Daniel 9:16

9:16 O Lord, according to all your justice, ¹  please turn your raging anger ²  away from your city Jerusalem, your holy mountain. For due to our sins and the iniquities of our ancestors, Jerusalem and your people are mocked by all our neighbors.

Daniel 1:1

Daniel Finds Favor in Babylon

1:1 In the third ³  year of the reign of King Jehoiakim of Judah, King Nebuchadnezzar ⁴  of Babylon advanced against Jerusalem ⁵  and laid it under siege. ⁶ 

Daniel 9:2

9:2 in the first year of his reign ⁷  I, Daniel, came to understand from the sacred books ⁸  that, according to the word of the LORD ⁹  disclosed to the prophet Jeremiah, the years for the fulfilling of the desolation of Jerusalem ¹⁰  were seventy in number.

Daniel 9:7

9:7 “You are righteous, ¹¹  O Lord, but we are humiliated this day ¹²  – the people ¹³  of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all Israel, both near and far away in all the countries in which you have scattered them, because they have behaved unfaithfully toward you.

Daniel 9:25

9:25 So know and understand:

From the issuing of the command ¹⁴  to restore and rebuild

Jerusalem ¹⁵  until an anointed one, a prince arrives, ¹⁶ 

there will be a period of seven weeks ¹⁷  and sixty-two weeks.

It will again be built, ¹⁸  with plaza and moat,

but in distressful times.

Daniel 6:10

6:10 When Daniel realized ¹⁹  that a written decree had been issued, he entered his home, where the windows ²⁰  in his upper room opened toward Jerusalem. ²¹  Three ²²  times daily he was ²³  kneeling ²⁴  and offering prayers and thanks to his God just as he had been accustomed to do previously.

¹ tn Or “righteousness.”

² tn Heb “your anger and your rage.” The synonyms are joined here to emphasize the degree of God’s anger. This is best expressed in English by making one of the terms adjectival (cf. NLT “your furious anger”; CEV “terribly angry”).

³ sn The third year of the reign of Jehoiakim would be ca. 605 B.C. At this time Daniel would have been a teenager. The reference to Jehoiakim’s third year poses a serious crux interpretum, since elsewhere these events are linked to his fourth year (Jer 25:1; cf. 2 Kgs 24:1; 2 Chr 36:5-8). Apparently Daniel is following an accession year chronology, whereby the first partial year of a king’s reign was reckoned as the accession year rather than as the first year of his reign. Jeremiah, on the other hand, is following a nonaccession year chronology, whereby the accession year is reckoned as the first year of the king’s reign. In that case, the conflict is only superficial. Most modern scholars, however, have concluded that Daniel is historically inaccurate here.

⁴ sn King Nebuchadnezzar ruled Babylon from ca. 605-562 B.C.

⁵ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁶ sn This attack culminated in the first of three major deportations of Jews to Babylon. The second one occurred in 597 B.C. and included among many other Jewish captives the prophet Ezekiel. The third deportation occurred in 586 B.C., at which time the temple and the city of Jerusalem were thoroughly destroyed.

⁵ tc This phrase, repeated from v. 1, is absent in Theodotion.

⁶ tn The Hebrew text has “books”; the word “sacred” has been added in the translation to clarify that it is Scriptures that are referred to.

⁷ sn The tetragrammaton (the four Hebrew letters which constitute the divine Name, YHWH) appears eight times in this chapter, and nowhere else in the book of Daniel.

⁸ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁷ tn Heb “to you (belongs) righteousness.”

⁸ tn Heb “and to us (belongs) shame of face like this day.”

⁹ tn Heb “men.”

⁹ tn Or “decree” (NASB, NIV); or “word” (NAB, NRSV).

¹⁰ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹¹ tn The word “arrives” is added in the translation for clarification.

¹² tn Heb “sevens” (also later in this line and in v. 26).

¹³ tn Heb “it will return and be built.” The expression is a verbal hendiadys.

¹¹ tn Aram “knew.”

¹² sn In later rabbinic thought this verse was sometimes cited as a proof text for the notion that one should pray only in a house with windows. See b. Berakhot 34b.

¹³ map For the location of Jerusalem see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁴ sn This is apparently the only specific mention in the OT of prayer being regularly offered three times a day. The practice was probably not unique to Daniel, however.

¹⁵ tc Read with several medieval Hebrew MSS and printed editions הֲוָה (havah) rather than the MT הוּא (hu’).

¹⁶ tn Aram “kneeling on his knees” (so NASB).