Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on Daniel 7:13
A historical reference excerpt for this verse.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.
The giving of the kingdom to the Son of Man. - The judgment does not come to an end with the destruction of the world-power in its various embodiments. That is only its first act, which is immediately followed by the second, the erection of the kingdom of God by the Son of man. This act is introduced by the repetition of the formula, I saw in the night-visions ( Dan 7:7 and Dan 7:2). (One) like a son of man came in the clouds of heaven. ענני עם, with the clouds, i.e., in connection with them, in or on them as the case may be, surrounded by clouds; cf. Rev 1:7, Mar 13:26, Mat 24:30; Mat 26:64. He who comes is not named, but is only described according to his appearance like a son of man, i.e., resembling a man (אנשׁ בּר as אדם בן = אנושׁ or אדם). That this was a man is not implied in these words, but only that he was like a man, and not like a beast or some other creature. Now, as the beasts signify not beasts but kingdoms, so that which appeared in the form of a man may signify something else than a human individuum. Following the example of Aben Ezra, Paulus, and Wegscheider, Hofmann (Schriftbew. ii. 1. 80, and 2, p. 582f.), Hitzig, Weisse, Volkmar, Fries (Jahrbb.f. D. Theol. iv. p. 261), Baxmann, and Herzfeld (Gesch. des V. Isr. ii. p. 381) interpret this appearance in the form of a man not of the Messiah, as the Jewish and Christian interpreters in general do, but of the people of Israel, and adduce in support of this view the fact that, in the explanation of the vision, Dan 7:27, cf. Dan 7:24, the kingdom, the dominion, and the power, which according to Dan 7:14 the son of man received, was given to the people of the saints of the Most High. But Dan 7:27 affords no valid support to this supposition, for the angel there gives forth his declaration regarding the everlasting kingdom of God, not in the form of an interpretation of Daniel's vision, as in the case of the four beasts in Dan 7:17 and Dan 7:23, but he only says that, after the destruction of the horn and its dominion, the kingdom and the power will be given to the people of the saints, because he had before ( Dan 7:26, cf. 22) spoken of the blasphemies of the horn against God, and of its war against the saints of the Most High. But the delivering of the kingdom to the people of God does not, according to the prophetic mode of contemplation, exclude the Messiah as its king, but much rather includes Him, inasmuch as Daniel, like the other prophets, knows nothing of a kingdom without a head, a Messianic kingdom without the King Messiah. But when Hofmann further remarks, that "somewhere it must be seen that by that appearance in the form of a man is meant not the holy congregation of Israel, but an individual, a fifth king, the Messiah," Auberlen and Kranichfeld have, with reference to this, shown that, according to Dan 7:21, the saints appear in their multiplicity engaged in war when the person who comes in the clouds becomes visible, and thus that the difference between the saints and that person is distinctly manifest. Hence it appears that the "coming with the clouds of heaven" can only be applied to the congregation of Israel, if we agree with Hofmann in the opinion that he who appeared was not carried by the clouds of heaven down to the earth, but from the earth up to heaven, in order that he might there receive the kingdom and the dominion. But this opinion is contradicted by all that the Scriptures teach regarding this matter. In this very chapter before us there is n…
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