Daniel 11 - New Catholic Bible (NCB)

Chapter 11

¹ “As for me, in the first year of Darius the Mede, I came forth to support and strengthen him.

Early Struggles between Seleucids and Ptolemies.^{[a] 2} “Now I shall tell you the truth about these things. Three more kings shall arise in Persia. Then a fourth will appear who will be far richer than all of them, and when he has enhanced his power through his wealth, he will mobilize the entire empire against the kingdom of Greece.^[b]

³ “Then a powerful king^[c] shall arise who will govern a vast empire and do whatever he pleases. ⁴ But as his power continues to increase, his kingdom will be broken up and parceled out to the four winds of heaven. However, it will not be inherited by his descendants, nor will it be ruled in the same fashion, for his kingdom will be uprooted and pass to others rather than to his descendants.

⁵ “The king of the south shall grow strong, but one of his princes shall grow even stronger and rule an empire greater than his. ⁶ After some years the two will enter into an alliance, and the daughter of the king of the south shall come to the king of the north. However, she will not be able to retain her power, and his offspring will not endure. She will be handed over, along with her attendants and her child and her husband.^[d]

⁷ “Later on, a descendant^[e] from her line will arise to take her place. He shall penetrate the defenses of the king of the north, enter his stronghold, and succeed in conquering them. ⁸ He will even carry away into Egypt, as spoils of war, their gods, with their molten images and precious vessels of silver and gold. For several years he will refrain from attacking the king of the north.

⁹ “After that, the latter will invade the kingdom of the king of the south, but then return to his own country. ¹⁰ However, his sons will prepare for war and assemble a great army that will sweep forth like a flood and advance as far as the enemy’s fortress.^[f]

¹¹ “The king of the south will then become enraged and set out to engage in battle with the king of the north. The latter will muster an immense army that will suffer a crushing defeat and be carried off.^{[g] 12} The heart of the king of the south shall be exalted, and he shall slaughter tens of thousands, but he shall not prevail.^{[h] 13} For the king of the north will once again raise another army, even larger than before, and finally, after some years, he will advance with a huge force and a great abundance of supplies.

¹⁴ “During those times many will take up arms against the king of the south. However, those among your own people who are lawless will rebel in fulfillment of the vision, but they will fail. ¹⁵ Then the king of the north will come and erect siege-works and capture the well-fortified city. The army of the south will not be able to withstand him, and not even the elite forces will be strong enough to resist.

¹⁶ “The invader will do as he pleases, and no one will be able to withstand him. He will establish a stronghold in the glorious land, and it shall fall completely into his power. ¹⁷ He will set his mind on conquering the entire kingdom and will make a treaty with the king of the south. Further, he will give him a daughter in marriage in order to overthrow the kingdom, but this will not succeed or be to his advantage.^[i]

¹⁸ “Next he will focus his attention on the coastlands and capture many of them, but a commander will put a stop to his outrageous conduct and turn his insolence back upon him.^{[j] 19} He shall then turn back to the strongholds of his own land, but he will stumble and fall, never to be seen again. ²⁰ His successor^[k] shall send forth a tax collector throughout the glorious kingdom, but within a short time this king will also be overthrown and meet his end, although not in anger or in battle.

²¹ Antiochus IV Epiphanes.“His place shall be taken by a despicable creature upon whom the royal insignia shall not be conferred. Rather, he will come forth without any warning and seize the kingdom through stealth and fraud. ²² A powerful army shall be completely routed and crushed by him. Both it and the prince of the covenant^[l] will be destroyed.

²³ “After he enters into an alliance, he will act deceitfully, and by treacherous means he will rise to power with only a few supporters. ²⁴ Without advance warning he will invade the most prosperous provinces and do what his fathers or his grandfathers had never done, lavishing plunder, spoil, and riches among them, yet all the while devising plans against their strongholds, but only for a time.

²⁵ “He shall arouse his strength and courage to lead a great army against the kingdom of the south. Meanwhile the king of the south will wage war with a much greater and more powerful army, but he will not succeed because of the plots devised against him. ²⁶ Even those who shared his food will seek to destroy him. His army will be swept away, and many will be slain in battle.^[m]

²⁷ “The two kings, their hearts bent on evil though seated at the same table, will exchange lies, but they will not succeed, because the end will not take place until the appointed time. ²⁸ Then the king of the north will return to his land with great riches, but his heart will be set against the holy covenant. He will devise his future plans and return to his own land.

²⁹ “At the appointed time he shall return again to the south, but this time the outcome will not be as it was before. ³⁰ For ships of the Kittim shall come against him, and he will lose heart and withdraw. As he retreats he will vent his fury and direct his energy against the holy covenant, and he will once again show his favor to those who forsake that holy covenant.

³¹ “Armed forces of his shall obey his command to desecrate the sanctuary, abolish the daily sacrifice, and install the abomination that causes desolation.^{[n] 32} He will seduce by his deceit those who break the covenant, but those people who are loyal to their God will stand firm and take action.

³³ “Wise leaders of the nation shall instruct many, although for a time they will fall by the sword and fire or suffer captivity and exile. ³⁴ When they fall, they will receive a little help, but many will have ulterior motives in offering support. ³⁵ Some of the wise leaders will stumble so that they may be tested, refined, and purified, until the end time, which is still appointed to come.

³⁶ “The king will do as he pleases, exalting himself and considering himself to be greater than any god. He will utter monstrous blasphemies against the God of gods, and he will prosper until the period of divine wrath is completed, for what has been determined must be fulfilled. ³⁷ He shall have no regard for the gods of his ancestors or for the god beloved by women^[o] or for any other god, for he shall consider himself greater than all.

³⁸ “Instead of these, he will honor the god of fortresses, a god unknown to his ancestors. This god he shall honor with gold and silver, precious stones and costly gifts. ³⁹ He will assign the people of a foreign god to defend the fortresses, and he will confer great honors on those whom he favors by appointing them as rulers over many people and distributing land to them as a reward.^[p]

⁴⁰ The End Time.^[q]“When the time comes for the end, the king of the south will prepare to attack the king of the north, but the latter will overwhelm him with chariots and cavalry and a large fleet. He will invade countries and sweep over them like a flood. ⁴¹ He will invade the beautiful land, and many countries will fall, but Edom and Moab and the leaders of the Ammonites will escape from his power.

⁴² “He will extend his power over many countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape. ⁴³ He will seize control of the treasures of gold and silver and all the riches of Egypt, and the Libyans and Ethiopians will be subject to him.

⁴⁴ “However, reports from the east and the north shall be a cause of alarm to him, and he will set out in great fury to bring ruin and total destruction to many. ⁴⁵ He will pitch the tents of the royal pavilion between the sea and the beautiful holy mountain. Yet he shall come to his end, with no one to help him.

Footnotes

1. Daniel 11:2 A clear passage gives the succession of kings from Cyrus to Antiochus IV Epiphanes. The historian can easily construct a detailed account. The author’s interest is mainly in the struggle, now overt, now covert, between the Lagids of Egypt, in the south, and the Seleucids of Syria, in the north, both of them being heirs to Alexander’s empire. Due to his excesses, Antiochus IV Epiphanes would come to be regarded as the Antichrist who opposes the reign of God.
2. Daniel 11:2 The three successors of Cyrus II (558–530 B.C.) were, in order: Cambyses (530–522 B.C.), Darius I (521–486 B.C.), and Xerxes I (485–465 B.C.). It was under Xerxes that the battles of Salamis and Thermopylae took place during the war against Greece. The greatest political and economic pressure, however, was exerted by Artaxerxes I (465–424 B.C.), who roused himself to hurl all the might of Persia against Greece; other kings would later continue to war against the Greeks.
3. Daniel 11:3 A powerful king: Alexander the Great.
4. Daniel 11:6 Antiochus II (261–246 B.C.) married Berenice, daughter of Ptolemy II.
5. Daniel 11:7 A descendant: Ptolemy III avenged his sister Berenice by conquering Antioch, the capital of Syria.
6. Daniel 11:10 Antiochus III the Great attacked Egypt.
7. Daniel 11:11 Beneath the fortress of Raphia, on the border between Egypt and Palestine, Antiochus was defeated by Ptolemy IV.
8. Daniel 11:12 Ptolemy conquered Palestine and Syria.
9. Daniel 11:17 Antiochus made a treaty with Ptolemy and married the latter’s daughter.
10. Daniel 11:18 After conquering some coastal cities, Antiochus suffered a great defeat by the Romans at Magnesia in 179 B.C.
11. Daniel 11:20 His successor: Heliodorus, sent by Seleucus IV, sacked the Jerusalem temple (see 2 Mac 3:7-13).
12. Daniel 11:22 The prince of the covenant was the high priest Onias III, who was deposed by Antiochus IV and then assassinated in 170 B.C.
13. Daniel 11:26 Antiochus attacked Egypt and captured Ptolemy VI.
14. Daniel 11:31 Abomination that causes desolation: see Dan 9:27; 12:11; this is the characterization of the altar to the pagan god Zeus Olympios set up in 168 B.C. by Antiochus IV Epiphanes, which prefigured a similar abomination that Jesus predicted would be erected (see Mt 24:15; Lk 21:10).
15. Daniel 11:37 The god beloved by women is the god Tammuz (see Dan 8:14).
16. Daniel 11:39 The reference is to Jupiter Capitolinus, whom Antiochus had come to know in Rome, where he had been taken after his defeat at Magnesia. He built a temple in honor of the god in Antioch.
17. Daniel 11:40 The martyrs and sages who resisted will be glorified even in their bodies. This is one of the great passages that, toward the end of the Old Testament, announce the resurrection of the flesh (see Isa 26:19; 2 Mac 7:9-14, 23-26; 12:43-45); the Book of Wisdom had highlighted mainly the immortality of the soul (Wis 2:23-24; 3:1-9).