temporary of his own. The association with Noah and Job, and the nature of the allusion, imply rather that, in the mind of the prophet, the Daniel whom he referred to was some ancient patriarch, renowned in the traditions of Israel for his piety and wisdom, as Enoch, for instance, was on account of his 'walking' with God. The tradition respecting Job was utilized, as we know, by the author of the book which bears his name, for the purpose of teaching a great moral lesson; and it is at least possible, if this view of the 'Daniel' of Ezekiel be correct, that there are features in the narrative of the Book of Daniel, which owe their origin, or at all events their form, to traditions of piety and wisdom associated with the name of the ancient patriarch (cf. Davidson, Z.c.)1.

The Greek translations of Daniel (LXX. and Theodotion), and following them the Vulgate, and some of the other derived versions, contain, like the LXX. of Esther, several passages not in the original text, the longer of which are contained, in a separate form, in the Apocrypha of the English Bible, under the titles of The Song of the Three Holy Children, The History of Susanna, and The History of the Destruction of Bel and the Dragon. The first of these additions follows iii. 23 of the Aramaic text, and contains a confession and prayer represented as having been uttered by Azariah in the midst of the flames (vv. 25—45), and a doxology (vv. 52—56) leading on into the hymn known familiarly as the Benedicite (vv. 57-90), which has been used in the public services of the Church since the fourth century. The History of Susanna is found in MSS. of Theod. at the beginning of the book. Susanna was the wife of

1 'Daniel' is also the name of two other persons mentioned in the O. T.: (1) David's second son, I Ch. iii. 1 (called in 2 Sam. iii. 3, Chileab: the text in both places is uncertain; cf. the versions); (2) a priest of the line of Ithamar, who in 458 B.C. returned with Ezra to Judah, Ezr. viii. 2, Neh. x. 6. Among the contemporaries of the latter, it has been observed, there occur a Hananiah (Neh. x. 23), a Mishael (Neh. viii. 4), and an Azariah (Neh. x. 2); but the coincidence is probably accidental.

2 In the LXX., the Syriac translation of the LXX. (the SyroHexaplar), and the Vulg., it follows at the end of the book (as chap. xiii.), before Bel and the Dragon (chap. xiv.). Perhaps this was its

a wealthy Jew, named Joakim (Jehoiakim), resident in Babylon. Two elders, becoming enamoured of her, but finding their advances repelled, accused her falsely of adultery, declaring that she had been detected by them in the act. The tribunal before which she was arraigned, accepting without inquiry the testimony of the two elders, condemned her to death. She protested loudly her innocence; and God, it is said, in answer to her appeal, 'stirred up the spirit1' of a youth among the bystanders, named Daniel, who, as she was being led forth to execution, proclaimed aloud that he would be no partner in the wrong that was about to be perpetrated, and remonstrated with the people upon what they were permitting. Being invited to conduct the inquiry himself, Daniel examined the two pretended witnesses separately, and quickly proved their testimony to be self-contradictory. Thereupon, in accordance with the law of Deut. xix. 19, the punishment which they had designed against the innocent Susanna was put in force against themselves; and Daniel 'became great in the sight of the people from that day onwards.' It is this apocryphal incident in Daniel's life that gives its point to Shylock's famous line (Merch. of Venice, IV. 1. 223):—

A Daniel come to judgement! yea, a Daniel!

and to Gratiano's hardly less famous retort (ibid. 333):

A second Daniel, a Daniel, Jew!

and (ibid. 340):—

A Daniel, still say I, a second Daniel!

:

The narrative of Susanna is evidently designed to illustrate the truth that Providence watches over the innocent, and does not allow them to become the prey of the wicked. It is difficult not to connect the part taken in it by Daniel with the meaning

original place: the fact that it narrates an anecdote of Daniel's youth, might readily have led to its subsequent transference to the beginning of the book. (On the Greek versions of Dan., see further p. xcviii ff.)

1 So Theod. In LXX. an angel is mentioned, who gives Danicl a 'spirit of understanding.'

of the name (which is transparent in the Hebrew), 'God is my judge!

The History of Bel and the Dragon stands in Greek MSS. at the end of the Book of Daniel: in the LXX. it bears the curious title 'From the prophecy of Habakkuk, son of Joshua, of the tribe of Levi,' which would seem to imply that it was an extract from a pseudepigraphic writing, attributed to the prophet Habakkuk. Whether that be the case or not, the scene of the story is laid in Babylon, shortly after the accession of Cyrus1, with whom, it is said (v. 2), Daniel lived on familiar terms (ἦν συμβιωτὴς τοῦ βασιλέως), and was honoured by him above all his friends. The Babylonians had an idol called Bel (cf. on v. 1), before whom were placed daily large offerings of flour, sheep, and wine, which the god was supposed to consume during the night. Daniel, being asked by Cyrus why he did not worship this idol, answered that he could worship only the living God, and not idols made with hands. The king replied that Bel was a living god, pointing, in proof of his assertion, to the amount of food regularly consumed by him. Daniel thereupon undertook to prove the contrary. The food was placed, as usual, before Bel; but, before the door of the temple was finally locked, Daniel strewed the floor within with ashes. Next morning, when the door was opened, the food was, of course, found to be gone. The king was triumphant: but, upon Daniel's pointing out to him the marks of footsteps on the floor, he saw that he had been duped: the priests were discredited and put to death, and Daniel was allowed to overthrow the temple. There was also a dragon in Babylon, which was believed to be a god, and worshipped as such. Daniel, being challenged by Cyrus, gave it a food which caused it to die. The people, enraged with Daniel, terrified the king into delivering him into their hands, and he was cast into a lions' den. Whilst he was there, the prophet Habakkuk, while carrying food to his reapers, at his home in Judah, was taken up by a lock of his hair (cf. 1 So, at least, according to the text of Theodotion. V. I, which alone gives the name of the king, is not in the LXX.

Ezek. viii. 3), and transported by an angel to Babylon, to provide Daniel with a repast. Upon the seventh day the king proceeded to the den to bewail Daniel; but, finding him still alive, he confessed aloud the power of his God: and, like 'Darius the Mede' (Dan. vi. 24), delivered those who would have destroyed Daniel to the same fate1.

It is not possible to speak with certainty as to the date of these additions to Daniel; but they may be assigned without improbability to the first cent. B.C.2

Later Jewish writings contain various anecdotes relating to Daniel3; but they are destitute of historical value. Naturally, he is often referred to honourably on account of his wisdom, his opposition to idolatry, and his good deeds. It was sometimes said that he returned to Judah and died there: but in the Middle Ages there was a persistent tradition that he was buried in Susa3. An early Arab historian describes how what was supposed to be Daniel's body was discovered at Susa about 640 A.D., and buried by King Sangar's orders under the river. Benjamin of Tudela, who visited Susa about 1160, found there a community of 7000 Jews, with 14 synagogues, in front of one of which there was, he says, the tomb of Daniel: the bones of the prophet were, however, elsewhere; for, as they were supposed to bring prosperity with them, there had been a dispute between the two quarters of the town for the possession of them, which had been settled by King Sangar ordering them to be suspended in a glass coffin exactly above the middle of the river, where, he adds, they still were. What purports to be the tomb of Daniel is shewn to the present day, a little W. of the mounds which mark the site of the ancient acropolis of Susa (cf. on viii. 1), on the opposite side of the Shaour®.

1 For various allusions in Rabbinical literature to these two stories of Bel and the Dragon, see the extracts quoted by Mr Ball in the Speaker's Commentary on the Apocrypha, ii. 344 f.

2 Cf. Schürer, Realencyklop. für Prot. Theol.3 i. (1896), p. 640. See e.g. the Midrash on the Song of Songs, on iii. 4, v. 5, vii. 8, 9.

4 Cf. Farrar, p. 6 f.

5 See Loftus, Chaldaea and Susiana (1857), pp. 317-323. See the Frontispiece to the present volume.

The Book of Daniel is written in two languages, i. 1-ii. 4 a and viii.-xii. being in Hebrew, and ii. 46 (from 'O king')-vii. 26 being in Aramaic (cf. on ii. 4). It cannot be said that this change of language has been altogether satisfactorily explained. The principal explanations that have been offered are the following. (1) Diversity of origin, ii. 46-vi. being supposed (Meinhold) to be a narrative written in Aramaic c. 300 B.C., which was afterwards accommodated to the needs of the Maccabaean age by a writer living then, who prefixed i.—ii. 4 a as an introduction, and added chs. vii.—xii., with special regard to the persecutions of Antiochus. But, though the Aramaic sections of the Book of Ezra (iv. 8-vi. 18; vii. 12—26) are due no doubt to the fact that the compiler incorporated in his work extracts from a pre-existing Aramaic source, the supposition of dual authorship is not probable in the case of the Book of Daniel: not only are there links of subject-matter connecting together the Heb. and the Aram. portions, but i. 1-ii. 4 a forms an introduction without which the sequel (ii. 46 ff.) would not be intelligible; and ch. vii., relating as it does chiefly to Antiochus, ought by the hypothesis to be in Hebrew (which it is not). (2) That the book was written originally in Hebrew, but translated early into Aramaic: a portion of the Hebrew text was accidentally lost, and it was then replaced by the Aramaic translation (Lenormant, Bevan, Prince). This explanation does not account for the two facts (which can hardly both be accidental) that the Aramaic part begins in ch. ii. just where the Aramaic language is mentioned, and breaks off just at the end of a chapter. (3) The explanation which seems to be relatively the best is that of Behrmann and Kamphausen, who suppose that in ch. ii. 'the author introduced the "Chaldaeans" as speaking the language which he believed to be customary with them: afterwards he continues to use the same language on account of its greater convenience, both for himself and for his original readers, alike in the narrative portions, and in the following (seventh) chapter, which in many respects is a counterpart to ch. ii.; for the last three visions (chs. viii., ix., x.-xii.) a return to Hebrew was suggested by