General introduction to the book of Daniel

Imagine that you are about fourteen years old.

One day, your country is invaded by a foreign army. You have to leave your family, your city and everything you know to go and live in one of the greatest cities of the world at that time: Babylon.

This is probably what happened to Daniel.

According to the chronology adopted in this study, Daniel would have been about fourteen years old when he was taken to Babylon, around 605 BC.

At that time, Babylon seems invincible.

Yet Daniel will live long enough to see this empire disappear, the one that seemed able to dominate the world.

The book then raises an essential question:

Who is really directing history?

Kings? Armies? Empires?

Or God?

Daniel does not arrive in Babylon as a tourist.

He is a deportee.

Along with other young men of Judah, he was taken far from Jerusalem to be trained for the service of King Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 1.3-6).

Everything changes around him.

He has to learn a new language, discover a new culture and receive a Babylonian education.

He is even given a new name.

Daniel becomes Belteshazzar. Hananiah becomes Shadrach, Mishael becomes Meshach and Azariah becomes Abednego (Daniel 1.6-7).

The Babylonians can change the place where Daniel lives.

They can change his education.

They can even change his name.

But they cannot decide for him what he believes.

Daniel chooses to remain faithful to God (Daniel 1.8).

This decision will change his whole story.

In Daniel's time, Babylon is an extraordinary power.

Its walls, its temples and its palaces impress those who discover the city. Nebuchadnezzar rules over an immense territory.

Everything might suggest that his empire will last forever.

But that will not be the case.

In 539 BC, Babylon falls to the Persians.

Daniel will thus have seen an empire dominate the world, and then disappear.

This idea becomes essential for understanding his prophecies.

In Daniel 2, for example, Nebuchadnezzar dreams of an immense statue made of different materials. This statue represents several kingdoms that will follow one another (Daniel 2.31-45).

They become powerful.

Then they disappear.

The message is simple:

no human empire is eternal — show definition INF038.

You may already know some stories from the book of Daniel without having read the whole book.

Three young men refuse to bow down before an immense statue and are thrown into a furnace (Daniel 3).

An extremely powerful king discovers that he is not, after all, master of everything (Daniel 4).

Another king holds a great feast when a mysterious hand appears and writes on a wall (Daniel 5).

Daniel keeps praying to God even though a law forbids it. He is arrested and thrown into a pit full of lions (Daniel 6).

These stories are spectacular, but they are not there merely to impress us.

They all raise a question:

What do you do when remaining faithful to God becomes difficult?

Daniel and his companions discover that it is sometimes necessary to stand alone against everyone.

From chapter 7 on, the book changes.

Daniel begins to tell of astonishing visions.

He sees strange animals, horns, wars and kingdoms that appear and then disappear.

At first glance, all this can seem complicated.

But there is an important key: the different visions complement one another.

Daniel 2 presents a great statue.

Daniel 7 shows four beasts.

Daniel 8 tells of the fight between a ram and a goat.

Daniel 9 contains the prophecy of the seventy weeks.

Daniel 10 to 12 present new conflicts and finally lead to the end times.

Imagine a puzzle.

The first vision gives you a few large pieces.

The following ones add others.

Gradually, the picture becomes clearer.

So there is no need to understand everything at once.

Even Daniel did not understand everything the first time!

This is one of the great questions raised by this book.

Some of Daniel's prophecies correspond very precisely to historical events that took place well after the time when Daniel is said to have lived.

How can this be explained?

Some scholars think the book took its final form much later, in the 2nd century BC. According to this interpretation, some events presented as future had already happened.

The interpretation followed in this study is different.

It holds that Daniel really lived in the 6th century BC and that God was able to reveal to him events that had not yet taken place.

This question is complex and deserves serious study. It will be explored further in the educational and academic versions.

For this Teen version, one thing is especially important: we will always try to distinguish what the Bible actually says from the interpretation we make of it.

This is probably the great question of the book.

Daniel sees extremely powerful kings pass before him.

Nebuchadnezzar can give orders to thousands of men.

He has an immense army.

He can decide to build a gigantic statue or even condemn someone to death.

Yet Daniel declares:

“He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings” (Daniel 2.21).

People can have enormous power.

But their power always has a limit.

Kings appear.

Empires grow.

Then they disappear.

God, for his part, remains.

Daniel was written several centuries before the birth of Jesus.

Yet certain passages will take on considerable importance for Christians.

Daniel sees in particular:

“one like a son of man” (Daniel 7.13).

He receives a dominion that will never pass away (Daniel 7.13-14).

Further on, Daniel 9 speaks of an anointed one, that is, a Messiah (Daniel 9.24-26).

Centuries later, Jesus himself will use the expression “Son of Man” and will refer directly to the prophet Daniel when he speaks about future events (Matthew 24.15).

Daniel thus builds a bridge between the Old Testament and the New Testament.

The book begins with a deported teenager.

But it ends with something much greater.

In the last chapter, Daniel receives this announcement:

"Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake" (Daniel 12.2).

In twelve chapters, then, we will travel an immense road:

Jerusalem → Babylon → the great empires → the Messiah → the end times → the resurrection.

That is why Daniel is not only the story of a young man who lived more than 2,500 years ago.

His book raises questions that go far beyond his time.

Daniel and his companions were probably not chosen at random.

Nebuchadnezzar asks that certain young men from important families of Judah be trained to serve in his administration (Daniel 1.3-5).

Training these young men in the language and culture of Babylon allowed the new empire to put their abilities to its service.

Daniel will therefore live at the very heart of the Babylonian system.

And yet, he will keep his identity and his faithfulness to God.

This is one of the great challenges of his story: living in a different culture without letting that culture entirely decide what he is to become.

Of course, you do not live in the Babylon of Nebuchadnezzar.

No one is asking you to learn cuneiform writing or to work in the palace of a Babylonian king!

But some of the questions Daniel faced remain very relevant.

What do you do when everyone around you thinks differently?

Can we respect people who do not share our convictions without giving up what we believe?

How should we react when following the group is much easier than saying no?

And how can we trust God when events seem incomprehensible?

Daniel does not give all the answers in the first chapter.

His story will precisely let us discover them gradually.

• Daniel is probably still a teenager when he is deported to Babylon.
• He discovers a new culture but chooses to remain faithful to God.
• The great empires seem invincible, but they end up disappearing.
• Daniel's visions work like the different pieces of a single puzzle.
• The book announces the Messiah and leads to the end times and the resurrection.
• The great question of the book is simple: who is really directing history?

This Teen version lets you discover the main ideas of the book of Daniel in a simple way.

The educational version goes further in explaining the text and its context.

The academic version offers a much more detailed study of the historical questions, the prophecies, the chronology and the various interpretations.