Notes on the Aramaic Part of Daniel. 247 



of Egypt, to the Syrian king Antiochus II Theos, which took place in 

 the year 248 B.C. The ahiance, following the long war with Egypt, 

 promised a new era of prosperity for Syria and Asia Minor ; but the 

 hope was vain, for a terrible tragedy was the almost immediate result. 

 Laodice, the rejected first wife of Antiochus, poisoned the king in the 

 following year, and murdered Berenice and her child, together with their 

 retainers, a few months later. " The peace of Asia, so recently secured, 

 suddenly vanished. The Seleucid power had ceased to be a unit)^ " 

 (Bevan, House of Seleuctis, i, 180 f.). This, expressed in the imagery 

 of Dan. 2, was the falling to pieces of the clay in the feet of the great 

 statue.^ The later author, writing in chap. 7, at a time when Syria and 

 Palestine were held fast by the Seleucids, while the Ptolemies were 

 powerful rivals on even terms, could never have thought of the king- 

 doms of the Diadochi as a mixture of clay and iron. In his day, there 

 were no obvious conditions that could have suggested such a comparison. 

 But to one who lived and wrote soon after the ill-fated marriage alli- 

 ance above mentioned, the figure would have described the situation 

 exactly. Nor is there any other period, in the history of the Diadochi 

 as it is known to us, when this would have been true in like degree. 

 At that time, Asia Minor had been lost, and the provinces of the Eu- 

 phrates and Tigris as well. After the sinister end of Antiochus IT, his 

 two sons were soon arrayed against each other, so that even this element 

 of weakness was added to all the rest. In short, for nearly a whole 

 generation the Seleucid power was reduced to a miserable remnant, in 

 comparison with what it had once been, and with what it was very 

 soon to become once more under Antiochus III the Great. And during 

 just that time, as the most portentous fact of all, came the tremendous 

 onslaught of the Egyptian forces, by land and by sea. Almost simulta- 

 neously with the murder of Berenice, her brother, Ptolemy HI Euergetes, 

 the greatest conqueror among the Ptolemies, appeared before Antioch ; 

 and during the greater part of his reign, which extended from 247 to 

 222 B.C., the dynasty of Seleucus seemed likely to lose even its last 

 possession. Northern Syria. The shattering blows dealt by this Ptolemy, 

 in repeated campaigns, continued to be felt long after his day, not only 

 in Syria but also aU the way from Cilicia to Iran. He and his Egyp- 

 tian armies were the ' iron ' of the image described in Dan. 2, as 

 the Sclcticid poiver zoas the 'clay' "As the toes of the feet were 

 part of iron and part of cla}-, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and 

 partly broken " 2 : 42\ The use of these words in immediate connection 

 with the mention of the royal ivedding (vs. 43) makes the allusion as 

 plain as day and places it quite beyond the reach of doubt. As for 

 ' See also below, the note on 2:41. 



