[227] The manner in which the maintainers of the genuineness get over this difficulty is surely an instance of such special pleading as can convince no unbiassed inquirer. They conjecture (1) that Nebuchadrezzar had been associated with his father, and received the title of king before he really became king; (2) that by "came to Jerusalem and besieged it" is meant "set out towards Jerusalem, so that (ultimately) he besieged it"; (3) and that a vague and undated allusion in the Book of Chronicles, and a vague, unsupported, and evidently erroneous assertion in Berossus—quoted by Josephus, Antt., X. xi. 1; c. Ap., I. 19, who lived some two and a half centuries after these events, and who does not mention any siege of Jerusalem—can be so interpreted as to outweigh the fact that neither contemporary histories nor contemporary records know anything of this supposed deportation. Jeremiah (xxv. 1) says correctly that "the fourth year of Jehoiakim" was "the first year of Nebuchadrezzar"; and had Jerusalem been already captured and plundered, it is impossible that he should not have alluded to the fact in that chapter. An older subterfuge for "explaining" the error is that of Saadia the Gaon, Abn Ezra, Rashi, etc., who interpret "the third year of Jehoiakim" to mean "the third year after his rebellion from Nebuchadrezzar," which is not only impossible in itself, but also contradicts Dan. ii. 1.
[228] Shinar is an archaism, supposed by Schrader to be a corruption of Sumir, or Northern Chaldea (Keilinschr., p. 34); but see Hommel, Gesch. Bab. u. Assyr., 220; F. Delitzsch, Assyr. Gram., 115. The more common name in the exilic period was Babel (Jer. li. 9, etc.) or Eretz Kasdim (Ezek. xii. 13).
[229] On this god—Marduk or Maruduk (Jer. l. 2)—comp. 2 Chron. xxxvi. 7. See Schrader, K. A. T., pp. 273, 276; and Riehm, Handwörterb., ii. 982.
[230] This seems to be a Persian word, fratama, "first." It is only found in Esther. Josephus says that the four boys were connected with Zedekiah (Antt., X. x. 1). Comp. Jer. xli. 1.
[231] Dan. i. 3; LXX., Ἀβιεσδρί. The name is of quite uncertain derivation. Lenormant connects it with Abai-Istar, "astronomer of the goddess Istar" (La Divination, p. 182). Hitzig sees in this strange rendering Abiesdri the meaning "eunuch." A eunuch could have no son to help him, so that his father is his help ('ezer). Ephræm Syrus, in his Commentary, preserves both names (Schleusner, Thesaurus, s.v. Ἀβιέσερ). We find the name Ashkenaz in Gen. x. 3. Theodot. has Ἀσφανέζ. Among other guesses Lenormant makes Ashpenaz = Assa-ibni-zir. Dr. Joel (Notizen zum Buche Daniel, p. 17) says that since the Vulgate reads Abriesri, "ob nicht der Wort von rechts zu links gelesen müsste?"
[232] Called in i. 7-11 the Sar-hassarîsîm (comp. Jer. xxxix. 3; Gen. xxxvii. 36, marg.; 2 Kings xviii. 17; Esther ii. 3). This officer now bears the title of Gyzlar Agha.
[233] Isa. xxxix. 6, 7.
[234] Athen., Deipnos, xi. 583. See Bevan, p. 60; Max Müller in Pusey, p. 565. How Professor Fuller can urge the presence of these Persian words in proof of the genuineness of Daniel (Speaker's Commentary, p. 250) I cannot understand. For Daniel does not seem to have survived beyond the third year of the Persian dominion, and it is extremely difficult to suppose that all these Persian words, including titles of Nebuchadrezzar's officials, were already current among the Babylonians. On the other hand, Babylonian words seem to be rare, though Daniel is represented as living nearly the whole of a long life in Babylon. There is no validity in the argument that these words could not have been known in the days of the Maccabees, "for half of them are common in Syria, though the oldest extant Syriac writers are later by three centuries than the time of the Maccabees" (Bevan, p. 41).
[235] The name Daniel occurs among Ezra's contemporaries in Ezra viii. 2; Neh. x. 7, and the other names in Neh. viii. 4, x. 3, 24; 1 Esdras ix. 44.
[236] Balatsu-utsur. The name in this form had nothing to do with Bel, as the writer of Daniel seems to have supposed (Dan. iv. 5), nor yet with Beltis, the wife of Bel. See supra, p. 47. Comp. the names Nabusarutsur, Sinsarutsur, Assursarutsur. Also comp. Inscr. Semit., ii. 38, etc. Pseudo-Epiphanius says that Nebuchadrezzar meant Daniel to be co-heir with his son Belshazzar.