Daniel 4:9-10

4:9 saying, “Belteshazzar, chief of the magicians, in whom I know there to be a spirit of the holy gods and whom no mystery baffles, consider ¹  my dream that I saw and set forth its interpretation! 4:10 Here are the visions of my mind ²  while I was on my bed.

While I was watching,

there was a tree in the middle of the land. ³ 

It was enormously tall. ⁴ 

[4:9]  ¹ tc The present translation assumes the reading חֲזִי (khazi, “consider”) rather than the MT חֶזְוֵי (khezvey, “visions”). The MT implies that the king required Daniel to disclose both the dream and its interpretation, as in chapter 2. But in the following verses Nebuchadnezzar recounts his dream, while Daniel presents only its interpretation.

[4:10]  ² tc The LXX lacks the first two words (Aram “the visions of my head”) of the Aramaic text.

[4:10]  ³ tn Instead of “in the middle of the land,” some English versions render this phrase “a tree at the center of the earth” (NRSV); NAB, CEV “of the world”; NLT “in the middle of the earth.” The Hebrew phrase can have either meaning.

[4:10]  ⁴ tn Aram “its height was great.”