14:13 You said to yourself, 1
“I will climb up to the sky.
Above the stars of El 2
I will set up my throne.
I will rule on the mountain of assembly
on the remote slopes of Zaphon. 3
“‘Your heart is proud 5 and you said, “I am a god; 6
I sit in the seat of gods, in the heart of the seas” –
yet you are a man and not a god,
though you think you are godlike. 7
28:6 “‘Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says:
Because you think you are godlike, 8
28:9 Will you still say, “I am a god,” before the one who kills you –
though you are a man and not a god –
when you are in the power of those who wound you?
7:8 “As I was contemplating the horns, another horn – a small one – came up between them, and three of the former horns were torn out by the roots to make room for it. 9 This horn had eyes resembling human eyes and a mouth speaking arrogant 10 things.
7:25 He will speak words against the Most High.
He will harass 11 the holy ones of the Most High continually.
His intention 12 will be to change times established by law. 13
They will be delivered into his hand
For a time, times, 14 and half a time.
8:9 From one of them came a small horn. 15 But it grew to be very big, toward the south and the east and toward the beautiful land. 16 8:10 It grew so big it reached the army 17 of heaven, and it brought about the fall of some of the army and some of the stars 18 to the ground, where it trampled them. 8:11 It also acted arrogantly against the Prince of the army, 19 from whom 20 the daily sacrifice was removed and whose sanctuary 21 was thrown down.
11:36 “Then the king 22 will do as he pleases. He will exalt and magnify himself above every deity and he will utter presumptuous things against the God of gods. He will succeed until the time of 23 wrath is completed, for what has been decreed must occur. 24
1 tn Heb “you, you said in your heart.”
2 sn In Canaanite mythology the stars of El were astral deities under the authority of the high god El.
3 sn Zaphon, the Canaanite version of Olympus, was the “mountain of assembly” where the gods met.
4 tn Or “ruler” (NIV, NCV).
5 tn Heb “lifted up.”
6 tn Or “I am divine.”
7 tn Heb “and you made your heart (mind) like the heart (mind) of gods.”
8 tn Heb “because of your making your heart like the heart of gods.”
9 tn Aram “were uprooted from before it.”
10 tn Aram “great.” So also in vv. 11, 20.
11 tn Aram “wear out” (so KJV, ASV, NRSV); NASB, NLT “wear down.” The word is a hapax legomenon in biblical Aramaic, but in biblical Hebrew it especially refers to wearing out such things as garments. Here it is translated “harass…continually.”
12 tn Aram “he will think.”
13 tn Aram “times and law.” The present translation is based on the understanding that the expression is a hendiadys.
14 sn Although the word times is vocalized in the MT as a plural, it probably should be regarded as a dual. The Masoretes may have been influenced here by the fact that in late Aramaic (and Syriac) the dual forms fall out of use. The meaning would thus be three and a half “times.”
15 sn This small horn is Antiochus IV Epiphanes, who controlled the Seleucid kingdom from ca. 175-164
16 sn The expression the beautiful land (Heb. הַצֶּבִי [hatsÿvi] = “the beauty”) is a cryptic reference to the land of Israel. Cf. 11:16, 41, where it is preceded by the word אֶרֶץ (’erets, “land”).
17 tn Traditionally, “host.” The term refers to God’s heavenly angelic assembly, which he sometimes leads into battle as an army.
18 sn In prescientific Israelite thinking the stars were associated with the angelic members of God’s heavenly assembly. See Judg 5:20; Job 38:7; Isa 40:26. In west Semitic mythology the stars were members of the high god’s divine assembly (see Isa 14:13).
19 sn The prince of the army may refer to God (cf. “whose sanctuary” later in the verse) or to the angel Michael (cf. 12:1).
20 tn Or perhaps “and by him,” referring to Antiochus rather than to God.
21 sn Here the sanctuary is a reference to the temple of God in Jerusalem.
22 sn The identity of this king is problematic. If vv. 36-45 continue the description of Antiochus Epiphanes, the account must be viewed as erroneous, since the details do not match what is known of Antiochus’ latter days. Most modern scholars take this view, concluding that this section was written just shortly before the death of Antiochus and that the writer erred on several key points as he tried to predict what would follow the events of his own day. Conservative scholars, however, usually understand the reference to shift at this point to an eschatological figure, viz., the Antichrist. The chronological gap that this would presuppose to be in the narrative is not necessarily a problem, since by all accounts there are many chronological gaps throughout the chapter, as the historical figures intended by such expressions as “king of the north” and “king of the south” repeatedly shift.
23 tn The words “the time of” are added in the translation for clarification.
24 tn Heb “has been done.” The Hebrew verb used here is the perfect of certitude, emphasizing the certainty of fulfillment.
25 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of the permission granted to the beast.
26 tn Grk “he” (or “it”); the referent (the beast) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
27 tc The reading “and his dwelling place” does not occur in codex C, but its omission is probably due to scribal oversight since the phrase has the same ending as the phrase before it, i.e., they both end in “his” (αὐτοῦ, autou). This is similar to the mistake this scribe made in 12:14 with the omission of the reading “and half a time” (καὶ ἥμισυ καιροῦ, kai {hmisu kairou).