Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on Daniel 10:12
A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.
Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
According to this verse, the words of Daniel, i.e., his prayer from the first day of his seeking to understand the future, and of his self-mortification in sorrow and fasting ( Dan 10:2, Dan 10:3), was heard of God, and the angel was immediately sent forth by God to convey to him revelations. And, he adds, בּדבריך בּאתי, I am come for thy words, i.e., in consequence of thy prayer, according to it. The בּאתי most interpreters understand of the coming to Daniel; Hofmann (Schriftbew. i. p. 331) and Kliefoth, on the contrary, understand it of the coming of the angel to Persia ( Dan 10:13). According to the matter, both views are correct, but in the form in which they are presented they are incorrect. Against the latter stands the adversative וin ושׂר (but the prince), Dan 10:13, by which the contents of Dan 10:13 are introduced; for, according to this, Dan 10:13 cannot represent the object of the coming. Against the former stands the fact, that the angel does not come to Daniel immediately, but only after having gained a victory over the prince of the kingdom. The בּאתי is again taken up in Dan 10:14, and must have here the same meaning that it has there. But in Dan 10:14 it is connected with להבינך, "I am come to bring thee understanding," in Dan 10:12 with בּדבריך, which only denotes that the "coming" corresponded to Daniel's prayer, but not that he came immediately to him. Daniel had, without doubt, prayed for the accomplishment of the salvation promised to his people, and eo ipso for the removal of all the hindrances that stood in the way of that accomplishment. The hearing of his prayer may be regarded, therefore, as containing in it not merely the fact that God directed an angel to convey to him disclosures regarding the future fortunes of his people, but also at the same time as implying that on the side of God steps were taken for the removal of these hindrances. The thirteenth verse speaks of this, not as denoting that the angel came to Persia for the purpose of working for Israel, but much rather as announcing the reason of the twenty-one days' delay in the coming of the angel to Daniel, in the form of a parenthetical clause. His coming to Daniel was hindered by this, that the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood him twenty-one days. The twenty-one days are those three weeks of Daniel's fasting and prayer, Dan 10:2. Hence we see that the coming of the angel had its reference to Daniel, for he came to bring him a comforting answer from God; but in order that he might be able to do this, he must first, according to Dan 10:13, enter into war with and overcome the spirit of the king of Persia, hostile to the people of God. The contents of Dan 10:13 are hence not to be understood as showing that the angel went to Persia in order that he might there arrange the cause of Israel with the king; the verse much rather speaks of a war in the kingdom of the supernatural spirits, which could not relate to the court of the king of Persia. The prince (שׂר) of the kingdom of Persia, briefly designated in Dan 10:21 "the prince of Persia," is not king Cyrus, or the collectivum of the kings of Persia, as Hv. and Kran., with Calvin and most of the Reformers, think, but the guardian spirit or the protecting genius of the Persian kingdom, as the Rabbis and most of the Christian interpreters have rightly acknowledged. For the angel that appeared to Daniel did not fight with the kings of Persia, but with a spiritual intelligence of a like nature,…
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