the word, placed in its right state with the consecration of the temple, when after this occurrence a they that were in the tower (Acra) shut up the Israelites round about the sanctuary," sought to hinder access to the temple, and, when Judas Maccabaeus had begun to besiege the tower, the Syrians approached with a reinforced army, besieged the sanctuary for many days, and on their departure demolished its strongholds (1 Mace. vi. 18 ff., 51, 62)? — when, again, under Demetrius Soter of Bacchides, the high priest Menelaus was deposed, and Alcimus, who was not descended from the family of a high priest, was advanced to his place, who cruelly persecuted the pious in Israel? — when the Syrian general Nicanor mocked the priests who showed to him the burnt-offering for the king, and defiled and threatened to burn the temple (1 Mace, vii.)? And did the trampling upon Israel cease with the consecration of the temple, when at the building up of the altar and the restoration of the temple the heathen around became so furious, that they resolved to destroy all who were of the race of Jacob amongst them, and began to murder them (1 Mace. v. 1 ff.)? Havernick therefore, with Bertholdt, places the terminus ad quern of the 2300 days in the victory over Nicanor, by which the power of the Syrians over Judea was first broken, and the land enjoyed rest, so that it was resolved to celebrate annually this victory, as well as the consecration of the temple (1 Mace. vii. 48-50), according to which the terminus a quo of the period named would be shortly before the erection of the abomination of idolatry in the temple.

If we now, however, turn from this supposition, since the text speaks further of it, to seek the end of the oppression in the restoration of the legal temple-worship, or in the overthrow of Antiochus Epiphanes, which the angel brings to view in the interpretation of the vision (ver. 26), so also in these cases the 2300 days are to be calculated. C. v. Leng., Maur.; and Wiesel., who regard the death of Antiochus as the termination, place the beginning of the 2300 days one year before the beginning of violence with which Antiochus, after his return from the expedition into Egypt in the year 143 Sel., went forth to destroy (1 Mace. i. 20) the Mosaic worship and law. Only a few weeks or months earlier, in the middle of the year 142 SeL, the point of commencement must be placed, if the consecration of the temple is held to be the termination. In the year 142 not only was the pious high priest Onias removed from his office by the godless Jason, but also Jason himself was forced from the place he had usurped by Menelaus, who gave Antiochus a greater bribe than he did, and gave away as presents and sold to the heathen the golden utensils of the temple, and commanded Onias, who denounced his wickedness, to be deceitfully murdered (2 Mace. ii. 4). Hence we need not, with Hofmann, regard the deposition of Onias, the date of which cannot be accurately fixed, but which, 2 Mace. iv. 7 ff., is brought into connection with the commencement of the reign of Antiochus, and which probably took place before the year 142, as the date of the commencement of the 2300 days, although the laying waste of the sanctuary may be dated from it; since Jason by royal authority set up a heathen yvfivdacov with an i(p7]j3etov} and by the wickedness of the profane and unpriestly conduct of this man Greek customs and the adoption of heathenish manners so prevailed, that the priests ceased to concern themselves about the service of the altar, but, despising the temple and forgetting the sacrifice, they hastened to witness the spectacles in the palaestra, which were contrary to the law; cf. 2 Mace. iv. 13 ff. with 1 Mace. i. 11-15. The 2300 days are thus, as well as the 1150 days, historically authenticated.

But it is on the whole questionable whether the number given by the angel is to be reckoned as an historico-chronological period of time, or is not rather to be interpreted as symbolical. The analogy of the other prophetic numbers speaks decidedly for the symbolical interpretation. The 2300 cannot, it is true, be directly a symbolical number, such as 7, 10, 40, 70, and other numbers are, but yet it can stand in such a relation to the number seven as to receive a symbolical meaning. The longer periods of time are usually reckoned not by days, but by weeks, months, or years; if, therefore, as to the question of the duration of the 2300 days, we reduce the days to weeks, months, and years, we shall find six years, three or four months, and some days, and discover that the oppression of the people by the little horn was to continue not fully a period of seven years. But the times of God's visitations, trials, and judgments are so often measured by the number seven, that this number came to bear stamped on it this signification; see under ch. iv. 13, vii. 25. The number of seven years is used in the symbolical meaning when, not to mention the cases in Gen. xxix. 18, 27, xli. 26 f., and Judg. vi. 1, seven years' famine were laid upon the land as a punishment for David's sin in numbering the people (2 Sam. xxiv. 13), and when in Elisha's time Israel was visited with seven years' famine (2 Kings viii. 1). Thus the answer of the angel has this meaning: The time of the predicted oppression of Israel, and of the desolation of the sanctuary by Antiochus, the little horn, shall not reach the full duration of a period of divine judgment, shall not last so long as the severe oppression of Israel by the Midianites, Judg. vi. 1, or as the famine which fell upon Israel in the time of Elisha, and shall not reach to a tenth part of the time of trial and of sorrow endured by the exiles, and under the weight of which Israel then mourned.

But if this is the meaning of the angel's message, why does not the divine messenger use a pure symbolical expression, such as " not full seven times?" and why does he not simply say, u not quite seven years?" As to the first of these questions, we answer that the expression "times" is too indefinite; for the duration of this period of sorrow must be given more minutely. As to the second question, we know no other answer that can be given than this, that, on the one side, only the positive determination of the length of time, measured by days, can afford full confidence that the domination and the tyranny of the oppressor shall not continue one day longer than God has before fixed; but, on the other side, by the measuring of this period by a number defined according to thousands and hundreds, both the long duration of the affliction is shown, and the symbolical character of the period named is indicated. While by the period " evening-morning " every ambiguity of the expression, and every uncertainty thence arising regarding the actual length of the time of affliction, is excluded, yet the number 2300 shows that the period must be defined in round numbers, measuring only nearly the actual time, in conformity with all genuine prophecy, which never passes over into the mantic prediction of historico-chronological data.

If we compare with this the designation of time in ch. vii. 25, instead of the general idea there expressed, of " time, times, and half a time," which is not to be computed as to its duration, we have here a very definite space of time mentioned. This difference corresponds to the contents of the two prophecies. The oppression prophesied 6f in this chapter would visit the people of Israel at not too distant a time; and its commencement as well as its termination, announced by God beforehand, was fitted to strengthen believers in the faith of the truth and fidelity of God for the time of the great tribulation of the end, the duration of which God the Lord indeed determined accurately and firmly beforehand, but according to a measure of time whose extent men cannot calculate in advance. In this respect the designation of the time of the affliction which the horn growing up out of the third world-kingdom will bring upon God's people, becomes a type for the duration of the oppression of the last enemy of the church of the Lord at the end of the days.

Vers. 15-27. The interpretation of the vision.

The interpretation of Daniel's vision, as given by the angel, falls within the vision itself. When Daniel sought to understand the vision, viz. in his mind, not by prayer or by asking a question, he saw before him, according to ver. 17, one standing at some distance, who had the appearance of a man, but was not a man, but a supernatural being in human likeness. This person resembling a man is (ver. 16) named by the angel, Gabriel, i.e. man of God. The voice of another, whom Daniel did not see, hearing only a human voice proceeding from the Ulai, commanded this person to explain the vision to the prophet (t?'!v> *•«• to Daniel). Nothing further is indicated of the person from whom the voice proceeded than what may be conjectured from viK pa (between the Ulai), whence the voice sounded. These words do not mean u hither from Ulai" (Bertholdt), but " between the two banks of the Ulai" (Chr. B. Mich., Hav., etc.); according to which, the being whose voice Daniel heard appears as if hovering over the waters of the river Ulai. This conjecture is confirmed by ch. xii. 6, 7, where Daniel sees a man hovering over the waters of the river of Ulai, who by the majesty of his appearance and his words shows himself to be a divine being, and is more minutely described according to the majesty of his appearance in ch. x. 5 ff. The question, who this man might be, is first answered in ch. x. 5 ff. Gabriel is not a nomen proprium but appellativum. The angel who was described as in appearance like a 13J (man) is named, for

Daniel, Qabritl (u man of God"), that on subsequent occasions. eh. ix. 21) he might recognise him again as the same (Hgst., Hofm., Kliefoth). As to his relation to other angels and archangels, the Scripture gives no information. If Lengerke and Maurer regard him, after the book of Enoch, along with Michael, and Raphael, and Uriel whose name does not occur in Scripture, as one of the four angels that stand before the throne of God, the Scripture affords no support for it; nor does it countenance the supposition of Hitzig, that the two angels in vers. 15 and 16 are identical with those in vers. 13 and 14 — that Gabriel who spake, and the unknown angel, was the angel of the " rivers and fountains of waters," Rev. xvi. 4.1

Ver, lb". As commanded, the angel goes to the place where Daniel stands. On his approach Daniel is so filled with terror that he falls on his face, because as a sinful and mortal man he could not bear the holiness of God which appeared before him in the pure heavenly being. At the appearance of God he fears that he must die. Cf. remarks at Gen. xvi. 13 and Ex. xxxiii. 20. But the angel, in order to mitigate his alarm, calls him to take heed, for the vision relates to the time of the end. The address (ver. 17), " son of man," stands in contrast to " man of God" (= Gabriel), and is designed to remind Daniel of his human weakness (cf. Ps. viii. 5), not that he may be humbled (Hiivernick), without any

1 Altogether groundless, also, is the identification of them with the Persian Amschaspands, since neither the doctrine of angels nor the names of angels of the 0. T. are derived from Parsism. The most recent attempt by Dr. Al. Kohut, in his researches regarding Jewish angelology and demonology in their dependence on Parsism (Abhand. fiir die Kunde des Morgen. iv. Bd., Nr. 3), to establish this connection, is extremely poor and superficial. The proof adduced in the first ten pages of his treatise is confined to these points: that in the writings of the 0. T. after the Exile or during the Exile the appearance of the angels is altogether different from that presented in the portions written before the Exile. It is said that, as a rule, the angels in the period first named take the human form, and bear names corresponding to their properties — Michael, Dan. x. 13, 21, xii. 1; Gabriel, viii. 16, ix. 21; and in the book of Tobit, xii. 15, not much later in date(?), Raphael; — now also, in contrast to the period before the Exile, there is an order in rank among the angels; Michael, Dan. x. 12, is designated as one of the first angel-princes, and, ch. xii. 1, as the greatest angel-prince; moreover, the number of D*1")^ {angel-princes) is spoken of as seven, corresponding to the Persian Amesha-c.pentas (Tob. xii. 15, and Book of Enoch xc. 21). But does this distinction between the pre-exilian and postexilian doctrine of angels, even though it were allowed to be as great as Kohut supposes, furnish a proof for the derivation of the latter from Parsism? or does this derivation follow from the fact that the Jews in exile came into intercourse occasion for that, but to inform him that, notwithstanding this, he was deemed worthy of receiving high divine revelations (Kliefoth). The foundation of the summons to give heed, " for the vision relates to the time of the end," is variously interpreted. Auberlen (p. 87) and Ziindel (p. 105 ff.) understand YP'W not of the time of the end of all history, but of a nearer relative end of the prophecy. " Time of the end " is the general prophetic expression for the time which, as the period of fulfilment, lies at the end of the existing prophetic horizon — in the present case the time of Antiochus. Bleek (Jahrb. f. D. Theol. v. p. 57) remarks, on the contrary, that if the seer was exhorted to special attention because the vision related to the time of the end, then Y\>m here, as in ver. 19, ch. xi. 35, 40, xii. 4, also ch. ix. 26, without doubt is to be interpreted of the end of the time of trial and sorrow of the people, and at the same time of the beginning of the new time of deliverance vouchsafed by God to His people; and herein lay the intimation, a that the beginning of the deliverance destined by God for His people (i.e. the Messianic time) would connect itself immediately with the cessation of the suppression of the worship of Jehovah by Antiochus Epiphanes, and with the destruction of that ruler." From the passages referred to, ch. xi. 40 and xii. 4, it is certainly proved that K2"fl3? denotes the time of all suffering, and the completion of the kingdom of God by the Messiah. It does with the Persians and the Medes, and that about this time the Zend worship flourished? And do the angels in the post-exilian writings for the first time indeed assume the human form? Kohut seems to know nothing of the appearance of angels in Gen. xix. 1 ff., Judg. vi. 11 ff., xiii. 9 ff. Then does the agreement, not of the doctrine of the 0. T., but of the later Jewish apocryphal writings, Tobit and the Book of Enoch, with regard to the number of angelprinces and of the Amesha-cpentas, furnish a sufficient proof of this derivation? Dr. Kohut does not himself appear to think so, since he regards it as necessary, in addition to this, which is " perhaps purely accidental," to furnish an etymological argument. Amesha-qpenta means " non connivens sanctus— the holy one not sleeping;" " thus," he says, " it is a mere Chaldee rendering of the word Amesha-gpenta, when in Dan. iv. 10, 14, 20, viii. 13, the Jewish angel-princes are called puhp pTJJ = holy watchers." But was, then, the Chaldean king Nebuchadnezzar, to whom in a dream a " holy watcher" appeared, a Jew? and in what edition of the Bible has Dr. Kohut found in Dan. viii. 13 the angel name YJJ? Nor is it any better proof that the demonology of the O. T. is a foreign production, resulting from the contact of the Jews with the Persians and Medes during the Exile, because in Zech. iii. 1 f., Ps. xlviii. 49, 1 Chron. xxi. 1, and especially in Job i. 6 f., ii. 1, Satan " is depicted as a plague-spirit, altogether corresponding to the Persian Agromainjus, the killing spirit." Such silly talk needs no refutation.

not, however, follow, either that these words " are to be understood of the absolute end of all things, of the time when the Messiah will come to set up His regmtm gloria?, and of the time of the last tribulation going before this coming of the Lord" (Klief.); or that the prophet cherished the idea, that immediately after the downfall of Antiochus, thus at the close of the 2300 days, the Messiah would appear, bring the world to an end, and erect the kingdom of eternity (v. Leng., Hitz., Maur., etc.). The latter conclusion is not, it is true, refuted by the remark, that the words do not say that the vision has the time of the end directly for its subject, that the prophecy will find its fulfilment in the time of the end, but only that the vision has a relation, a reference, to the time of the end, that there is a parallelism between the time of Antiochus and the time of Antichrist, that " that which will happen to Javan and Antiochus shall repeat itself in, shall be a type of, that which will happen in the time of the end with the last world-kingdom and the Antichrist arising out of it" (Klief oth). For this idea does not lie in the words. That is shown by the parallel passage, ch. x. 14, which Kliefoth thus understands — " The vision extends to the days which are before named tPDjn WnnN (latter days); it goes over the same events which will then happen." Accordingly the angel can also here (ch. viii. 17) only say, u Give heed, for the vision relates to the end-time; it gives information of that which shall happen in the end of time."

Ver. 19. The justice of this exposition is placed beyond a doubt by this verse. Here the angel says in distinct words, "I will show thee what will happen D^n fPfflKa (in the last time of the indignation) 9 for it relates to the appointed time of the end." Kliefoth indeed thinks that what the angel, ver. 19, says to the prophet for his comfort is not the same that he had said to him in ver. 17, and which cast him down, and that ver. 19 does not contain anything so weighty and so overwhelming as ver. 17, but something more cheering and consoling; that it gives to the vision another aspect, which relieves Daniel of the sorrow which it had brought upon him on account of its import with reference to the end. From this view of the contents of ver. 19 Kliefoth concludes that Daniel, after he had recovered from his terror in the presence of the heavenly messenger, and had turned his mind to the contents of the vision, was thrown to the ground by the thought presented to him by the angel, that the vision had reference to the end of all things, and that, in order to raise him up, the angel said something else to him more comforting of the vision. But this conclusion has no foundation in the text. The circumstance that Daniel was not again cast to the ground by the communication of the angel in ver. 19, is not to be accounted for by supposing that the angel now made known to him something more consoling; but it has its foundation in this, that the angel touched the prophet, who had fallen dismayed to the earth, and placed him again on his feet (ver. 18), and by means of this touch communicated to him the strength to hear his words. But the explanation which Kliefoth gives of ver. 19 the words do not bear. "The last end of the indignation " must denote the time which will follow after the expiration of the DVT, i.e. the period of anger of the Babylonian Exile. But rvnnx means, when space is spoken of, that which is farthest (cf. Ps. cxxxix. 9), and when time is spoken of, the last, the end, the opposite of 1WN"?., the end over against the beginning. If JV"]nx D^n does not denote such a time as follows an otherwise fixed termination, but the last time, the end-time (see under ch. ii. 28), so also, since DVT is here the time of the revelation of the divine wrath, DIM1] n*lQN can only denote the last time, or the end-time, of the revelation of the divine wrath. This explanation of the words, the only one which the terms admit of, is also required by the closing words of ver. 19, YZ **$°? *? (for at the time appointed the end). According to the example of the Vulg., quoniam habet tern-pus finem suum, and Luther's version, a for the end has its appointed time," Kliefoth translates the words, " for the firmlyordained, definite time has its end," and refers this to the time of the Babylonish Exile, which indeed, as Daniel knew (ch. ix. 2), was fixed by God to seventy years. But that the Babylonish Exile will have its fixed end, will come to an end with the seventy years, the angel needed not to announce to the prophet, for he did not doubt it, and the putting him in remembrance of that fact would have afforded him but very poor consolation regarding the time of the future wrath. This conception of the words depends on the inaccurate interpretation of the words DJttn nnnx, and will consequently fall to the ground along with it. If *ljHo? (to the appointment) were separated from f'i?, and were to be taken by itself, and to be understood of the time of the DJJT, then it ought to have the article, as in ch. xi. 27, 35. Without the article, as here, it must be connected with PP, and then, with |iTnn supplied as the subject from the context (ver. 17), is to be translated, as it is by almost all modern interpreters: for the vision relates to the appointed time of the end. But PPTO, the time of the end, and YP. ^S^0* the appointed time of the end, is not the absolute end of all things, the time of the setting up of the r>gnum glorice, and the time of the tribulation preceding the return of our Lord; but the time of the judgment of the world-kingdom and the setting up of the everlasting kingdom of God by the appearance of the Messiah, the end of aioav ot/Vo? and the commencement of the alcov ixeKkwv, the time. of the JVirw DWi (ch. x. 14), which the apostle calls (1 Cor. x. 11) ra t£\t] tcov alcovcov, and speaks of as having then already come.

Ver. 20. Since, from the explanation given by the angel in this verse, the vision relates to the Medo-Persian and the Javanic worldkingdoms, and to the persecuting kingdom of Antiochus which arose out of the latter, so it cannot be disputed that here, in prophetic perspective, the time of the end is seen together with the period of. the oppression of the people of God by Antiochus, and the first appearance of the Messiah with His return in glory to the final judgment, as the latter is the case also in ch. ii. 34 f., 44 f., and vii. 13, 26 f. If Kliefoth objects: The coming of the Messiah may certainly be conceived of as bound up with the end of all things, and this is done, since both events stand in intimate causal relation to each other, not seldom in those O. T. prophets who yet do not distinguish the times; but they also know well that this intimate causal connection does not include contemporaneousness, that the coming of the Messiah in the flesh will certainly bring about the end of all things, but not as an immediate consequence, but after a somewhat lengthened intervening space, that thus, after the coming of the Messiah, a course of historical events will further unfold themselves before the end comes (which Daniel also knew, as ch. ix. shows), and where the supposition is this, as in Daniel, there the time before the appearance of Christ in the flesh cannot be called the time of the end: — then the inference drawn in these last passages is not confirmed by the contents of the book of Daniel. For in the last vision (ch. x.-xii.) which Daniel saw, not only the time of oppression of Antiochus and that of the last enemy are contemplated together as one, but also the whole contents of this one vision are, ch. x. 14, transferred to the u end of the days;" for the divine messenger says to Daniel, "I am come to make thee understand what shall befall thy people in the end of the days, for the vision yet relates to the days." And not only this, but also in ch. xi. 35 it is said of the tribulation brought upon the people of God by Antiochus, that in it many would fall, to cleanse them and to purify them to the time of the end, for it is yet for the appointed time. Here, beyond doubt, the time of the persecution by Antiochus is placed in intimate union with the time of the end, but, as is to be particularly observed, not so that the two are spoken of as synchronous. This point is of importance for the right exposition of the verse before us. If, in ch. xi. 35, 40, it is twice said ""Wto? Yp. *1W *3 {the end is yet for the appointed time), and thus does not begin with the oppression of the people of God by Antiochus, so we may not conclude from these verses — and in this Kliefoth is perfectly justified — that Daniel expected the erection of the Messianic kingdom and the end of all history with the overthrow of Antiochus. If, however, on the whole, the intimate causal connection of the two periods of tribulation placed together in ch. xi. in one vision neither demands nor even permits us to regard the two as synchronous, so this erroneous conclusion drawn from these verses before us, in connection with an incorrect interpretation of ch. xi. 36-45, is sufficiently obviated, both by ch. ii. and vii., according to which the fourth world-kingdom shall precede the erection of the everlasting kingdom of God and the manifestation of the Son of man, as also by ch. ix. 24-27, where — as our exposition will show — the coming of the Messiah and the perfecting of the kingdom of God by the overthrow of the last enemy are dependent on one another in point of time — the coming of the Messiah after seven weeks, the perfecting of the kingdom of God will follow, but not till after the lapse of seventy weeks.

This passage is to be understood according to these distinct revelations and statements, and not that because in them, according to prophetic perspective, the oppression of the people of the saints by Antiochus, the little horn, is seen in one vision with the tribulation of the end-time, therefore the synchronism or identity of the two is to be concluded, and the erection of the regnum gloria? and the end of the world to be placed at the destruction of this little horn. The words, u the vision relates to the time of the end," thus only declare that the prophecy has a reference to Messianic times. As to the nature of this reference, the angel gives some intimation when, having touched the prophet, who had fallen in amazement to the ground, he raised him up and enabled him to listen to his words (ver. 18), the intimation that he would make known to him what would happen in the last time of violence (ver. 19). OJttn is the wrath of God against Israel, the punishment which God hung over them on account of their sins, as in Isa. x. 5, Jer. xxv.

17, Ezek. xxli. 24, etc., and here the sufferings of punishment and discipline which the little horn shall bring over Israel. The time of this revelation of divine wrath is called ITHHK because it belongs to the BW] 0*1$^, prepares the Messianic future, and with its conclusion begins the last age of the world, of which, however, nothing more particular is here said, for the prophecy breaks off with the destruction of the little horn. The vision of the eleventh chapter first supplies more particular disclosures on this point. In that chapter the great enemy of the saints of God, arising out of the third world-kingdom, is set forth and represented as the prefiguration or type of their last enemy at the end of the days. Under the words HW 1BW (ivhich shall be) the angel understands all that the vision of this chapter contains, from the rising up of the Medo-Persian world-kinc;dom to the time of the destruction of Antiochus Epiphanes, as vers. 20-25 show. But when he adds Djttn IVjnKj he immediately makes prominent that which is the most important matter in the whole vision, the severe oppression which awaits the people of Israel in the future for their purification, and repeats, in justification of that which is said, the conclusion from ver. 17, in which he only exchanges riy for "ITO. nj) denotes time in the sense of a definite point of time, while "TjrtD is the definite time in its duration; J*P. *W° thus denotes the endtime as to its duration. This expression is here chosen with regard to the circumstance that in ver. 14 the end of the oppression was accurately defined by the declaration of its continuance. The object of these words also is variously viewed by interpreters. The meaning is not that the angel wished to console Daniel with the thought that the judgment of the vision was not yet so near at hand (Zundel); for, according to ver. 17, Daniel was not terrified by the contents of the vision, but by the approach of the heavenly being; and if, according to ver. 18, the words of the angel so increased his terror that he fell down confounded to the earth, and the angel had to raise him by touching him, yet it is not at the same time said that the words of the angel of the end-time had so confounded him, and that the subsequent fuller explanation was somewhat less overwhelming than the words, ver. 17, something lighter or more comforting. Even though the statement about the time of the end contributed to the increase of the terror, yet the contents of ver. 19 were not fitted to raise up the prophet, but the whole discourse of the angel was for Daniel so oppressive that, after hearing it, he was for some days sick, ver. 27. From Daniel's astonishment we are not to conclude that the angel in ver. 17 spoke of the absolute end of all things, and in ver. 19, on the contrary, of the end of the oppression of the people of Israel by Antiochus. By the words, u the vision relates to the appointed end-time," the angel wished only to point to the importance of his announcement, and to add emphasis to his call to the prophet to give heed.

Vers. 22-26. After the introductory words, we have now in these verses the explanation of the chief points of the vision.

Vers. 20-22 explain vers. 3-8. " The kings of Media and Persia " are the whole number of the Medo-Persian kings as they succeed each other, i.e. the Medo-Persian monarchy in the whole of its historical development. To ^S*»? the epithet "Py&n, hairy, shaggy, is added to characterize the animal as an he-goat. The king of Javan (Greece) is the founder and representative of the Macedo- Grecian world-kingdom, or rather the royalty of this kingdom, since the great horn of the ram is forthwith interpreted of Alexander the Great, the first king of this kingdom. The words rna&krn to rpflfifl (ver. 22) form an absolute subject-sentence, in which, however, njnfoyrfi is not to be taken efc/3aTiKtt?, it broke in pieces, so that... (Kran.); for " the statement of the principal passage may not appear here in the subordinate relative passage " (Hitzig); but to the statement beginning with the participle the further definition in the verb. fin. with 1 consec. is added, without the relative "JB^, as is frequently the case (cf. Ewald's Lehr. § 351), which we cannot give with so much brevity, but must express thus: " as concerning the horn, that it was broken in pieces, and then four stood up in its place, (this signifies) that four kingdoms shall arise from the people.'' *13D without the article does not signify from the people of Javan, for in this case the article would not have been omitted; nor does it signify from the heathen world, because a direct contrast to Israel does not lie before us; but indefinitely, from the territory of the people, or the world of the people, since the prophecy conceives of the whole world of the people (Volkerwelt) as united under the sceptre of the king of Javan. nyibyj is a revived archaism; cf. Gen. xxx. 38, 1 Sam. vi. 12; Ewald, § 191; Gesen. Gramm. § 47.^>-inm N7)? but not in his power, not armed with the strength of the first king, cf. ch. xi. 4

Vers. 23-26 give the interpretation of the vision of the little horn (vers. 9-12), with a more special definition of certain elements not made prominent in the vision. The horn signifies a king who will arise " in the last time of their kingdom." The suffix to ornate (of their kingdom) relates to the idea contained in HlwO (kings). O'V'J^n Dnnd. when the transgressors have made full, scil. the transgression or measure of the sins. The object wanting to onn is seen from the conception of the subject. D^JRPBHj the rebellions, are not the heathen, for 901 denotes the apostasy from God which is only said of the Israelites, but not of the heathen; and the word points back to V'w"£3 in ver. 12. The lung that rises up is Antiochus Epiphanes (cf. 1 Mace. i. 10 ff.) 0':5f?y, hard of countenance, i.e. impudent, unashamed in trampling down, without fear of God or man; cf. Dent, xxviii. 50. rriTn p3E>, understanding mysteries; here sensu malo, concealing his purpose behind ambiguous words, using dissimulation, forming an artifice, interpreted in ver. 25 by »1D"JD, cf. ch. xi. 21. The unfolding of these qualities is presented in vers. 24, 25; in ver. 24 of the EWBTJJ. By virtue of the audacity of his conduct his power will be strengthened, ttl33 fc&l, but not by his own might. The contrast here is not: by the power or permission of God (Ephr., Theodrt., Hiiv., Hitz., Kran.), reference being made to jnjn (was given) in ver. 12, and to rin (to give) in ver. 13. This contrast is foreign to the passage. The context much rather relates to the audacity and the cunning by which, more than by his power, Antiochus raised himself to might. The strengthening of the power is limited neither to his reaching the throne by the overthrow of other pretenders to it (Berth, and others), nor to the conquest of Palestine, but relates to the power which, according to the following statements, he developed as king against Israel, as well as against other kingdoms. riiK?D3 (wonderful works) is used adverbially, as in Job xxxvii. 5: in an astonishing, wonderful way, he will work destruction. But from this wTord it does not follow that the expression inbn vo\ is to be referred to the power of God, for it does not necessarily mean deeds or things supernaturally originating from God; and even though it had only this meaning, yet here they could not be thought of as deeds accomplished in God's strength, but only as deeds performed by demoniacal strength, because Nn&l (shall destroy) cannot be predicated of God in the sense determined by the context. This destructive work he shall direct against the mighty and against the people of the saints. D^Divy does not here signify many, numerous, many individual Israelites (v. Leng., Maur., Kliefoth), partly because in ver. 25 0^ stands for that, partly because of the OWp DV, by which we are to understand the people of Israel, not merely the insignificant and weak, or pious

(Kran.). Hence 0*»wy cannot mean the elders of Israel, much less merely foreign kings (Berth., Dereser), but the mighty generally, under which perhaps we are specially to think of heathen rulers.

In ver. 25 the cunning and craftiness of his action and demeanour are depicted. v35? sll (through his craft) is placed first. 73K>, sagacity, here sensu malo, cunning. On the ground of this cunning his deceit will be successful. HDip without the article means a all kinds of deceit which he designs " (Hitzig). On that account his heart is raised in haughtiness, so that not only does he destroy many unexpectedly, but also raises himself against God. In the Q^l (many) are comprehended " the mighty and the holy people " (ver. 24). n^n does not mean in deep peace, but in careless security, and thus unexpectedly. An historical proof of this is found in 1 Mace. i. 10. D''"]'?' *ti& (Prince of princes) corresponds with Q^lKH \pK (Lord of lords) in Ps. exxxvi. 3. It is God; cf. ver. 11. But the angel adds, " he shall be destroyed without hands," i.e. he shall be destroyed not by the hand of man, but by God.

In ver. 26 there follows, in conclusion, the confirmation of the truth of what is said of the duration of this oppression for the people of God. Because the time of it was not seen by Daniel, but was revealed to him in words, "MDW *\WK is here used in reference to that which was, or of which it was, said. But we need not connect this relative sentence with the genitive "i£3?tt I'ljjn (the evening and the morning), although this were admissible, but can make it depend on HfeOE (vision), since the word-revelation of the evenings and mornings forms an integral part of the " vision." ""lip'arn nnyn are to be taken collectively. The confirmation of the truth of this revelation does not betray the purpose to make the book falsely appear as if it were old (v. Leng., Hiteig); it much more is fitted to serve the purpose of strengthening the weakness of the faithful, and giving them consolation in the hour of trial. For in the statement of the duration of the afflictions lies not only the fact that they will come to an end, but at the same time also that this end is determined beforehand by God; cf. ch. xii. 7. In other places this confirmation serves only to meet doubts, arising from the weakness of the flesh, as to the realization of revelations of such weighty import; cf. ch. x. 1, xii. 1, Rev. xix. 9, xxi. 5, xxii. 6.

But Daniel must close the prophecy, because it extends into a long time. DHD is not equivalent to Drm, to seal up, but it means to stop, to conclude, to hide (cf. 2 Kings iii. 19, Ezek. xxviii. 3), but not in the sense of keeping secret, or because it would be incomprehensible for the nearest times; for to seal or to shut up has nothing in common with incomprehensibility, but is used in the sense of keeping. u A document is sealed up in the original text, and laid up in archives (shut up), that it may remain preserved for remote times, but not that it may remain secret, while copies of it remain in public use " (Kliefoth). The meaning of the command, then, is simply this: " Preserve the revelation, not because it is not yet to be understood, also not for the purpose of keeping it secret, but that it may remain preserved for distant times" (Kliefoth). The reason assigned for the command only agrees with this interpretation. D^SH CTpv (to many days) is not to be identified with r?."nP in ver. 17, but designates only a long time; and this indefinite expression is here used because it was not intended to give exactly again the termination according to vers. 17 and 19, but only to say that the time of the end was not near.

In ver. 27 the influence of this vision on Daniel is mentioned (cf. ch. vii. 2S). It so deeply agitated the prophet that he was sick certain clays, and not till after he had recovered from this sickness could he attend to the king's business. The contents of the vision remained fixed in his mind; the scene filled him with amazement, and no one understood it. Maurer, Hitzig, and Kranichfeld interpret?20 r-X / understood it not, supplying the pronoun of the first person from the connection. But even though the construction of the words should admit of this supplement, for which a valid proof is not adduced, yet it would be here unsuitable, and is derived merely from giving to EHD (ver. 26) the false interpretation of to conceal. If Daniel had been required to keep the prophecy secret according to the command in ver. 26, then the remark " no one understood it " would have been altogether superfluous. But if he was required only to preserve the prophecy, and it deeply moved him, then those around him must have had knowledge of it, and the amazement of Daniel would become the greater when not only he but all others failed to understand it. To refer P^5 fK only to Daniel is forbidden by the comparison with I^N K7) in ch. xii. 8. The fulfilment of this vision can alone lead to its full understanding.

In the first year of Darius the Median, Daniel, by a diligent study of the prophecies of Jeremiah as to the number of years during which Jerusalem must lie desolate (vers. 1, 2), was led to pour forth a penitential prayer, in which he acknowledges the justice of the divine chastisement which hung over Israel on account of their sins, and entreats the mercy of God in behalf of his people (vers. 3-19). In consequence of this prayer, the angel Gabriel (vers. 20-23) appeared, and announced to him that seventy weeks (vers. 24-27) must pass over his people and the holy city before the consummation of the kingdom of God.

Vers. 1 and 2 mention the occasion on which the penitential prayer (vers. 3-19) was offered, and the divine revelation following thereupon regarding the time and the course of the oppression of the people of God by the world-power till the completion of God's plan of salvation.

Regarding Darius, the son of Ahasverosch, of the race of the Medes, see under ch. vi. 1. In the word ^J?n the Hophal is to be noticed: rex constitutus, /actus est. It shows that Darius did not become king over the Chaldean kingdom by virtue of a hereditary right to it, nor that he gained the kingdom by means of conquest, but that he received it (?2\>, ch. vi. 1) from the conqueror of Babylon, Cyrus, the general of the army. The first year of the reign of Darius the Mede over the Chaldean kingdom is the year 538 B.C., since Babylon was taken by the Medes and Persians under Cyrus in the year 539-538 B.C. According to Ptolemy, Cyrus the Persian reigned nine years after Nabonadius. But the death of Cyrus, as is acknowledged, occurred in the year 529 B.C. From the nine years of the reign of Cyrus, according to our exposition (p. 198), two years are to be deducted for Darius the Mede, so that the reign of Cyrus by himself over the kingdom which he founded begins in the year 536, in which year the seventy years of the Babylonish exile of the Jews were completed; cf. the exposition under ch. i. 1 (p. QQ ff.) with the chronological survey in the Com. on the Books of the Kings (p. 140 ff.).

The statement as to the time, ver. 1, is again repeated in the beginning of ver. 2, on account of the relative sentence coming between, so as to connect that which follows with it. "We translate (in ver. 2), with Ilgstb., Maur., Hitzig, " I marked, or gave heed, in the Scriptures to the number of the years," so that i?D?p (num- be?') forms the object to ^3 (/ understood); cf. Prov. vil. 7. Neither the placing of B^"}BD3 (by books) first nor the Atnach under this word controvert this view; for the object is placed after "by books" because a further definition is annexed to it; and the separation of the object from the verb by the Atnach is justified by this consideration, that the passage contains two statements, viz. that Daniel studied the Scriptures, and that his study was directed to the number of the years, etc. ^I?1??, with the definite article, does not denote a collection of known sacred writings in which the writings of Jeremiah were included, so that, seeing the collection of the prophets cannot be thought of without the Pentateuch, by this word we are to understand (with Bleek, Gesenius, v. Leng., Hitzig) the recognised collection of the O. T. writings, the Law and the Prophets. For B'nDprij T^ fil/fi\Ldj is not synonymous with DUirorij al rypacpai, but denotes only writings in the plural, but does not say that these writings formed already a recognised collection; so that from this expression nothing can be concluded regarding the formation of the O. T. canon. As little can Dn^Da refer, with Hav.

and Kran., to the letter of Jeremiah to the exiles (Jer. xxix.), for this reason, that not in Jer. xxix., but in Jer. xxv. 11 f., the seventy years of the desolation of the land of Judah, and implic. of Jerusalem, are mentioned. The plur. B'nsp also can be understood of a single letter, only if the context demands or makes appropriate this narrower application of the word, as e.g. 2 Kings xix. 14. But here this is not the case, since Jeremiah in two separate prophecies speaks of the seventy years, and not in the letter of ch. xxix., but only in ch. xxv., has he spoken of the seventy years' desolation of the land. In E^SD? lies nothing further than that writings existed, among which were to be found the prophecies of Jeremiah; and the article, the writings, is used, because in the following passage something definite is said of these writings.

In these writings Daniel considered the number of the years of which Jeremiah had prophesied. "1B?K, as ch. viii. 26, with respect to which, relates not to &wny but to D"o$n "ispp (number of the years). It is no objection against this that the repetition of the words " seventy years " stands opposed to this connection (Klief.), for this repetition does not exist, since ">Sp£ does not declare the number of the years. With ri^fep (to fulfil) the contents of the word of Jehovah, as given by Jeremiah, are introduced. rfa*inp does not stand for the accusative: to cause to be complete the desolation of Jerusalem (Hitzig), but p signifies in respect of, with regard to. This expression does not lean on Jer. xxix. 10 (Kran.), but on Jer. xxv. 12 (u when seventy years are accomplished"). ni3"jn, properly, desolated places, ruins, here a desolated condition. Jerusalem did not certainly lie in ruins for seventy years; the word is not thus to be interpreted, but is chosen partly with regard to the existing state of Jerusalem, and partly with reference to the words of Jer. xxv. 9, 11. Yet the desolation began with the first taking of Jerusalem, and the deportation of Daniel and his companions and a part of the sacred vessels of the temple, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim1 (606 B.C.).

Consequently, in the first year of the reign of Darius the Mede over the kingdom of the Chaldeans the seventy years prophesied of by Jeremiah were now full, the period of the desolation of Jerusalem determined by God was almost expired. What was it that moved Daniel at this time to pour forth a penitential prayer in behalf of Jerusalem and the desolated sanctuary? Did he doubt the truth of the promise, that God, after seventy years of exile in Babylon, would visit His people and fulfil the good word He had spoken, that He would again bring back His people to Judea (Jer. xxix. 10)? Certainly not, since neither the matter of his prayer, nor the divine revelation which was vouchsafed to him in answer to his prayer, indicated any doubt on his part regarding the divine promise.

According to the opinion of Bleek and Ewald, it was Daniel's uncertainty regarding the termination of the seventy years which moved him to prayer. Bleek (Jahrbb. f. D. Theol. v. p. 71) thus expresses himself on the subject: u This prophecy of Jeremiah might be regarded as fulfilled in the overthrow of the Babylonian kingdom and the termination of the Exile, when the Jews obtained from Cyrus permission to return to their native land and to rebuild their city and temple, but yet not perfectly, so far as with the hope of the return of the people from exile there was united the ex-

1 Thus also the seventy years of the Exile are reckoned in 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21-23, Ezra i. 1 ff. This Ewald also recognises (Proph. iii. p. 430), but thinks that it is not an exact reckoning of the times, but rather, according to Zech. i. 12 and Dan. ix. 25, that the destruction of Jerusalem forms the date of the commencement of the desolation and of the seventy years. But Dan. ix. 25 contains no expression, or even intimation, regarding the commencement of the Exile; and in the words of Zech. i. 12, "against which Thou hast had indignation these threescore and ten years," there does not lie the idea that the seventy years prophesied of by Jeremiah came to an end in the second year of Darius Hystaspes. See under this passage.

pcctation that they would then turn in truth to their God, and that Jehovah would fulfil all His good promises to them to make them partakers of the Messianic redemption (cf. Jer. xxix. 10 ff., also other prophecies of Jeremiah and of other prophets regarding the return of the people from exile, such as Isa. xl. ff.); but this result was not connected in such extent and fulness with the return of the people and the restoration of the state." On the supposition of the absolute inspiration of the prophets, it appeared therefore appropriate " to regard Jeremiah's prophecy of the seventy years, after the expiry of which God will fulfil His good promises to His people, as stretching out into a later period beyond that to which the seventy years would extend, and on that account to inquire how it was to be properly interpreted." Ewald (Proph. iii. p. 421 ff.) is of opinion that these seventy years of Jeremiah did not pass by without the fulfilment of his prophecy, that the ruins of Jerusalem would not continue for ever. Already forty-nine years after its destruction a new city of Jerusalem took the place of the old as the centre of the congregation of the true religion, but the stronger hopes regarding the Messianic consummation which connected itself herewith were neither then, nor in all the long times following, down to that moment in which our author (in the age of the Maccabees) lived and wrote, ever fulfilled. Then the faithful were everywhere again exposed to the severest sufferings, such as they had not experienced since the old days of the destruction of Jerusalem. Therefore the anxious question as to the duration of such persecution and the actual beginning of the Messianic time, which Daniel, on the ground of the mysterious intimation in ch. vii. 12, 25 and viii. 13 ff., regarding the period of the sufferings of the time of the end, sought here to solve, is agitated anew; for he shows how the number of the seventy years of Jeremiah, which had long ago become sacred, yet accorded with these late times without losing its original truth. Thus Ewald argues.

These two critics in their reasoning proceed on the dogmatic ground, which they regard as firmly established, that the book of Daniel is a product of the age of the Maccabees. All who oppose the genuineness of this book agree with them in the view that this chapter contains an attempt, clothed in the form of a divine revelation communicated to the prophet in answer to his prayer, to solve the mystery how Jeremiah's prophecy of the beginning of the Messianic salvation after the seventy years of exile is to be harmonized with the fact that this salvation, centuries after the fall of the Babylonish kingdom and the return of the Jews from the Babylonish exile, had not yet come, but that instead of it, under Antiochus Epiphanes, a time of the severest oppression had come. How does this opinion stand related to the matter of this chapter, leaving out of view all other grounds for the genuineness of the book of Daniel? Does the prayer of Daniel, or the divine revelation communicated to him by means of Gabriel regarding the seventy weeks, contain elements which attest its correctness or probability?

The prayer of Daniel goes forth in the earnest entreaty that the Lord would turn away His anger from the city Jerusalem and His holy mountain, and cause His face to shine on the desolation and on the city that was called by His name (vers. 15-18). If this prayer is connected with the statement in ver. 2, that Daniel was moved thereto by the consideration of the words of Jeremiah regarding the desolation of Jerusalem, we can understand by the ruins, for the removal of which Daniel prayed, only the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple which was brought about by the Chaldeans. Consequently the prayer indicates that the desolation of Jerusalem predicted by Jeremiah and accomplished by Nebuchadnezzar still continued, and that the city and the temple had not yet been rebuilt. This, therefore, must have been in the time of the Exile, and not in the time of Antiochus, who, it is true, desolated the sanctuary by putting an end to the wrorship of Jehovah and establishing the worship of idols, but did not lay in ruins either the temple or the city.

In his message (vers. 24-27) the angel speaks only of the going forth of the word to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, and presents the going forth of this word as the beginning of the seventy weeks of Daniel determined upon the people and the holy city within which Jerusalem must be built, and thus distinguishes the seventy weeks as distinctly as possible from Jeremiah's seventy years during which Jerusalem and Judah should lie desolate. Thus is set aside the opinion that the author of this chapter sought to interpret the seventy years of Jeremiah by the seventy weeks; and it shows itself to be only the pure product of the dogmatic supposition, that this book does not contain prophecies of the prophet Daniel living in the time of the Exile, but only apocalyptic dreams of a Maccabean Jew.1

1 The supposition that the seventy weeks, ver. 24, are an interpretation of the seventy years of Jeremiah, is the basis on which Hitzig rests the assertion that the passage does not well adjust itself to the standpoint of the pretended

Moreover, it is certainly true that in the Exile the expectation that the perfection and glory of the kingdom of God by the Messiah would appear along with the liberation of the Jews from Babylon was founded on the predictions of the earlier prophets, but that Daniel shared this expectation the book presents no trace whatever. Jeremiah also, neither in ch. xxv. nor in ch. xxix., where he speaks of the seventy years of the domination of Babylon, announces that the Messianic salvation would begin immediately with the downfall of the Babylonian kingdom. In ch. xxv. he treats only of the judgment, first over Judah, and then over Babylon and all the kingdoms around; and in ch. xxix. he speaks, it is true, of the fulfilling of the good word of the return of the Jews to their fatherland when seventy years shall be fulfilled for Babylon (ver. 10), and of the counsel of Jehovah, which is formed not for the destruction but for the salvation of Plis people, of the restoration of the gracious relation between Jehovah and His people, and the gathering together and the bringing back of the prisoners from among all nations whither they had been scattered (vers. 11-14), but he says not a word to lead to the idea that all this would take place immediately after these seventy years.

Now if Daniel, in the first year of Darius the Mede, Le, in the sixty-ninth year of the Exile, prayed thus earnestly for the restoration of Jerusalem and the sanctuary, he must have been led to do so from a contemplation of the then existing state of things. The political aspect of the world-kingdom could scarcely have furnished to him such a motive. The circumstance that Darius did not immediately after the fall of Babylon grant permission to the Jews to return to their fatherland and rebuild Jerusalem and the temple, could not make him doubt the certainty of the fulfilment of the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah regarding the duration of

Daniel, but is in harmony with the time of the Maccabees. The other arguments which Hitzig and others bring forth against this chapter as the production of Daniel, consist partly in vain historical or dogmatic assertions, such as that there are doubts regarding the existence of Darius of Media, — partly in misinterpretations, such as that Daniel wholly distinguishes himself, vers. 6, 10, from the prophets, and presents himself as a reader of their writings (Hitz.), — opinions which are no better founded than the conclusions of Berth., v. Leng., and Staeh., drawn from the mention of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, ver. 7, and of the holy city, ver. 24, that Jerusalem was then still inhabited and the temple still standing. To this it is added, that the prayer of Daniel is an imitation of the prayers of Ezra ix. and Neh. ix., or, as Ewald thinks, an extract from the prayer of Baruch (Bar. ch. i. and ii.).

the Exile, since the prophecy of Isaiah, ch. xliv. 28, that Coresch (Cyrus) should build Jerusalem and lay the foundation of the temple was beyond question known to him, and Darius had in a certain sense reached the sovereignty over the Chaldean kingdom, and was of such an age (ch. vi. 1) that now his reign must be near its end, and Cyrus would soon mount his throne as his successor. That which moved Daniel to prayer was rather the religious condition of his own people, among whom the chastisement of the Exile had not produced the expected fruits of repentance; so that, though he did not doubt regarding the speedy liberation of his people from Babylonish exile, he might still hope for the early fulfilment of the deliverance prophesied of after the destruction of Babylon and the return of the Jews to Canaan. This appears from the contents of the prayer. From the beginning to the close it is pervaded by sorrow on account of the great sinfulness of the people, among whom also there were no signs of repentance. The prayer for the turning away of the divine wrath Daniel grounds solely on the mercy of God, and upon that which the Lord had already done for His people by virtue of His covenant faithfulness, the flipIV (righteousness) of the Lord, not the " righteousness" of the people. This confession of sin, and this entreaty for mercy, show that the people, as a whole, were not yet in that spiritual condition in which they might expect the fulfilment of that promise of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah (ch. xxix. 12 ff.): " Ye shall seek me and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart; and I will be found of you, and will turn away your captivity," etc.

With this view of the contents of the prayer corresponds the divine answer which Gabriel brings to the prophet, the substance of which is to this effect, that till the accomplishment of God's plan of salvation in behalf of His people, yet seventy weeks are appointed, and that during this time great and severe tribulations would fall upon the people and the city.

This prayer has been judged very severely by modern critics. According to Berth., v. Leng., Hitzig, Staeh., and Ewald, its matter and its whole design are constructed according to older patterns, in particular according to the prayers of Neh. ix. and Ezra ix., since ver. 4 is borrowed from Neh. i. 5, ix. 32; ver. 8 from Neh. ix. 34; ver. 14 from Neh. ix. 33; ver. 15 from Neh. i. 10, ix. 10; and, finally, vers. 7 and 8 from Ezra ix. 7. Bat if we consider this dependence more closely, we shall, it is true, find the expression D^Qn nt?3 {confusion of faces, vers. 7 and 8) in Ezra ix. 7, but we also find it in 2 Chron. xxxii. 21, Jer. vii. 19, and also in Ps. xliv. 16; ninpp (forgivenesses, ver. 9) we find in Neh. ix. 17, but also in Ps. cxxx. 4; and pV "H^ (is poured upon, spoken of the anger of God, ver. 11) is found not only in 2 Chron. xii. 7, xxxiv. 21, 25, but also Jer. xlii. 18, xliv. 6, and Nah. i. 6. We have only to examine the other parallel common thoughts and words adduced in order at once to perceive that, without exception, they all have their roots in the Pentateuch, and afford not the slightest proof of the dependence of this chapter on Neh. ix.