Daniel 2:14

2:14 Then Daniel spoke with prudent counsel ¹  to Arioch, who was in charge of the king’s executioners and who had gone out to execute the wise men of Babylon.

Daniel 2:29

2:29 “As for you, O king, while you were in your bed your thoughts turned to future things. ²  The revealer of mysteries has made known to you what will take place.

Daniel 3:17

3:17 If ³  our God whom we are serving exists, ⁴  he is able to rescue us from the furnace of blazing fire, and he will rescue us, O king, from your power as well.

Daniel 5:10

5:10 Due to the noise ⁵  caused by the king and his nobles, the queen mother ⁶  then entered the banquet room. She ⁷  said, “O king, live forever! Don’t be alarmed! Don’t be shaken!

Daniel 5:15

5:15 Now the wise men and ⁸  astrologers were brought before me to read this writing and make known to me its interpretation. But they were unable to disclose the interpretation of the message.

Daniel 7:1

Daniel has a Vision of Four Animals Coming up from the Sea

7:1 In the first ⁹  year of King Belshazzar of Babylon, Daniel had ¹⁰  a dream filled with visions ¹¹  while he was lying on his bed. Then he wrote down the dream in summary fashion. ¹² 

Daniel 8:27

8:27 I, Daniel, was exhausted ¹³  and sick for days. Then I got up and again carried out the king’s business. But I was astonished at the vision, and there was no one to explain it.

Daniel 11:38

11:38 What he will honor is a god of fortresses – a god his fathers did not acknowledge he will honor with gold, silver, valuable stones, and treasured commodities.

[2:14]  ¹ tn Aram “returned prudence and counsel.” The expression is a hendiadys.

[2:29]  ² tn Aram “your thoughts upon your bed went up to what will be after this.”

[3:17]  ³ tc The ancient versions typically avoid the conditional element of v. 17.

[3:17]  ⁴ tn The Aramaic expression used here is very difficult to interpret. The question concerns the meaning and syntax of אִיתַי (’itay, “is” or “exist”). There are several possibilities. (1) Some interpreters take this word closely with the participle later in the verse יָכִל (yakhil, “able”), understanding the two words to form a periphrastic construction (“if our God is…able”; cf. H. Bauer and P. Leander, Grammatik des Biblisch-Aramäischen, 365, §111b). But the separation of the two elements from one another is not an argument in favor of this understanding. (2) Other interpreters take the first part of v. 17 to mean “If it is so, then our God will deliver us” (cf. KJV, ASV, RSV, NASB). However, the normal sense of ’itay is existence; on this point see F. Rosenthal, Grammar, 45, §95. The present translation maintains the sense of existence for the verb (“If our God…exists”), even though the statement is admittedly difficult to understand in this light. The statement may be an implicit reference back to Nebuchadnezzar’s comment in v. 15, which denies the existence of a god capable of delivering from the king’s power.

[5:10]  ⁵ tn Aram “words of the king.”

[5:10]  ⁶ tn Aram “the queen” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV). In the following discourse this woman is able to recall things about Daniel that go back to the days of Nebuchadnezzar, things that Belshazzar does not seem to recollect. It is likely that she was the wife not of Belshazzar but of Nabonidus or perhaps even Nebuchadnezzar. In that case, “queen” here means “queen mother” (cf. NCV “the king’s mother”).

[5:10]  ⁷ tn Aram “The queen.” The translation has used the pronoun “she” instead because repetition of the noun here would be redundant in terms of English style.

[5:15]  ⁸ tn The Aramaic text does not have “and.” The term “astrologers” is either an appositive for “wise men” (cf. KJV, NKJV, ASV, RSV, NRSV), or the construction is to be understood as asyndetic (so the translation above).

[7:1]  ⁹ sn The first year of Belshazzar’s reign would have been ca. 553 B.C. Daniel would have been approximately 67 years old at the time of this vision.

[7:1]  ¹⁰ tn Aram “saw.”

[7:1]  ¹¹ tn Aram “and visions of his head.” The Aramaic is difficult here. Some scholars add a verb thought to be missing (e.g., “the visions of his head [were alarming him]”), but there is no external evidence to support such a decision and the awkwardness of the text at this point may be original.

[7:1]  ¹² tn Aram “head of words.” The phrase is absent in Theodotion. Cf. NIV “the substance of his dream.”

[8:27]  ¹³ tn The Hebrew word here is נִהְיֵיתִי (nihyetiy). Its meaning is not entirely clear. Hebrew הָיָה (hayah) normally has meanings such as “to be” or “become.” Here, however, it describes Daniel’s emotional and physical response to the enigmatic vision that he has seen. It is parallel to the following verb, which refers to illness, and seems to refer to a state of utter exhaustion due to the amazing things that Daniel has just seen. The LXX lacks the word. On the meaning of the word see further, BDB 227-28 s.v. הָיָה Niph.2; DCH 2:540 s.v. היה I Ni.3.