Page 332 - Daniel

11:13–17 “For the king of the north shall again raise a multitude,
greater than the first. And after some years he shall come on with a
great army and abundant supplies. In those times many shall rise
against the king of the south, and the violent among your own people
shall lift themselves up in order to fulfill the vision, but they shall fail.

Then the king of the north shall come and throw up siegeworks and
take a well-fortified city. And the forces of the south shall not stand,
or even his best troops, for there shall be no strength to stand. But he
who comes against him shall do as he wills, and none shall stand
before him. And he shall stand in the glorious land, with destruction

in his hand. He shall set his face to come with the strength of his
whole kingdom, and he shall bring terms of an agreement and perform
them. He shall give him the daughter of women to destroy the
kingdom, but it shall not stand or be to his advantage.”

In 201 B.C., Antiochus managed to assemble another great army and
again began a series of attacks on Egypt, as described in verses 13–16.
The expression “the violent among your own people” (v. 14) refers to

persons who violated law and justice; hence, they were “robbers,” or
“men of violence” (RSV). As Zöckler says, “The oracle refers to the league
against Egypt, into which a large number of Jews entered with
Antiochus the Great, and to their participation in his warlike operations

against that country, e.g., in his attacks on the garrison which the
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Egyptian general Scopas had left in the citadel of Jerusalem.” Zöckler
further comments: “The theocratic writer sternly condemns this partial
revolt to the Syrians as a criminal course or as common robbery, because
of the many benefits conferred on the Jewish state by the earlier
Ptolemies.” 25

The reference “to fulfill the vision” is probably a prophecy of the
afflictions the Jews suffered under Antiochus Epiphanes, recorded in
Daniel 8. These troubles appropriately could be regarded as a

consequence of the retaliation of the Egyptians against Syria; encouraged
by the rising power of Rome that threatened Syria, Egypt fought back.
The Egyptian armies led by Scopas were defeated at Paneas, near the
headwaters of the Jordan River. Antiochus III subsequently forced
Scopas to surrender at Sidon, referred to as “a well-fortified city,” which