THE FALL OF BABYLON AND DANIEL V, 30. 



25 



unexplained promise of Belshazzar that Daniel should rule as " one 

 of three " in the kingdom, was a touch that indicated the contem- 

 porary historian. 



It was absurd to cavil at the use of the word "father" for 

 " grandfather," as the Hebrews had no word for the last relation, 

 but freely used "father " instead. For instance, in ll Samuel ix, 7, 

 both Jonathan and Saul are called the " father " of Mephibosheth. 



Xenophon, alone among the Greek writers, mentioned the fact 

 recorded in the Annals that Gobryas, or Gubaru, was the chief 

 leader of the final attack upon Babylon in which the "king's son " 

 perished. Since he alone gave this name correctly, why should wo 

 suppose him to be romancing when he says that after the capture of 

 Babylon, Cyrus visited Ecbatana and there told Cyaxeres, King of 

 Media, that a house " had been chosen for him in Ba-bylon and a ruler's 

 palace, so that when he went thither he might come to this, as to his 

 own household " (Cyrop. viii, 5, 17). Josephus tells us that, before 

 Cyrus himself, his kinsman, Darius, King of Media, son of Astyages, 

 reigned for a while, and that he was " known to the Greeks by 

 another name " ; no doubt the name that Xenophon supplies — 

 Cyaxeres. He, therefore, and not Gobryas, a mere deputy of Cyrus, 

 was probably that "Darius the Mede " who " took the kingdom." 

 Darius the Mede is called " king " a score of times in Dan. vi, 

 and his final decree is quoted as made for " every dominion of his 

 kingdom," and intended to be read in " all languages." It was 

 noteworthy that in Dan. v and vi we read of " Medes and Persians " ; 

 but at a later period in Esther i, we find Persia set before Media 

 [Moreover a Greek scholiast tells us that the Persian gold coin, the 

 "daric," was so called after an earlier king than Darius Hystaspes, 

 and Lenormant points out that in Babylonian and Chaldean 

 contracts, Cyrus is designated only " king of the nations " in the 

 first and second years after the capture of the city, but thereafter 

 is called " King of Babylon " as well.]* 



In answer to Archdeacon Potter's objection that certain Greek 

 words occur in Daniel, these are confined to three, or at most four, 

 musical instruments bearing Greek names, and may well have been 

 imported from the great Greek cities on the coasts of Asia Minor. 



Added subsequent!}-. 



