Daniel 1:21

1:21 Now Daniel lived on until the first ¹  year of Cyrus the king.

Daniel 2:13

2:13 So a decree went out, and the wise men were about ²  to be executed. They also sought ³  Daniel and his friends so that they could be executed.

Daniel 4:28

4:28 Now all of this happened ⁴  to King Nebuchadnezzar.

Daniel 5:30

5:30 And in that very night Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, ⁵  was killed. ⁶ 

¹ sn The Persian king Cyrus’ first year in control of Babylon was 539 B.C. Daniel actually lived beyond the first year of Cyrus, as is clear from 10:1. The purpose of the statement in 1:21 is merely to say that Daniel’s life spanned the entire period of the neo-Babylonian empire. His life span also included the early years of the Persian control of Babylon. However, by that time his age was quite advanced; he probably died sometime in the 530’s B.C.

² tn The Aramaic participle is used here to express the imminent future.

³ tn The impersonal active plural (“they sought”) of the Aramaic verb could also be translated as an English passive: “Daniel and his friends were sought” (cf. NAB).

³ tn Aram “reached.”

⁴ tn Aram “king of the Chaldeans.”

⁵ sn The year was 539 B.C. At this time Daniel would have been approximately eighty-one years old. The relevant extra-biblical records describing the fall of Babylon include portions of Herodotus, Xenophon, Berossus (cited in Josephus), the Cyrus Cylinder, and the Babylonian Chronicle.