Daniel 5:1

Belshazzar the king made a great feast,.... This king was not the immediate successor of Nebuchadnezzar, but Evilmerodach, Jeremiah 52:31, who, according to Ptolemy's canon, reigned two years; then

Belshazzar the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand. Belshazzar.

DANIEL CHAPTER 5 Belshazzar’ s impious feast, . The hand-writing on the wall, which the magicians could not explain, troubleth him, . At the recommendation of the queen Daniel is brought in, . He reproveth the king of pride, profaneness, and idolatry, . He readeth and interpreteth the writing, . Belshazzar slain; the kingdom translated to the Medes, ,31. Belshazzar’ s name is from riches and power. They were wont, when they were promoted, to take new names, which also were significant, as this is, Belshazzar; Bel hath or gives power and riches; this they attributed to the honour of their idol, which belongs only to the God of heaven. There is much contest among the learned who this Belshazzar was; let us mind the Scripture, and not trust to heathen historians. In the second verse here he is called the son of Nebuchadnezzar, his father, so twice, and ,18,22; if he were his son, then was he called also Merodach, or Evil-merodach. Yet he might be called his son though his grandson; under these three was the captivity, , Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-merodach, and Belshazzar. Made a great feast, after the manner of the East, who showed their magnificence this way, and pleased the epicurean palates of his nobles herein, it being no small piece of policy with some princes to oblige their grandees by balls and compotations; this I believe: yet I conceive also, this feast was anniversary for the honour of their idol Bel, as Herodotus testifieth. But this is prodigious, that he should carouse when the city was besieged and ready to be taken by Darius the Mede, for, saith the text, he drank wine before the thousand. These Bacchanalian feasts have often proved fatal and tragical, Es 1.

Daniel 5:1 Belshazzar the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before the thousand.Ver. 1. Belshazzar the king.] Son to Evilmerodach, grandson to Nebuchadnezzar, whose line failed in this king, according to Jeremiah 27:7. Of Evilmerodach, Daniel saith nothing, because nothing remarkable happen in his time but what was before related. Made a great feast.] Of this feast, see Jeremiah 25:26; Herodot., lib. i.; Xenoph., lib. vii. It was made, say some, upon occasion of a yearly solemnity, which continued five days together, wherein the servants bare sway in every family, having a master of misrule over them. Cyrus took this opportunity, saith Xenophon, and made himself master of the city. Nota hic Baltasaris miram vecordiam, saith one; that is, take notice of Belshazzar’ s strange stupidity and security, that having such a formidable enemy before the city, he should thus revel and bezzle: but he did it perhaps to show his valour, and how little he cared for the Persians, who showed themselves soon after to be no contemptible persons. Certain it is that he minded nothing less at his feast than the deliverance of God’ s poor people, which now he was in working. Now were the seventy years exactly ended; now therefore was Israel to be dismissed, and it was done. The Rabbis have a tradition, that Belshazzar, seeing the seventy years spoken of by Jeremiah expired, and the Jews, by the coming on of another monarch, not delivered, kept this feast in contempt of that prophecy and people. To a thousand of his lords.] Who, it is like, were all drunk for company; what wonder, then, that a land so sick of drink spued them all out? Lords and lowlies were grown desperate drunkards, ripe for ruin. Here were a thousand princes, but not one faithful counsellor to better advise this festival king, as he is called, wholly given over to dissolute lusts. Who can tell whether it were not now with him as afterwards with Vitellius the Emperor, when his enemy was at hand, Vitellius trepidus, dein temulentus, to put away the fear of death, he made himself drunk? Lyra. Tacitus.

V. (1) Belshazzar.—On this king see Excursus C. As he was the son of Nabonidus, a space of about thirty years must have elapsed since the event recorded in the last chapter. The Babylonian empire survived the death of Nebuchadnezzar only twenty-five years. A thousand.—There is nothing unreasonable in the number of the guests; in fact, the LXX. have doubled the number. (See Esther 1:3-4.) Before the thousand.—The king appears to have had a special table reserved for himself apart from the guests. For this custom comp. Jeremiah 52:33.

CHAPTER V In the commencement of this chapter we are informed how Belshazzar, the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar, when rioting in his palace, and profaning the severed vessels of the temple, 1-4, was suddenly terrified with the appearance of the fingers of a man's hand, which wrote a few words on the wall before him, 5, 6. The wise men and astrologers were immediately called in to show the king the interpretation; but they could not so much as read the writing, because (as Houbigant and others have conjectured) though the words are in the Chaldee tongue, yet they were written in the Samaritan or ancient Hebrew characters, with which the wise men of Babylon were very probably unacquainted, as the Jews were at that time a despised people, and the knowledge of their language not a fashionable attainment, 7-9. Daniel, who had been so highly esteemed by Nebuchadnezzar for his superior wisdom, appears to have been altogether unknown to Belshazzar, till the queen (the same who had been the wife of Nebuchadnezzar according to the general opinion, or the queen consort according to others) had informed him, 10-12. Upon the queen's recommendation, Daniel is called in, 13-16; who boldly tells this despotic king, that as he had not benefited by the judgments inflicted on his grandfather, but gave himself up to pride and profanity, and had added to his other sins an utter contempt for the God of the Jews by drinking wine out of the sacred vessels of Jehovah in honour of his idols, 17-23; the Supreme Being, the Ruler of heaven and earth, had written his condemnation in three words, MENE, TEKEL, PERES, 24, 25; the first of which is repeated in the copies containing the Chaldean original; but all the ancient Versions, except the Syriac, are without this repetition. Daniel then gives the king and his lords the fearful import of the writing, viz., that the period allotted for the duration of the Chaldean empire was now completed, (see Jeremiah 25:12-14,) and that the kingdom was about to be transferred to the Medes and Persians, 26-28. However unwelcome such an interpretation must have been to Belshazzar, yet the monarch, overwhelmed with its clearness and certainty, commanded the prophet to be honoured, 29. And that very night the prediction was fulfilled, for the king was slain, 30, and the city taken by the Medes and Persians, 31. This great event was also predicted by Isaiah and Jeremiah; and the manner in which it was accomplished is recorded by Herodotus and Xenophon. NOTES ON CHAP. V. Verse 1. Belshazzar the king made a great feast] This chapter is out of its place, and should come in after the seventh and eighth. There are difficulties in the chronology. After the death of Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-merodach his son ascended the throne of Babylon. Having reigned about two years, he was slain by his brother-in-law, Neriglissar. He reigned four years, and was succeeded by his son Laborosoarchod, who reigned only nine months.

1. Belshazzar] Babyl. Bκl-shar-uṣ ?ur, ‘Bel, protect the king!’ LXX. Theod. and Vulg. confuse this name with Belteshazzar (Daniel 1:7), representing both by Βαλτασαρ, ‘Baltassar.’ to a thousand of his lords] in accordance with the magnificence of Eastern monarchs. and drank, &c.] and before the thousand was drinking wine. By ‘before’ is no doubt meant, facing the guests, at a separate table, on a raised dais at the end of the banqueting-hall. We have little or no information respecting the custom of the king at state-banquets in Babylon: but something similar is reported, or may be inferred, of royal banquets among the Persians (Athen. iv. 26, p. 145 c, ll. 1–3; cf. Rawl. Anc. Mon.4 iii. 215), and Parthians (Athen. iv. 38, p. 153 a–b).

Belshazzar the king - See Introduction to the chapter, Section II.

’S VIEW OF THE DOOM WRITTEN BY JEHOVAH AGAINST HIS KINGDOM, AND ITS .1. On Belshazzar see Introduction, III, 3, (4).