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Monday, February 24, 2020

Daniel 10-11: angels and a vision of history

AT READING ACTS, Phil Long continues his blog series on the Book of Daniel.

Daniel 10 – Daniel’s Vision of a Great Angelic Being
I have some comments on chapter 10 here.

Daniel 11 and History
As Phil notes, chapter 11 is difficult to follow. It briefly deals with the Persian empire, mentioning only four of the eleven kings (v. 2). Then it refers obliquely to Alexander the Great (vv. 2-3) and the Diadochoi (v. 4). The rest of the chapter covers a span of Ptolemaic and Seleucid history without giving any actual names of the people. Indeed it gives them code names, some of which are repeated for different individuals.

In a number of PaleoJudaica posts on numismatic articles etc., I have gone through Daniel 11 and explained who many of the characters are.

For the figures in the Ptolemaic dynasty, see here, here, and here.

For the figures in the Seleucid dynasty, see here, here and here.

Phil notes correctly that the events in 11:40-45 are actual predictions, not predictions after the fact. We know that because the events in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes turned out differently. More on that here and here.

For notice of previous posts in Phil's series on Daniel, sometimes with my own comments, see here and follow the links.

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