Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Daniel · About this commentary
The Living God, Steadfast Forever
Daniel 6:24-28
24 The king commanded, and they brought those men who had accused Daniel, and they cast them into the den of lions—them, their children, and their wives; and the lions mauled them, and broke all their bones in pieces before they came to the bottom of the den. · WEB
The accusers fall into the pit they dug, and a Persian king publishes to the world a creed about a kingdom that will not be destroyed.
The king commanded, and they brought those men who had accused Daniel, and they cast them into the den of lions Daniel 6:24.
The unalterable law that could not spare the innocent has no difficulty reaching the guilty. The men who had engineered the decree are put where it put Daniel, and the lions mauled them, and broke all their bones in pieces before they came to the bottom of the den — which settles beyond argument what had been in the pit all night. The trap closing on its builders is a pattern Scripture states as a principle: the pit digger falls in, and Haman hangs on his own gallows Psalms 7:15 Proverbs 26:27 Esther 7:10. That their families died with them is Persian practice, reported and not commended; the text records what the empire did, and the empire's justice was never the book's model.
Then King Darius wrote to all the peoples, nations, and languages who dwell in all the earth: "Peace be multiplied to you" Daniel 6:25.
A second imperial circular, in the same form as the first Daniel 4:1 — the machinery of world government used twice in this book to publish the God of a captive people. Two empires, two kings, two decrees, both testifying.
I make a decree that in all the dominion of my kingdom men tremble and fear before the God of Daniel Daniel 6:26.
The old error survives in the new decree: reverence cannot be legislated, and a king commanding an empire to fear God is making the same category mistake his predecessor made when he threatened dismemberment for blasphemy Daniel 3:29. But the creed attached to it is extraordinary, and it comes from a Persian pen: for he is the living God, and steadfast forever. His kingdom is that which will not be destroyed. His dominion will be even to the end. Every clause is the language of the visions — a kingdom which will not be destroyed is the stone kingdom of the first dream Daniel 2:44 and the everlasting dominion of the vision Daniel had already received Daniel 7:14 Daniel 7:27. A monarch of the second empire announces the permanence of the fifth.
He delivers and rescues. He works signs and wonders in heaven and in earth, who has delivered Daniel from the power of the lions Daniel 6:27.
The general statement rests on the particular evidence: he delivers, who has delivered Daniel. Theology from a witness. And the reason this chapter stands where it does becomes visible here. The Aramaic section closes with a Gentile king confessing the indestructible kingdom, having opened with a Gentile king dreaming of a statue ground to chaff Daniel 2:35 — the six chapters addressed to the nations in the nations' own language end with the nations' own ruler stating the conclusion.
So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian Daniel 6:28.
He outlives the plot, the reign, and the empire that conquered the empire that took him Daniel 1:21. The narratives end here; from the next chapter the book belongs to the visions, and the man who has been shown surviving furnace-makers and lion-pit lawyers is the man who will be trusted with what history is for.
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