Daniel 5:18-23

5:18 As for you, O king, the most high God bestowed on your father Nebuchadnezzar a kingdom, greatness, honor, and majesty. ¹  5:19 Due to the greatness that he bestowed on him, all peoples, nations, and language groups were trembling with fear ²  before him. He killed whom he wished, he spared ³  whom he wished, he exalted whom he wished, and he brought low whom he wished. 5:20 And when his mind ⁴  became arrogant ⁵  and his spirit filled with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne and his honor was removed from him. 5:21 He was driven from human society, his mind ⁶  was changed to that of an animal, he lived ⁷  with the wild donkeys, he was fed grass like oxen, and his body became damp with the dew of the sky, until he came to understand that the most high God rules over human kingdoms, and he appoints over them whomever he wishes.

5:22 “But you, his son ⁸  Belshazzar, have not humbled yourself, ⁹  although you knew all this. 5:23 Instead, you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven. You brought before you the vessels from his temple, and you and your nobles, together with your wives and concubines, drank wine from them. You praised the gods of silver, gold, bronze, iron, wood, and stone – gods ¹⁰  that cannot see or hear or comprehend! But you have not glorified the God who has in his control ¹¹  your very breath and all your ways!

Genesis 11:4

11:4 Then they said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens ¹²  so that ¹³  we may make a name for ourselves. Otherwise ¹⁴  we will be scattered ¹⁵  across the face of the entire earth.”

Genesis 28:12

28:12 and had a dream. ¹⁶  He saw ¹⁷  a stairway ¹⁸  erected on the earth with its top reaching to the heavens. The angels of God were going up and coming down it

Genesis 28:2

28:2 Leave immediately ¹⁹  for Paddan Aram! Go to the house of Bethuel, your mother’s father, and find yourself a wife there, among the daughters of Laban, your mother’s brother.

Genesis 28:9

28:9 So Esau went to Ishmael and married ²⁰  Mahalath, the sister of Nebaioth and daughter of Abraham’s son Ishmael, along with the wives he already had.

Psalms 36:5

36:5 O Lord, your loyal love reaches to the sky; ²¹ 

your faithfulness to the clouds. ²² 

Psalms 108:4

108:4 For your loyal love extends beyond the sky, ²³ 

and your faithfulness reaches the clouds.

Jeremiah 27:6-8

27:6 I have at this time placed all these nations of yours under the power ²⁴  of my servant, ²⁵  King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I have even made all the wild animals subject to him. ²⁶  27:7 All nations must serve him and his son and grandson ²⁷  until the time comes for his own nation to fall. ²⁸  Then many nations and great kings will in turn subjugate Babylon. ²⁹  27:8 But suppose a nation or a kingdom will not be subject to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. Suppose it will not submit to the yoke of servitude to ³⁰  him. I, the Lord, affirm that ³¹  I will punish that nation. I will use the king of Babylon to punish it ³²  with war, ³³  starvation, and disease until I have destroyed it. ³⁴ 

Revelation 18:5

18:5 because her sins have piled ³⁵  up all the way to heaven ³⁶  and God has remembered ³⁷  her crimes. ³⁸ 

[5:18]  ¹ tn Or “royal greatness and majestic honor,” if the four terms are understood as a double hendiadys.

[5:19]  ² tn Aram “were trembling and fearing.” This can be treated as a hendiadys, “were trembling with fear.”

[5:19]  ³ tn Aram “let live.” This Aramaic form is the aphel participle of חַיָה(khayah, “to live”). Theodotion and the Vulgate mistakenly take the form to be from מְחָא (mÿkha’, “to smite”).

[5:20]  ⁴ tn Aram “heart.”

[5:20]  ⁵ sn The point of describing Nebuchadnezzar as arrogant is that he had usurped divine prerogatives, and because of his immense arrogance God had dealt decisively with him.

[5:21]  ⁶ tn Aram “heart.”

[5:21]  ⁷ tn Aram “his dwelling.”

[5:22]  ⁸ tn Or “descendant”; or “successor.”

[5:22]  ⁹ tn Aram “your heart.”

[5:23]  ¹⁰ tn Aram “which.”

[5:23]  ¹¹ tn Aram “in whose hand [are].”

[11:4]  ¹² tn A translation of “heavens” for שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) fits this context because the Babylonian ziggurats had temples at the top, suggesting they reached to the heavens, the dwelling place of the gods.

[11:4]  ¹³ tn The form וְנַעֲשֶׂה (vÿna’aseh, from the verb עשׂה, “do, make”) could be either the imperfect or the cohortative with a vav (ו) conjunction (“and let us make…”). Coming after the previous cohortative, this form expresses purpose.

[11:4]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew particle פֶּן (pen) expresses a negative purpose; it means “that we be not scattered.”

[11:4]  ¹⁵ sn The Hebrew verb פָּוָץ (pavats, translated “scatter”) is a key term in this passage. The focal point of the account is the dispersion (“scattering”) of the nations rather than the Tower of Babel. But the passage also forms a polemic against Babylon, the pride of the east and a cosmopolitan center with a huge ziggurat. To the Hebrews it was a monument to the judgment of God on pride.

[28:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and dreamed.”

[28:12]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and look.” The scene which Jacob witnessed is described in three clauses introduced with הִנֵּה (hinneh). In this way the narrator invites the reader to witness the scene through Jacob’s eyes. J. P. Fokkelman points out that the particle goes with a lifted arm and an open mouth: “There, a ladder! Oh, angels! and look, the Lord himself” (Narrative Art in Genesis [SSN], 51-52).

[28:12]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew noun סֻלָּם (sullam, “ladder, stairway”) occurs only here in the OT, but there appears to be an Akkadian cognate simmiltu (with metathesis of the second and third consonants and a feminine ending) which has a specialized meaning of “stairway, ramp.” See H. R. Cohen, Biblical Hapax Legomena (SBLDS), 34. For further discussion see C. Houtman, “What Did Jacob See in His Dream at Bethel? Some Remarks on Genesis 28:10-22,” VT 27 (1977): 337-52; J. G. Griffiths, “The Celestial Ladder and the Gate of Heaven,” ExpTim 76 (1964/65): 229-30; and A. R. Millard, “The Celestial Ladder and the Gate of Heaven,” ExpTim 78 (1966/67): 86-87.

[28:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Arise! Go!” The first of the two imperatives is adverbial and stresses the immediacy of the departure.

[28:9]  ²⁰ tn Heb “took for a wife.”

[36:5]  ²¹ tn Heb “[is] in the heavens.”

[36:5]  ²² sn The Lord’s loyal love/faithfulness is almost limitless. He is loyal and faithful to his creation and blesses mankind and the animal kingdom with physical life and sustenance (vv. 6-9).

[108:4]  ²³ tn Heb “for great upon the sky [or “heavens”] [is] your loyal love.”

[27:6]  ²⁴ tn Heb “have given…into the hand of.”

[27:6]  ²⁵ sn See the study note on 25:9 for the significance of the application of this term to Nebuchadnezzar.

[27:6]  ²⁶ tn Heb “I have given…to him to serve him.” The verb “give” in this syntactical situation is functioning like the Hiphil stem, i.e., as a causative. See Dan 1:9 for parallel usage. For the usage of “serve” meaning “be subject to” compare 2 Sam 22:44 and BDB 713 s.v. עָבַד 3.

[27:7]  ²⁷ sn This is a figure that emphasizes that they will serve for a long time but not for an unlimited duration. The kingdom of Babylon lasted a relatively short time by ancient standards. It lasted from 605 b.c. when Nebuchadnezzar defeated Necho at Carchemish until the fall of Babylon in 538 b.c. There were only four rulers. Nebuchadnezzar was succeeded by his son, Evil Merodach (cf. 52:31), and two other rulers who were not descended from him.

[27:7]  ²⁸ tn Heb “until the time of his land, even his, comes.” The independent pronoun is placed here for emphasis on the possessive pronoun. The word “time” is used by substitution for the things that are done in it (compare in the NT John 2:4; 7:30; 8:20 “his hour had not yet come”).

[27:7]  ²⁹ tn Heb “him.” This is a good example of the figure of substitution where the person is put for his descendants or the nation or subject he rules. (See Gen 28:13-14 for another good example and Acts 22:7 in the NT.)

[27:8]  ³⁰ tn Heb “put their necks in the yoke of.” See the study note on v. 2 for the figure.

[27:8]  ³¹ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[27:8]  ³² tn Heb “The nation and/or the kingdom which will not serve him, Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, and which will not put its neck in the yoke of the king of Babylon, by sword, starvation, and disease I will punish [or more literally, “visit upon”] that nation, oracle of the Lord.” The long complex Hebrew sentence has been broken up in conformity with contemporary English style and the figures interpreted for the sake of clarity. The particle אֵת, the sign of the accusative, before “which will not put…” is a little unusual here. For its use to introduce a new topic (here a second relative clause) see BDB 85 s.v. אֵת 3.α.

[27:8]  ³³ tn Heb “with/by the sword.”

[27:8]  ³⁴ tc The verb translated “destroy” (תָּמַם, tamam) is usually intransitive in the stem of the verb used here. It is found in a transitive sense elsewhere only in Ps 64:7. BDB 1070 s.v. תָּמַם 7 emends both texts. In this case they recommend תִּתִּי (titi): “until I give them into his hand.” That reading is suggested by the texts of the Syriac and Targumic translations (see BHS fn c). The Greek translation supports reading the verb “destroy” but treats it as though it were intransitive “until they are destroyed by his hand” (reading תֻּמָּם [tummam]). The MT here is accepted as the more difficult reading and support is seen in the transitive use of the verb in Ps 64:7.

[18:5]  ³⁵ tn On ἐκολλήθησαν (ekollhqhsan) BDAG 556 s.v. κολλάω 2.a.β states, “fig. cling to = come in close contact with (cp. Ps 21:16; 43:26 ἐκολλήθη εἰς γῆν ἡ γαστὴρ ἡμῶν. The act.=‘bring into contact’ PGM 5, 457 κολλήσας τ. λίθον τῷ ὠτίῳ) ἐκολλήθησαν αἱ ἁμαρτίαι ἄχρι τ. οὐρανοῦ the sins have touched the heaven = reached the sky (two exprs. are telescoped) Rv 18:5.”

[18:5]  ³⁶ tn Or “up to the sky” (the same Greek word means both “heaven” and “sky”).

[18:5]  ³⁷ tn That is, remembered her sins to execute judgment on them.

[18:5]  ³⁸ tn Or “her sins.”