Page 14 - Daniel

Introduction

DATE AND AUTHORSHIP

he book of Daniel, according to its own testimony, is the record of
Tthe life and prophetic revelations given to Daniel, a captive Jew
carried off to Babylon after the first conquest of Jerusalem by

Nebuchadnezzar in 605 B.C. The record of events extends to the third year
of Cyrus, 536 B.C., and, accordingly, covers a span of about seventy years.

Daniel himself may well have lived on to about 530 B.C., and the book of
Daniel was probably completed in the last decade of his life.

Although Daniel did not speak of himself in the first person until
chapter 7, there is little question that the book presents Daniel as its
author. This is assumed in the latter portion of the book and mentioned
especially in 12:4. The use of the first person with the name Daniel is
found repeatedly in the last half of the book (7:2, 15, 28; 8:1, 15, 27;
9:2, 22; 10:2, 7, 11, 12; 12:5). Most expositors, whether liberal or

conservative, consider the book a unit, so Daniel’s claim to authorship is
recognized even by those who reject it. 1
Except for the attack of the pagan Porphyry (third century A.D.), no

question was raised concerning the traditional sixth-century B.C. date, the
authorship of Daniel the prophet, or the genuineness of the book, until
the rise of higher criticism in the seventeenth century, more than two
thousand years after the book was written. Important confirmation of

the historicity of Daniel himself is found in three passages in Ezekiel
(14:14, 20; 28:3), written after Daniel had assumed an important post in
2
the king’s court at Babylon. Convincing also to conservative scholars is
the reference to “the prophet Daniel” by Christ in the Olivet Discourse
(Matt. 24:15).

Higher critics normally question the traditional authorship and dates
of books in both the Old and New Testaments, and therefore disallow the
testimony of the book of Daniel itself, dispute the mention of Daniel by